Reuters, Beirut
Islamic State fighters captured territory from Syrian rebels in an area near the Turkish border on Friday and were close to cutting off an insurgent-held town, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported.
The jihadists seized a number of villages around the town of Marea, north of Aleppo, and had almost fully encircled it, the British-based monitoring group said.
US states sue federal govt over transgender directive
AP, Austin
Texas and 10 other states are suing the Obama administration over its directive to US public schools to let transgender students use the bathrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identity.
The lawsuit announced on Wednesday includes Oklahoma, Alabama, Wisconsin, West Virginia, Tennessee, Maine, Arizona, Louisiana, Utah and Georgia. It asks a North Texas federal court to declare the directive unlawful in what ranks among the most coordinated and visible legal challenges by states over the socially divisive issue of bathroom rights for transgender persons.
Israeli minister quits ‘extremist govt’
AFP, Jerusalem
Israeli environment minister Avi Gabbay announced his resignation on Friday, saying the appointment of a hardline nationalist as defence minister had created an “extremist government”.
Gabbay said that he was “unable to swallow” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to take the defence portfolio from former general Moshe Yaalon and hand it to Avigdor Lieberman, who has pledged harsh measures against Palestinian “terrorists”.
US nuke force still using floppy disks
AFP, Washington
America’s nuclear force still uses floppy disks designed in the 1970s to coordinate some of its functions, according to a watchdog report released on Wednesday.
The report by the Government Accountability Office points to a number of worryingly outdated “legacy systems” still in use across the US government that are in desperate need of upgrading.
A Pentagon command and control system that “coordinates the operational functions of the United States’ nuclear forces, such as intercontinental ballistic missiles, nuclear bombers, and tanker support aircrafts,” runs on an IBM Series/1 computer and uses 8-inch floppy disks, the report says.
