controversy. >> answers to the questions no one else will ask. >> real perspective, consider this on al jazeera america this is al jazeera america live from new york city. i'm tony harris with a look at today's top stories. calls for a cease-fire rejected by hamas as israel intensifies its offensive many gaza. president obama announces new expanded sanctions against russia aimed at hitting their economy. the ncaa adprees to a multi-million dollar settle. okcupid admits to experimenting on users, manipulating matches and tweaking profiles.

the palestine liberation organization called for a 24-hour humanitarian cease-fire in gaza today, but hamas rejected it saying at the present times to hear from israel first. israel intensified the offensive in gaza. palestinian health officials say at least 100 people in gaza were killed just today. israel attacked several hamas targets in gaza. palestinian officials say israel shelled the only power plant in the area. that will make life much more difficult for the area's nearly 2 million residents. nicole johnston has more for gaza. >> reporter: this is as bad as it gets for the electricity supply. the power station is up in smoke. no one has ever seen anything like this here before. it's been burning out of control for hours. too dangerous to send crews in

to try and put it out. there's been tank shelling around this power station for days, and now it's taken another direct hit. they're trying to repair this, and it could take months. all the plant's fuel is burning. >> the power plant has been targeted several times for the last couple of days, and we have informed all of them and everybody about the shelling. they told us this is my mistake. i don't know. i mean, this has been repeated several times. >> reporter: al jazeera visited the power plant a few days ago. then one of its four generators had been hit, and the main office. even still the workers showed up to try and keep the place running. they were nervous. >> translator: it's death. this is dangerous. what can we do? this is our work. >> reporter: there's been no electricity in east gaza since the israeli ground invasion

started. >> talking about the humanitarian situation, there is no electricity, there is no water, no essentials, no supplies. >> reporter: this shop relies on a generator for all its electricity, but the cost of running it is so expensive they can't use freezers and only one fridge. >> translator: after destroying the power plant in gaza, we suffered a lot from the loss of electricity. we just use our generators for eight to ten hours a day. >> reporter: now it's going to get much worse for the rest of gaza. with the electricity plant down, people will be lucky to get a few hours of power every two days. nicole johnston, al jazeera, gaza. >> talk of a cease-fire emerged today from leaders of palestine liberation organization, but on the ground in gaza the fighting continues. nick shifrin joins us live now. it's been a busy and devastating day in gaza. fair to say it's one of the

worst days since the conflict started? >> reporter: yeah, absolutely, tony. we have seen a huge bombardment from israel really relentless in the last 24 hours. we were out on this spot all last night watching the flares fly, hearing the drones fly over gaza city, hearing the air strikes from f-16s as well as the strikes from my right. that's the mediterranean sea. you may hear them right now. those are the big booms of israeli gunboats firing into gaza. i have to play one piece of video for you. this is actually just about an hour and a half ago in the spot where i am. let's take a look at what happened about 150 feet behind me.

>> reporter: apparently we don't have the video, but it was a strike by a -- by one of those gun ships that hit that field right behind me. you can't see it. it was very close and very loud, tony. it's just one example of what all the people of gaza are going through tonight. the israeli military says they hit hundreds of targets including the head of hamas here, the number two in the organization, his house was hit. hamas television was hit. going after the symbols of power that hamas has here. >> you wonder if there is anywhere in gaza that is safe whether you talk about the number of strikes here. what effect is this having on the humanitarian crisis there, nick? >> reporter: yeah, well as nicole talked about in the

story, this strike on the power plant has a huge impact. this is not just about power. this is about water. people need power in order to pump the water into their homes. so there's a lot of people without water tonight. it's about sewage. the sewage plant needs power in order to pump the sewage to where it should be right now. instead, we were looking at scenes where the sewage is being pumped into the mediterranean or back into communities. so there's a huge humanitarian crisis that is going to be happening because of the power plant strike. in addition, of course, to the more than 180,000 people who have been displaced already in the last few weeks. they're in u.n. schools turned shelters across this strip. that's 1 in 10 people. many more who aren't even counted are staying in private homes, staying in friends' homes or family members' homes, and those homes are very crowded. a lot of people are moving every night. we had one friend tell us that

