For all its beauty, Android’s openness is the reason why manufacturers and carriers are able to make their own tweaks to the OS. Some companies go as far as completely forking the platform, and we know how terrible that can be — though there are…
GAZA/JERUSALEM, July 20 (Reuters) – At least 40 Palestinians were killed on Sunday by Israeli shelling in a Gaza neighborhood, where bodies were strewn in the street and thousands fled toward a hospital packed with wounded, witnesses and health officials said.
The mass casualties in the Shejaia district in northeast Gaza were the heaviest since Israel launched its offensive on the Palestinian territory on July 8 after cross-border rocket strikes by militants intensified.
Anguished cries of “Did you see Ahmed?” “Did you see my wife?” echoed through the courtyard of Gaza’s Shifa hospital, where panicked residents of Shejaia gathered in family groups, while inside bodies and wounded lay on blood-stained floors.
Video given to Reuters by a local showed at least a dozen mangled corpses, including three children, lying in the rubble-filled streets.
At the hospital, about 3 km (2 miles away), elderly men said the Israeli attack was the fiercest they had seen since the 1967 Middle East war, when Israel captured Gaza.
“Forty martyrs have been counted so far … medics are searching for possibly more casualties,” Naser Tattar, Shifa hospital’s director, told Reuters. He said some 400 people were wounded in the Israeli attack.
Thousands fled Shejaia, some by foot and others piling into the backs of trucks and sitting on the hoods of cars filled with families trying to get away.
Asked about the attack, an Israeli military spokeswoman said: “Two days ago, residents of Shejaia received recorded messages to evacuate the area in order to protect their lives.”
There were no signs of a diplomatic breakthrough toward a ceasefire, and militants kept up their rocket fire on Israel. Sirens sounded in southern Israeli towns and in the Tel Aviv metropolitan area. There were no reports of casualties.
Hamas, the dominant armed group in the Gaza Strip, had urged people across the territory not to heed the Israeli warnings and abandon their homes.
As the tank shells began to land, Shejaia residents called radio stations pleading for evacuation. An air strike on the Shejaia home of Khalil al-Hayya, a senior Hamas official, killed his son, daughter-in-law and two grandchildren, hospital officials said.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned “the new massacre committed by the Israeli government in Shejaia”, a spokesman for the Western-backed leader said.
Israel, which has accused Hamas of using civilians as human shields by launching rockets from residential areas, sent ground forces into the Gaza Strip on Thursday after 10 days of air, naval and artillery barrages failed to stop the salvoes.
The military said it beefed up its presence on Sunday, with a focus on destroying missile stockpiles and a vast tunnel system Hamas built along the frontier that crosses into Israel.
Gaza’s Health Ministry officials said at least 370 Palestinians, many of them civilians, have been killed in the 13-day conflict and about 2,600 have been wounded. On Israel’s side, two civilians were killed by cross-border fire and five soldiers died as fighting occurred at close quarters.
The United Nations Works and Relief Agency (UNRWA) said more than 63,000 people have now sought sanctuary in 55 of its shelters, mostly schools, in Gaza.
The army said that since the start of the ground offensive three days ago, it had killed more than 70 militants and that troops had discovered five tunnels running under the border. It said that since July 8, it had attacked 2,570 targets, describing them as “terror sites”.
TRUCE EFFORTS
Diplomatic efforts to secure a ceasefire involving, among others, Egypt, Qatar, France and the United Nations, have failed to make headway.
Qatar was due to host a meeting between Abbas and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Sunday, a senior Qatari source told Reuters. Ban was due during the week to travel to Kuwait, Egypt, Israel, the Palestinian Territories and Jordan, a U.N. statement said.
The Qatari source said Abbas was also due to meet Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal.
Western-backed Abbas in April struck a deal with Islamist Hamas that led to the formation of a Palestinian unity government, seven years after the group seized control of Gaza from Abbas’s Fatah party in a brief civil war.
Hamas has rejected Egyptian efforts to end fighting, saying any deal must include an end to a blockade of the coastal area and a recommitment to a ceasefire reached after an eight-day war in Gaza in 2012.
Egypt said on Saturday it had no plans to revise its ceasefire proposal. A Hamas source in Doha said the group has no plans to change its conditions for a ceasefire.
Hostilities between the two sides escalated following the killing last month of three Jewish students that Israel blames on Hamas. Hamas neither confirmed nor denied involvement.
