2 U.S. troops killed fighting Taliban in Afghanistan; civilians hit by airstrike —  KABUL — At least 26 Afghan civilians were killed and many others injured in airstrikes early Thursday while NATO and Afghan forces were battling Taliban fighters in northern Kunduz province, Afghan officials and witnesses said. Two American service members also died in ground clashes there, U.S. military officials confirmed. Details of the incidents were murky, with conflicting reports on the number of casualties and no official account of the airstrikes. Some local officials claimed that up to 100 civilians were killed or wounded in a series of airstrikes around Kunduz city. [NATO and government forces are increasingly responsible for Afghan civilian deaths] A portion of the strategic provincial capital was briefly overrun by insurgents last month, and Afghan troops assisted by U.S. forces have been trying to clear them from the area. The confusing and deadly drama recalled the tragic events in Kunduz just over a year ago, when the Taliban overran the city and Afghan and NATO forces were trying to beat them back. In the chaos, a U.S. airstrike mistakenly targeted an emergency hospital operated by Doctors Without Borders, killing 42 patients and staff members.  As of late Thursday, NATO officials had not confirmed or commented on the reported deaths of the civilians, who were said to be members of several families living in a neighborhood near the city. Photographs published on the Internet showed the bodies of small children crumpled on a blanket and being carried in a cart by weeping adults.  Angry relatives of the victims attempted to parade their bodies through the city to the provincial governor’s residence in a protest caravan, but they were stopped by security forces, Amruddin Wali, a member of the provincial council, said in a telephone interview.  A security official in Kunduz said an “operation against the opponents” resulted in the deaths of more than 20 civilians from “various families.” Ghulam Rabbani, another provincial council member, said 36 people were killed. Other officials said homes in various locations were destroyed by the strikes. [Kabul not spared Taliban strikes] U.S. military officials in Kabul confirmed that two U.S. service members were killed and two others wounded when they came under insurgent fire. “Despite today’s tragic event, we are steadfast in our commitment to help our Afghan partners defend their nation,” said Gen. John W. Nicholson, the senior U.S. military commander here, referring to the deaths of the U.S. troops.  Late Thursday afternoon, Brig. Gen. Charles Cleveland, the chief spokesman for Resolute Support, the U.S.-led NATO mission in Afghanistan, issued a statement that referred to airstrikes by “friendly forces” but did not confirm any civilian casualties. It said all information on that matter should come from Afghan officials. The NATO mission’s mandate is to assist, advise and train Afghan defense forces in their war against insurgents. Almost all foreign combat troops withdrew at the end of 2014, leaving Afghan troops facing an aggressive Taliban militia. “As part of an Afghan operation, friendly forces received direct fire and airstrikes were conducted to defend themselves,” Cleveland’s statement said. “We take all allegations of civilian casualties very seriously. As this was an Afghan operation, we’ll work with our partners to investigate but refer you to them for additional details in the near term. We’ll provide updates as we have them.” The senior Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman, Brig. Gen. Dawlat Waziri, said three Afghan special forces members were killed in fighting with the Taliban. He said he had no information on civilian deaths.  A spokesman for the Taliban, Zabiullah Mujahid, said three Taliban fighters were targeted by the Afghan and foreign forces and were then killed in a firefight in which Afghan and American troops also died. He said a large number of civilians also were killed. Pajhwok Afghan News quoted a farmer in Kunduz named Taza Gul as saying: “I was working on my farm when the bombardment started. On coming home, I saw seven members of my family, including women and children, killed in the raids.”  After the deadly 2015 airstrike in Kunduz, a U.S. military investigation led to the disciplining of 16 military members who were said to have made mistakes leading to the strike. Doctors Without Borders called the attack a war crime.

Troops killed in Afghanistan always angers because we should no longer be there in the first place. The fact that we are still there says a lot about us as a country. We need to realize that we have no business there anymore and get out. I don't know why we try to be the world police when it clearly does us no good in the long run.


The person is male. Racially, the person is hispanic / latino. The person is 32 years old. The person has a college or university degree. The person earns 35000 dollar per year. According to the Big Five personality test, on a scale of 10, the person has scored 5.0 in openness, 5.5 in conscientiousness, 2.0 in extraversion, 5.5 in agreeableness, and 4.5 in stability.

Justice For Disturbing Case Of Kitten Strangled To Death in Spokane, Washington —  Last month, a man named Wesley O’Dell and his wife, were walking around their neighborhood in Spokane, Washington and found something that changed their lives and opened their eyes to the cruelty that humanity can possess. *The real image of the kitten they found was too graphic and disturbing to display. The couple spotted a baby kitten on the side of the road completely wrapped in phone and electrical chargers and dumped like a piece of garbage on the sidewalk. When they approached the helpless kitten, they noticed that it was methodically wrapped so tightly around the kitten’s little body, from its tiny neck, to its small tail and back legs so that so that the poor things appendages were tied up next to its face. When O’Dell began to cut the cords off the the kittens small body, he felt that rigor mortis had already set in and it was hard for him to seperate the wires from its stiff figure. He also saw that the kitten’s jaw was ripped down, with a cord running through its mouth and around its neck. O’Dell was absolutely disgusted with this sight and is now determined to take action and find the culprit accountable for the horrendous crime. This act of cruelty is inhumane, disgusting and it is truly unthinkable that someone would do such a thing to a kitten who had barely even opened its eyes. The couple is now standing up and fighting for animal rights and animal welfare until justice and equality is received by all beings living on this earth. O’Dell is making a point to voice his story so that everyone is aware of the animal abuse that happened in Spokane, Washington and the lack of empathy that his local governing body has over the gruesome death of a helpless baby kitten. “Can you imagine how that would feel? What you would think, the fear in your heart, to be completely helpless at the hands of something much bigger and more poweful than you. Try to feel the pain and sadness this infant feline would have felt. Imagine what you would be thinking as the terror welled up in your swelling throat? The darkness that you would experience as you took your last breath, while someone laughed at you. Think how it would feel to be snuffed out in a cold dark street, scared and alone.” This act happened just two blocks from the couples home while their local police and animal shelters have done nothing about it. O’Dell says that this horrific situation must be remedied and he will try his hardest to ensure justice is served. Since this occurrence, O’Dell has spoken to people throughout the nation who would like to help, including the group “Gaurdians of the Rescue”. The rescue group has sent him flyers to be posted around his neighborhood as well as in local veterinarian hospitals and emergency pet clinics. He is hopeful that by distributing these flyers around town, someone will come forward with information on this crime and possibly who is at fault. O’Dell is asking for the public to repost this tragic story on social media and to talk about the kitten with friends and neighbors, not allowing for the kitten’s death to be in vein. Raising awareness of this story is one of the most important things we as animal lovers can do at this point.

How someone can have the cold heart to strangle a living thing let alone a baby kitten to death is beyond me.  Imagine the pain the poor thing felt? How can we let people that do these things continue to live amongst us. Surely there must be some justice for this? What a disturbing case if I've ever seen one.


Video Shows Cop Punching Woman In The Face, But She’s The One Arrested For ‘Assault’ —  A uniformed Arizona police officer who was filmed punching a woman has been placed on administrative leave while the incident is investigated.   “Our agency is very concerned by what is depicted in this video,” police in Flagstaff, Arizona, said in a Wednesday evening press release.   The footage, shot and posted to Facebook on Wednesday, shows a woman struggling with two officers who apparently believe there is an outstanding warrant for her arrest. She can be heard on video saying the issue has already been resolved.   “You cannot arrest me until I know I have a warrant,” she tells the officers as she struggles with them.   Suddenly, one of them strikes her in the face with a closed fist.   Authorities have identified that officer as Jeff Bonar. They haven’t released the name of the woman, but she identifies herself in the video as Marissa Morris. “You just fucking punched me in the face,” Morris can be heard yelling after Bonar hits her.   A number of people appear to be watching the scene from a porch. The man who filmed the confrontation — identified by The Arizona Republic as Danny Paredes — can be also heard shouting, “Hey, you can’t hit a girl like that.”   Bonar cuffs Morris and the two other officers lead her away and place her in the back of a patrol car while a man ― presumably Paredes ― can be heard saying, “I got it on video, Marissa.”   Morris’ boyfriend, Jimmy Sedillo, told The Arizona Republic he and his children, ages 3 and 9, witnessed the incident.   “She had a warrant a few weeks ago,” Sedillo said. “He still assumed she had a warrant.” Sedillo told Phoenix’s KTVK his girlfriend was ultimately charged with assaulting an officer and resisting arrest.Morris, who reportedly remains behind bars, could not be reached for comment.   “An internal affairs investigation is being initiated,” Flagstaff police said. “Further details will be released as the investigation progresses.”

I understand that there are more good cops than bad cops and overall cops are needed in society, but at what point do we start training these guys more than they are trained? Literally anybody can be a cop it seems and all these viral videos of cops hurting people are all too common. This is why a lot of the public is growing a huge distrust for cops.


