>> good evening everyone welcome to al jazeera america. i'm john siegenthaler in new york. >> this is beyond any doubt in my opinion that it was malone yum thapoloniumthat caused the r arafat. >> without question, yassir arafat was poisoned. plus. this is a crime, an assassination of an elected leader by his people. >> what arafat's widow is saying, and how she got results. about the healthcare.gov

website, the health and human services secretary grilled again on capitol hill. the case of two local women angry at christian prayer said at their county's board meetings. >> we begin tonight with an al jazeera exclusive. new research that concludes the late palestinian leader yassir arafat was poisoned. a lab team of swiss scientists examined his remains and they found more polonium than normal. arafat's body was exhumed and now clayton has nor. >> first they found abnormally high amounts of polonium 210 in arafat's clothes.

now they found an abnormally large amount in his bones. the scientists say their data clearly favors polonium poisoning with up to 83% confidence. the arafat family received the findings with their lawyer and david barkley. >> if i was a judge and jury this is absolutely stone cold certain. this is beyond any doubt in my opinion that it was polonium that caused the death of yassir arafat. >> for widow and daughter it is 100% truth. >> when they came with the result, they told me just died. i will not stop. me and my daughter will go to all courts in all over the world to punish who did this crime. >> now that i have proof that he was poisoned, i feel a bit

relieved, i feel releeived, actually, final closure for me will be knowing who killed him. and the motive and the reason behind it. >> average rates of polonium, in skeletons, what was found in arafat's ribs and hips was the highest ever published. >> everybody has a very tiny amount of polonium in their bones. the level of polonium in yassir arafat is about 900 mil mili becarrils, about nine times depending on the literature. >> the soil also measured at least 18 times higher than earth not visibly taped. the report rules out any external contamination and it confirms through dna testing

that the body was arafat's. the scientists support poisoning at level 5. the theory of polonium poisoning first put forward last year. arafat's blood and urine city's were strongly are lifted from the stained clothes the palestinian leader wore in his final days. but this latest test was in arafat's flesh and bones. the samples were gather when his body was unearthed ca the year before. a russian team also carried out results after a last minute invite from the palestinian authority. their results have not yet been made public and there was a team in france. the french results remain a secret but as the three

investigating magistrates continue with the murder decree they now have evidence. whether the palestinian authority shifts the case to the international criminal court. perhaps ms. arafat and her auditor will see results and find out not just what killed arafat but who. >> when yassir arafat died in 2004, there was no autopsy. arafat's wirarafat's widow sayse still many questions and she is angry about the findings in this report. >> our thanks for being on joorls al jazeera america. >> thank you david. >> nine months ago, what is your reaction? >> you know, it's a very -- it is what, a very, very strong shock. i mean, i'm mourning my husband

again now. it is -- i'm full of anger. this is a crime. this is an assassination of an elected palestinian leader by his people. >> who do you suspect did this? >> you know, i have no right to suspect, because all the case, the name of the you know, the hands of the judiciary, in france now, but i don't know a lot of countries that have nuclear reactors in the world. i mean to find this substance of polonium which is rare and which is only done in reactors. and to killer him with it. but the -- and to kill him with it. but the problem is, if any country did this, who gave him this poison? w.h.o. administrated it and --

who administrated it and who gave the go-ahead to put it in his tea, his coffee, his food, you know? it's a very terrible feeling to be deceived. >> so you're saying then that somebody from your late husband's inner circle, the elite leadership of the palestinians must have been involved in this, in some fashion. >> no, i'm not accusing any kind of leadership. they were all his friends and his you know acquaintances. but you know, he had a lot of people around him. i can't accuse, it's very, very very, very you know complicated issue to find who did it. but yassir was, you know, a lot of people were saying that yassir was an obstacle to peace. and now, nine years after, we see how peace flourished in the middle east. i mean, or how peace flourished in palestine with building of

settlements and more and more problems, more prisoners, stealing lands, everybody was saying, he's an obstacle. even huge countries would say that he was an obstacle for peace. and we need better leadership. they got hamas better leadership. >> how did your husband describe the final months when he got sick in 2004, what did he say what he was feeling and what was going on? >> he could not, he could not feel it because he was shrinking day by day and he could not even express himself and he was very, very sick and this poison that now we know is sure poison hit all his gastrointestines and a struck in his brain and it was so terrible about it. so it was -- it could not, you know, he could not expression

