Salaar 09/09/2021

The Middle East conflict has been occurring for the past 20 years ever since Al Qaeda an Islamic militant organization, had taken responsibility for the devastating attacks that took place in the World Trade Center in New York, USA on September 11th, 2001. This devastating attack was the start of a chaotic war in the Middle East with the US and Afghanistan.

As the Taliban were slowly strengthening their army in Afghanistan, president Joe Biden announced in April that the US would slowly start to withdraw from Afghanistan however in a recent speech on July 8th President Biden said “Our Military Mission in Afghanistan will conclude on August 31st. The drawdown is proceeding in a secure and way, prioritizing the safety of our troops as they depart.” As the US troops started to depart from Afghanistan the Taliban slowly took control over multiple cities in Afghanistan to the point where they were able to push the capital and take over the Kabul capital. This take over had led the Afghan president no other choice but to flee the country. The Afghan president stated in a facebook post that he left to “avoid any further bloodshed.”

Emerson 

50,000 Indian farmer protesters took to the streets on tractors waving flags about the new legislation regarding agriculture on July 26th.  Their goal was to make the Government reverse the new Legislation that could negatively affect their farming businesses.

The Legislation is called the “three farms law” and it changes the rules on how farmers can sell their goods. The government believes that it will benefit the farmers by loosening the rules on how they are able to price and sell their goods; however, the farmers see it in a completely different way. They believe that it leaves them vulnerable to large corporations taking advantage of them. Not only that, but now private companies will be allowed the opportunity to use up all the resources that the farmers are so desperate for. Without those resources the farmers will no longer be able to have an income, leaving them at a higher risk of poverty. 

As of this controversy, many protests occurred. One protest in particular became extremely violent from both the police officers and farmers. Some farmers trespassed and drove on prohibited grounds. They were met with the police and that is the point when fights started to break out. One protester was killed during this conflict and around 500 police officers were injured due to the batons and sharp weapons that protesters had.

 "We will not leave the protest site (in Delhi) even if our graveyard is made there. We will lay down our lives if needed, but will not leave the protest site until we emerge victorious," a man named Mr Tikait said. Another protester said "Our message is very clear - either repeal the laws or face defeat in the state election," said farmers' leader Balbir Singh Rajewal.

As of now, negotiations are still persisting and there is still back and forth between the two parties. The Indian government proposed an offer that stated they would push back the legislation 18 months. Though the farmers were not pleased, they said that they would not stand for anything less than the legislation to be fully revoked forever. Protesters are planning on a strike against the legislation on September 27th.

Emil 

On August 29 in Kabul, Afghanistan, an errant US missile killed 10, 7 of which were children. Zemari Ahmadi, returning home after a day of work arrived at 4:30 p.m. His son asked if he could park the car in the driveway; in a matter of seconds what the family says was an American missile drilled through the car, slammed into the ground below and detonated. 

According to the Los Angeles Times and recent reports, “Among the dead were Ahmadi, 40, who the family said worked for a Southern California-based charity; a 25-year-old nephew who was about to be married; and five kids who were 5 years old or younger.”

According to the Pentagon, the missile’s purpose was to target ISIS-K fighters inside a vehicle. Before the strike had been executed, they had collected enough evidence to point them to believe that the vehicle was filled with explosives, suicide bombers, and was headed for the Hamid Karzai International Airport.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley who spoke privately to CNN journalists said that in the missile strike at least one of those killed was a part of ISIS-K. Other officials along with Milley also stated that the strike had to be executed to prevent an “imminent” threat to the US troops helping evacuate innocent Afghan refugees and American lives from Kabul.

The deaths of the children were unplanned. The Pentagon acknowledged that the reason the civilians died could be due to the detonation of explosives being transported in the vehicle, indicating the presence of explosives in the Vehicle.

After the horrific event, U.S. Navy Capt. Bill Urban, a spokesman for the U.S. military’s Central Command, said the strike had hit its intended target and that there were no indications of civilian casualties. Although in a later statement Urban said the Pentagon was aware of reports of civilian casualties and was investigating. “We would be deeply saddened by any potential loss of innocent life”

While the families of the deceased stated that none of them were affiliated with ISIS-K the Pentagon defended their actions by saying the strike is now under investigation. US information gatherers and officials firmly stated that the missile was targeted to hit an ISIS-K vehicle, while the family says it was the car he used to deliver food to refugee camps. 