The Jewish Struggle to Understand Trump's Election —  Synagogues hosted prayer and healing services on Wednesday for congregants grappling with the outcome of the U.S. presidential election. PHILADELPHIA—On November 8, 1938, Nazi paramilitary soldiers and German civilians looted and vandalized thousands of Jewish businesses and synagogues. Jews were murdered. Up to 30,000 Jewish men were arrested and taken to concentration camps. On November 8, 2016, Donald Trump was elected president of the United States. The next day, a man discovered that someone had painted swastikas on an abandoned storefront in South Philly, placing the symbols next to Trump’s name and the words “Sieg Heil,” a salute used by Nazis during World War II. Maybe it was an anti-Trump protester. Maybe it was an anti-Semite. Either way, it underscored the ways in which Trump’s election has evoked the persistent Jewish nightmare: That America will become like Germany in 1938. Jews, who have a keen eye for the repetition of history, might be forgiven for worrying about the fragility of American democracy. This is the scale of fear, grief, and anger about Trump in some Jewish communities across America. In Philadelphia, at least three synagogues held prayer services on Wednesday; congregations in a number of other cities, including Durham, North Carolina, and Washington, D.C., held similar events. “No matter who we voted for and how we are feeling this morning, we all know that we and our country are in desperate need of healing,” read the Facebook invite for an event at the Germantown Jewish Centre in north Philly. “We will sit together, sing together, pray together, and have a chance to share what is on our hearts with the support of the community.” A woman was crying when I walked into the cavernous sanctuary of GJC on Wednesday night. Roughly 100 people were gathered in a circle of chairs toward the front of the room; the cream ceiling and warmly brown furniture gave the space a living-room feel. In the center of the gathering, a single candle sat burning on a small round table. The space was still except for the occasional baby squeal or patter of toddler feet at the side of the room; people had brought their children because, as someone on Facebook observed, they need to heal, too. Trump’s daughter Ivanka came up—whether Jews would be safe because one of the president’s children is an Orthodox convert. The congregants were concerned about the racism and sexism revealed during the campaign, and discussed the stages of grief. They talked of making aliyah, or emigrating to Israel—not as a plausible possibility, but as a back-of-mind option in case things get really bad. And yes, people brought up Nazi Germany. Unlike Muslims, Mexicans, African Americans, the disabled, and women, Jews have not been directly insulted by Donald Trump during this election. Anti-Semites have arguably been empowered by his campaign: Jewish journalists have been consistently threatened and harassed on Twitter since the election got underway, often by people who self-identify as Trump supporters. But the fear seems to be less that Trump will specifically persecute Jews than the sense that America under Trump will become an increasingly hostile space for Jews and other minority groups. Trump doesn’t have to be an anti-Semite to bear responsibility for anti-Semitism. While exit polls suggest that roughly 25 percent of American Jews voted for Trump—fewer than voted for Mitt Romney in 2012, but more than voted for John McCain in 2008—the group as a whole is overwhelmingly liberal and Democratic. Adam Zeff, the rabbi at GJC, said in an interview that the synagogue’s neighborhood, Mt. Airy, is so left-wing that it’s almost “self-parody.” Most Jews live in cities or stay concentrated in “little enclaves,” as Zeff called them—he pointed out that on the map of the election results, there are tiny blue spots even deep in Trump country. “That’s where Jews live,” he said, along with other minority groups. It wasn’t Jews Trump promised to ban some 13 months ago. It was Muslims. This clustering creates a dual challenge for Jewish communities. People at GJC spoke about Trump’s election like they might about a death in the family—with a sense of real and personal loss, and a staggering alienation from their fellow Americans. “It is kind of shattering to people to feel like, wow, there’s such a difference,” said Zeff. “To think that racism, anti-immigrant sentiment, and misogyny could be given a pass by so many people makes Jews feel like anti-Semitism could also be given a pass.” And yet the congregants also spoke about the need for understanding. “The people for whom this is a happy day—we have to think about them, too,” Zeff said during the prayer service. Mt. Airy is about a half hour drive from Bucks County, a swing area in Pennsylvania where nearly half of voters went for Trump this year. But even within such a short distance, it’s difficult to imagine how the liberal Jews of Philadelphia and the Trump supporters one county up would start to know one another or be in community. The other challenge for Jews who are scared is putting that fear into context. Other groups are hurting just as much as Jews are right now, and in some cases, their fears are more tangible. It wasn’t Jews Trump promised to ban from entering the country some 13 months ago—it was Muslims. It wasn’t Jewish neighborhoods Trump described in apocalyptic terms in the presidential debates—it was black neighborhoods. At times, Jews have struggled or declined to find solidarity with both of those groups, often over the issue of Israel. “When disaster strikes, the Jewish impulse is to look inward, to say, ‘What t’shuva,’” or repentance, “do I need to do?” Zeff said. If his community looked inward and asked what kind of allies they have been to African Americans, Latinos, and other groups in Philadelphia, Zeff said, “I know what [those groups’] answer is, which is: not very good ones.” For Jews, as for other groups who feel threatened by Trump, this new era has begun with a struggle of contradictions: to understand Trump supporters while maintaining their value commitments; to experience their particular and unique pain while finding solidarity with others. When Zeff sent out a note to his synagogue about the election, “I got a response back from a congregant that said, ‘This is very nice, rabbi, but you’re asking us to do two contradictory things: You’re asking us to reach out, and you’re asking us to stand up,’” Zeff told me. He wrote back, “‘Yes, and isn’t that the lot of the Jew?’”

I can relate to the Jewish in the sense that I too struggle to realize and accept the fact that Trump got elected. I think the realization that he got elected is one that I tend to think  made me realize the USA was not the country I thought it was. At the end of the day its good that it happened because we realized that we are not perfect as a country.


Spain’s Deadly Train Crash —  A train crash in Spain has killed at least four people and injured nearly 50 others after it derailed in the northwest region of the country.   About 65 people rode the Portugal-bound train, including crew, when it crashed just before 9:30 a.m. local time. Photos of the wreck showed the train’s carriage flipped on its side and smashed from where it likely hit part of a bridge near the tracks. It crashed just 20 minutes after leaving the Spanish city of Vigo, in Galicia, and was headed for Porto, Portugal.   It’s not clear what caused the wreck, but passengers said the train began to rock. As the BBC reported:   A passenger in a video posted by local daily La Voz de Galicia said the train had suddenly started swaying from one side to the other.   "It wouldn't stop," she said. "I was sitting down and I fell to the ground. And then the train stopped. It was that quick."   A witness woman told Spanish television about hearing a "very strong bang" before seeing billowing black smoke. Friday’s crash is near the site of a 2013 train crash, one of the country’s worst in recent decades. In that crash, a high-speed train derailed and hit a wall near Santiago de Compostela, about a 30-minute drive northeast from Friday’s wreck.

Anytime a train or car crash happens you start to think of what caused it. You wonder if the conductor was drunk or what? Usually there is a hidden reason as to why they happened and a lot of the time we never find out what truly happened. Its near the site of a 2013 crash though which leads me to believe that this happens regularly there!


Americans feel guilty about wasting too much food, but still do it —  Americans eat a lot, also throw a lot of food. That is the main point worth underlining in the new study published at Plos One, a peer-reviewed journal. Surprisingly, it is just one of the two large-scale papers about food waste.   In 2010, the study says that about one-hundred and thirty-three billion pounds of edible food both at the retail and consumer levels went uneaten. That’s about one-thousand two-hundred and forty-nine calories per person per day. Two-thirds of which were attributed to consumers, meaning people in homes that waste the food that they purchase.   In addition to the significant waste of resources, the paper says that this behavior of consumers has a substantial negative impact to the environment as about ninety-five percent of food waste enter the United States landfills.   In a press release, Ohio State University professor Brian Roe explains that the results provide the data required to develop targeted efforts to reduce waste of food each year. “If we can increase awareness of the problem, consumers are more likely to increase purposeful action to reduce food waste,” he said. “You don’t change your behavior if you don’t realize there’s a problem in the first place.”   The team of researchers has developed a national survey to identify the awareness and attitudes of Americans regarding food waste. Last year, it was administered to five-hundred people representative of the country’s population.   The study has found that about fifty-three percent of American respondents said that they’re aware that it is a problem; that’s about ten percent higher than the related research published by Johns Hopkins last year.   Doctoral student Danyi Qi, one of the authors of the research, says that they’ve found three things that people consider regarding food waste: First, about sixty-eight percent of respondents believe that throwing away edible food after the package date has passed is reducing the chance of food-linked diseases and illnesses. Meanwhile, about fifty-nine percent believe that some food waste is ‘necessary’ for freshness and flavorful certainty.   Second, seventy-seven percent said they feel a “general sense of guilt” when throwing food away. Also, about fifty-eight percent claimed to understand that throwing away of food is bad for the environment. Meanwhile, only forty-two percent said they believe wasted food is a “major source of wasted money.”   And third, which is perhaps the most interesting, is that fifty-one percent of respondents believe it would be difficult to reduce home food waste. Plus, about forty-two percent said they don’t have enough time to worry about it. For the economic perspective, fifty-three percent admit that they waste a lot of food but still buy more in bulk or in large quantities during store sales.   For the throwing-the-blame perspective, about eighty-seven percent believed that they waste less food than other similar households.   The research in full is available at the PLOS One website, and it is titled ‘Household Food Waste: Multivariate Regression and Principal Components Analyses of Awareness and Attitudes among U.S. Consumers.’

We shouldn't be wasting food like that us Americans when there are so many starving children around the world. We need to find a way to preserve leftover food , renew it and give it to the people in need. It can be the homeless or children in need. The bottom line is we need to make better use of the food so other people can enjoy it.