himself but i could see in his eyes that he was asking, you know, trying to ask me questions, that what happened? tried to find a solution. and he felt that he was betrayed. in his eyes, he would say that i was -- there was a betrayal. >> finally, what would justice look for you? now that you know it was very likely that your husband was poisoned i was assassinated, as you say, how should justice be served? >> i think all the actors of this horrible crime must go to justice, if not to international courts, if there is some countries involved, my daughter and my sons decided not to be silent on such crime, we'll go further, and this crime has to be punished, crime of cirl killn elected leader. this is the hidden poison that anybody would have not you know,

please, anybody could kill anybody, it becomes like a jungle, it's terrible and it's a lesson to i think everybody. >> yassir arafat remains a figure in the middle east, led the p lo for decades, still considered by many as the face of the middle eastern movement. the u.s. refused to have ties with him for decades. arafat shook hands with israel's prime minister at the time on the white house lawn. arafat served as the politically leader in the gaza strip but his relationship with the u.s. was never smooth especially after the second palestinian uprising which began in 2000. by the time he died in 2004,

u.s. viewed had him as a terrorist and had only limited contact with him. joining us, in light of al jazeera's new report, is robert o'brien, a former delegate to the u.n. and former middle east advisory to mitt romney. thank you for joining us. >> thank you, john. >> what do you make of this report? >> it is an interesting report. i was somewhat skeptical about the claiming, the swiss have very good medicine and good scientists and so the question of how he died may be answered, although we are still waiting for some additional reports. now the question turns to who was involved in the assassination. >> so you would assume based on this information he was poisoned but the real question is who. and even his widow seems not to be sure about who is responsible for this. how would anyone go about figuring this out?

>> it is very difficult to do nine years later. and as she mentioned it would have likely have been someone in his inner circle that administered the dose. polonium is something that is very rare. it is not something you find in the corner pharmacy. most of it is created in russia and it has to be ingested. someone gave it to him through toothpaste or his coffee or his feed. this would have been someone very close to him. >> this would have happened seems like over a long period of time over slow, low doses. >> again it's hard to know. very small amounts of polonium are quite deadly. we know are that two years later, with the russian dissident and former intelligence officer libvenko was killed with polonium in an assassination attempt, that apparently was one dose. i just don't know how it would

have been done with arafat. >> what would have been the motive for this? >> again, this is hard to say. this is a guy who survived 13 to 40 assassination attempts over his life. there were factions within the palestinian movement that were opposed to him. certainlcertainly hamas would, t had had arafat remained alive, and had the moral victory of palestinians, iran is close with hamas, they are still searching for billions of dollars that arafat is suspected of having hidden away. perhaps this is nothing more than a crime caper with someone looking for that money. >> so we have the potential of peace talks in the middle east. do you see any impact of this

news having -- would have any impact on those peace talks? >> you know, it's an interesting story, it's clearly driving the news today on al jazeera, on twitter, it was a big scoop for al jazeera to get this report. but i don't see -- the peace talks are going to go forward and they're going ostand or fall on the merits of -- to stand or fall on the merits of those talks. perhaps if there was some way to link israel to this killing which i think is going to be very difficult for nenl to do it would -- for anyone to do it would provide pr or public relations leverage to the case. so i don't see a big impact on the peace talks. certainly, secretary kerry ached the united states are pressing both parties to move forward and continue and i don't think this will derail these talks. >> certainly a mystery that

hasn't been unraffle unraveled . thanks for being with us. >> thanks for having me. secretary of state john kerry was in israel and in his platest move forward to promote peace, the sides blame each other for lack of progress in negotiations. earlier today kerry met with israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu. praised the palestinian leader. >> i'm convinced that president abbas wants to find peace and that he understands it will require compromise by all party and he has restated his own willingness to compromise in the effort to find a fair and just

