U.S., Russia at Odds over How to Revive Syria Truce

UNITED NATIONS – Efforts by the United States and Russia to resuscitate a Syrian cease-fire that collapsed after seven days remained stalled on Friday.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov met on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly a day after both took part here in an acrimonious session of the International Syria Support Group.

“We exchanged some ideas and we had a little bit of progress. We’re evaluating some mutual ideas in a constructive way,” Kerry said of his talks Friday with Russia’s top diplomat.

Both Washington and Moscow say the cease-fire accord Kerry and Lavrov announced two weeks ago in Geneva offers the only realistic chance for progress toward ending a conflict that has claimed more than 400,000 lives since the spring of 2011.

But the atmosphere between the two great powers has grown frosty following a U.S. airstrike last weekend that killed scores of Syrian government troops – attributed by Washington to a mistake – and Monday’s attack on a Syrian Red Crescent aid convoy, which left at least 20 dead.

The U.S. accuses Russia of bombing the convoy. The Russians deny any involvement and demand a “thorough and impartial” investigation.

Kerry said this week that restoring the shattered truce will require a major gesture on the part of the Syrian government and its allies, demanding the establishment of a no-fly zone over areas controlled by the opposition.

In an address Friday to the General Assembly, Lavrov made it clear that Russia will not accede to Kerry’s demand, insisting instead on the responsibility of the U.S. and it allies to separate “so-called moderate opposition from terrorists.”

Under the plan adopted in Geneva, the cease-fire was supposed to lead to cooperation between the U.S. and Russia in mounting coordinated airstrikes against terrorist groups such as Islamic State and the al-Nusra Front.

The prerequisite for the joint strikes was disentangling the Western-backed rebels from the terrorists.

Sen. Ted Cruz Back-Pedals, Now Supports Trump

WASHINGTON – The Republican senator previously in the running for his party’s presidential nomination, Ted Cruz, back-pedaled Friday from his rejection of Donald Trump as his party’s presidential candidate and stated that he will cast his vote for the magnate next November.

Cruz was a leading figure in one of the most controversial moments of the Republican National Convention last July in Cleveland, Ohio, when the multimillionaire was officially nominated for the presidential race and the senator in his speech withheld his support for Trump.

The Republican nominee was visibly annoyed with the senator, his toughest rival in the primaries, and countered by saying “I don’t want his endorsement,” and “if he gives it, I will not accept it.”

“This election is unlike any other in our nation’s history. Like many other voters, I have struggled to determine the right course of action in this general election,” Cruz said Friday on his Facebook page.

“In Cleveland, I urged voters, ‘please, don’t stay home in November. Stand, and speak, and vote your conscience, vote for candidates up and down the ticket whom you trust to defend our freedom and to be faithful to the Constitution,’” he recalled

“After many months of careful consideration, of prayer and searching my own conscience, I have decided that on Election Day, I will vote for the Republican nominee, Donald Trump,” the senator said in a long message to voters.

Cruz said he has taken that decision for two reasons: first, because last year he promised to support whatever Republican candidate was elected; and second, though he has “areas of significant disagreement” with Trump, “by any measure Hillary Clinton is wholly unacceptable.”

Trump replied that “I am greatly honored by the endorsement of Senator Cruz. We have fought the battle and he was a tough and brilliant opponent.”

The backing by Cruz, a symbol of the Tea Party and of the extreme right wing of the Republican Party, comes at less than two months before the country’s presidential and legislative elections.

NYC-Ahmad Khan Rahami, a suspect in this weekend's bombings in New Jersey and New York City, was (ARRESTED.)

Manhattan Explosion: At Least 25 Victims in Chelsea NYC

At least 16 killed, 23 injured in attack on mosque in Pakistan

 The attack happened at 13:00 p.m. local time (08:30 a.m. GMT) at the Gul Muhammad mosque in a tribal area in the northwest of the country, local security official Gulab Khan said.

More than 200 people were participating in Friday afternoon prayers at a place of worship at the time of the attack, and it was feared that there could be more victims, said Khan.

The injured were taken to hospitals in the area, which is mountainous and has bad roads, he said, adding that an investigation into the attack had begun.

The attack came one day after Eid al-Adha (The Feast of the Sacrifice) ended in the Muslim country.

Two police officers died and four were injured on Tuesday on the first day of the feast in an explosion in Quetta, hours after a failed suicide attack against a Shiite mosque in the south of the country.

Despite such incidents, Pakistan has seen a fall in the number of terrorist attacks, which the government and army attribute to a military operation that was launched in June 2014 in the northwest of the country against the Taliban.

Palestinian man killed after alleged knife attack near settlement

A Palestinian man was shot dead by Israeli soldiers after he allegedly attacked one of them with a knife in the southern West Bank, military sources reported Friday.

The suspect had allegedly managed to injure a soldier in the face before being killed outside the Jewish settlement Tel Rumeida in the city of Hebron, officials said.

The incident occurred on the same day two other Palestinians and a Jordanian man were killed in what the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have termed "a wave of terror attacks."

The military report added the soldier had been taken to a Jerusalem hospital for treatment for his injuries.

Hebron is the largest city in the West Bank, with a population of around 150,000.

It has become the epicenter of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the past few years, and is divided into two sectors: H1, under Palestinian control, and H2, under Israeli military occupation.

The H2 sector is host to the Ibrahimi Mosque, Islam's fourth-holiest site _ after Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa mosque.

Police Officer, 5 Others Killed in Honduran Capital

TEGUCIGALPA – Gunmen killed at least six people, including a police officer, in a poor district of the Honduran capital, authorities said.

The multiple homicide occurred Wednesday in the Abraham Lincoln neighborhood of western Tegucigalpa while the victims were talking at a grocery store, a forensic spokesperson told EFE.

Eyewitnesses said between six and eight armed men arrived in two pickup trucks at the establishment and opened fire.

The victims included an off-duty police officer, two moto-taxi drivers and two woodworkers, Luis Osabas, spokesman for the Security Secretariat, which oversees the National Police, told reporters.

Investigators have not yet determined a motive, he added.

Criminal violence has been responsible for an average of around 14 deaths per day in Honduras thus far in 2016, authorities say.