What Veterans Want You To Know About PTSD —  For many, this Veterans Day comes with a little extra heaviness. Just days ago, our country elected a new president who has insulted decorated war veterans and suggested that post-traumatic stress disorder is a sign of weakness.    Unfortunately, PTSD myths and stereotypes like this are all too common. An estimated 8 million Americans ― and up to 31 percent of Vietnam War veterans and 20 percent of Iraq veterans ― suffer from PTSD, and rates of the disorder in the U.S. are now higher than ever.    But still, the disorder is poorly understood, stigmatized and often misrepresented, and the negative connotations surrounding PTSD are a major part of what keeps many veterans from seeking help. Increasing understanding around the disorder can only help more veterans to seek help and get better treatment.   In honor of Veterans Day, here are five things vets wish others knew about PTSD. Anyone who refers to veterans with PTSD as “weak” has no idea what those people have seen and experienced in a war zone, or the toll that these experiences can take on an individual ― no matter how “strong” they are.    “War, I believe, dare not be commented on by those who has yet to experience it,” one military veteran told Gawker. “Until you kill other human beings for survival, what could you possibly say about it? It assaults all your scenes, the smell of death and the machines that cause it. Noises so loud you feel like an ant under a lawnmower. It is incomprehensible.”   “On my best days I tell myself I killed to survive,” he added. “On my worst my mind tells me I committed acts of madness so that I didn’t go mad.”   The blog PTSD: A Soldier’s Perspective aims to share stories from and inspiration for veterans struggling with after-effects of their service.   “There is disconnection between everything human and what has to be done in combat,” a vet named Scott Lee wrote on the platform in 2008. “Imagine being in an unimaginable situation and having to do the unthinkable.”   That being said, some veterans say there’s a common misperception that counselors or therapists can’t do anything because they can’t possibly understand. Psychologists can help even if they don’t understand everything about war, according to Jeffrey Denning, the author of Warrior SOS: Military Veterans’ Stories of Faith, Emotional Survival and Living with PTSD.   PTSD isn’t always easy to recognize.   Symptoms of the disorder often go masked and unnoticed. War journalist Sebastian Junger, who spent months embedded with American troops in Afghanistan, wrote a Vanity Fair essay about the experience last June. In it, he highlighted his own struggle to recognize PTSD.    “I had no idea that what I’d just experienced had anything to do with combat; I just thought I was going crazy,” he wrote. “For the next several months I kept having panic attacks whenever I was in a small place with too many people — airplanes, ski gondolas, crowded bars. Gradually the incidents stopped, and I didn’t think about them again until I found myself talking to a woman at a picnic who worked as a psychotherapist. She asked whether I’d been affected by my war experiences, and I said no, I didn’t think so. But for some reason I described my puzzling panic attack in the subway. ‘That’s called post-traumatic stress disorder,’ she said.”   Much of the suffering of PTSD is silent.    PTSD survivors often suffer in silence, trying to present a strong face to the world and not seeking help for fear of being seen as week. A veteran who served in Baghdad in 2007 and 2008 opened up about the struggle to admit to himself that he needed care.    “The few nights a week I’d get drunk and start crying inconsolably, although often silently, I tried to shake off as simple moments of weakness,” he wrote, according to Gawker. “I should be tough, like my grandfather returning from WW2, or all the others who seemed to get on day after day without noticeable problems.”    “Some of the toughest guys I had ended up the worst off” he added. “I simply hope that everyone, at some point, can get the help they need and I hope the VA can get its act together to assist those who so desperately need it.”   PTSD doesn’t make you violent.    A harmful stereotype about PTSD is that it leads to aggressive behavior. But research indicates that the prevalence of violence among individuals with PTSD is only slightly higher than the general population, according to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.   In a viral blog post published on the website RhinoDen, a veteran named Rob fights back against the dangerous stereotype that veterans with PTSD have violent tendencies.    “I have never committed violence in the workplace, just like the vast majority of those who suffer with me,” he writes. “I have never physically assaulted anyone out of anger or rage. It pains me when I listen to the news and every time a veteran commits a crime (or commits suicide); it is automatically linked to and blamed on PTSD. Yes, there are some who cannot control their actions due to this imbalance in our heads, but don’t put a label on us that we are all incorrigible. Very few of us are bad.”    Recovery is possible.   One of the most damaging stereotypes about PTSD is the idea that people with the disorder are somehow broken or can’t heal.    Roy Webb, a Marine who served in Vietnam and suffered from PTSD and insomnia for four decades, told CBS News about his recovery through yoga and meditation.    “I did feel at total peace, like I hadn’t known in years. You don’t have all those thoughts flying through your mind at night,” he said.   Iraq veteran Gordon Ewell, who has overcome PTSD, sent a message of hope to his fellow veterans: Recovery is always possible, and you’re never alone.    “You may not be able to see the light at the end of the tunnel yet, but I promise it is there,” he said in an interview published in Denning’s book. “I promise you can get through anything. I also promise that there are people willing to walk with you every step of the way.”

PTSD is something I personally know because I have friends with it. It is no joke and really makes people feel vulnerable. The troubles of war are something real dangerous and really make you think twice about enlisting. I think we must do what we can to research this and hope for better outcomes for people.


Members of Eagles of Death Metal, Band That Played Bataclan, Attend Paris Attacks Memorial —  Members of Eagles of Death Metal, the band that was playing at the Bataclan concert hall when the deadly Paris Attacks occurred, attended a town hall memorial in the city Saturday to remember the 130 people killed in coordinated terrorist attacks across Paris one year ago. Dozens were killed and hundreds were injured at the Bataclan after jihadists opened fire during the band's set on Nov. 13, 2015, taking fans of the band and venue workers hostage in the hall. "I wouldn't imagine anyone not wanting to be here. This city is a shining example of really the best possible way to react to something that's awful and evil," said Jesse Hughes, Eagles of Death Metal's controversial frontman. "This is the leadership core of what to do, and I'm very proud that I get to count so many people amongst my family and friends now." On Saturday, Sting, the British pop legend and former frontman of the Police, played the first show at the Bataclan since the tragedy. Hughes was not admitted entrance to the concert, according to the Agence France-Presse (AFP).   The AFP reported that the venue's co-director would not allow Hughes to enter after he told Fox Business Channel that he thought Muslim security personnel at the venue collaborated with attackers.   Hughes later apologized and retracted his statement. The band's manager, Marc Pollack, refuted the claim that Hughes was not admitted to the concert in an interview with Billboard, describing the co-director's description of the situation as false.   Hughes, at the town hall, offered his gratitude to the people of France.   "And from the second that the first bullets started flying, this country took care of us. And we are grateful forever, and I just hope everyone here knows how much we love this country and every person in it," he said.   Sting's performance at the newly restored Bataclan included a moment of silence and statement in French, saying he hoped "to remember and honor those who lost their lives in the attacks a year ago and to celebrate the life and the music of this historic venue."

I feel like overall it is quite sad that this happened and it should have been prevented by the proper authorities. I feel like as a people we should do what we can to prevent these things.  I feel like the fact that the city reacted well is a good sign. I think they did the right thing in not letting muslims security personnel enter as you have to take all precautions necessary.


When tragedies like the one in Paris happen we must dig down deep and look for proper solutions. I think we need to research what goes through people's heads when they commit crimes like this.It was a little racist for one of them to say muslim security collaborated with the criminals. That was a bad thing to say.


Horrific crash kills Yu Xu, 1st woman to fly China's J-10 fighter —  One of China's first female fighter pilots and a member of the country's air force aerobatics team was killed in a training accident over the weekend, according to Chinese state-run media.   Capt. Yu Xu, 30, died Saturday during a routine training flight with the aerobatics team, according to the reports. The Chinese military did not provide details of the accident in Hebei province, but state-run media, citing military sources and witnesses, said Yu ejected from her aircraft after it collided with another during the training. After the ejection, the wing of another plane hit Yu, killing her, according to a report from China Daily. Yu's male co-pilot ejected safely and survived, the report said. The other jet also landed safety. The flight data recorder, or black box, from Yu's jet was recovered as authorities investigate the accident, China Daily reported. Yu: 'I have become a real fighter pilot' Yu was the first of four women who are certified to fly the J-10, a single-engine multi-role jet that entered service in 2004 and is considered the first Chinese domestic fighter to rival Western fighters in its capabilities. Yu flew a J-10 fighter with China's August 1st Aerobatics Team. Her last performance was at Airshow China in Zhuhai earlier this month. J-10 fighters from China's August 1st aerobatics team perform at Airshow China in Zhuhai on November 4, 2016. The show was Capt. Yu Xu's last public performance. J-10 fighters from China's August 1st aerobatics team perform at Airshow China in Zhuhai on November 4, 2016. The show was Capt. Yu Xu's last public performance. "I think the acrobatics are quite difficult, with high requirements and standards made in all aspects. Our condition is quite satisfactory, but we need more trainings if we want to be better," Yu said of her performances in an interview with China's CCTV. Yu, 30, joined the People's Liberation Army Air Force in September 2005. She qualified as a fighter pilot in 2009 and qualified to fly the J-10 in 2012, when she soloed in the fighter. A Chinese Air Force J-10 fighter on display an Airshow China in Zhuhai November 2016. A Chinese Air Force J-10 fighter on display an Airshow China in Zhuhai November 2016. "I'm quite happy with myself, because this solo flight means that I have become a real fighter pilot," she told CCTV. Wan Ying, a friend of Yu's, told CNN that Yu was "a very positive, humble and nice person who loved taking care of friends." She was also an avid reader, Wan said.  Wan said she and Yu had talked only two days before the deadly crash about meeting up for dinner. Capt. Yu Xu described herself as "a real fighter pilot" after she qualified to fly the J-10. Capt. Yu Xu described herself as "a real fighter pilot" after she qualified to fly the J-10. Yu saluted as a hero Yu's death Saturday saw many in China questioning in online forums whether women should be fighter pilots and if they were getting the right training. "I only want to know the cause of the incident. What should be to blame for, problems with the plane or lack of training?" one poster wrote on the Chinese social website Weibo. But state-run Global Times quoted a Chinese aviation expert, Wang Ya'nan, as saying Yu and other women in the Peoples Liberation Army Air Force were trail blazers. "China is a pioneer in training female aerobatic pilots. When the program started, there was no foreign experience to borrow from or statistics to rely on from other countries. From this perspective, Yu Xu and other female aerobatic pilots have taken greater risks, which deserve more of our respect," Wang was quoted as saying. On Weibo, Yu was saluted as a hero. "Yu Xu is our most proud female pilot. Her death is a great loss for our country," wrote one poster. "Yu is the Hua Mulan (legendary woman warrior) of our era, a rare heroine," wrote another. The website for the All-China Women's Federation reported Monday that 60 million users of the Weibo site had clicked on Yu's story by Sunday night.

