>> welcome to al jazeera america i'm stephanie sy. here are the stories we are following for you. >> the end of the year means the end of unemployment benefits for more than a million americans. a congressional committee addresses the problem. >> some fast food workers are striking across the country we'll talk to a single mom to explain why they need a raise. >> secretary osecretary of staty goes to israel to talk over a deal with iran and middle east peases. ♪ peace >> we begin with nguye new encog

unemployment figures. they show a fix year low in the number of people applying for one employment blown fits. benefits. the labor department is reporting an average of 200,000 new jobs from august to october. the employment firm says employers announced fewer layoffs last month. but that leaves an important decision ahead for congress if law macerlawmakers don't act son 1.3 million people could lose their unemployment insurance in 23 days. libby casey joinin joins us livm capital. capitol hill. what is on the table. leader pelosi i is holding a hearing today to raise concern. the democrats are raising the charge to get longterm

unemployment benefits extended. they run out december 28 them. they werthe benefits were instia year and a half ago. they are trying to drum up interest and support for this. wthey talked about it on the house floor. up to 1.6 million americans are out of work or will be out of work because of these mindless cuts. and we are pu further cutting or safety net. he is talking about not just raising unemployment benefits but sequester cuts. they feel that they have been hit hard with programs like head start. they are trying to get it dealt with. >> has the white house weighed in on this t. >> the white house talked talked in a statement about what the

latest unemployment numbers look like. here is what their release said. they said unacceptably high. they are trying to get more jobs and get interest in trying to help americans who are dealing with unemployment. >> what is the republican response to democrats calls to extend the unemployment benefits? >> there are some push back. house speaker will be giving remarks to the press in a few moments. we'll see if he addresses this issue since it's gaining momentum on the democratic aisle. >> the republicans say there are safety nets in place and there has to be some give and take in the budgeting process. as everyone looks for ways to stimulate the economy they are questioning whether the longterm benefits are needed at this point. >> we'll see what happens in the next few weeks, thank you. >> tomorrow the labor department releases the labor numbers.

>> the hits keep coming for the nsa. the agency tracks up to 5 billion cell phones a day. they use the data to map people's location to follow their movement around the globe. the newspaper says the information came from documents provided by former nsa contractor edward snowden. the cell phones wer being trackd are outside of the united states. >> the fast food workers are striking across the country they are pushing to make it easier to unionize. many pr protestors are asking fr 15 there an hour. that is twice as much as many owner in the u.s. it comes after president obama says raising the minimum wage will not hurt jobs. last month a seattle suburb increased their wage to $15 an hour and that is by far the high

over the in thhigh -- highest i. it's 2:00 and her five-hour shifted at kfc is over. she is off to pick up her joiningest sojoining -- youngesm daycare to head home. with no time to take off her uniform she heads to the kitchen to make a snack and help her older children with their homework. >> they look to me. they have no one else to look to. for the last five years she has been making $9.13 a 9.1317 an h. i'm the definition of working poor. she is barely able to cover the cost of living expenses. i receive food stamp benefits and subsidized daycare and my son is on wick.

>> it's a federal program that offers food and healthcare for low income families. her main concern is providing stablity for her children. i'm focusing on taking care of them and making them happy and make sure they get the education so they don't have to work a fast food ra.t restaurant at 9 . >> for the past three weeks i have been working nights and weekends because christmastime is coming up. >> one day she plans to return to college and ultimately changing careers. a bump in pay would help make that happen. >> the vatican is starting a new program to fight sexual abecause in the catholic church. pope francis is putting together a committee for a way to protect children from pedophiles and improve screening from proo pris and help those that have been

abused. >> they ar dealing with the sexual abuse crisis is vital for the church's credibility. >> twenty-five soldiers were killed in a suicide attack at the yemen defense three. a car bomb wait went off. shortly after the bombing gunmen opened fire. no one has claimed responsibility. the interim government has had ongoing problems with al qaeda linked groups and northern rebels. >> secretary of state john kerry is meeting with the palestinian officials hoo today. nick joins us live from jerusalem with more on kerry's visit. >> kerry arrives with a huge agenda.

pushing forward middle east peace. before he talks about peace he needs to reassure israel over iran. today a chummy secretary of state gave an unambiguous report, the u.s. has israel's back. >> the bond between the united states and israel is unbreakable. occasionally we may have a dinse of a tactical measure we do not have a difference about the fundamental strategy that we seek with respect to the security of israel. >> kerry us used the word ten ts in seven minutes it freezes iran's nuclear program. but kerry says they share a long term goal to dismantle their nuclear capacity.