This attack caused Afghans to think differently of the country that used to protect them. “America is the killer of Muslims in every place and every time,” said Jamshid Mejrabi, a 35-year-old relative of the family. “I hope that all Islamic countries unite in their view that America is a criminal.” “We’re now much more afraid of drones than we are of the Taliban,” said a colleague of Ahmadi’s. 

Last week on Wednesday in Texas, the Supreme Court announced that the Abortion Ban Law will be going into effect. 

The Abortion Ban vote count was 5-4 when brought up in the Supreme Court. The five Republican nominated justices follow the anti-abortion movement leading to the ban. The Supreme Court does not wish to block the law this week as they are currently sifting over the merits of Texas.

Who Is Responsible?

The man responsible is Mitch McConnell. He scrapped the requirement of having 60 votes allowing Trump to pick a different conservative US Supreme Court Nominee. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away last October allowing McConnell to use his Senate Republican Majority Leadership to seat a new Trump pick. Additionally, Anthony Kennedy, another justice retiree, enabled another republican into the Supreme Court. The three additional republican justice votes led to the new law. Joe Biden, however, is against the new law. On Thursday he said, "Rather than use its supreme authority to ensure justice could be fairly sought, the highest court of our land will allow millions of women in Texas in need of critical reproductive care to suffer while courts sift through procedural complexities." Based on this statement, it is thought that the President of the United States is not in favor of the anti-abortion law currently being implemented. 

Roe v Wade

Forty-eight years ago, in 1973 abortion was legalized and was declared Roe v Wade. Women were able to perform an abortion in their first trimester during pregnancy accounting for 12 weeks. Many democrats were in celebration because of the anti-abortion law, back then, whilst the republicans were in denial and opposed the past law. From that year onwards Republican politicians have tried to make lengthy efforts to overpower this regulation. And now that Mitch McConnell brought more conservatives into the Supreme Court their goal is progressively being accomplished; year by year the rights of abortion are being picked away.

What’s Going On With Clinics And Citizens?

Most abortion clinics are being forced to shut down, this has cost many losses including job terminations, and effectively is changing the paths of many lives. Continuing on, when Ashley Lopez visited one of a few abortion clinics that continued to stay open eleven patients waited for the confirmation of their pregnancy and if they could terminate while abiding by the law. Only three were allowed to legally get an abortion because they were within six weeks of pregnancy. Dr. Joe Nelson spoke about a patient that had taken pills to abort way back but she was extremely unlucky as the procedure failed - a rarity. On Wednesday she returned to the same clinic and here are the exact words of Dr. Joe Nelson of the moment, “Here she was still pregnant. The law was passed. And not only was she now forced to continue a pregnancy that she didn't want, it's now a complicated pregnancy because of the medications she took”. That patient didn’t even want a child but because of the pills there was a chance of a malformed baby being born, moreover, she has no freedom on her own body and future life. This law doesn’t only involve the mentioned patient but involves over a thousand more women in a similar situation.

One of the largest cellular networks in the US, T-Mobile, has had a data breach that started in August of this year. 

Due to its huge platform, it’s a big target for hackers. On the dark web, an anonymous account started selling the personal information of T-Mobile users that he/she had found. 

The company stated on August 18th that millions of their customers may have gotten hacked and exposed. 

About 40 million people appear to have had their names, social security numbers, and state ID cards exposed. All of which had a T-Mobile credit card. 7.8 million other phone customers got the same information exposed. 

T-Mobile also established on August 18th that around 850,000 names, phone numbers, and account pin numbers got exposed. 

"Yes, they have a big target on their back but that shouldn't be a surprise to them, you have to start questioning the organization. How much are they actually addressing these breaches and the level of seriousness?" data expert Paul Furtado said.

“Customers might consider whether or not they would want to continue working with T-Mobile," security expert Allie Mellen said. "It's just a matter of luck that, this time, the information affected was not financial information."