Its quite sad when crashes like these happen and when they do happen I can't help but feel like something could have been done to prevent it. I feel like as humans we do not do enough to try and prevent all of these crashes. The fact that it was a routine training flight with the aerobatics team makes it worse. IT was also the first woman to fly a China j_10 fighter.


French school bullying deaths stir intense debate —  Two stories about two French girls who killed themselves after being bullied at school have prompted an emotional response and intense debate about how teenagers can be better protected. Emilie, 17, took her life in January and a graphic account of the torment she suffered emerged this week when her diary appeared in a newspaper. It was immediately followed by a French TV dramatisation of the story of Marion Fraisse, who died three years ago. The France 3 film was poignantly entitled Marion, 13 ans pour toujours - Marion, Forever 13. The question for France is whether their deaths will help change the way bullying is tackled. It starts so gradually, you hardly notice it. In a classroom of rowdy students, Marion is marked out as one of the good girls. Over the course of the 90-minute drama, she loses her friends, is the victim of rumours, insults and isolation, and then is cornered by a group of boys in the corridor, who grab her, pin her down and throw her shoes away. "She was asking for it," says a passing girl. Marion breaks down and cries. From there the drama follows her descent into desperation, depression, and finally suicide. The film was adapted from a book by Marion's mother, Nora, who found a letter from the teenager after her death and decided to tell her story. A poignant act, because one of the most striking elements of that story is how Marion's parents knew about what was happening to their daughter at the time. Interviewed by a French newspaper to mark the launch of the dramatisation, actress Julie Gayet, who plays Nora, said the film had two points of view: Marion's and her mother's. The script "shows that parents never really know their child. Half a child's life escapes them". More than four million people tuned in to watch the drama, which was followed by a one-hour debate. Many took to social media afterwards to share their stories and express their anger. "It's not a suicide, it's murder," wrote one Twitter user, called Sara. Another suggested that the film be shown in schools. Others wrote of their own experiences of bullying, with some saying the experience had haunted them for years after they had left full-time education. For help and advice on bullying, visit BBC Advice BBC iWonder: How do we talk about teen suicide? Read more here: * French Periscope death stirs social media fears * Quarter of bullied children bully others How France has tried to address bullying According to official figures, 700,000 pupils are bullied each year in France, and activists say more than 90% of children have access to social networks. France has tried to improve awareness of bullying in schools, as well as support for the victims. In 2014, a new anti-bullying law was brought in, and a hotline set up for pupils to report incidents. But activists say France is still not tackling the problem effectively. "The authorities' response is improving very slowly," says psychologist and campaigner Catherine Verdier. "But France is dragging behind other countries. If you look at Finland, Sweden, where it's a national cause, there was a real impulse from the top to change things." "A few schools have improved, but not enough," says Willy Pierre who runs 'You Are Heroes', set up after Marion's death to break the taboo around bullying. "The hotline is only open in school hours, and it can take weeks or months to find a designated adult for the child to talk to face to face." The problem has also grown to encompass cyber-bullying and harassment outside the school gates. The solution, he says, is for parents, teachers and pupils to talk openly about the problem. Emilie's story Emilie was four years older than Marion when she died in January after jumping out of a window at her father's house. A bright pupil at a private school in the northern city of Lille, Emilie's parents say she endured years of terror up to the age of 13 because she was not considered cool and trendy and loved reading. Eventually she snapped and they pulled her out of the school. For three years she tried other schools and distance learning, but she developed a phobia of schools and her parents believe her death was linked to depression as a result of the bullying. ________________   Excerpts from Emilie's diary Dodging blows, being tripped up and spat at. Closing your ears to insults and mockery. Keeping an eye on your bag and your hair. Holding back the tears. Again and again Hey, you know what? a boy exclaimed loud enough for everyone in the class to hear but the teacher. Apparently they're going to award a prize to the ugliest clever-clogs in every country. Oh yeah? his neighbour tittered. I bet you we've got the winner in the class I don't want my parents to know how pathetic I am, and think they've given birth to a piece of crap The diary was published in La Voix du Nord (in French) ________________   A report by Unicef two years ago found that bullying was a worldwide problem that "exists at some level and in some form in every country". Children who are bullied, it says, are prone to a vast range of negative effects "including depression, anxiety, thoughts of suicide". One mother told a French newspaper that her daughter's school had responded to the problem of bullying with "a conspiracy of silence". But after days of debate about the sad lives of two French teenagers, those taboos may finally be crumbling. Are you being bullied? Useful contacts * BullyingUK - Tel 0808 800 2222 * Childline - Tel 0800 1111 * Bullying at school - UK government website * Non au harcelement - French government website - Tel 3020

I feel like bullying is not something new and the fact that we still have not done anything about it is repulsive. We are not doing enough in preventing bullying or educating kids about how bad they really are. I think we need to understand that and teach these kids that there are other way to go about things.


Tragedy as father and son die after falling off a cliff during hike on a California trail —  A father and son have died after falling off a cliff during a hike. The two plunged to their death while on a trail next to Shaver Lake in Fresno, California. Though deputies attempted to get to the hikers, there was a helicopter power failure during a refueling and they made an emergency landing, meaning they couldn't get to the pair, ABC 30 reported.  The report said a search-and-rescue crew is going out Sunday morning for the two victims' bodies.   The names of the father and son have not been publicly revealed.

It is quite sad that a father and son fell off a cliff like this after a simple hike. The helicopter power failure however is totally uncalled for and should be looked into by the proper authorities there is no way it should be allowed to happen like that because overall help needs to be there when needed asap.