his family had to move four or five times in the last week and a half because each of the communities that they moved to having bombed. so clearly the power plant strike is only increasing in humanitarian crisis. >> last one for you, nick. is there any movement on the cease-fire talks started by the plo today? i guess at this point rejected by hamas. >> yeah. it's less about rejecting and approaching as it is about is everything on the same side? in the west bank you have the head of the media branch of the plo, the palestinian authority, saying that we speak for hamas and hamas accepts this. five minutes later we all got a text from the hamas spokesman saying, not so fast. nobody speaks for us and we don't agree with this announcement. in the last half an hour you had the head of hamas' military wing getting on television and say, no cease-fire until our demands are met, and that's the lifting

of the israeli siege and the opening of the borders. israeli officials are vowing that they will continue this fight until all those tunnels that lead from gaza to israel are destroyed and until all the rockets that fly from here into israel are destroyed. so both sides continue to use the rhetoric of increasing the violence rather than accepting the cease-fire. >> nick shifrin for us in gaza city. thank you. here's a look at the conflict by the numbers. more than 1200 palestinians have been killed and more than 7,000 have been injured. the united nations says nearly 183,000 palestinians in gaza have been displaced. on the israeli side, at least 56 people have been killed, most of them are soldiers. a short time ago president obama announced that the united states is joining the european union in imposing new sanctions on russia in the wake of the shootdown of malaysian airlines flight 17. mike viqueira joins us from washington. mike, are these sanctions a significant difficulty with what areas are the sanctions

targeting? >> reporter: the arms industry, the energy industry, the finance industry. tony, it's significant, and here's the main reason why. president obama has been trying to bring along major allies in europe for months now since the invasion of crimea or the annexation of victim ya earlier in the spring and sdwent actions by russia to destabilize eastern ukraine and destabilize the government in kiev. today the president in concert with the european union, and that is a significant part, instituted if not the broad sectoral sanctions he promised and threatened and tried to cajole the europes for months to come along with it. here here heretofore he had instituted sanctions against individual sanctions, but the white house repeatedly termed his cronies. now they go up by an expotential

factor, and he stopped in front of marine one and what he was supposed to do in concert with the europeans. >> russians' action in the ukraine that we have imposed have made a weak russian economy even weaker. foreign investors are staying away even before our actions today nearly $100 billion in capital was expected to flee russia. russia's energy and financial and defense sectors feel the pain. >> reporter: president obama was on the phone with vladimir putin just a couple of days ago. secretary of state john kerry on the phone with russian foreign measure lavrov this morning. the upshot of all that is the dossier, an indictment if you will on the part of the administration saying, the president saying there is clear evidence now russia is taking advantage of the crisis in the two weeks since the downing of malaysian aircraft to continue to pour arms and armaments and

supplies and fuel and funds over the border from russia into ukraine, and now the administration is even going so far as to accuse russia of firing artillery shells against ukrainian government positions from russian territory over the border and into ukraine. the situation continues to escalate. the president now bringing the europeans forward with him on some measure of stronger sanctions against russia, tony. >> that's interesting, mike, because i wasn't sure i heard it correctly when the president said russia was involved in firing essentially from its territorial borders across the border and onto ukrainian forces but thank you for confirming that. mike viqueira at the white house for us. thank you. escalation on the ground in ukraine today with direct strikes on the center of donetsk, something that had been avoided until now. at least 23 people are dead amid the fighting in three cities. ukrainian troops are trying to regain control of areas seized.

it's hampering effort by intefrnlt international inspectors to get to the crash site. we have more now from donetsk. >> reporter: she shows me where the shells hit her first floor apartment. her son was inside when shrapnel cut through their living room. he jumped out of the window to safety. the war has destroyed her home and is tearing apart her family. they are split by conflicting loyalties. >> translator: i'm not only shocked, but this is completely crazy. most of my family lives in central ukraine. the government asked my brother to join the ukrainian army. they send a armed man to come here and shoot at my people and son. >> reporter: other residential areas are pounded by artillery. this man was killed by shrapnel. the ukrainians aren't targeting civilians blaming the separatists for the violence.