The apparent revenge murder of a Palestinian youth in Jerusalem, for which Israel has charged three Israelis, further fueled tension.
Israel says more than 1,700 rockets have been fired out of Gaza during this month’s fighting, and between 3,000 and 4,000 destroyed in military strikes – together almost half of the militants’ original estimated arsenal.
Hamas says it is continuously replenishing its stock of weapons and is ready for a prolonged conflict.
The Israeli death toll has been kept low due to the rockets’ relative inaccuracy, a network of air-raid sirens and shelters and the Iron Dome rocket interceptor’s 90 percent success rate.
The Israeli military urged Palestinians to flee a growing area of Gaza ahead of further military action in the Mediterranean enclave. Residents say about half of the territory’s 1.8 million population have been told to move.
With the Israeli and Egyptian borders sealed off, Gazans say they have few places to escape to.
The largest U.N. agency in Gaza, UNRWA, said about 61,500 people had sought refuge in its buildings, mainly schools – more than in any previous conflict there between Israel and Islamist militants. (Additional reporting by Noah Browing in Gaza and Ari Rabinovitch in Jerusalem; Writing by Jeffrey Heller; Editing by Dale Hudson)
Celebs color their hair all shades of the rainbow (ahem, Nicole Richie), but we thought our eyes were playing tricks on us when we saw Rita Ora‘s new colorful hairdo.
The 23-year-old British singer made an appearance at Michalsky Style Night in Berlin sporting a purple, teal and blonde dip-dyed ponytail that reminded us of “My Little Pony.” The colorful tresses cascaded beautifully against her shoulder and added an unexpected pop to her all-black outfit.
Check out Ora’s 80’s-tastic hair below and see which other stars made this week’s best and worst beauty list.
BEST: Rita Ora
Isn’t this multicolored hairstyle rad? It almost deflects attention away from Ora’s gelled sideburns. But with her neutral makeup, we give it a thumbs up.
BEST: Debra Messing
“The Mysteries of Laura” star’s red hair looks really ravishing. Styled in big barrel curls, Messing’s hair frames her face perfectly and accentuates her peachy makeup and navy eyeliner.
BEST: Jessica Chastain
Chastain is a vision of summer with her full, copper bangs, metallic gold eyeshadow and coral lipstick. The twisted updo helps to showcase those gorgeous chandelier earrings.
BEST: America Ferrera
We’re getting pinup girl vibes from Ferrera with her glossy, side-swept waves, flirty eyelashes and red lips. Dewy skin helps to give this look a modern touch.
WORST: Kate Hudson
We’re huge fans of ’90s-inspired dark lipstick. However, this burgundy shade looks garish against Hudson’s super tanned skin.
WORST: Rose McGowan
McGowan barely looks recognizable with her jet black locks all pulled back. We wished she would’ve spent a bit more time carefully choosing the best wine lip color for her porcelain complexion and filling in her brows so that they don’t appear noticeably different.
WORST: Karina Smirnoff
The “Dancing With The Stars” professional has a lot going on with her over-plucked eyebrows, white eyeliner and melon red lipstick, which doesn’t flatter her bronzed skin.
WORST: Alexia Dox
This is a messy fishtail braid to the extreme! While her makeup isn’t entirely terrible, we just can’t stop staring at all the flyaways.
It’s probably time to just accept the fact that we can’t stop scrolling through Instagram this summer.
This week, we couldn’t take our eyes off our screens thanks to all the amazing arm (and hand) candy. Our favorite Insta-users have been killin’ it in the accessories department with layers of gold and silver jewelry. From chunky bracelets to stacked rings and watches, these photos prove that there is no such thing as too much bling.
Take some pointers from the photos we liked and remember: more is more.
‘Tis the season for oversized sunglasses, floppy hats and… suspenders?
Yes, you heard us right. This week, Hollywood kept us on our toes when it came to summer accessories. While many stars stepped out wearing classic warm-weather pieces like strappy shoes and statement clutches, others took a more adventurous route.
Whether you want to take a style risk this weekend or play if safe, you’ll find plenty of inspiration from our favorite accessories of the week.
Kate Bosworth’s Bionda Castana heels
These ladylike heels complement her floral dress perfectly.