>> we'll consult closely and continually with our israeli friends in order to bring about a comprehensive agreement that can with stand everybody's test. >> now kerry wants to changes the topic. they want to talk about israel-palestinian peace but because the u.s. ignored israel over iran, kerry has lost leverage. >> now he is going to come with a extreme diplomatic weakness. i have a hard time feeling that netanyahu will move one inch. >> he will promise that the relationship's drift won't turn into a rift. and if net afternoon yaho net t going to give a bit, kerry's

task is he large. >> ththis comes hours after deay clashes broke out in the capital. at least 105 people were killed and dozens were wounded. today's figh fighting was betwen fighters who control the nation and christians that support the former president that was ousted this year. >> western diplomats are asking authorities in ukraine. they raise the flag in the capital of kiev. thousands of people have taken to the streets since the president said he would not sign a trade deal with the eu opting for closer ties with russia. >> in thailand protests were put on hold as they celebrated the revered king's birthday.

the monarch called for stablity but he did not mention the political crisis that divided the nation and led to battles between the police and protestors in bangkok. they are asking for the president to step down. >> next on al jazeera america, president obama said if you like your doctor you can keep your doctor. but the affordable care act doesn't say your doctor will keep you. you live news at the top of every hour. >> a deal in the senate may be at hand and just in the nick of time. >> thousands of new yorkers are marching in solidarity. >> we're following multiple developments on syria at this hour. >> every hour from reporters

stationed around the world and across the country. >> only on al jazeera america.

>> start with one issue ad guests on all sides of the debate. and a host willing to ask the tough questions and you'll get... the inside story ray suarez hosts inside story weekdays at 5pm et / 2pm pt only on al jazeera america >> mexican authorities have tracked down the stolen shipment of radioactive material. the shipment of cobalt 60 e radioactive material that was stolen from a gas station monday, has been found in central mexico about half a mile from the van that was carrying it. the director of mexico's national commission of nuclear security said the thieves were most likely dead or dying from the exposure to the cobalt 60.

the radio being a tich material. use for treating cancer was being transported from a hospital for waste disfoes al at the time of the theft. a controversial new plan to create a new city in louisiana is raising questions ... about race and class. the racial makeup of the new city would be dramitcally different with residents being mostly white and affluent. last week, supporters of the plan announced that they collected more than half of the signatures needed ... to let voters decide if they can go forward with the municipal plan. al jazeera's ben lemoine has more. >> jeffrey lee doesn't miss a moment with his grandchildren on the north end of baton rouge. and although they're not in school yet, he knows their education will be the key to a better life. i want them to go to a good school and learn as much as they can. >> but that's a challenge in this city where 60% of public school children aren't learning at grade level. >> it's one of the worst school systems in the state. 01:29:28 how many more generations of children do you have to disserve before you have to say let's try something different.

>> lionel rainey is part of a group who claim they're pushing for a "different" plan for better schools. by breaking away from east baton rouge parish and starting a new city. the city of "st. george" would encompass an unincorporated area that's home to a quarter of parish residents, making it the 5th largest city in the state. it would control and run its own schools with its own tax revenue. >> a new city for you guys, this is strictly about education? it's 100% totally about education. we didn't come into this saying we want to create the 5th largest city in louisiana, we came into this saying we want to take accountability for the schools in our area. >> but critics say st. george would take more than just accountability. a report commissioned by the baton rouge area chamber warns the break up would cost the city at large 53 million dollars, 20% of its budget. and it would futher segregate

the city. baton rouge is already majority black, st. george would be a majority white by a 3 to 1 ratio. >> so now we would have white kids going to school over here on this end of the parish, white kids going to school over there on the other end of the parish, and in the middle, we'd have just the black kids going to school. >> there's also a major income disparity. residents in baton rouge make an average of 58 thousand dollars a year. in the much more affluent st. george area, the average income is 90 thousand. >> i think we have to look at does that take us backwards where we're segregating ourselves again? and i don't see it as a win.

>> but it's not a new trend. both the white and black middle class have been fleeing baton rouge in search of better schools for decades. so those looking to break away say it's not about race, but education. . so this has nothing to do with skin color, this has to do with middle class flight. if you've got the means to leave baton rouge and to leave this school system, you've left. but for those who may not be able to leave like jeffrey lee, it's means more division. i guess eventually it's all going to change. you're going to have one side better than the other side or east and west side. what's going to happen to the lower side i guess you would say. if everybody's going to move to a different city for better classes. for now, the break-away effort continues to gain momentum and could soon be decided on by voters. ben lemoine, al jazeera baton rouge, louisiana. it's been tried in new york city .. los angeles ... philadelphia .. and gary, indiana. improving economic data raises fears that the fed will pull back on the bond buying stimulus. >> government reforms since 2009 make it als less likely that taxpayers will have to bailout

the financial crisis. >> he added more is to be dobb ito be done to prevent a economc melt down. the forward mustang is going on sale around the globe. thford won't reveal the price-tg but the current version starts at $23,000. >> college students are getting deeper in debilities. debilities -- debt. the average owed was $29,000. that is up 10% from 2011. >> doctors are getting worried as the obama administration ramps up enrollment in state exchange. the government's new medical insurance plans will force physicians to take a hard look at whether they can afford to practice at the same prices. >> if you like your doctor, you