peace. >> kerry is continuing his tour in the middle east and expected in jordan tomorrow. >> feefng, everyone. we are -- good evening, everyone. we are watching supertyphoon, this would be equivalent to a category 5 hurricane, it is extremely powerful. it really hasn't even dropped its intensity over the last 24 hours. 173 mile-per-hour winds. the gusts are going up higher than 200. unfortunately for the philippines this is extremely dangerous, because of the infrastructure as well as where it is landing. this is actually very close to a region that saw an earthquake last month, sebu that killed 150 people still recovering from that. let's look at the track that we expect to see as the storm makes

its way across the central regions, exiting 24 hours later towards south china sea, gaining intensity. anything to the north of the slide is going to be hit the worst. the right track of the storm is always the most intense. we expect to see also eight to ten inches of rain with this storm. john, back to you. >> all right kevin thank you. police in detroit investigating a shooting at a barber shop, located in a strip mall on the city's east side. authorities say it's not clear who the victims are or how many people were shooting but detroit's police chief says the barber shop is a known gambling site. wall street reaches new heights, find out what has investors so optimistic. plus, trying to change minds of the affordable care act. the president's uphirl battle jusuphill battlejust ahead.

>> in southern california the melon bank had the opportunity to ring the opening bell. 15,746 all time high. investors were encouraged by positive economic data out of europe and by solid third quarter earnings. investors are also looking forward to the initial public offering of twitter. the company's pricing its ipo at $26 a share, twitter is expected to raids 1.8 billion and values the company at more than $14 billion. health and human services secretary kathleen sebelius was on the hot seat again on alcohol today. she fac ons capitol hill today. libby casey has more on what happened from washington. >> secretary sebelius met tough

questions and criticism right from the start of today's senate finance committee hearing. the chairman is a democrat of montana and he is one of the chief architects of the health care law, so he has got a lot riding on its success. he actually warned secretary sebelius last sprirng that if its -- spring that if it implementation wasn't done correctly it would be a train wreck. >> this is unacceptable. it has been disappointing to hear members of the administration say they didn't see the problems coming. secretary sebelius, last time you came before this committee i used two words to voice my concerns about the law's implementation. since then, my words have been twifortetwisted and maligned the forecast. make no mistake i believe in this law. >> the secretary said there's no

excuse for what she calls a miserable five weeks since the website healthcare.gov launched. but she tried to fight back against any republican suggestion that the whole law be postponed. >> some have asked why not just delay implementation of the new law until all of the problems are fixed. and there's a pretty straightforward answer: delaying the affordable care act wouldn't delay people's cancer, or diabetes, or parkinson's. didn't delay the need for mental health services or cholesterol screenings or prenatal care. delaying the affordable care act doesn't delay the foreclosure notices for families forced into bankruptcy because of unpayable medical bills. >> one of the most vocal congress people initially supported her becoming part of president obama's cabinet.

his tune has changed. in the past month he has been pushing for her to take responsibility in his words and step down. >> you have said america should hold you accountable which is today ma'am secretary i repeat my request for you to resign. >> president obama met with more than a dozen senate democrats today, and they talked about the health care law, on the minds of these democrats, many of which are facing reelection and the success or failure will be crucial as to whether senator mark se dprvetionech kay hagan and gene sheheen will get reelected. they have been supporting the law. president obama went behind closed doors to talk to them today. >> president obama is supporting his health care law and told volunteers that he's unhappy

with the troubled rollout. >> right now there's great insurance to be had out there. choice and competition, where people can save money, for a better product, except, too many folks haven't been able to get through the website. >> heidi zhou-castro from our bureau, heidi, why texas, why now? >> the president said it himself. texas may be one of the most resistant states to the affordable care act, but also one of the states with the greatest potential for this law to succeed, if they tap into the wide pool of uninsured. and when it comes to the rate of uninsured in texas that's also the highest one in four people in texas not having health insurance at this moment. as for the timing of today, for the president's visit, well it

follows on the heels of some good news for healthcare.gov. yesterday, that's when congressional committee heard from the center for medicaid and medicare that some of those technical glitches have been fixed and people can enroll almost with no errors, of course, almost being the catchy word there. >> what was the president's message, today, sign up? >> it certainly was. really a pep to be john for these volunteers who have been on the front line of these frustrations for the website. the president was also trying to refocus the attention away from the negativity with these glitches and the criticism and back to the people that he says this lanes will help. notably there was one element missing from any of the comments today, the president did not address some of the frustrations that we've heard from people receiving cancellation notices from their current plans. 3.5 million people across the country saying that has been the case for them.