>> translator: the shelling in donetsk is continuing, civilians are dying. we have nfths information that milt tants don't just gather people but use children as human shields. they completely control the situation and don't allow citizens to leave cities. >> what happened here shows you how close the fighting is getting to the center of donetsk. it's still not clear who is responsible for the shelling here, but clearly civilians are getting caught up once again in the conflict. there's also fighting close to the crash site of malaysian airliner mh17. for the third day in a row, investigators haven't been able to reach the wreckage. the site has been left unguarded now for almost a week. the ukrainians are closing in on separatist territory, attempting to cut the supply routes retaking donetsk is kiev's ultimate goal. people here are preparing for a battle for control of this city.

al jazeera, donetsk, eastern ukraine. amid the controversy between ukraine and russia, the u.s. today also accused of russia of violating a 1987 nuclear missile treaty. the treaty bans rushing ya from processing, produces or testing nuclear-capable cruise missiles with a certain range. kimberly joins us from washington. what is the u.s. saying russia did to violate this particular treaty? >> well, the united states is saying that russia violated this treaty when it tested, and that's the keyword, tested a banned ground launch cruise missile. this is something that has been articulated in a formal letter by president obama, hand-dlifred by american embassy officials. in this letter the u.s. is articulating the concerns say there's a violation through the testing but there needs to be high level dialogue as the united states calls it to try and bring russian back into

compliance. should russia not supply it will consult with international allies in terms of steps forward. >> how long has the u.s. been concerned about this particular issue? >> the short answer is years, 2008 is really whether this popped up on the u.s. radar and in 2011. it was may that we know that a state department official had a consultation with the counterpart in the russian government about this around the same time. there was a high level obama administration meeting of top security officials. the national security adviser, the cia, the department of defense, all of them came to the conclusion that this testing was serious enough to warrant a response or to discuss that this was indeed a violation. so now we have this formal letter as well as a report to congress on the fact that there has been a violation in terms of violating international arms control agreements. >> i think i know the answer to the next one and will ask it anyway. what effect is this having on the u.s.-russian relationship, which is pretty frosty at the

moment? >> indeed, because in the last hour we had the latest rounds of sanctions announced by the white house. that is the second round of sanctions in just a few weeks. of course, we know that there was a phone call with sergei lavrov the russian foreign minister and secretary of state john kerry. we know they discussed this issue. there's no formal response so far. this is a very tense time for u.s.-russian relations. the u.s. is not happy with the russian role in eastern ukraine, not happy about the granting of asylum to the nsa whistleblower edward snowden. president obama was asked by a reporter, is this a new cold war? the president saying no, that's not the case, but it is the u.s. view that there is a desire to have russia feel the cost of being involved in that conflict in eastern ukraine. >> froesy, and feels pretty cold to me. kimber kimberly, appreciate it. an appeals court ruled today that a mississippi abortion law is unconstitutional. that law requires physicians at

abortion clinics to obtain admitting privileges at local hospitals to essential sli close down the state's only abortion center. we spent the day with one of the few doctors that performs the procedure in mississippi. >> this is the key to the apartment here in chicago. these are the keys to my apartment in mississippi. >> reporter: dr. willie parker lives and works in two worlds. twice a month for the last two years he packs a bag and hits the road. the chicago-based gynecologist travelings to where he sees the most need. >> ideally about mid-day, sometimes i end up leaving a little later and arrive at night. then i have a full day the following day in the clinic. >> reporter: his final destination? the heart of the deep south. here in jackson sits the last remaining abortion clinic in the entire state of mississippi. it's known as the pink house. many travel hundreds of miles from some of the poorest rural

communities looking for medical attention here. >> we're in mississippi, so you have a right to stand your ground. >> reporter: outside protesters try to discourage women from going inside. >> does anybody care? little black boys and girls are being decimated here. >> reporter: inside the waiting room is full. >> expect to be here two to three hours, no bags, purses or children are allowed. >> on the day we visited, there were 39 women waiting to see dr. parker. >> he's going to tell you what the risks are. he's going to tell you what to expect. >> reporter: once inside they undergo group counseling and meet one on one with dr. parker. >> i'll be taking care of you. >> reporter: after the 24-hour waiting period is met, he goes from exam room to exam room. >> i know you don't want to be here and don't know what to expect. that's why i tell you everything in advance. that was a tough one. she'd never had a pelvic exam before. >> reporter: rachel is 23 years

