>> announcer: this is al jazeera. ♪ hello and welcome to the news hour, i'm in doha with the top stories on al jazeera, high tensions amid fears of more violence in the occupied palestinian territories after friday prayers. new offensive to retake aleppo and russian air strikes bomb syrian rebel positions. the u.s. drops plans to withdraw troops from afghanistan as taliban attacks intensify and a new study says the ebola

violence can be transmitted sexually after a victim recovers. ♪ hello, in just a few hours the u.n. security council will be holding an emergency meeting after violence in occupied jerusalem and restrictions are in place as muslim worshippers gathered at a compound for friday prayer. palestinian men under the age of 40 are not allowed to take part, since the first of october 35 palestinians and seven israelis have been killed. we are in the occupied west bank to talk to us about what is happening there and first we cross to mike hanna who is joining us from occupied east jerusalem to tell us what effect the israeli measures are having on palestinians hoping to go to a mosque to pray. >> what is happening is what has

happened for a number of fridays in resent times and what is happening is restrictions imposed on those who wish to pray and those 14 men above the age of 40 are allowed to enter and go through the checkpoints that lead to the compound itself. what you are seeing behind me are large numbers of people who were not allowed to get past that particular check point. as we have seen in the past a large number of them praying in sink with those who actually were able to get through the mosque compound. once again you see heavy security presence as there has been in place here and one must remember too that although there are a number of checkpoints in this immediate facility there are also blockades, blockages in neighbors of occupied east jerusalem as piles of concrete put into the roads, traffic and pedestrians being funneled through particular areas being forced to go through police checkpoints where their identity

is checked on each and every occasion. so for those wishing to come and pray this friday a long journey going through a large number of checkpoin checkpoints. >> a lot to talk about on behalf of the international community today in a couple hours when the u.n. security council meets to discuss the situation. >> well the whole issue of international involvement is something in resent days has been a real point of criticism among many palestinian leaders and palestinian community. what we have this week is a scheduled visit by the quartet who then cancelled their trip. i have been told by organizers in occupied east jerusalem this gave a red flag in a way to the netanyahu government for their increase in security measures throughout the region. also they argue very little being heard from the international community during this resent rise in the crisis in a way many palestinians

feeling abandoned by the international forces, not getting any support they believe and also not receiving that degree of criticism that they believe the actions of the netanyahu government merits so they will be watching very, very closely the u.n. security council meeting in the course of the day hoping against hope that for a change something tangible may come out, something that actually gives some hope to palestinians living in what is becoming increasingly a state of siege that people outside the region that people in the international community actually do care. >> mike, thank you for that update from occupied east jerusalem and let's cross over from ramallah and we understand that protests have been called by palestinian factions but how much support do these factions actually have compared to all the students who have been calling for protests and coming out in large numbers over the past couple of weeks? >> well, from what we have seen

over the past weeks, whenever students call or universities call for protests you have a larger turnout. usually when palestinian factions or any political faction calls for similar demonstrations we have a much lower turnout so we will just have to see what is going to happen today. we are reaching the end of friday prayer, as you said the palestinian factions have called for demonstrations, a day of rage all over palestinian territory and leaving it to every area to organize itself and have to see later what happens but the students and youth have been saying they are very angry and frustrated of the lack of progress with israel, they are very angry overactivity of the expansion of the activity and what they say the aggression of the israeli settlers on palestinians, but they are also angry at the leadership and say

the leadership is weak, the leadership is not doing anything, it's calling for calm but especially here in the occupied west bank they say we've had calm for more than ten years and nothing has been achieved and actually things have gone worse. at the moment from what we have witnessed the leadership is not having much sway over the youth who say they want to do things their own way. >> what about the security coordination from what we understand that continues to exist between the palestinian forces as well as the israeli forces? >> yes, it continues and it's one of the points that some of the youth and not all of them, many would say what is the security cooperation for so if one of our guys gets wounded he gets to go to a better hospital and the other side they would say we don't want that, we don't want security coordination, we want to know factually what is going to happen with a clear timetable with the problem that in their view there is no guaranty that israel will abide

by any of the accord so a suitable catch 21 situation where they have their demands, want them to be respected but don't have any hope that anything would be implemented, very difficult situation indeed. >> okay, thank you for that update. syrian government forces backed by russian jets attacked rebels in the south of aleppo, aleppo is syria largest city and control is divided between the government and rebel fighters. crossing over to zaina who is joining us from beirut to talk to us about this seemingly several fronts that are being fought now in syria. >> reporter: yes, the syrian army along with its allies have expanded the counter offensive against the opposition. like you mentioned a ground operation is underway in the province of aleppo. we understand that the army is advancing in an area south of

the city and their aim is to push the rebels from a main highway that connects the northern city of aleppo to government-controlled territories further south in particular the capitol damascus so it seems the government is trying to open this main supply line. now, the offensive in aleppo is only one of several fronts. the government yesterday launched a ground operation against the opposition in the northern countryside of homs and a few days earlier they opened an offensive in the countryside and seems this offensive has a strategy. what they are concentrating on is taking control over main highways, what could be supply lines that they can use to reenforce their positions further north so they are not just aiming to take territory, what they want is to recapture strategic land. >> and zaina with all this going on militarily, we must