can keep your doctor so long as your doctor keeps you. >> the new health plan has physicians wondering if they will be able to keep their so sf insured patients. >> i think the first thing that thphysicians can expect is a lot more patients with health insurance and a lot more will be covered through medicade because it's the biggest part of the insurance expanse i expansion ie affordable care act. >> many physicians restrict the number of patients that they accept because of the low reimbursements rates. >> medicade rates vary from state to state but are typically far below medicare and private insurance. >> look to the right. >> for instance. a brooklyn based opthamologist says that private insurance for

a full eye exam will reimburse rates up to $150. medicare pays him $145 but for the same procedure medicade pays $63. primary care rates and med canadian armedicadeare going to% internationally but in new york they will hav have to triple. >> even though they are selling plans on the obama changes dock portiodoctors remain ambivalent whether they will take the insurance. >> in new york 44% say they will set out the first year and 33 are not sure if they will participate. and 4. 4:10 are weighing their operations. lower pay to physicians is away to make plans affordable. but even for plans that pay higher rates many carry higher out of pocket costs which can create extra hurdles for doctors

trying to collect. and that could leave physicians on the hook for the cost. many insurance companies will not advise us what the actual deductible will be ahead of time that means the doctor will have to wait for the insurance company determination and has to bill the patient and then hope that the patient can pay it. >> and that hea hope may not mae financial sense for doctors when the drive for the healthcare cost is putting pressure on their bottom line. >> it looks like a giant video but it does a whe a whole lot m. how scientists are taking 3-d. imaginingsimimages to a whole n. ñ

america i'm stephanie sy. here are today's headlines congress has until december 28th to extend

longterm unemployment insurance to 1.3 americans. a health committee is meeting right now on capitol hill to discuss the issue. >> secretary of state john kerry is in israel. he reassured netanyahu that their bond is unbreakable. this is after he opposed the nuclear deal with iran. >> the nsa is tracking cell phones everyday. that is from documents by he had snowden. it's to track movements of the people outside of the us ar u.s. >> commuter scientists are taking 3-d computer imaging to the extreme. >> 224 inin this stunning caverf

pixals data cops t comes to lif. known as the cave 2 this large scale virtual reality environment was dreamed up by computer scientists at the university of illinois, chicago. think of a project room or a war room where you hang up pieces of paipaper and photographs and you tape them to the wall and you see lots of different data at the same time. today all data is stored n in ce computer we wanted electronic walls so you can display information. >> these visualzations can show howdhowdyhow depression ma manie mind. you can get big or shrink down.

you get different understanding of the data when you look at it in different sizes and relationships. >> researchers say the applications are seemingly endless. but it' it's at the heart k-2's dimensions. in 2009 nasa funded the endurance research project to study under water environments. they dropped a 6 million-dollar robot into the center of lake bonnie using sonar to collect data from the lake's deepest point. >> we had the robot sending out sonar and what we ended up getting back was 50 million points. university of illinois professor headed up the mission. it's a data set unlike any other

in a lake environment. >> that data now processed inside of k-2 is providing key siinsights of what kind of life can be sustained in icy bodies of the planet. >> on europa it is almost certain that it has an othe ocen underneath. on earth everywhere you find water you find life. >> k-2 and it's 3-g visualzations are one small step for computer scientists and one giant leap for explorers and researchers. ♪ >> i'm meteorologist dave warren. we are starting here in the southern plains there is texas and oklahoma and this color is be isan ice storm warning.

it will coat everything with ice including trees and bringing down branches and roadways making them slick. this is what is happening. this is the past six hours. this is the pink color we are focused with and it's not snow or rain. oklahoma city at 24° and dallas at 25. look at these temperatures 20° and 50° and a tremendous temperature contrast. not from place to place. 5000 feet it's 50 there and the rain is falling into air that is 20°. this is where you goa get the ie accumulation. it freezes before it hits the ground or when it hits the ground we will see this tremendous area of icing happening overnight tonight we'll get a little break and overnight tonight icing conditions here in northern oklahoma and moving up through missouri and it continues until eighuntil:00 tomorrow:00 -- 8:0w

morning. it will come to an end and push off to the north east at 12:00. a half inch or more ice accumulation is possible over the next 24 hours. there could be 4 to 6-inches of snow through northern oklahoma and ice and rain through texas and louisiana we are looking at bitter cold air coming in from the north. these are the actual temperatures below zero in bismark. 40-degrees below zero in the northern plains. the cold air is moving south and the warm air is moving up. look for rain followed by that cold air by this weekend. >> thank. s. we have breaking news. we have reports that a dump truck has crashed into a elementary school bus near boise, idaho. one child is dead and four are hurt. >> we'll bring you more details

as soon as we get them. thanks for watching al jazeera america i'm stephanie sy, inside story is next. but it's hardly alone in its efforts to solve the burden of runaway debt. i'm ray suarez. bankruptcy lessons learn and the real impact on people's lives. that's the "inside story." >> in the 1950s, a gm ceo famously said what is good for our country is good for general motors, and vice versa.