while texas's republican governor rick perry didn't hesitate to talk about that point in a statement he released immediately after obama's visit, he said that president obama deceived the american people by promising that anyone who likes their health care plan could keep it. but millions of americans are now discovering that simply isn't true. now he's coming to texas in a desperate attempt to salvage his ill-conceived and unpopular program, a quote from rick perry. >> so this issue of medicaid has been an issue in a number of states, including texas. so why has texas chosen not to expand medicaid? >> well governor rick perry says it's bad for the economy because the state would have to sink 15.6 million into the expansion in the next ten years. he says the program medicaid is broken in texas and because of

the state's decision not to expand it leaves 1.5 million people ineligible for the subsidies under the affordable care act. and i have to emphasize that these people are the poorest of the poor in texas. they fall below the poverty line. and the reason they don't qualify for obamacare subsidies is because of that supreme court decision. you remember that granted the states the right to opt out of that provision. texas is among the 25 states that are doing just that. >> all right, heidi zhou-castro good to have you in new york this week. >> absolutely. >> jessica taff is here with headlines and the bullying scandal is ongoing. >> jonathan martin left the dolphins. the player was treated with emotional distress, went back to

california, following that latest incident with team mate richie andre knott. richie incognito. two other players have been diagnosed as having signs of cte, a d degenera tiff disease. rick renteria is settle to take over the reins in chicago, as the coach in the past season and has played for parts of five major league season. that's a look at our sports headlines. we'll dig a little deeper into this. >> thank you jessica. a new study has shown that palestinian yassir arafat was poisoned. a lawsuit by two women in a

small new york town could impact the nation.

>> welcome back to al jazeera america. i'm john siegenthaler. here are the top stories. health and human services secretary kathleen sebelius was back on capitol hill to talk about the problems on the healthcare.gov website. >> too many hardworking people have been waiting too long for the ability to obtain health insurance. >> the secretary told the senate's committee, that the website shouldn't have been rolled out, she should resign according to legislators, over this incident. >> secretary of state john kerry has been optimistic, so far, the

negotiators have played little progress. there was evidence that palestinian leader yassir arafat was poisoned. died in 2004. unusually high levels of polonium in his remains. leading the investigation was reporter clayton swisher, he was outside the lab in lauzanne switzerland when the investigation was done. >> clayton swisher said there were plenty of reasons to prompt the investigation. >> i was also shown the medical file that i had never seen and frankly i didn't even know she had it. in looking through it, we started discussion about opening up a cold case investigation. and ms. arafat said that she had a bag of her late husband's belongings that accompanied him

to the hospital in france at the military hospital where he died. and when they found the high levels of polonium they decided to exhume his body. >> the investigation gained real momentum when the body was exhumed a year ago. >> 18 to 36 times higher than one would find on any of us who walked this planet and are buried in this planet. and that can't be explained by an adulteration. that was within his bones. so to data speaks for itself. >> he expects reports from other countries to back up the swiss findings. >> that period around the time he had the sudden onset of symptoms is going to be a critical focus of this, the focus of the french government which has a murder inquiry. >> swisher pointed out the

examiners only what killed him not who killed him or how. what is polonium and who could have access to it? al jazeera's signs director, jacob ward says it's been used in another notorious case. >> when you think of death you think of someone on a high rise with a knife or a gun. alex lepvenenko died in 2007 of polonium poisoning. and his case revealed how tiny almost inindividualible doses of stuff can do terrible things to the body. the alpha regard yaition attacks your organs in succession, shutting them down until finally your bone marrow comes apart, your white blood cells drop off

and you diane excruciating tet. why didn't this show up? even if you were to suspect raids yaitioradiation poisoningl geiger counter doesn't pick this up.who could have done this? really almost any industrialized nation has a certain access to polonium but in incredibly tiny quantities for laboratory testing. to do intentional harm to someone would require deep sinister motives. in possession of an invisible weapon that could blend into any crowd. >> jacob ward reporting for us. lower courts have struggled for years with the issue of public prayer but for the first time in 30 years the supreme court is

