Six In The Morning Saturday 14 November 2020

 

Mississippi's Democrats look to Georgia for lessons — but face even bigger challenges

Political experts say Mississippi won't see nail-biter elections, especially at the nation level, anytime soon — thanks in part to stalled population growth.

By Bracey Harris

 At the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum here, what started as a fingers-crossed watch party for Democratic Senate candidate Mike Espy ended in dismay by the time Jarrius Adams arrived.

Adams had spent much of Election Day working with a voting rights organization that combats voter suppression, and he was optimistic that Espy would prevail in unseating Republican incumbent Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith.

Adams is 23. The last time a Democratic presidential or Senate nominee carried the state was before he had been born. On election night, the Republican streak remained unbroken.

Israeli agents in Iran kill al-Qaida's top lieutenant – report

Abu Muhammad al-Masri was gunned down in Tehran more than three months ago, says New York Times

Staff and agencies

Sat 14 Nov 2020 03.04 GMT

Al-Qaida’s second-in-command was killed in Iran in August by Israeli operatives acting at the behest of the United States, the New York Times has reported, citing intelligence officials.

Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah, who went by the nom de guerre Abu Muhammad al-Masri, was gunned down by two men on a motorcycle in Tehran, the NYT reported. He was accused of helping to mastermind the 1998 bombings of two US embassies in Africa.

Masri was seen as a likely successor to Ayman al-Zawahri, believed to be al-Qaida’s current leader.

Ethiopian cities hit by rockets from Tigray forces

Two cities in the Amhara region have been struck by rockets fired by forces from the neighboring Tigray region, the government has claimed. Hundreds of people have been killed so far this month in a spiraling conflict.

The Ethiopian government said on Saturday that fighters from the northern Tigray region had fired rockets at the cities of Bahir Dar and Gondar in the Amhara region.

According to a tweet from the special task force set up to provide information about the government's operations in Tigray: "In the late hours of Nov. 13, 2020, a rocket was fired towards Bahir Dar and Gondar cities."

Ethnic Armenian villagers burn houses before Azerbaijan takeover

First handover of land held by ethnic Armenians to Azerbajian is expected to happen on Sunday under deal which ended six weeks of fighting.

Ethnic Armenian villagers in Nagorno-Karabakh set their houses on fire on Saturday before fleeing to Armenia on the even of deadline that will see parts of the territory handed over to Azerbaijan as part of a ceasefire agreement.

Residents of the Kalbajar district in Azerbaijan that was controlled by ethnic Armenians for decades began a mass exodus this week after it was announced Azerbaijan would regain control on Sunday.

“Children in Armenia are crying and want to return home, it is such a sorrow,” a tearful resident of Kalbajar told Al Jazeera.

A German man's Nazi grandfather took over a Jewish man's store. He tracked down his descendants to apologize

By Lianne Kolirin, CNN

Updated 0502 GMT (1302 HKT) November 14, 2020

Thomas Edelmann was born in Germany more than 25 years after the Allies defeated Hitler.

Yet last year, following an unexpected marketing call, the 49-year-old businessman contacted a retired teacher in Israel to apologize for the actions of the grandfather he never met.

Growing up, Edelmann had heard rumors about the family business and suspected it had previously been owned by Jews who were forced to sell to his paternal grandfather, Wilhelm.

Art or vandalism? Japan tries to find the right balance with street graffiti.

• BY ANDREW MCKIRDY

• STAFF WRITER

Ken Hasebe, mayor of Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward, has a message for anyone thinking of visiting his part of the city to tag a wall with illegal graffiti.

“It’s absolutely unacceptable,” says Hasebe. “I read that someone

from overseas had been caught by the police doing graffiti in Shibuya, and they had said they thought they were allowed to do it freely here. That’s a serious misunderstanding.”