old and in a committed relation slip. despite using birth control she became pregnant, but the couple knew they weren't ready to be parents. she didn't want to show her face, but told us if the clinic were closed she would have so travel three hours to new orleans for care. >> i think that people don't realize that the people who need abortions are the ones that can't afford to have a doctor in the first place. >> reporter: the governor has vowed to make mississippi an abortion-free state. >> now there are all these variables that make it so difficult as to being impractical. some states have parental noifkz laws and some stits have waiting periods and face-to-face counseling. mississippi has it all of them. it makes it harder for women. >> reporter: in 2012 the legislature passed a law requires doctors that do abortions to get hospital privileges. so far no local hospital has granted them to dr. parker and his partner, the only two abortion providers in the state. >> the special question becomes

is it right? so even when it's not popular or politically exbead yens, you have to do what your conscience tells you right now. 12 years ago my conscience said to make sure this care is available for women. >> reporter: for now dr. parker will continue to travel to mississippi providing abortion care to women who have nowhere to turn. al jazeera, jackson, mississippi. coming up, new numbers showing americans are once again piling on debt. plus, in today's power politics, rob ford's newest photo op. oh, my. oh, my. @

wall street concerned a bit about what's happening in eastern ukraine. understandable, right? the dow is down 75 points today and the nasdaq and s&p 500 down on the day. let's get to the power of politics now. 98 days until the midterm elections and with parties trying to galvanize and energize the supporters, the house republican leadership tried to squash a key message from

democrats. david shuster is here with more. >> democrats have a windfall in political donations thanks to sarah palin and a few other conservatives in the house calling for the impeachment. the threat has motivated democrats like no other issue this summer, so today house speaker john boehner tried to pour cold water on the idea that there would be any efforts to remove the president from office. >> we'll talk about impeachment. it's coming from the president's own staff and coming from democrats on capitol hill. why? because they're trying to rally their people to give money and to show up in this year's election. we have no plans to impeach the president. we have no future plans. listen, it's all a scam started by democrats at the white house. >> actually the topic was started by conservative lawmakers including congressman stephen king and michelle bae bachma bachmann.

they highlighted and leveraged this talk for personal gain? you bet. senate democrats are trying to box in republicans about a new gun control measure. it would expand restrictions on people who are convicted stalkers or have restraining orders against them. today a gun safety group funded by michael bloomberg is airing a dramatic ad in the home states of key senators whose position on the bill is uncertain. watch. >> 911. what's your emergency? >> it's my ex. he's trying to break in. >> do you have a restraining? >> yes. please my son is here. >> he just broke in the door. you need to come now. get away from him. stop it. get away. get out of here! >> i'm taking him. [ gunshot ] >> pretty tough stuff. the ad urges viewers about the

content. kelly ayotte of new hampshire and dean heller of nevada and tell them to support the new legislation. the senators have not commented. and the north carolina senate race, democratic incumbent kay haguen is trying to promote her political moderation. here's her latest ad. >> republican or democrat, if the idea works for middle class families, i'm all for it. i approve this message because i was so proud with a nonpartisan national journal ranked me the most moderate senator. not too far left or right, just like north carolina. >> in iowa another crucial senate battleground state. successful statewide candidates in the hawkeye state tend to lean moderate, so republican senate candidate joni ernst is in table. she says that states have the right to naul fie federal laws when, in fact, they don't. >> we have talked about this at the state legislature before.

but bottom line is as a u.s. senator why should we be passing laws that the states are considering nullified? >> maybe because federal law cannot be nullified by a state? the campaign said the video is out of context and that the candidate understands the limits of state power. finally, in canadian politics toronto mayor rob ford who was seeking re-election despite recent troubles with drugs and alcohol abuse just held one of the more memorable photo-opes one will say. the mayor in the white shirt and his brother in the red shirt went to a local park and took a ride on a seesaw. the mayor is going up and down, up and down. kind of like his political career. they were trying to highlight new combroouchts to the toronto park. we suspect it's new weight-bearing reinforcements on that seesaw?

that's the power politics. >> michael eaves, that was good, wasn't it? that was good. the ncaa agrees to settle a class action lawsuit over head injuries in college athletics, but it doesn't provide any money for treatment. we break down the settlement with michael eaves. that's next.