Karolina Kourkova’s Giuseppe Zanotti purse and shoes
Nothing amps up a LBD like a pair of badass gold shoes and a matching clutch.
Nicole Richie’s Chanel suspenders
Suspenders may have you thinking of Steve Urkel, but not when they are Chanel and on Nicole Richie.
Heidi Klum’s sunglasses
Babe alert! These oversized sunglasses make Klum’s plain jeans and blazer outfit just fashion-forward enough.
Kate Hudson’s scarf
Scarves aren’t just for winter. In fact, a lightweight kerchief is perfect for summer and a little unexpected, so you can bet that you’ll stand out from the crowd.
Rachel Zoe’s hat
Zoe might look like she is dressed for fall, but who can blame her when she looks this good?
HRABOVE, Ukraine (AP) — Armed rebels forced emergency workers to hand over all 196 bodies recovered from the Malaysia Airlines crash site and then had them loaded onto refrigerated train cars bound for a rebel-held city, Ukrainian officials and monitors said Sunday.
The surprising, rapid-fire developments Sunday morning came after a wave of international outrage over how the bodies of plane crash victims were being handled and amid fears that the armed rebels who control the territory where the plane came down were tampering with the evidence. Ukraine and the separatists accuse each other of firing a surface-to-air missile Thursday at Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 as it flew from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur some 33,000 feet (10,000 meters) above the battlefields of eastern Ukraine. Both deny shooting down the plane. All those onboard the flight — 283 passengers and 15 crew — were killed.
Ukraine says Russia has been sending sophisticated arms to the rebels, a charge that Moscow denies.
The rebels have been strictly limiting the movements of international monitors and journalists at the crash site, which is near the Russian border, and Ukraine’s Emergency Ministry said its workers were laboring under duress, overseen by the armed rebels.
Associated Press journalists saw reeking bodies baking in the summer heat Saturday, piled into body bags by the side of the road or still sprawled where they landed in the verdant farmland in eastern Ukraine after their plane was shot out of the sky.
By Sunday morning, AP journalists saw no bodies and no armed rebels at the crash site. Emergency workers were searching the sprawling fields only for body parts.
It was immediately not clear Sunday if the rebels and the Ukrainian government were working together or at odds with each other on recovering the bodies — and from their comments, many of officials didn’t appear to know either. Separatists were not immediately available to comment.
Nataliya Khuruzhaya, a duty officer at the train station in Torez, 15 kilometers (9 miles) from the crash site, said she saw emergency workers loading plane victims’ bodies Sunday morning into five sealed, refrigerated train cars.
She said the train was scheduled to head to the town of Ilovaysk, 35 kilometers (22 miles) further east toward the Russian border, but no instructions had been given about when it would leave or any possible destinations beyond Ilovaysk.
Russian news agencies said the bodies were heading to the rebel stronghold of Donetsk. Ukrainian officials say they expected to have the bodies eventually delivered to government-held city of Kharkiv, but it’s unclear if the rebels will agree to do so.
The deputy of governor of the Kharkiv region, where the Ukrainian government has set up a crisis center to coordinate its response to the disaster, said the Ukrainian state railway company had provided the refrigerated train cars.
Earlier in the day, Ukrainian Emergency Ministry spokeswoman Nataliya Bystro said workers at the crash site were forced to hand over the 196 bodies they had recovered to the armed gunmen who controlled the territory.
“Where they took the bodies — we don’t know,” Bystro told The Associated Press, adding she had no information either about the other 102 victims’ bodies.
Michael Bociurkiw, a spokesman for monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, said some bodies have likely been incinerated without a trace.
“We’re looking at the field where the engines have come down. This was the area which was exposed to the most intense heat. We do not see any bodies here. It appears that some have been vaporized,” he told reporters in Kiev, speaking via phone from the crash site.
Alexander Pilyushny, an emergency worker combing the crash site for body parts Sunday morning, told the AP it took the rebels several hours cart away the bodies on Saturday. He said he and other workers had no choice but to hand over the bodies.
“They are armed and we are not,” Pilyushny said. “The militiamen came, put the bodies onto the trucks and took them away somewhere.”
Despite the restrictions seen by journalists and observers at the crash site, separatist leader Alexander Borodai insisted Saturday the rebels have not in any way interfered with the work of observers.