once again addressing the issue of church versus state. the debate focused on upstate new york, the town of greece, a suburb of rochester. the issue was, are public prayers appropriate? every meeting of the down board opens with a prayer. and nearly every prayer was christian. two town members sued the town, say that these violate the first amendment. a lower court said that exclusivity, made the public prayer unconstitutional. others disagree. >> so as a minister, it's my prayer that the justices will uphold my constitutional right. >> it is not permissible for the courts to regulate the cop tent of the prayer. >> -- the content of the prayer. >> lawyers for the court argued that it was not the issue of

prayer, but just the prayer that invoked a specific religion. justice antoniin scalia, those two plaintiffs who filed the original lawsuit, susan galloway and linda stevens join us. welcome, it's good to see both of you. >> thank you. >> let me start with you susan, what was this that really started this, why did you decide to get involved in this? >> well, i had been going to the board meetings for a reason regarding my public cable access. and the prayers continued to be going on. at all the meetings i attended. >> christian prayers? >> and they were all christian prayers, yes. and i found them, that i did not feel they were appropriate.

and i felt it seemed to align the town with christianity. >> but linda don't they open congress with christian prayers sometimes? >> they do. but they have guidelines. pointing out that they should be inclusive and not try to include as many people as possible. unlike the -- what goes on in the greece town hall, with their prayers. >> what goes on there? >> almost exclusively christian prayers. most often, alluding to jesus or the holy spirit, or some aspect of christianity. >> again, i do believe that in

many places, there are public meetings that open with the prayers that mention jesus's name. was it the problem that there were just christian prayers or would it have been better in your opinion if there had been prayers from other religions? >> well, for me, i think that it -- first of all the town of gross had no written policy. they -- greece had no written policy. they were basically inviting clergy to do this prayer. and i felt like they were not including all the residents, now, not all the religions have pooh building in the town of greece -- have a building in the town of greece. that doesn't mean there aren't a variety of religions. we are talking about a town of almost 100,000 people. so there are a variety of people of different faiths as well as nonbelievers. >> so as i understand it, susan,

you're jewish and linda, you're an atheist. so do you just want no prayers at the meeting, is that correct? >> well you know, i've lived in the town of greece for over 40 years. and up until the time the present town supervisor came into office, the town board meetings were always opened with a moment of silence. and when you use a moment of silence, no one is secluded. and so that was perfectly fine, and no one -- no one would oppose that. and then sunlt suddenly, we turd from that which is not a divisive way of starting the meetings, to this other way of doing business. with using, you know, christian prayers that exclude people. >> let me just ask you this, people of religious beliefs

ought to be able to invoke the deity. what do you say about that? >> well i believe that people should be able to do that. i don't think that people of these clergy and prayer givers are acting as private citizens when they are coming here. they are invited from the town. they are standing behind a podium with the town seal. that's evident on the podium. it's almost like a pulpit. they are praying not to the board but to the participants in the town meeting. interwhat sort of reaction have you gotten from the town? you're smiling. >> from the town, well, susan and i early on, when we both became very concerned about this issue, tried to meet with the

town supervisor, and persuade him that he should return to the historical historical way of toing thing, with a moment of silence. >> and he said no? >> we were rebuffed, and met with two other officials and said if we didn't like the christian prayers we could stand in the hallway which made us feel like second class citizens. we were very offended by that. and by this time, this was not the only thing that the town supervisor had done. , mixing religion and government. he had also had prepare services on january 1st every year, he had gotten the town involved in the national day of prayer which was a christian political event

and all of these things piled up and bringing in the pastors to do these christian prayer. so one thing led to another. that's when i discovered that there was a chapter of americans united for separation of church and state in the rochester area and i joined that. and one thing -- >> that led to this lawsuit. >> one thing led to another. and americans united wrote to the town supervisor, and explained why, what he was doing was not appropriate. that didn't work. and eventually, we decided that we would file a lawsuit. >> well, we will follow that lawsuit and we appreciate you taking the time to talk with us. susan and linda thanks very much. >> thank you. >> let's go down to washington, d.c, joie chen has been standing by to tell us what's coming up on america tonight. hi, joie. >> hey, good evening john.