>> now available, the new al jazeea america mobile news app. get our exclusive in depth, reporting when you want it. a global perspective wherever you are. the major headlines in context. mashable says... you'll never miss the latest news >> they will continue looking for survivors... >> the potential for energy production is huge... >> no noise, no clutter, just real reporting.

the new al jazeera america mobile app, available for your apple and android mobile device. download it now primetime news. >> welcome to al jazeera america. >> stories that impact the world, affect the nation and touch your life. >> i'm back. i'm not going anywhere this time. >> only on al jazeera america. welcome back, everyone. the ncaa agreed to settle a class action lawsuit. we will create a fund to help diagnose former and current college athletes with brain injuries. michael eaves is here with more lawsuit and the proposed settlement. micha michael. >> a lot of people think this is not enough. >> we need to get into that. >> more on that in a moment. $70 million is how much the

governing body for a college sports is setting aside for student athletes for the diagnosis and treatment of concussions and other brain injuries. the lawsuit settled ten separate lawsuits combined into one during the negotiation, but it's not just limited to football players. this settlement applies to all current and former ncaa student athletes in all sports and divisions who competed at a member school. to give you an idea how many may benefit, consider from 2004 to 2009 alone 29,225 ncaa athletes suffered concussions. we're talking about potentially millions of athletes. those student athletes who dwaul fie for the settlement will receive free physical exams, neurological measurements and neurocognitive assessments, but any treats for head injuries have to be paid by the student athletes themselves. it establishes a single return to play policy singling out how

they receive head blows before they have to assume it. it has to be approved by a federal judge and it could take months. he will hear from student athletes across the some of whom may reject to the termsful settlement. >> among the terms is 70 million. that feels low to me. i don't know. >> if you compare it to the nfl lawsuit related to concussions, that was almost a billion dollars, and the judge sent it back and said it wasn't enough. you have way more athletes in the ncaa than the nfl. critics say it's not enough money because it doesn't set aside money for treatment. >> that's right. >> if you diagnose, you take care of the treatment yourself. what you're allowed to do is sue your member school to pay for the treatment. some schools may set up a fund to do it, but the settlement doesn't allow for damages from concussions and there's no discussions to be had and there's a court process. >> it can take months. the judge can sent it back is

see what happens with it. they settled the lawsuit. >> mike, appreciate it. michael eaves is with us. thank you. in news around the world right now, sierra leone's lead ebola physician died at the ebola management center in the eastern part of the country. sierra leone is one of the three nations in west africa along with liberia and guinea where hundreds have died from ebola. two americans in liberia tested positive for the disease. today we spoke to a doctor who is the direction for the division of global migration and quarantine at the cdc. he said not enough is being done to control the epidemic. >> it's not under control, and the international community is fully engaged. w.h.o. is assisting coordinating with many non-governmental organizations and partners as well as cdc's deployed team, and more needs to be done to get the epidemic under control. identifying cases early,

managing those contacts, and making sure the contacts are on fever watch and not able to move and travel across borders is a very, very critical aspect of the control of the epidemic. >> officials in liberia success sended ought flights to the city hit hardest by the outbreak. more than 700 people have died since the outbreak began. kurdish officials in northern iraq ask the west to help in the fight against the islamic state. it is a tough battle that could drag kurdish forces into a wider war. omar has a report. >> reporter: heading to the front line. it's a battle kurdish forces cannot lose. their enemy is the islamic state group and other rebels. south of kirkuk the fighters have fortified their positions.

a gas field and energy complex is just hundreds of meters away. signs of fighting winning. >> translator: our mission is to prevent kirkuk and prevent any advancement. they use precise mortar shells and snipers. >> reporter: the iraqi army abandoned their weapons and fled after sunni rebels on a number of cities. kurdish troops moved in and took control. that puts them at the forefront of battles with the islamic state. the flag of the islamic group is raised over a building about 800 meters away from i am. kurdish forces are engaged in fierce battles with the islamic group on a number of fronts. they are overstretched. soon the commander in kirkuk shows me the hotspots in the area under his command. what he says is the battle is much wider. >> translator: we have eight

different battlefields with the fighters. we have more than 1,000 kilometers of border with the islamic state. from the syrian border to iran, we're ready for them. they're all well-trained farmer officers including arabs, afghans and chechyans. they parade the streets in the town, and tense of fighters well hiech armed and determined to carry on. kurdish security officials say these fighters are armed with more than weapons seized from the iraqi army. back at the kurdish front, they are preparing for a long battle. the kurdish region has so far managed to secure itself away from the violence in the rest of iraq, but now it's being dragged into it. al jazeera south of kirkuk. in libya militias agree to a 24-hour cease-fire to allow

