The volume of aid delivered to Gaza has collapsed in recent weeks as Israeli airstrikes have targeted police officers who guard the convoys, U.N. officials say, exposing them to looting by criminal gangs and desperate civilians.

After a string of Israeli attacks on members of Gaza’s Hamas-run civilian police force, officers withdrew earlier this month from the Palestinian side of the Kerem Shalom crossing with Israel. Since they left, trucks have been attacked in the crossing’s holding area, according to U.N. humanitarian coordinator James McGoldrick. Drivers have been shot at, attacked with axes and box cutters, and had their windows smashed, he said.

Humanitarian officials said police have also stopped serving as security guards for aid convoys, paralyzing deliveries in the enclave, where some hungry families have resorted to eating weeds and animal feed and profiteers are selling stolen food at astronomical rates on the black market.

“With the departure of police escorts it has been virtually impossible for the U.N. or anyone else ... to safely move assistance in Gaza because of criminal gangs,” U.S. Ambassador David Satterfield, appointed by President Biden to coordinate humanitarian aid to Gaza, said Friday.

Satterfield said Israeli forces had killed as many as nine Palestinian police officers involved in protecting aid convoys, including a commander. Police include “Hamas elements” he said, but also people who are politically unaffiliated and remnants of Palestinian Authority forces.

Three police officers were killed by an Israeli airstrike in Rafah on Feb. 10, according to Rafah governorate police and eyewitnesses, as they were driving to monitor the distribution of food aid in Tal al-Sultan, west of Rafah.

Researchers say that parents are tortured for information and forced to work in prison camps while their children are sent elsewhere — first to occupied territories like Donetsk and Luhansk, and then to Russia or Belarus.

Entire families have also been forcibly deported, Kyiv says, telling the United Nations in December 2022 that more than 2.5 million Ukrainians of all ages were deported in the initial months of Russia’s invasion.

[Edit typo.]

The 25-year-old college senior was told she likely had an ectopic pregnancy, a highly dangerous condition where the embryo implants outside of the uterus. Without immediate treatment, the fallopian tube can rupture — and the patient can die.

The law that has prohibited abortions in Texas since Roe v. Wade was overturned now explicitly allows doctors to treat ectopic pregnancies. But when doctors at Texas Health Arlington Memorial Hospital evaluated Norris-De La Cruz last week, they refused to terminate the pregnancy, saying there was some chance the pregnancy was still viable, Norris-De La Cruz recalled. Instead, they advised her and her mother to go home and wait, according to medical records.

From what I've observed, many accounts which were critiqued to the current Modi govt have been withheld in the country. Accounts of farmer leaders were also suspended amid the ongoing farmers protest in the country. It's worth noting that India will see the general elections this year around May.

Finland, despite its status as the newest NATO member, is in a better condition than most of the other 28 European alliance members. Empty stockpiles and slow armaments production are causing concern elsewhere in Europe, but not so in Finland.

The Finnish Defense Forces (FDF) received extra funding for procurement and immediately issued new contracts in the spring of 2022, not long after Russia’s full-scale invasion and before other countries woke up to the issue. As a result, the country’s stockpiles have been filling to such an extent that more warehouse capacity is needed.

This year, the FDF will also conduct logistics exercises and activate so-called production reserve agreements with civilian companies that keep extra capacity in place for the defense forces’ needs in crisis and war — akin to a war economy lite. In this pre-conflict period, sufficient availability and production capacity of everything from food supplies to machinery is tested with sustained warfighting in mind, as seen in Ukraine.

Finland’s efforts to maintain an efficient national defense capability are motivated by sheer proximity to Russia and a history of aggression from the east. Similar reasoning explains other countries in the Nordic-Baltic region likewise increased their preparedness levels over the past two years.

Researchers from Queen Mary University of London have found that the molecule RvT4 enhances the body's natural defenses against atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries) in patients with rheumatoid arthritis.

Studies in mice undertaken by researchers from Queen Mary University of London's William Harvey Research Institute and Center for Inflammation and Therapeutic Innovation show that increasing levels of the RvT4 molecule in the body improves the ability of the body's own defense mechanisms (macrophages) to reduce local inflammation and remove blockages in blood vessels. This breakthrough in understanding the processes involved could lead to better treatments for people who have rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and who are at higher risk of developing cardiovascular disease.

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is the most common form of inflammatory arthritis in the UK and affects around 1% of the population. Approximately 10,000 people receive a diagnosis of RA every year. Alongside the more widely-known symptoms of joint inflammation, people with the condition are also twice as likely as others to develop blood vessel disease. This can lead to serious complications and an increased risk of premature death.

So lame

UN delegates spoke out against Russia's use of North Korean ballistic missiles in its war against Ukraine at a Security Council meeting on Jan. 10.

An Arkansas man has been arrested after being found with six homemade pipe bombs, according to court documents.

Lawrence Hickman, 52, was booked into the Benton County Jail on Thursday on six counts of criminal possession of explosive materials or a destructive device. He is being held on a $1 million bond.

According to the arrest affidavit, a woman called Bella Vista police on Dec. 9 to report that Hickman had been harassing her.

Once BVPD arrived at Hickman’s residence, the woman told police she found a bottle of chloroform in a dresser drawer.