acknowledge also that civilians caught up in this fighting cross fire and the strategy that you speak to us about. >> yes, there were reports from activists that dozens of people were killed in the homs offensive in particular and that civilians are being caught in the cross fire. russia's military campaign is going to enter its third week and the question people are asking is what is the end game, what is their plan but what is clear, what they have achieved so far on the ground is that they have pushed the rebels back from the government stronghold of latikia and contained them there and rebels no longer on offensive but on defensive posture and trying to put pressure on the rebels in order for them to make political compromises but we heard both the armed groups as well as the main political opposition with the syrian national coalition say we are not interested in engaging in any peace talks especially if russia is involved

because russia is not an impartial player in the conflict but most analysts will say russia needs a victory on the ground to change the balance on the ground or else it's in the conflict and it's going to get prolonged and lit be a costly battle so this air campaign is now entering its third week and yes they have contained the rebels to a certain extent but syrian army and allies on the ground have still not made any significant gains. >> thank you for that update from beirut. retired lebanese general and he says without russia bashar al-assad's forces would still be losing territory. >> the russian air strikes to the armed positions seem to be affected because they hit the vital targets such as field headquarters and weaponry arsenals and gathering of the

armed people in idlib and latakia but the advance on the ground of the army units is still slow until now. i think now the russians will accelerate the pedal and air strikes in order to push the syrian land forces forward to gain -- to regain more land. so far the russians declared they are not aimed to take part in any ground operations and it seems that no russian boots on the ground and even the force that the russian airforce is a task force is not an air base or a navel base, it's a task force for a certain task in fighting the terrorist organizations, that means it's easy to withdraw it within a couple of weeks. >> reporter: killed at least 30

people in northern nigeria. the attackers targeted a mosque near the capitol of borno state, no one has claimed responsibility but the armed group boko haram is suspected of carrying out attacks on wednesday the bombers killed seven people nearby and we sent this update. >> reporter: the multi national joint task force at the moment is awaiting the u.n. mandate to launch. and so far the nigerian military has kicked out boko haram in most of the areas they occupy. it has bombed their enclaves and chased them into the forest and some of them are even rumored to be sighted along the showers of lake chad but cameroon is stepping up and niger and chad is stepping up operations but over the past few weeks what we have been seeing is that boko haram is stepping up its operations as the military ramp up against boko haram. boko haram in this particular

instance is using bombs like this suicide bombs and roadside bombs placed at strategic locations to cause maximum damage and seen it in a number of ways. what people hope now is with the presence of the american troops and the drones there probably there will be better intelligence, better surveillance and hope this will be shared with troops of the region in their fight against boko haram. here is what is coming up, on the al jazeera news hour eu offers turkey aid with an unprecedented flow of refugees. we will take you to an annual trade-in china that is the economic lifeline for many in north korea. coming up, in sport the new york mets win a trip home and what happened in their game decider and their championship series against the l.a. dodgers. ♪

first the u.s. is shifting its afghan policy and president barack obama says the war won't end before he leaves office and that american soldiers will stay on until 2017. there are 9800 u.s. troops on the ground, training and advising the afghan military. obama had hoped to withdraw almost all the troops leaving about a thousand by the end of next year. now he says more than 5,000 soldiers will stay on. obama says the extension is necessary because of the fragile security situation as patty reports from washington d.c. >> reporter: it was the central foreign policy issue that helped then senator barack obama stand out from a crowd of candidates. he was opposed to the iraq war from the beginning and he vowed if he was elected president he would end the wars in iraq and afghanistan. in 2008. >> we will end this war in iraq. we will bring our troops home. we will finish the job.

we will finish the job against al-qaeda in afghanistan. >> reporter: during his reelection campaign in 2012. >> we are bringing our troops home from afghanistan and i set a timetable, we will have them all out of there by 2014. >> reporter: and this in 2014. >> by the end of 2016 our military will draw down to a normal embassy presence in kabul. with a security assistance component just as we have done in iraq. >> reporter: now he says that isn't going to happen after all but the president is trying to down play the significance. >> this decision is not disappointing continually my goal has been to make sure that we give every opportunity for afghanistan to succeed while we are still making sure we are meeting our core missions. >> reporter: the white house says keeping the status quo is proof the strategy is working. but many analysts just don't believe that. >> i don't think you can easily

call this a result of a success and i think again the fact of the timing comes now after the fall of kunduz makes it look like a reaction to the fall of kunduz as opposed to if the same decision had been made in march when all of the same elements that president obama listed a cooperative government, an army that will fight and so forth were all in place in march. >> reporter: bang bang bang, it's clear the next president will decide how long u.s. troops stay in afghanistan and now it will become a campaign issue with a majority of republican candidates expressing a willingness to stay. >> i think it's pretty clear when we withdraw as we have done in iraq a dangerous situation becomes more dangerous. >> reporter: president obama had some foreign policy successes but when he leaves offices critics will undoubtedly point to two promises not kept the prison in guantanamo bay will be open and the war in afghanistan will still be going on and the longest war in