Animals Rescued From the 'World’s Worst Zoo' —  An animal-welfare organization reflects on its nerve-wracking rescue—and what it might mean for troubled zoos around the world. Update: October 14—This story has been updated to include more information about the care of animals at the zoo, and to clarify the nature of the 2014 conflict between Hamas and Israel. When a rescue team arrived to evacuate a closing zoo near the Gaza Strip city of Khan Younis in late August, just 15 animals were still alive—the survivors from what had once been a collection of hundreds of animals. They included Laziz, a nine-year-old Bengal tiger that is the last tiger in Gaza, according to Four Paws, the Vienna-based animal-welfare nonprofit that led the rescue. There were also five monkeys, an emu, a pelican, two buzzards, two porcupines, two tortoises, and a doe. The doe had lost her fawn to wounds shortly before the rescuers arrived. Opened in 2007 on three and a half acres next to an amusement park, the Khan Younis Zoo has long been called “the world’s worst zoo” by animal-welfare groups such as Four Paws and various international media outlets. Animals there were reported to have starved to death during military conflicts between Gaza’s Hamas-led government and neighboring Israel. And last year, the surviving animals began sharing their cramped cages with the dead: More than 50 dead animals—including Laziz’s mate—were taxidermied by the zoo staff. (See "Tiger’s Death Raises Question: What Makes a Good Zoo?") A seven-week conflict in 2014 hastened the decision to close the zoo. The conflict stemmed from the kidnapping and killing of three Israeli teenagers on the West Bank. Israel linked the crimes to Hamas, and began making hundreds of arrests in the case, including many of Hamas’ West Bank leaders. Hamas later began firing rockets at civilian areas in Israel, which retaliated by bombing sites in Gaza. The United Nations reported that nearly 2,200 people were killed in the conflict, more than 2,100 of them Palestinians. It’s unclear precisely what led to the animals’ deaths at the zoo. The zoo itself was not bombed during the 2014 conflict, and animal-welfare groups say it had a troubled history of caring for animals. Abu Diab Oweida, the Palestinian businessman who owned the zoo, said many animals died during that conflict, and that the mummifications were an effort by the zoo’s staff “to prove to the whole world that even animals (were) affected.” Oweida previously blamed a 2009 conflict for the death of several animals in the zoo, some of which also were mummified. How It Happened Four Paws and its director of emergency response, Amir Khalil, had sought for months to close the zoo and transfer the animals to sanctuaries. In late August of this year, the ambitious rescue plan became reality. “The idea to close (the zoo came in) April of last year,” said Khalil, an Egyptian-born veterinarian who lives in Austria. “It was a concept last September. It was a plan this April. It was a mission in August.” Khalil needed to negotiate with four people: Oweida and three of his sons. In May they agreed on the concept of evacuating the zoo. (Also see "Animals Starving in Venezuela Zoos.") “I decided to donate the animals to save what remained of (them), to live safely inside a nature reserve and in peace and security,” Oweida said. (Read about the tunnels of Gaza in National Geographic magazine.) The rescue itself was complicated, “a complex coordination between Israeli, Palestinian, and international officials,” according to a spokesperson for the Israeli Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, a branch of the Ministry of Defense that works with the Palestinian population in the Gaza Strip and West Bank, and with international organizations working in both territories. Israel has not occupied Gaza since 2005, but retains various controls of its trade, border traffic, sea traffic, and air space. The rescue “was not easy,” Khalil said. “To be neutral is not easy. I think Four Paws was a form of mediator between three, four countries”—Israel, Jordan, and the Palestinian governments of Hamas and Fatah Khalil and Four Paws carried out the multiday rescue in the midst of a military conflict this past August, crossing disputed borders as unseen Israel Defense Forces aircraft dropped bombs on military targets in the Gaza. Khalil has worked to save animals from crisis situations before, including the 2011 Libyan uprising that toppled Muammar Qaddafi. But the Khan Younis mission, he says, was one of the toughest. “In terms of the (mission), it went quite well,” team member Ioana Dungler says. “In terms of time, it was quite exhausting. On a (difficulty) scale of 1 to 10, it was an 8.” Animal Rescue The plans for the mission began to take shape in April 2015, when Khalil first visited Khan Younis and was horrified by the mummified animals. He soon began negotiating with Oweida and three of his sons. First, Four Paws would pay for the animals’ feeding. Next, it would cover all of the zoo’s operational costs, including staff salaries. It also removed the cadavers from public view. The final condition was that Oweida agreed not to work with animals again upon closure of the zoo. (See "Opinion: Killing Healthy Zoo Animals Is Wrong—And the Public Agrees.") Finally, in mid-August, Khalil led a 14-person team to the zoo. The team departed from the Erez border crossing in southwest Israel. Shortly before they crossed the border, a rocket from Gaza landed in the Israeli city of Sderot. Khalil said he could see smoke from the Erez border crossing. As the rescuers headed to the zoo, the Israel Defense Forces launched 50 retaliatory airstrikes at Hamas targets in Gaza. Nevertheless, Khalil said the team felt “safe and secure.” “Four Paws was checking what was going on,” he explained. “Locally, we were informed of anything happening. ... I was not worried about security, but about the mission.” (Also see "Jerusalem Zoo Struggles to Remain Common Ground for Israelis, Palestinians.") The team arrived at Khan Younis on August 22 to heartbreaking news: A baby deer, which had suffered during its few weeks of life, had died the day before. Four Paws prepared the surviving animals for their journey to new homes. The group spent August 23 loading the animals into crates, placed on a truck. The rescue became official when the team crossed back into Israel early on August 25. From there, team members escorted the animals to their new homes. Where Things Stand Four Paws has also transferred five Gaza lions and 15 other wild animals to sanctuaries. Now four active zoos remain in the Strip. Khalil says that Palestinian authorities are hoping to close them all. Alan Knight, chief executive of the U.K.-based International Animal Rescue, says the Khan Younis mission was a milestone in animal rights. “We are of course delighted that this terrible zoo has finally been closed and the surviving animals have been saved, thanks to Four Paws,” Knight said. “The success of the rescue operation proves that … extraordinary things can be achieved with passion and determination. Suffering animals should not be forgotten or overlooked, even in the midst of human conflicts or natural or man-made disasters. “We must all continue to strive to drive up the welfare of animals in world zoos. And if they can’t meet even the most basic standards, we must work toward getting them closed down.” Ahmad Safi, executive director of the Palestinian Animal League, also praised the rescue but tempered his words with concern about unresolved issues in Gaza. “While we are delighted that the individual animals have now been moved to safety and can begin to enjoy life in a sanctuary environment,” he says, “we are concerned that simply removing animals while failing to acknowledge and tackle the wider issues at play — such as wildlife trafficking and commercialization of wild animals in the Gaza Strip — means that these animals may be replaced and the good work done recently will simply be part of a vicious cycle which continues.” Khalil added that local authorities in Gaza have expressed interest in creating new legislation on wild animals. At the moment, “there is no legislation, no law”—a situation that results in “wild animals [being] smuggled and kept in poor cages.” “There are no current plans for assistance,” he adds, though “we asked the authorities in Gaza to … issue a regulation to keep wild animals in captivity [and] stop [animal] smuggling from Egypt.” A New Life for Rescued Animals Of the Khan Younis survivors, Laziz had the longest journey to his new home—the Lionsrock Big Cat Sanctuary in South Africa, where he’ll live on a hectare with grass, trees, and a bathing area. Lionsrock, run by Four Paws, is fenced in and patrolled regularly for poachers. The buzzards may eventually be released into the wild. All of the other Khan Younis animals except the monkeys—four vervets and a macaque, which are bound for the Israeli Primate Sanctuary Foundation—went to the New Hope Centre sanctuary in Jordan. They’ll eventually move to Al Ma’wa for Nature and Wildlife, a Jordanian sanctuary run by Four Paws and the Princess Alia Foundation. But the animals’ problems may not be over. “Our experience rescuing and rehabilitating wild animals that have spent years in captivity—often in appalling and traumatic conditions—has taught us that this can lead to a wide range of physical and psychological problems,” Knight says. “Some animals have suffered lengthy periods of starvation and need treatment for malnutrition and dehydration. Others, like the tiger in Gaza, have been fed an entirely unsuitable diet”—Laziz was fed chicken, which Dungler says tigers should not eat—“that, coupled with constant confinement and an inability to exercise, leads to obesity and the many diseases associated with that. “On a positive note,” he adds, “we have also learned that with expert treatment and care, in time even the most damaged animals can be rehabilitated and given a second chance in life. Some, but not all, can even be returned to the wild.” What’s Next for Zoo Survivors The two Palestinian governments, Hamas and Fatah, have recently approached Four Paws about creating a sanctuary in Gaza. But “how far it is from reality,” says Khalil, “I don’t know.” There are currently just 12 veterinarians in the Gaza Strip, with four set to retire soon. (Five veterinarians assisted Four Paws during the rescue, with Khalil and his team providing on-hand training.) Khalil says he’s worried about the remaining Gaza zoos—and about other zoos in conflict zones that require immediate attention. Some of these, he says, can be found in Yemen, Syria, Libya, Sudan, and Venezuela. But that’s a very partial list. “There are,” he says, “hundreds of such zoos worldwide.” Time will tell if Four Paws’ inspiring work can be replicated at some of them.

I think there should be STRICT world laws to prevent people and countries that cant have zoos not to have them. It is unfortunate that in 2019 this is s till happening and we should totally fix this. We need to be able to get it right and to be honest the only way is being the world police and stopping them from doing this.


Airstrikes kill more than 40 and wound scores in Yemeni port city —  CAIRO — Fighter jets from a U.S.-backed Saudi-led coalition struck a security complex in the western Yemeni city of Hodeidah late Saturday night, killing at least 43 and injuring scores more, according to Yemeni officials and local news reports. Many of those killed were inmates being held in prisons on the site, located in the city’s al-Zaydiya enclave. Hodeidah, a port city on the Red Sea, is held by the rebel Houthis, who also control the capital, Sanaa, and much of northern Yemen. Saba, the government news agency, reported that 43 were killed and that dozens were wounded. According to other news reports, the death toll is at least 60. Images of bodies covered in blankets, purportedly from the attacks, were shown on local news channels and on social media. In a statement, the Saudi-led alliance said the Houthis were using a building at the complex “as a command and control center for their military operations” and said “targeting protocols and procedures were followed fully.” In Yemen’s civil conflict, which began in March 2015, the Houthis are aligned with loyalists of former president Ali Abdullah Saleh. The Saudi-led coalition, backed by the United States and other Western powers, is trying to restore Yemen’s internationally recognized president, Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, to power. Hadi was driven into exile last year, and he is now based in the southern port city of Aden. Saudi Arabia’s Sunni Muslim monarchy entered the war in large part because of concerns of Iranian influence in the region. That Shiite theocracy is widely perceived to be backing the Shiite Houthi rebels. The airstrikes in Hodeidah come on the same day Hadi rejected a new U.N. peace proposal that would have sidelined him and given the Houthis prominent roles in a new government. More than 10,000 people have died in the conflict, many of them civilians who were killed by Saudi-led coalition bombings, according to the United Nations. Millions more are suffering from hunger, illness and displacement as the nation is now in the throes of a humanitarian disaster. Earlier this month, Saudi-led coalition airstrikes killed more than 100 people, most of them civilians, when warplanes targeted a funeral hall in Sanaa. The coalition later claimed responsibility, saying that the bombings were a result of receiving faulty information. Speaking after meeting U.N. envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, Hadi said that the agreement would “reward” the Houthis and that it “only opens a door towards more suffering and war and is not a map for peace,” according to the Saba news agency.

More than 40 people were hurt and it is quite depressing any time anyone is hurt. I feel like the best thing we can do is be sure that we get things right in the long run and change the way things are ran. I feel like we should be sure to change things for the better.. The fact that air strikes still hurt innocent people is mind blowing.


DAKOTA FANNING PARENTS SPLIT ... Hot Dad Back on the Market —  Dakota Fanning's mom and dad are done after almost 27 years ... TMZ has learned.  Dakota's dad, Steven Fanning, just filed for divorce from his wife, Heather, citing irreconcilable differences. Their kids are both of age, so child support isn't an issue -- Dakota's 22, Elle is 18.  As for spousal support, it's as a bit of a mystery ... Steve didn't check any boxes asking for support from Heather.  That said, he says he still needs to figure out how he and Heather are going to split their property. But we're guessing this stud will be just fine when it's all said and done.

When people split up it not only affects them but it affects the kids as well. The kids have to deal with the burden of having to live separate lives between time spent with the mom, and all the time they have to spend with the dad. I feel like this causes a toll on their childhood and they are not the same when they grow up because of it.