we're going to follow up tonight on obamacare, with a look of one particular part of the health care policy that could mean real savings for systems. but critics charge, it will all end up with a bureaucratic waste. the 5% of recipients who school half of all health care spending. the cost of caring for critically ill patients is staggering. meant to streamline costs with reducing patient risk. can it work? we'll hear from correspondent chris bury on that. at the top of the hour. john. >> thank you joie. champions of the economy, an idea that's already working in other parts of the world. we'll find out how micro-loans are helping small businesses in this country. coming up. jess caf taff will have an update on the miami dolphins

fiasco. that connect to you. [[voiceover]] they risk never returning to the united states. >> grounded. >> real. >> unconventional. [[voiceover]] we spent time with some members of the gangster disciples. >> an escape from the expected. >> i'm a cancer survivor. not only cancer, but brain cancer. america tonight next on al jazeera america

>> all this week, al jazeera is shining a spotlight on creative ways americans are dealing with economic struggles. and we call them champions of the economy. we take a look at microlending. those are businesses that loan people very small amounts of money for business ventures. microlending is growing plairp ipopularity in the united state. jennifer london has the story. >> a farmer in kenya, a weaver, they are all connected by big dreams and small financing. >> i was able to get a loan of

15 k which was -- which is a lot of money to me. but that, that helped. because at the time, i thought wow, i had this $15,000 microloan, i had some of my own money and i felt like i had enough. >> enough for michael elliot a former screen writer to open hammer and nails. a nail shop don't call it a salon just for guys. michael knew he had a unique and winning business plan. but when he asked for a loan, the answer was no. >> there are so many people who could be doing big things. >> in fact seven out of ten small business loan applications are denied by banks. >> making small loan and recovering those small loan involves huge amount of cost. and banks are not set up to minimize those costs in a way that will make this feasible. >> michael elliot ended up finding a financial friend at

vedc aa nonprofit emphasis development organization. >> microloan closes the gap between opportunity and talent. talent is universal but opportunity is not. and through small bits of financing people can actually start their idea today. >> historically microlending has been associated with the developing world. keva launched in south africa in 2005 but has since spread to 75 countries including the u.s. loan amounts can be as small as $25. last year keva and vedc formed a partnership to expand microlending right here in los angeles, home of the largest number of small businesses in the country. so far they have loaned more than $400,000 to 63 entrepreneurs. >> overall, small business play a tremendous role with job

creation, as well as just holding onto the entrepreneurial spirit that gives really light to the american dream. >> like i'm driving down melrose avenue, and one of those businesses is mine! and i'm 46 years old. and i'm getting a second chance at a new dream. >> a small business funded by a small loan can mean a big difference for thousands of entrepreneurs around the world. >> life-changing. >> and right here at home. jennifer london, al jazeera, los angeles. >> it's official this time to say good-bye to blockbuster. owners dish network is closing the last 300 stores and laying off workers. a dramatic end of a company that was once valued at $45 billion.

the business couldn't compete with online rivals netflix and amazon. all right jessica's back with sports and this story just keeps going, dripping dripping dripping more information every day. >> absolutely with the dolphins right now it's really opened up a can of worms for the entire nfl in every clubhouse really. but we know in this case jonathan martin's team mate of the miami dolphins richie incognito was at the center of the bullying. but asked to toughen up the dolphins young guard, the man who broke that story and joins us now for more from miami with this saga going on. chris let's just ask the question, what exactl exactly dd coaches ask of incognito? >> well, coaches told richie

incognito to quote unquote toughen up jonathan martin. he had missed a couple of voluntary spring practices and coaches ordered richie, toughen him up. the question is what did they mean about that specifically? they weren't specific they just gave that order according to what we've heard and maybe richie incognito took it too far. but here is the funny thing. a lot of jonathan martin's teammates are taking richie incognito aside on this. they feel that jonathan martin handled this the wrong way, that this thing should have been handled internally, not gotten to this point. if jonathan martin had a problem with richie incognito, he should have taken care of it like a man. >> he never went to the coach to talk about those things but we also know that martin was treated for emotional distress. was this a precautionary thing or did he finally hit that breaking point?