The U.S. has pointed blame for downing the plane at the separatists, saying Washington believes the jetliner was probably downed by an SA-11 missile from rebel-held territory and “we cannot rule out technical assistance from Russian personnel.”
An Associated Press journalist saw a Buk missile launcher in rebel-held territory close to the crash site Thursday just hours before the plane was brought down.
The latest U.S. intelligence assessment suggests that more than one missile system was given to the separatists by the Russians in the last week or so. But both Russia and the rebels vehemently deny any role in downing the plane.
In a blistering article for the Sunday Times, British Prime Minister David Cameron called the attack a “direct result of Russia destabilizing a sovereign state, violating its territorial integrity, backing thuggish militias and training and arming them.”
“We must turn this moment of outrage into a moment of action,” he wrote.
In a coded rebuke of German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other European leaders who have blocked efforts to impose tougher sanctions on Russian President Vladimir Putin for Russia’s actions in Ukraine, Cameron said Europe must now “respond robustly.”
“For too long, there has been a reluctance on the part of too many European countries to face up to the implications of what is happening in eastern Ukraine,” Cameron wrote.
Despite calls by world leaders for an independent, international investigation into the plane’s downing, armed separatists limited observers’ access to the crash site for the first few days.
The U.S. State Department described the rebels’ refusal to give monitors a full access to the site “an affront to all those who lost loved ones and to the dignity the victims deserve.”
Dutch Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans told the Ukrainian president in Kiev on Saturday that people in his country were shocked by reports of the bodies being dragged around the crash site.
“People are angry, are furious at what they hear,” Timmermans said, demanding that the culprits be found. “Once we have the proof, we will not stop until the people are brought to justice.”
Putin and Merkel agreed Saturday in a phone call that an independent commission led by the International Civil Aviation Organization should be granted swift access to the crash site.
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Peter Leonard in Kiev; Nataliya Vasilyeva in Moscow; Nicholas Garriga in Hrabove, Ukraine and Lolita C. Baldor in Washington contributed to this report.
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Peter Leonard in Kiev; Nataliya Vasilyeva in Moscow; Nicholas Garriga in Hrabove, Ukraine and Lolita C. Baldor in Washington contributed to this report.
WASHINGTON — “Southern women are different,” says Garden & Gun, the cheeky lifestyle magazine out of Charleston, S.C.
“They’re forever entangled in and infused by a miasma of mercy and cruelty, order and chaos, cornpone and cornball — a potent mix that leaves them wise, morbid, good-humored, God-fearing, outspoken and immutable.”
This year, they are also politically pivotal.
As candidates and voters, the women of the South could well be the Democrats’ last line of defense against Republicans hungering to retake the U.S. Senate in November.
In presidential years, the South is pretty much GOP territory. But in 2014, Democrats are in desperate need of help from four Southern states and the women running in them: Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes in Kentucky, Sen. Mary Landrieu in Louisiana, Sen. Kay Hagan in North Carolina and charity CEO Michelle Nunn in Georgia.
All but Hagan are members of deeply rooted political families in their respective states, and Hagan has acquired that aura through her unassuming charm and prodigious fundraising.
The consensus of public polls has each of the four neck and neck in her race. The overall Senate math is complex and ever-changing, but Democrats probably need Hagan and Landrieu to hold onto their seats and either Grimes or Nunn to win.
“We’re the ballgame,” said Grimes adviser Jonathan Hurst.
That the Southern Quartet is even in the ballgame is remarkable.
The national political environment heading into the fall is bleak for Democrats, especially in the deep red and dark pink states.
The recovery from the Great Recession is tepid; international events seem to be spinning out of control; the Affordable Care Act is working but not popular; and President Barack Obama’s job-approval number hovers around 40 percent — historically a danger sign for a president’s party.
That environment and the cyclical history of midterms lead the geek squad of algorithmic pundits to predict the GOP is likely to win the six seats it needs to take control of the Senate.
The four don’t run as a group, even though they have gotten some combined attention in the past year. But the mere fact that the Southern Democratic women are hanging on is worth noting, and it leads party strategists to look for ways to boost grass-roots turnout — especially among women — to allow them to hang on though November.
Democrats have no choice but to try to get it done the hard way.
With ample campaign funds, Democrats not only are planning their largest TV campaign but are putting more emphasis than ever on social media, voter registration and get-out-the-vote efforts.