firefighters to fight a fire. 6 million liters of fuel were sent on fire. that fire is now out of control. the government says it needs international help to put it out. in afghanistan a suicide bomber assassinated the cousin of president karzai. he was a staunch supporter of the president and played an active roll in the campaign. in belgium a special prosecutor says senior members targeted people to harvest and sell their organs. the alleged crimes happened after the civil war. now senior political figures face indictments. we have more. >> reporter: they held the victims' bodies, but how many killed in the kosovo war died because of a horrific trade in body parts. to years it was claimed civilians were detained and killed so their organs could be harvested and sold.

15 years later and after a long investigation, on tuesday the eu's lead prosecutor backed that theory. >> i can say at this point there were compelling indications that this practice did occur on a very limited scale, and that a small number of individuals were killed for the purpose of extracting and trafficking their organs. a handful of individuals were subjected to this crime. >> reporter: more than 3,000 people disappeared during the conflict, which began in february 1998 and ended in june the following year. the claim was that the organs were sold on behalf of the kla, the kosovo liberation army. officials say indictments have been prepared against senior political figures. >> translator: i think it is now confirmed that war crimes did happen. he mentioned the word "indications." he said there was strong indications. he didn't say proof. i don't want to comment on that. let's wait for the indictment to

see what the evidence actually means. >> reporter: this house in northern albania was raided by the u.n. one of the a number of properties suspected of being used to carry ut the operations. traces of blood and empty medicine bottles other operation paraphernalia was found. the owners still insist they had no part to play in organ removals. >> demand and continue to demand moral compensation, because this isn't justice. they brought international investigators into our house and threw us out. we had to sleep in snow. we want them to come back and look again. >> reporter: for those that lost family members, the news is unlikely to bring much peace, but they will still keep searching for answers and justice. a 9-year-old hit by a plane on a florida beach has now died. maria has that story and more news making headlines across america today. >> family members are grieving for the 9-year-old girl today.

the aircraft crash-landed on the beach earlier this week killing her father. the girl was airlifted to the hospital where she died of her injuries. the pilot of the single engine plane called air traffickers on sunday saying he was doing an emergency landing on the beach. the passenger and pilot were unharmed. crews have discovered six more homes destroyed during a wildfire in northern california. the fire is now 80% contained over six square miles. about 1200 residents have returned to their house, 19 homes and 48 other structure rs have been destroyed so far. improvements are on the way for neighborhoods hit during last year's colorado floods. habitat for humanity has been awarded $4 million to build 35 new homes, more than 1500 homes were damaged during the floods. residents that lost homes can apply for a new one. an appeals court says a cross-shaped steel beam found in the world trade center wreckage

can stay on display. the judges cited with a ruling last year allowing it to be part of 9/11 memorial and mu sfwleem. a group of atheists sued the museum on constitutional grounds. it was found by rescue workers two days after the attacks. in indiana new video from a train bearing down on two women that survived. they caught their final moments. >> can you believe this? >> yes, it's incredible. they were walking on a railroad bridge just after sunrise. the 100-car coal train makes every effort to stop. >> this engineer threw the train into braking as quickly as possible. he yelled back and asked them, are you okay? one of them yelled that she had stubbed the toe and otherwise fine. i'm sure their nerves were as shattered as his were. >> the women crawled out, and they have been identified and will be prosecuted fortress

passing. >> you're not supposed to do that. if they jumped they would be killed. >> that's like from "stand by me." that's scary. america's aging zoo elephant population is dwindling. the 224 zoos in the united states only 66 actually have herds. tonya moseley shows us how one zoo in seattle is making pretty difficult decisions. >> reporter: all of these people eagerly waiting in line are about to get closer than they have before to an 8,000-pound giant. at 47 years old, bamboo is the oldest elephant here at seattle's zoo. >> hi, pumpkin. hi sweetie pie. >> she shares the space with two other elephants, 35-year-old chi

and 45-year-old ratoto. all of them have spent their lives here, but you never see all three interact at the same time. watoto is unpredictable and aggressive towards bamboo. >> even when we have elfanlts shares the same space together, they oftentimes choose to share the opposite ends of the exhibit. >> the association of zoos and aquariums says a growing body of evidence shows that zoo elephants thrive when they socialize with each other in a herd of three or other. they require all of the accredited zoos with less than three elthe infants increase their herds or phase out the programs and donate their elephants to other zoos. because of her aggressive nature, that's what woodland park would do with yatota and get another elephant. animal rights advocates say that's not enough. >> when i look at the elephants and see them, i think it's a sad commentary on our humanity.