>> it seems like he finally hit that breaking point. the way this thing all started or the catalyst of where we are now a week ago monday the entire offensive line, maybe eight, ten guys were sitting down in the team cafeteria having lunch and it's kind of a tradition the linemen do to each other every now and then when the last guy gets to the table everybody else gets up and leaves. for some reason this particularly set jonathan martin off. he set his food tray down on the floor and storms out of the facility. from the player's point of view they are looking around to see what's going on. it appears that this is jonathan martin's breaking point as opposed to him going to this the facility sort of for maintenance if you will. >> there's been so much talk around the dolphins organization between the hazing, of course all the other stuff we have going on. what is exactly the state of the miami dolphins now as they are

getting set to have monday night football against tampa now? >> the players are angry i can tell you that. here is why they are angry. they feel that they are being unfairly portrayed as a locker room out of control. as a team devoid of leadership. and that they have this bigoted racist guy in richie incognito who they voted to the six-member team leadership council. the players wanted to speak out today in the locker room and kind of set the record straight on all this kind of stuff. brine hartline a veteran receiver on the team, said basically sometimes it's the ones closest to you that can hurt you the most, that is the case in this situation, meaning jonathan martin. the players think that they have been unfairly characterized, that they are out of touch with each other's feelings, and they

came out to set the record straight in their opinion and to deny all those allegations and basically say richie incognito is our guy. interestingly enough when we asked them about the voice mail that richie is alleged to have used, i'm going to slap your mother, i'm going to kill you, used the n word, perhaps richie took things too far. they have never heard richie use the n word in their presence and they say there is that culture in athletics where certain guys use the n word and they say that richie did not use it in a mean-spirited way. and even black players were saying, it's okay. richie didn't mean anything when he used the n word. so again they almost absolved richie incognito of all guilt here and the players are pretty much putting this on jonathan martin. >> will we see incognito who is

suspended indefinitely, will he play again and do you see any fault from the dolphins organization from up top? >> i think richie will probably play again. the way this thing is going now, it appears that all the players have his back. there is an independent nfl investigation that is just starting up so that's going to reveal a lot more things. but i think right now, richie has a chance to play in the nfl again. and as far as fallout in the organization, i think it's like this: if this team does not perform well this season, general manager jeff ireland and head coach joe philbin will be gone and can get rid of this whole mess. if this team somehow makes it to the playoffs that complicates the decision. >> chris perkins a beat writer for miami dolphins and certainly this case continues to have legs. backing up incognito as opposed

to martin. >> their need to speak out too. and kevin is next with sports right after this. >> audiences are intelligent

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>> well, hello again, yesterday at this time we were talking about the snow event that was going on in the northern plains. now it's those temperatures that are dropping all the way down towards texas. right now minneapolis at 33, north dakota, some of those purpose -- purples, down towards denver 41, we'll get to texas in just a moment but what we're seeing is a lot of rain now. the snow is pretty much gone. going to be a very rainy day on thursday for boston, new york, washington, philadelphia, all the way down to atlanta. that will be extending and we could be seeing severe weather in addition to that. flooding in texas was pretty bad, some of those places haven't dried out yet. we have some rain here, that is now along the coastal region,

corpus christi picking up rain. dallas agree°, we'll see 53, we'll see the frost advisory, you may want to scrape your windows in the morning. freeze warnings are in effect, that includes oklahoma as well. you need to bring in your plants. temperatures are going to be dipping down below freezing and coastal areas. san antonio, not much warmer at 46° there, it's only going to last one day though. those temperatures will be back on the rebound into the 70s by the trial we go into next week. i told you about the rain across the northeast. that's going to be making its way to new york, 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. that's a look at your national weather, have a great evening, everyone.

>> welcome to al jazeera america i'm john siegenthaler and here are tonight's top stories. >> it looks like yasser arafat was poisoned. they made that conclusion after examining his remains at al jazeera request they found a high level of radioactive substance called pulominau ium. and another contention hearing for health an human