Civilians shot, bodies hung from poles in Mosul, Iraqi sources say —  As fighting continued in and around Mosul on Friday, civilians caught in crossfire have a stark choice: whether to flee or stay huddled inside their homes.   Many residents tell CNN the intensity of the fighting and the airstrikes in eastern parts of the city limited their options. Still, tens of thousands have chosen the escape route. More than 47,730 people have been displaced because of the ongoing military operations to retake Mosul from ISIS, according to the International Organization for Migration. Roughly 12,800 people have fled since Tuesday, the organization said. Other residents of Mosul have simply chosen to heed the Iraqi Security Forces instructions to stay in their homes if they feel safe enough inside. Still others are too scared to leave their homes, because of ISIS' campaign of terror against the civilians. Witnesses told CNN among the dozens executed this week, more than 30 people were shot in the head for having cell phones. Their bodies were left at various intersections across Mosul as a warning. The bodies are not being removed as residents fear reprisals from ISIS militants, witnesses said. Here are some of the latest developments in the battle for Mosul: The UN human rights office released a report Friday, confirming that at least 60 civilians have been killed in Mosul this week, and reported new details of alleged atrocities by ISIS fighters. On Wednesday evening, ISIS reportedly killed 20 civilians at the Ghabat military base in northern Mosul on charges of leaking information, the UN body said. "Their bodies were also hung at various intersections in Mosul, with notes stating: 'decision of execution' and 'used cell phones to leak information to the ISF.' " On Tuesday, ISIS shot and killed 40 civilians in Mosul after accusing them of "treason and collaboration" with Iraqi security forces, according to a report by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, or UNHCR. "The victims were dressed in orange clothes marked in red with the words: 'traitors and agents of the ISF.' Their bodies were then hung on electrical poles in several areas in Mosul city," the report said.   Local ISIS commanders have started fleeing in some neighborhoods, residents said, leaving behind trained teenage ISIS combatants to fight Iraqi forces. Mosul residents said they fear these young fighters as much, if not more, than other ISIS militants because they have been brainwashed, have no fear and have a great amount of zealotry after being indoctrinated and trained for two years. The UNHCR report said ISIS had "deployed what it calls the 'sons of the caliphate' in the alleys of the old town of Mosul, wearing explosive belts. We are concerned that these may be teenagers and young boys." ISIS posted video footage Wednesday, "showing four children, believed to be between 10 and 14 years old, shooting to death four people for spying for the ISF and the Peshmerga," the report said, referring to Iraqi and Kurdish forces. UN human rights chief Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein cited "heartbreaking images" of ISIS forcing children to carry out executions and reports of women being "redistributed" among ISIS fighters, as evidence of the "numbing and intolerable" suffering of civilians in Mosul and other ISIS-held areas. He called on Iraqi authorities to ensure the perpetrators of such abuses are dealt with according to the rule of law so as to limit revenge attacks and help communities rebuild. Senior ISIS leader killed In another development, Mahmoud Shukri al Nuaimi, a senior ISIS commander, has been killed in the battle for Mosul, the terror group's last major stronghold in Iraq, Iraqi military intelligence sources tell CNN. Al Nuaimi, also is known as Sheikh Faris, was killed Tuesday in an Iraqi-led coalition airstrike in western Mosul, the sources said. ISIS confirmed his death in a video montage, referring to him as "the martyr of the battle." The Iraqi sources told CNN that Nuaimi was formerly a high-ranking intelligence officer in Saddam Hussein's intelligence services. In Mosul's east, residents said ISIS militants were forcing them from their homes, either to booby trap the houses or to take them over as fighting positions. Militants have reportedly left barrels of crude oil at major intersections, ready to be set afire to hamper Iraqi advances. ISIS has also used white flags to disguise suicide car bombs in Mosul, according to Saban Al Numan, an Iraqi counterterrorism official. The battle for Mosul is difficult, slow and complicated, Numan said. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi vowed victory last month at the start of the long-awaited offensive on Mosul, but he warned the effort could take time. ISIS, an agile enemy, has been preparing its defenses for two years. It takes advantage of the terrain, a network of tunnels and booby-trapped buildings, to great effect. US military officials estimate some 3,000 to 5,000 ISIS fighters are in Mosul. An additional 1,500 to 2,000 fighters may be waiting outside the city limits.

Its always sad when these things happen because we are humans at the end of the day. I feel like civilians for the most part are innocent and it doesn't make sense that people do this to compete innocent people. We must find a way to prevent these unnecessary  wars and fighting that leads to no proper solution to problems


Family loses home and two pets in D.C. fire —  A fire displaced a family of five and killed two cats inside their Northwest Washington rowhouse, D.C. fire and emergency services officials said. Firefighters were called to the two-story home in the 5000 block of Illinois Avenue NW about 1 p.m., said Vito Maggiolo, a fire department spokesman. All the residents escaped without injury, but two family pets did not. The Red Cross was notified to help two adults and three children who cannot reenter the home due to fire damage, officials said. The cause of the fire is under investigation.

the fact that the pets died is heart breaking. I can't imagine that the pets died and to be honest it was quite depressing. The fact that the pets are gone means they have lost a lot of valuable memoires with them. I feel like when you lose someone like this it is quite hard to get over it one can only pray and hope they find relief.


Myanmar 'child slavery' outrage sparks investigation —  The Burmese president has ordered an investigation into the case of two girls who say they were kept prisoner and tortured for five years in a tailor shop. The teenagers were freed last week after a journalist helped them, but their families say that the police had on numerous occasions refused their pleas to get involved. This Wednesday, with the case now generating headlines, the police finally arrested the tailor and two family members. The two girls were aged just 11 and 12 when they were sent by their parents to the commercial capital Yangon. For poor Burmese families it's a painful but depressingly common decision. The United Nations estimates that at least a million Burmese children are forced to give up on education and go to work. These girls became maids in a tailor shop in the centre of Yangon. But what started as paid work allegedly turned into modern-day slavery. The girls say they were denied contact with their parents, were unable to leave and were no longer being paid. Then there was the abuse. Visited by the French news agency AFP in their village after their release, the girls had injuries and scars on their arms which they say were inflicted by their captors. "I have a scar from where an iron was stamped on my leg and a scar on my head as well," one of the girls, now 16, told AFP. "This was a wound from a knife, because my cooking was not OK," she said, showing a mark on her nose. The other girl, now 17, has burnt, twisted fingers - the consequence, she says, of them being broken deliberately by her captors as punishment. The allegations of mistreatment are shocking, but it's the authorities handling of the case that has really enraged the Burmese public. Many see it as further proof of a judicial system stacked against the poorest and most vulnerable. On several occasions over the last five years, the girls' families say they asked the Burmese police for help and were turned away. It was only when a journalist called Swe Win became involved that things started to move. He approached the police, who again refused to help, before taking the matter to the national human rights commission. To its credit, the commission did act, negotiating with the tailor for the girls' release and for a payment equivalent to about 4,000 dollars (£3060) to be made, effectively as back-pay. But there was public outcry when it emerged that no further measures were taken against the girls' alleged abusers. "We figured at the time that we could solve the case satisfactorily to all parties involved with a compensation settlement," U Zaw Win, a member of the Myanmar National Human Rights Commission told an angry news conference in Yangon. With the girls' story now front page news and reverberating around social media, the Burmese police were finally spurred into action. On Wednesday evening the tailor was arrested, along with her two adult children. They all now face charges related to human trafficking. Questions are now being asked as to why it took so long for the authorities to get involved. In a rare public intervention, President Htin Kyaw released a statement. He said he had instructed the relevant ministries to assist and protect the girls, their families and the journalist Swe Win from possible reprisals. The president has also asked for a report on how the police handled the case and said he would be taking a close look at the work of the human rights commission. Swe Win is receiving a presidential award for his work on the case.

This is just disgusting and makes me really doubt us as human beings. The fact that children are exposed to this really makes me doubt who we are as a people. I understand it is in Myanmar and not in the states but that should not mean anything and we should still be able to help these innocent children.


Study reveals why seabirds eat plastic in the ocean —  The human sense of smell is important. It alerts us to different dangers including spoiled food, poison, fire, and so on. But other species on this planet have no sense of smell like humans have. In fact, a new research revealed that the sense of smell of seabirds, which they use to hunt for food, have put them in danger. Not surprisingly, humans ARE to blame.   Published last week in the PNAS, or the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers said that ninety percent of seabirds eat plastic flowing in oceans. By 2050, the team revealed that virtually all seabirds will be eating it.   So the question now is why do seabirds eat plastic?   The paper said plastic in the ocean emit the scent of a sulfurous compound which seabirds have relied upon for thousands of years. It tells them where to hunt for food.   In other words, the compound trick them into confusing marine plastic with food.   Lead researcher Matthew Savoca said–via the UC Davis website–that in order to understand the problem, we have to think about how animals look for food.   Researchers learned what plastic in the ocean smell like by putting beads–made of the three most common types of plastic beads–into the ocean at Monterey Bay and Bodega Bay in California. They placed it in mesh bags to protect the species there, and tied them to an ocean buoy before collecting them about three weeks later.   Then, the team brought the beads to UC Davis Department of Viticulture and Enology where scientists are often found analyzing wine chemistry. Using the chemical analyzer provided by food-and-wine chemist Susan Ebeler, the research team confirmed that the beads emit the sulfur compound dimethyl sulfide, or DMS, a chemical cue released by algae, which coats floating plastic.   Co-author and UC Davis professor Gabrielle Nevitt had previously established that the said compound triggers seabirds to search for food. DMS is released when algae is eaten by animals (like crustaceans). So while the algae doesn’t smell like food itself, it does emit the scent of food being eaten which works like a dinner bell of the birds.   The paper also revealed that birds that track the scent of the compound to look for food are about six times more likely to consume plastic than those that don’t.   Professor Nevitt said their research gives spotlight to species that don’t receive a lot of attention, like petrels and species of shearwaters, which are impacted by plastic ingestion. These species, she added, are hard to study as they nest in underground burrows. So they’re often overlooked.   Apart from that, the study could open the door to new steps to address the growing plastic pollution in oceans which not only plague the seabirds, but also sea turtles, fish and other marine animals.   Apparently, the problem starts on land. According to NOAA, one of the biggest sources of ocean pollution is called nonpoint source pollution which occurs as a result of runoff. It includes many small sources like boats, septic tanks, cars, etc, and larger sources like farms, forest areas, etc.   A study published last year said that the top five countries that dump plastics into oceans are China, Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia and Thailand. It projected that by 2025, plastic consumption in the region will increase by eighty percent.