>> reporter: she says the elephants here are stressed with highway noise hint them and less than an acre to roam. >> what would you like to see? >> i would like them retired to a sanctuary where they can roam on vast acres of land and they can swim in a lake and heal from the arthritis and the lameness that they have. become as much of an elephant as they can for the remainder of their lives. >> reporter: curator martin ramirez believes zoos have a do you toy to breed new animals. breeding is difficult to do. woodland park has unsuccessfully tried to artificially inseminate chi 112 times. with 96 elephants poached each day -- >> if given a choice between a zoo and being free roaming around, i would say the elephants are safer in a zoo

because they don't have the threats that they face in the wild. >> there you go. perfect! >> ramirez hopes that providing an up close and personal experience will inspire everyone to join the effort to save the elephants. tonya mosley, al jazeera, seattle. i have real issues with the next story, but the team says i need to do it and wipe down. coming up dating site okcupid admits to manipulating data, but they sail it's part of the making of the site and making it better. we will talk to one of the founders. that's next. that's next. le of our time.

>> talk to al jazeera only on al jazeera america we are learning more today about how much americans are really struggling to deal with

debt. more than 35 milon americans have debt andaid bills the average amount is $5200. resechers s the avera ameran is $54,0 in de let's get to this story here. the story of the day for some popular dating website okcupid says it's been lying to some of its users conducting social experiments with their profiles? are you outraged? it's a few week after facebook said it manipulated news feeds. you've been looking at this story. what did you find? >> i know you're not outraged, tony, because you don't have an yoin profile, but imagine you're looking for love online. okcupid says you're a great match with someone -- >> what's the story? >> now is the time for you to try the online profile.

>> okay. >> let's say that okcupid says you're a great match with someone after they've manipulated the data. now the company says it ran experiments like pairing up incompatible people to improve the site, but a lot of users are angry. for people looking for love online, okcupid is one of the hottest spots. it offers free matching and many, many choices. now they admit in a blog post they tricked some users by running experiments on them without their knowledge. in one experiment the site told people that were bad matches they'd be great together. the result? the matches were twice as likely to start a conversation. christian rudder says the test help the site learn an important less son-in-lawing. okcupid works but that's not the whole story. the mere miss of compatibility works as well as the truth. in another experiment they rated pretty people highly when the

site hid the text in a profile. they say okcupid's tests are unethical. >> if you are investing time to find a relation shirp and the owners use it for their own social engineering, that might not be okay with a lot of people. >> reporter: it isn't okay for some users. this person tweeted i just deleted my account because of this story. invading privacy is not good. another wrote nice to know i can blame all those bad dates on someone else. >> i think they're overestimated the user's tolerance to be used as a guinea pig. >> okcupid's announcement is weeks after facebook revealed it tweaked news feeds to see what would put them in a bad mood and that led to an uproar. the company that owns okcupid owns match.com and tinder. >> i hear a lot about tinder. >> click on right r on or left.

i've only heard through the grapevine. >> thank you. more questioning to. joins me is christian rudder, the co-founder of okcupid. good to talk with you. walk me through an experiment on people who use your site. how does it actually work? >> we took people that weren't good matches and told them they were. >> why would you do that? i don't know whether i'm upset about this or not, but i'm thinking the reason i'm going to the site is because i want a genuine, compatible match. >> exactly. you know, that's how you test whether something is working. it's a scientific method. the alternative if we don't test it, we lie to the people that come every month. instead we did a -- we took a small group and everyone was notified they were in the experiment after the fact. it was less than 500 messages exchanged under this false match