This was not the first time that the company experienced this situation. T-Mobile had breaches in January 2021, November 2019, and August 2018. In 2015, hackers stole personal information from about 15 million T-Mobile customers in the U.S.

"There was a gate left wide open for the attackers and they just had to find the gate and walk through it," Allie Mellen said. "And T-Mobile didn't know about the attack until the attackers posted about it in an online forum. That's really troubling, it means T-Mobile likely doesn't have the appropriate security monitoring in place."

The company said that the place to gain access was then closed and the leader of the company, Mike Sievert said on Twitter "If you were affected, you'll hear from us soon.”

On the 30th of August, at around 6:00 PM, NASA’s well-known Hubble telescope captured a very magnificent sight, the HH111. The Hubble telescope captured a relatively rare celestial phenomenon known as a Herbig-Haro object. The object, as I mentioned before, is named the HH111. This object is only to occur under extremely specific circumstances. When a star is formed, they are likely to be immensely active, and so in very few cases, they oust very narrow jets of rapidly moving ionized gas. Now, this gas is so hot that its molecules and atoms have lost their electrons. This makes the gas highly charged. The spurts of ionized gas then strike with the clouds of gas and dust that is surrounding the newly formed star at hundreds of miles per second. It is because of these energetic collisions that form the Herbig-Haro objects such as HH111.

The European Space Agency (ESA) described the object as a "relatively rare celestial phenomenon", but exactly how rare? Only around 600 have been found up to date, and that too every few years. 

The wonderful view of HH111 originates from Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3. What this camera sees is both optical (which is close to what our human eyes see) and infrared. The ability to make observations in infrared gives Hubble the clarity to look through the gas and dust to get a good glimpse at objects like this one.

You may wonder ‘why exactly is that object named the Herbig-Haro?’ It is named after the 2 astronomers George Herbig and Guillermo Haro. Guillermo Haro discovered a new type of large planetary nebula with his Hawaiian colleague, George Herbig, that is why they are named the Herbig-Haro objects.

Gaby

 On September 11 in Queens borough of New York City 18-year-old, Emma Raducanu makes history after battling out Leylah Fernandez in the US Open final. Emma Raducanu has just won her first grand slam title 6-4, 6-3 in the US Open final on Saturday.

The game was remarkably close, "It was an incredibly difficult match, but I thought the level was extremely high," Emma said.

“The fact that the 18-year-old reached the final in the first place is astonishing. The fact she won it -- historic,” CNN wrote. The young athlete became the first qualifier in both men’s and women’s tennis to reach a grand slam final and now she’s the first qualifier to actually win one.

Raducanu was up 5-2 in the second set and needed just one more point to win it both times. Fernandez on the other hand fought back each time and eventually won the game 5-3. Raducanu skinned her knee in a lunge on the baseline at 5-3 putting her 30-40 behind in the game. She then raced back in after a medical pause to treat her bleeding knee. After that Raducanu became the first British woman to win a major since Virginia Wade in 1977, and she is also the youngest grand slam winner since Maria Sharapova won Wimbledon in 2004. Raducanu, who entered the US Open ranked 150th in the world. Demonstrating her potential at Wimbledon this year and winning the hearts of the British public as she advanced to the fourth round before withdrawing with breathing difficulties. 

Incredibly, Raducanu did not drop a single set in the tournament -- and blew away every opponent she played.  Her opponent later comments, “I think we're all just super hungry to make a difference in the tennis world. We've always talked about and joked around that we're going to be in the WTA Tour and we're going to be on the big stage together. We want to make a difference. We want to make an impact in tennis."

Raducanu later received a letter from Queen Elizabeth II of England reading, "remarkable achievement at such a young age… a testament to your hard work and dedication." "I have no doubt your outstanding performance, and that of your opponent Leylah Fernandez, will inspire the next generation of tennis leaders."

Reaching the finals and winning them has had a huge impact on Raducanu and swarmed her with generous messages and hope to do well in her career. The future of this 18-year-old athlete has many thrilled to see what she’ll bring next.