IT angers me that we put out that plastic in the ocean for these animals in the first place. These animals do not know any better and we need to fi nd ways to improve these conditions I feel like anything other than changing the way we recycle is just not enough. Especially in these times that global warming is prevalent!


Wind turbines killing more than just local birds —  Wind turbines are known to kill large birds, such as golden eagles, that live nearby. Now there is evidence that birds from up to hundreds of miles away make up a significant portion of the raptors that are killed at these wind energy fields. Using DNA from tissue and stable isotopes from the feathers of golden eagle carcasses, researchers from Purdue University and the U.S. Geological Survey found that golden eagles killed at the Altamont Pass Wind Resource Area in northern California can come from hundreds of miles away. Golden eagles are a species of conservation concern, so understanding population-level differences and how individuals interact with turbines is key to meeting a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service target of no net loss to their populations. The APWRA is one of the oldest wind farms in the country and one of the largest in the world originally with around 5,000 turbines. Worldwide, such facilities have been responsible for the deaths of 140,000 to 328,000 birds and 500,000 to 1.6 million bats, raising questions about their effects on population sustainability. "Eagles tend to use that habitat around the turbines. It's windy there, so they can save energy and soar, and their preferred prey, California ground squirrels, is abundant there," said J. Andrew DeWoody, a Purdue professor of genetics in the Department of Forestry and Natural Resources. "As they soar, these eagles are often looking straight down, and they fail to see the rapidly moving turbine blades. They get hit by the blades, and carcasses are found on the ground under the turbines." Collaborator David Nelson, a stable isotope ecologist with the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, tested the birds' feathers for stable hydrogen isotopes, which can be used to determine where the birds likely grew their feathers. The research team determined that about 75 percent of the 62 birds were from the local population. The remaining 25 percent likely migrated into the area before they were killed. Isotopes are atoms of an element that have different molecular weights. As precipitation moves inland, water with the heavier form of hydrogen falls out first, which creates predictable patterns of the stable isotopes ratios of precipitation across continents. "When a bird drinks water or eats animals in a particular place, the hydrogen isotope ratios of precipitation in that area get recorded in its tissues," Nelson said. "You can use these hydrogen ratios in the feathers to determine the approximate place that the bird grew its feathers." A genetic analysis revealed that golden eagles from the western U.S. have gene pools similar to those killed at the APWRA, which reflects the capacity of these birds to disperse widely. "The population models we built confirm that the age structure of the eagles killed at Altamont is difficult to replicate without substantial immigration," said co-author Todd Katzner, a wildlife biologist with the USGS. Katzner said these findings suggest that environmental assessments of alternative energy facilities like Altamont Pass should take into consideration that animal populations affected by wind turbines might not be just local. "If you only consider local birds in an environmental assessment, you're not really evaluating the effect that facility may have on the entire population," Katzner said. DeWoody said that wind energy generators can receive permits that allow a certain number of unintended bird deaths. But if that number is too large, the companies could be fined. And knowing that a large percentage of the birds killed are from neighboring states could muddy the management waters. "The golden eagle fatalities at this one site have demonstrated consequences that extend across much of the range of the species across North America," DeWoody said. The golden eagle population is a concern for several state and federal agencies, DeWoody added. He said future research could include looking at more bird species affected by turbines.

I think its really sad we need to do something these animals are precious and do not deserve to be killed off not only unknowingly but also so scary. Imagine flying like a free bird and all of a sudden facing a sudden death at the hands of these wind turbines. That is something just scary overall to be quite honest.


Man Is Shot in Charlotte as Unrest Stretches to Second Night —  A second night of protests set off by the police killing of a black man spiraled into chaos and violence after nightfall here Wednesday when a demonstration was interrupted by gunfire that gravely wounded a man in the crowd. Law enforcement authorities fired tear gas in a desperate bid to restore order. The city said on its Twitter account that the unidentified man was on life support after what officials said was a “civilian on civilian” confrontation. The authorities provided no further details. Charlotte officials had said earlier that the man had been killed in the unrest. The Police Department reported that four officers had injuries that were not life-threatening. Gov. Pat McCrory’s office said late Wednesday that he had declared an emergency and had “initiated efforts” to deploy the National Guard and the state Highway Patrol. The shooting heightened the tension among the demonstrators and the police alike. City officials were quick to say the police had not fired any live rounds, but riot police personnel did fire repeated rounds of tear gas. The scene of the shooting and the largest demonstration of the evening happened along a crowded street in Charlotte’s city center, where the sound of gunfire mixed with the noise of people banging objects into vehicles. The gunshot victim lay motionless on the ground, his eyes open, as people surrounded him and blood pooled among their feet. He was taken into the nearby Omni Hotel, and a series of confrontations played out afterward as the police kept people from entering. There was sporadic looting. Twitter messages showed that the team store of the Charlotte Hornets of the N.B.A. had been broken into and gutted of merchandise. “We are working very hard to bring peace and calm back to our city,” Mayor Jennifer Roberts said on CNN. A spokesman for Ms. Roberts said she had requested and planned to review on Thursday a police dashboard video of the encounter with Keith L. Scott, the black man who was shot and killed here on Tuesday. But she said she would not make the video public. Around 10 p.m., the police ordered all civilians, including members of the news media, to leave parts of the Uptown neighborhood and threatened to arrest those who did not comply. When the crowd did not respond immediately, the authorities fired more tear gas within minutes. After that, it appeared that the crowd started to disperse, although some stragglers remained in the area. The unrest in Charlotte came after two other police-involved deadly shootings in the last week. First came the shooting of a teenager in Columbus, Ohio, who had been brandishing a BB gun. Two days later, on Friday, was the shooting death in Tulsa, Okla., of a man who had his hands above his head before an officer opened fire. And then it was Charlotte, where Mr. Scott, 43, black like the other two, was shot by a police officer in a parking space marked “Visitor” outside an unremarkable apartment complex. On Wednesday that parking space was both a shooting site and a shrine, and Charlotte was a city on edge, the latest to play a role in what feels like a recurring, seemingly inescapable tape loop of American tragedy. “To see this happen multiple times — just time after time — it’s depressing, man,” said Tom Jackson, 25, who works with mentally disabled people. He didn’t know Mr. Scott but was drawn here nonetheless, one of many strangers and friends who came to pay their respects and make sense of their sorrow. In addition to the fatal attacks on police officers in Baton Rouge and Dallas, it was another grim snapshot of America’s continuing crisis in black and blue, this moment amplified by presidential politics. And as usual, there was very little consensus on what went wrong and how to fix it. At a news conference on Wednesday, Kerr Putney, chief of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg police, said officers had found the gun that the police said Mr. Scott had brandished before an officer, who is also black, fatally shot him and were examining police video of the encounter that unfolded as Mr. Scott stepped out of a car. Family members of Mr. Scott have said that he was unarmed and was holding only a book. Chief Putney said Wednesday morning, “We did not find a book.” The response of B. J. Murphy, an African-American activist here, could not have been more different: “Everybody in Charlotte should be on notice that black people, today, we’re tired of this,” he said, adding an epithet. “We’re tired of being killed and nobody saying nothing. We’re tired of our political leaders going along to get along; they’re so weak, they don’t have no sympathy for our grief. And we want justice.” All three shootings are under investigation, and are rife with questions. The police in Columbus said that the BB gun wielded by 13-year-old Tyre King was built to look nearly identical to a Smith & Wesson Military & Police semiautomatic pistol. Mayor Andrew J. Ginther blamed the shooting, in part, on Americans’ “easy access to guns, whether they are firearms or replicas.” In Tulsa, the police said investigators found the drug PCP in the shooting victim’s S.U.V. The drug is known to induce erratic behavior in some users. But Mr. Crump, who is representing the family of the victim, Terence Crutcher, said the discovery of the drug, if true, would not justify the deadly shooting. In an interview on Wednesday, Mr. Crutcher’s father, the Rev. Joey Crutcher, said his son had marched in protest of earlier police killings and had thought about how to protect himself during interactions with police officers. They had planned to go to a church event aimed at teaching people how behave around the police and avoid becoming another hashtag shared on social media by Black Lives Matter protesters. “I never thought this would happen to my family,” Mr. Crutcher said, adding that he had counseled his son all his life about how to behave around the police. “I said, ‘Whenever you’re stopped by a police and you’re in that situation, raise your hands up, always let them see your hands, let them see that you are not going for a gun.’ And that is what Terence was doing. I said, ‘Always put your hands on your car.’ I made that specific, ‘your car.’ And that’s what Terence was walking to do on his car so that they could see his hands.” John Barnett, a civil rights activist in Charlotte, said during a raucous news conference near the site of the shooting that Mr. Scott had been waiting for his son to arrive home from school. “The truth of the matter is, he didn’t point that gun,” Mr. Barnett said. “Did he intend to really sit in a vehicle, waiting on his son to get home from school and then plot to shoot a cop if they pulled up on him?” Adding to an atmosphere loaded with suspicion and mistrust, residents of the apartment complex gave varying accounts of Mr. Scott’s death. Some differed from the police on which officer fired the shots, and others said that no one had tried to administer CPR for Mr. Scott as officials had said. Brentley Vinson, the officer who the police say shot Mr. Scott, is black, as is the police chief. “Since black lives do not matter for this city, then our black dollars should not matter,” said Mr. Murphy, the activist. “We’re watching a modern-day lynching on social media, on television and it is affecting the psyche of black people.” Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch said Wednesday that the Justice Department “is aware of, and we are assessing, the incident that led to the death of Keith Lamont Scott in Charlotte.” Responding to another police shooting, the state’s attorney in Baltimore County, Md., Scott D. Shellenberger, announced Wednesday that no charges would be filed against any of the officers involved in the Aug. 1 shooting death of Korryn Gaines or the shooting of her 5-year-old son. In Charlotte, Rakeyia Scott, Mr. Scott’s wife, said on Wednesday the family was “devastated” by the shooting. She described her husband as “a loving husband, father, brother and friend” and called on protesters to remain peaceful. At a campaign rally in Orlando, Fla., Hillary Clinton spoke about the shootings here and in Tulsa. “There is still much we don’t know about what happened in both incidents, but we do know that we have two more names to add to a list of African-Americans killed by police officers in these encounters,’’ she said. “It’s unbearable, and it needs to become intolerable. We also saw the targeting of police officers in Philadelphia last week. And last night in Charlotte, 12 officers were injured in demonstrations following Keith Scott’s death. Every day police officers are serving with courage, honor and skill.” Her Republican rival, Donald J. Trump, reacted on Twitter. “Hopefully the violence & unrest in Charlotte will come to an immediate end,” he wrote. “To those injured, get well soon. We need unity & leadership.” Unity, thus far, has been in short supply. On Friday, Mr. Trump earned the endorsement of the Fraternal Order of Police. But polls show that his support among African-Americans is negligible, even though he has singled them out in promising to solve the ills of poverty and violence that he has characterized as plaguing black neighborhoods. On Wednesday, Mr. Jackson, the man who came here to mourn, was not thinking about the current presidential candidates. The police, he said, “are out here killing people, and they don’t even know their backgrounds,” he said. “They could be killing the next president.”