“We’re spending at least a third of our money on organization,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said in a small briefing last week. “I don’t think that TV has the bang for its buck that it used to.”
Reid is also using the floor of the Senate as a stage to highlight issues of special relevance to the party’s base, and especially to women.
For example, Reid used his power to control the floor to try to get a vote on a bill to reverse the U.S. Supreme Court’s Hobby Lobby contraception decision. The bill was filibustered, but Democrats were able to make their point.
The women’s vote is so important that some of these senators have taken the risk of collateral political damage to target it. Grimes recently welcomed Elizabeth Warren to Kentucky, despite the Massachusetts senator’s record of raising environmental concerns about reliance on coal.
Close-to-home issues such as education, health care and pay equity are key, said Grimes pollster Mark Mellman.
“Women voters are of course central,” he said, “but those issues aren’t just ‘women’s issues.’ Pay equity is a concern for everyone, especially men and women in two-income families.”
The four are navigating tricky territory, however, especially in the South, where the name “Barack Obama” is an epithet to some.
They avoid mentioning let alone praising the Affordable Care Act, even less so “Obamacare,” and tout the ways they have disagreed with it or tried to change it to suit local conditions.
In Kentucky, Grimes has left prideful talk about the program to the state’s popular Democratic governor, Steve Beshear.
Though Nunn and Grimes come from political families (the former’s dad was a senator; the latter’s was state party chairman), they have a double advantage: They are not incumbents and by definition they aren’t part of an “old boy network.”
At a time of sulfurous disgust with Washington, the Congress and old-line establishments of all sorts, being a woman is an advantage.
In Louisiana, Landrieu has long since built a brand of conservative Democratic independence, thanks in part to the pro-business reign of her father when he was mayor of New Orleans.
In Kentucky, Democrats have had some success framing the race as a referendum on the ultimate GOP insider, Sen. Mitch McConnell.
“Team Mitch” has yet to find a way to discombobulate Grimes, a young good ol’ gal who rides horses, is handy with a rifle and is raising record amounts of money.
McConnell’s handlers claim not to be worried, even as they plan to spend record amounts on what could be the most expensive Senate race ever. (Grimes is matching Mitch in the money department.)
They say they think Obama’s deep unpopularity in the state (and that of “Obamacare”), coupled with the “anti-coal” environmental positions of D.C. Democrats, will be enough.
McConnell adviser Jesse Benton says he has numbers that show the Affordable Care Act is unpopular even with urban women in Louisville and elsewhere in Kentucky.
We shall see — and that could be the ballgame.
LOS ANGELES, July 20 (Reuters) – Actor James Garner, best known for his prime-time television roles as the wisecracking frontier gambler on “Maverick” and as an ex-con turned private eye on “The Rockford Files,” has died at age 86, the celebrity news website TMZ reported on Sunday.
Garner, who built a six-decade career playing ruggedly charming, good-natured anti-heroes and received the highest honor of the Screen Actors Guild in 2004, was found dead on Saturday evening by ambulance personnel sent to his Los Angeles home, TMZ said, citing unnamed law enforcement sources.
There was no immediate word on the cause or circumstances of his death, TMZ reported.
(Reporting by Steve Gorman; Editing by Alison Williams)
High-speed photography can be daunting if you’re not a seasoned pro. You may have a fast camera and flash, but you probably don’t have the gear (or people) you’d need to get that frozen-in-time look in most situations. MIOPS’ new camera trigger might…
Before I heard the following quote I never realized there was such a thing as “winged hope.”
“Faith is a bird that feels dawn breaking, and sings while it is still dark.”
After my friend, Lynn, shared this quote with me, she began an uplifting story. Her son was caught smoking marijuana, and when her husband heard the news, he knew just what to do.
Her husband, who struggles with substance abuse, took their son on a long walk. When they returned, they both had tears in their eyes.
Lynn’s husband assured their son there are other ways to deal with worries. Smoking pot is not the right path to take.
Lynn told her husband his wisdom was golden.
She believes that incident with her son is a blessing. It may be just the impetus her husband needs to steer clear of alcohol completely, and be a strong role model to their son.
After telling me the story, Lynn smiled. Her smile lit up her face so brightly, it left her with ruddy cheeks.
Lynn is hopeful. She is that bird that feels the dawn breaking.
To learn more about our one-minute blog, watch our video at www.gratitudereport.com.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
