First Guard troops arrive on border
HIDALGO, Texas – The first wave of National Guard troops has taken up observation posts along the Texas-Mexico border.
Texas National Guard Master Sgt. Ken Walker of the Joint Counterdrug Task Force says “several dozen” soldiers deployed in the Rio Grande Valley are part of the up to 1,000 troops called up by Gov. Rick Perry last month.
Several guardsmen were seen Thursday afternoon manning an observation tower along the busy road leading to the Hidalgo International Bridge.
U.S. to expand aid to Iraqi refugees
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama on Thursday promised to expand U.S. humanitarian relief to Iraqis threatened by the advancing army of the Islamic State militants. He took credit for alleviating the genocide threat to thousands trapped on a mountaintop but said the situation “remains dire” throughout the country.
Obama also said U.S. airstrikes would continue to protect Americans and U.S. facilities in Iraq, and he said Washington has increased its delivery of military assistance to Iraqi and Kurdish forces fighting the Islamic State.
But he gave no indication he intends to shift from the limited, defensive military campaign he announced last week..
Study links melting of glaciers to man
WASHINGTON – More than two-thirds of the recent rapid melting of the world’s glaciers can be blamed on humans, a new study finds.
Scientists looking at glacier melt since 1851 didn’t see a human fingerprint until about the middle of the 20th century. Even then, only one-quarter of the warming wasn’t from natural causes.
But since 1991, about 69 percent of the rapidly increasing melt was man-made, said Ben Marzeion, a climate scientist at the University of Innsbruck in Austria.
“Glaciers are really shrinking rapidly now,” he said. “I think it’s fair to say most of it is man-made.”
Scientists fault global warming from the burning of coal, oil and gas as well as changes in land use near glaciers and soot pollution.
Palestinian officials hint at possible deal
CAIRO – Palestinian officials voiced cautious optimism Thursday, hinting at progress in Egyptian-mediated negotiations with Israel to bring an end to the fighting in Gaza and secure new arrangements for the war-battered territory.
But with the sides’ demands still seemingly irreconcilable, that optimism may be premature and a deal not so close in the making.
Israel and Hamas are observing a five-day cease-fire which began at midnight Wednesday.
“The war is now behind us, and the chances for an agreement on a lasting cease-fire are encouraging,” Ziad al-Nakhaleh, deputy leader of the Islamic Jihad militant group, told The Associated Press.
Associated Press