The violence due to guns in this co0untry is becoming way too prevalent. We must do something to fix it but the republicans seem to be too much into gun control. I feel like that is the downside of things. There needs to be a better dialogue between both parties because too many people are dying at the hands of guns.


Paris attacks: A year of grief, anger and change —  Lanterns, candles and calls for peace illuminated the City of Light on Sunday as Paris mourned 130 people killed one year ago in attacks throughout the city.   November 13, 2015, was like any other day for Georges Salines: Work, a lunchtime swim with his daughter Lola, watching the news on TV, and an early night. He had no idea, until the phone rang, jolting him from his sleep, that his world was about to change forever. "I went to bed ... without knowing what was going on in the streets of Paris," he recalls. "I was woken up by a phone call in the middle of the night, from my eldest son, who knew that his sister was at the Bataclan." Salines' 29-year-old daughter, Lola, had gone to a concert at the Bataclan by US rock band the Eagles of Death Metal. Midway through the show, ISIS-linked gunmen opened fire on the audience and detonated suicide vests; 90 people were killed in the raid, one of a series of coordinated attacks across Paris. Unable to reach her, the family spent hours trying to find out what had happened to Lola, calling emergency help lines and hospitals, even the morgue, but nobody could tell them if she was alive. Then the worst news, delivered in the worst way: They discovered via social media that she had been killed. "I hope she didn't suffer or see her death coming," her father says. French President Francois Hollande unveiled plaques at attack sites in the city -- at the Stade de France, outside the Petit Cambodge restaurant, in the Boulevard Voltaire, and at the Bonne Biere and Belle Equipe cafes. At the Bataclan, the President tore down a French flag to reveal the memorial, as the names of all 90 who perished there were read aloud in solemn ceremony. It followed an emotional performance on Saturday night by musician Sting, a fundraiser for victim support charities at the newly opened Bataclan. He began with the words: "We shall not forget them." The much-loved venue has been renovated to remove all traces of the massacre that took place there. On Sunday, Prime Minister Manuel Valls said a state of emergency, first imposed in the immediate aftermath of the attacks, will likely be extended. With the country's presidential elections coming in April-May, the prime minister said the government needs to retain the extra powers delegated by emergency laws "to protect our democracy."   Denys Plaud was also at the Bataclan on the night of the attacks. He credits his survival to the fact that, when the attackers burst in, he was up on the balcony where there was more room to move to the music. "I love to dance, and that saved my life," he told CNN days after his escape from the Bataclan. "It meant I was not in the direct line of fire from the terrorists' machine guns." Plaud hid in a tiny room at the venue with 15 others; they waited as the gunmen got closer and closer, even shooting at the partition that sheltered them: "I thought, 'Oh my God, I hope that wall will stand.'" "For three hours, we had to listen to the shooting," he remembers. "That was terrible. Every time we thought it would end, it was just time for the terrorists to get their weapons reloaded, and then they would shoot again." Eventually, the police arrived and led them to safety across what Plaud calls "the bloody battlefield," urging them not to look at the bodies of their fellow music fans. "But ... it was not a direct path, I had to look where I was putting my feet. ... There was no way but to look at death." A year on, he says, the memories are "very fresh ... it's just like it was yesterday." By late morning Sunday, the first flowers to remember victims were placed among the autumn leaves at the Place de la République, which became the center of the city's mourning and expressions of national unity after the attacks. For many Parisians, it is an opportunity to begin getting on with life. The year since the attacks has been filled with shock, grief and mourning -- for the relatives of the dead, for those who survived, and for France as a whole: The nation was left traumatized. Extra police and troops have been on the streets of France since January 2015, when terrorists attacked the offices of satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, killing 12 people: Armed officers now patrol outside tourist hot spots, schools, government and religious buildings. Operation Sentinel has seen the mobilization of 10,000 soldiers to monitor and protect more than 11,000 locations across the country -- 3,000 of them religious sites, the rest a mixture of key infrastructure, industrial plants and "symbolic" places around the country. And despite all the extra security on the streets, what happened in January and November 2015 -- and other incidents that followed in 2016, in Nice, Rouen and Magnanville -- have impacted the country's morale. Plaud says Paris itself was left "in shock." Anger at these events has been linked to a steep rise in xenophobia; according to the National Commission on Human Rights, or CCNDH, there were 429 reports of attacks on, and threats against, Muslims in France in 2015 -- a rise of 223% on the previous year. This "wave of aggression against Muslims" ranged from assaults on women wearing the hijab to graffiti on places of worship and halal butcher shops. In one incident, the door handle of a mosque was wrapped in bacon. The CCNDH says the majority happened in January and November. The attacks have also damaged France's prized tourism industry: Almost 2 million fewer visitors have come to the country over the past year -- international arrivals are down 8.1% so far in 2016. But Plaud says the country has seen troubled times before, and is sure to bounce back: "I am confident; in Parisian history there have been a lot of events like that -- war, civil war. But Paris has always been able to recover." #ParisResiste Balloons were released into the skies over Paris, and as darkness fell, thousands of lanterns were floated on the waters of the Canal St. Martin, close to the scene of several of the attacks. A social media campaign, #ParisResiste called on people to display lighted candles in the windows of their homes on Sunday evening, to "light up the city" and "brighten the future." Salines concedes the day will be a difficult one for many: "Some families have chosen to take a vacation and go abroad even, because there will be a lot of media attention and there will be a lot of archive footage of last year -- I'm sure it will be painful to see these images again." Plaud suffered flashbacks in the months after the attack that forced him to give up his job as a math and physics tutor, but says he is gradually recovering. This week he returned to the Bataclan for the first time. "I want[ed] to come back to pay my last homage to the victims and people who died there," he says. "It is important even if it is very strong, emotionally, to be here." Both Plaud and Salines say putting pen to paper has helped them through the past 12 months. "I wanted to write in order not to forget," Salines says. "The writing helped me, because it was the only way in the first days that I could think about what had happened ... not without pain, but being able to stay calm and to keep some distance between the pain and my thinking." The idea for his book, "The unspeakable, from A to Z" came, he says, from "the messages I received from friends and family -- lots of them started with the words, 'this is unspeakable,' 'we don't know what to say,' 'there are no words.' They had no words but I had lots! I started to make a list of words and ... little by little it grew and it grew into a book." He says the dictionary-like form his writings took helped reflect the rapidly changing emotions he experienced in the weeks and months after Lola's death. "It was very close to what I was experiencing in terms of the shift between very different moods, even happening all at the same time, within a few minutes, from crying to laughing. When you read you go from one word to another, from emotional feelings ... to very funny." The first entry in the book: A is for absurd. "Because Lola, and I am sure all the other young people who lost their lives that day, were total strangers to the situation, the fight that the terrorists have and it is profoundly unjust." For Plaud, revisiting his experiences to write about them "was very difficult [but] it was therapeutic." "It was a way to exorcise the demons and all the horror I saw that night. It was dangerous because sometimes I had to go deep inside my memories of death." 'Grieving never ends' "The grieving never ends," says Salines. "I am at a stage now where I know that things are relatively stable -- the pain will probably last for the rest of my life but I don't break down in tears three times a day as I was doing at the beginning." Salines is sustained by his work as chairman of one of the support groups for those affected by the events of November 13, and by his memories of Lola. "Her life was maybe short, but it was a full life, full of happiness," he says. A publisher of children's and young adult books, Lola loved to travel and had a passion for roller derby. "She had incredible energy. We didn't know how she could do so many things in a day." "She did a lot of good things in her life, she had a great deal of pleasure, she was very enthusiastic," he says. "She had a good life. Writing about it was maybe a way of convincing myself, but I feel pretty confident that my daughter's life was a good life." Plaud says for him, the time has come to move on. "It's been one year now and I feel like it's the end of my mourning." "It is a good thing that life has come back again," he says. "We have to keep the memory, but you also [must] not be stuck in that horror, [you must] keep on living."

I think what happens is just too sad. Anytime attacks like these are done on innocent people you can't help but try and think of ways you can prevent this. Paris is such a long historic place too and  to have these attacks happen there really makes you wonder if there is any place that is safe. That is the truth.