percentage, and everyone was correct in the end. then we learned something. >> what did you learn? >> we learned that the power of suggestion is about half of the equation, and then the match is about the other half. i guess in short maybe there's room for improvement, but at least it does work somewhat. the alternative would be, i guess it works. i don't know. i'm not going to test it. >> i don't know whether to be upset about it. when you put your information online, it's a free-for-all. i don't necessarily like it. i don't know. help me be a bit more comfortable with this idea that, you know, i'm thinking i'm signing up for one thing, but the reality is once i let out of the profile folks like you have access information. >> i didn't access anybody information and nobody's privacy was violated at all. every single website, every single website, the newyorktimes.com and pinterest,

everybody has testing stuff. that's how they're built. nobody launches a feature and bets the farm on 10% of the users watching how it goes and seeing if it's good or getting rid of it if it's bad and rolling it out to everybody else. >> ares users canceling accounts because of this? >> not at all. >> would you tell me if it were happening? would you tell me how many people are canceling they're upset with this. >> you can corroborate this other places. at least a million check in. we had less than 10 complaints. there's just not -- the i think users because okcupid uses data all the time on the blog, i think they expect it a little bit. >> i get that the website in order to stay innovative, need to collect and analyze the data. if you're actually telling someone who you're not

necessarily a great match with that you are going to take ace closer look, is that crossing the line in any way? >> i definitely understand how it feels weird, but it's part of a continuum that we're always changes to match algorithms. that means we test it and one user sees one percentage and another user sees another. at the end of the line we test it against the scientific method basically. it's part of a continuum. i understand why it sounds weird. >> it does sound weird. i definitely agree with you. >> you and rock ann are on the same page, and 90% of people in our newsroom, i'm the old foeingy on this one. neighbor against maybe amid water wars. while drought shaming is trending online.

the government has doubled the tourism budget in haiti. we have surfers leading the push for increased exposure. >> reporter: on haiti's southern coast, surfers aren't an unusual site these days. a few months ago some of these boys couldn't even swim. now look at them. they're all part of surf haiti, an ambitious project aimed at bringing tourists and money to the beaches. the man who runs the camp says surfing here is about more than just catching waves. >> we love to be here. you have to take pleasure to take some waves, but i think the pleasure is theirs to share, the life of people. >> in a place where most people live on $2 a day, that sense of

community is vital. the boys are taught about the environment, and there are plans to show them how to make surfboards, instructure and run sufsh haiti says. jules who was one of the first to learn to surf here says the project has the potential to change the lives of his entire community, but it's not an easy road. i've traveled all over haiti and been to various tourists destinations but for surfing with a sense of adventure doesn't get much better than this. the biggest challenge is getting people to come to haiti in the first place. for many tourists haiti is perceived as being dangerous and dirty. the coach says beaches aren't exactly pristine. passion from these young haitians is unmistakable, and it's a chance to be part of the lives of people like samson that organizers hope will draw

attention to the waves and ultimately help tourism grow. >> i would love for there to be a haitian representation in the international surfing circuit, professional. i would really, really love that. then once they announced this surfer is from haiti ripping it, people go haiti surfing? a whole industry kind of paying attention. >> reporter: surfing remains a small project with few customers. with waves like this, it's hoped that will soon change. >> how cool is that? it's neighbor against neighbor in the battle over water. california residents are turning to social media to call people out for using too much water amid one of the state'worst periods of drought in four decades. she's back with the story. >> the drought problem is to bad in california residents face up to $500 in fines for wasting water outdoors.

some neighbors take matters into their own hands. they post these kinds of images with a #droughtshaming with pictures of runoff water from sprinklers and wet sidewalks and driveways like this one. tufr right spotted in northeast l.a., and this has been on for 35 minutes. the sidewalk here and the driveway here is wet. this is a worker in beverly hills. >> you can't do that. >> he's hosing down a sidewalk. this one says, my building thinks there's enough water to hose down our court yard with the #droughtshaming. claire writes, come on, have decency not to pour water down the gutter. tony, residents are also using an app called this safe, and they're posting images on the app with a map with the exact location of the picture that you're actually looking at. >> this is what it comes to when you have a drought as severe as

this is at the moment. that's where we are right now, right? >> it sure is. >> that's you will the time this news hour. i'm tony harris in new york city. "inside story" is coming up next on al jazeera america. >> people have suffered and died from ebola for years. it's a devastating disease. what makes this latest west african outbreak the worst ever? the number of dead, the geographics spread. the threat of many more case. ebola is the "inside story."