history will be left to his successor to deal with. in the first serious incident involving asylum seekers in bulgaria an afghan man died after he crossed illegally from turkey. shots were fired by border guards who spotted a group of refugees near the town there and bulgaria deployed more border police and extending security fence along the turkish border and refugees have drown after their wooden boat collided with a coast guard vessel off the coast of greece and baby and children were of seven dead on the island of lespos and 31 were rescued. the new emergency plan being worked out between eu and turkey with how to deal with the refugee crisis and turkey hosts over 2 million syrian refugees and most asylum seekers arriving in europe now travel via turkey and hosting that many people is expensive and turkey spent at least $4.5 billion in the response to the crisis, adding

to the uncertainty in turkey is the political turmoil following last week's bombing attack at a peace rally in ankora and 27 were killed and anti-government demonstrations ahead of november's parliamentary election and steve barker reports from brussels why the eu thinks turkey is key to solving the refugee crisis. >> reporter: european leaders arrived in brussels facing multiple challenges. the war in syria, conflict in ukraine and the aftershocks of the greek bail out saga put the block under mounding strain. but it's the unrelenting refugee crisis that continues to dominate european politics and more than half a million people, many of them refugees from syria, have arrived in the eu this year, a large number have traveled through turkey, to europe's shores and now a preliminary agreement with turkey to help reduce the number of people attempting to make it to europe. >> translator: we received a

report very early this morning there have been an outcome of the negotiations and we were then able to reach an agreement this evening with regards to the exact shape of the joint action plan. >> reporter: under the draft plan turkey would receive $3.4 billion in aid in return for clamping down on the numbers of people crossing its territory heading towards the european union. the money would be used only tightening security but it would also be used on creating greater incentives for people to stay in turkey. greater levels of integration and better living conditions also. but as well as the money, there is also talk of lib liberalizing on people entering and conditions the eu is not prepared to accept including the french president. >> translator: we cannot have a situation where in exchange for turkey helping us to hold back

refugees in the territory and liberalized the condition with nothing attacked and identities we don't know and can't check and a process with lots of conditions attached. it's normal to discuss with the turks but france and other countries will pay attention to make sure the conditions are not only set but also respected. >> reporter: but with europe under pressure to come up with a lasting solution to the refugee crisis, the eu may have little choice but to concede to turkey's demands. >> willingness to complaint liberalization is on the part of member states to stem the flow of arrivals to the union and want turkey to play a role because that is the best option. >> reporter: in return for help with the refugee crisis the european union also promised to start new talks with turkey about eventually joining the eu but in the short term there is the question of where billions of dollars in aid to turkey will

come from, the eu suffering effects of the euro zone crisis and they will have to dig deep if they want control over the borders, lee barker, al jazeera, brussels. >> let's talk about this and talk to a spokesman from the organization from istanbul and does turkey not only have the will but the ability to stop refugees, stop migrants traveling to europe? >> well, that is yet to be seen but clearly the view in europe seems to be that turkey is a contender now and needs to be taken very seriously and needs to be negotiated with. the huge amount of money that is on the table and we potential of an offer of turkey people to travel visa free across europe shows the desperation we are seeing at the political levels in europe. turkey is the key i think to as they see it to resolving many of the issues. >> how would turkey actually

physically stop the migrants coming across? >> well, already there is over two million migrants and refugees living in turkey within communities, living in the cities, probably many of them working illegally and there is over 200,000 in camps, in formal refugee camps so all right here many of those are choosing not to go to europe. those going to europe are probably flying from lebanon and carrying on. but the big point is we are particularly worried that the fate of the migrants and refugees, not be held hostage to some political negotiations over visa access for example or over a sum of money. we think the interest of these human beings need to be put first. >> but that is seemingly indeed the case when turkey is being promised more than $3 billion in aid. it is possibly being promised liberalizing visa restrictions as well. >> well the aid is of course

welcome to a country like turkey which is spending so much to support the migrants and refugees but what we are concerned about is if they speed up the so called returns or deportations are what are commonly referred to economic refugees, people who are not judged to be entitled to political asylum that this could become very hasty and could scoop up people who are vulnerable in the rush. they have a political problem and that is they feel they need to return a lot of people who have come in the waves of migraines and refugees. and if they are simply buying their way into doing it and putting people at risk we are not happy with that. >> what would an ideal look like for you? your latest figures say 593,432 migrants arrived by sea in 2015, 3903 have died and a deal can't come fast enough for you. >> well, we want to make sure those who do come through are properly assessed and that their

needs are looked after. those who are clearly refugees status keep that status, those who need family they get that. unaccompanied minors are treated fairly and not simply sent back home and want to make sure the vulnerable people are not caught in the rush for political solutions and requires investment and management migration and putting processes in place to help educate europeans to make sure they welcome migrants and do not revert to right wing politics or xenophobia and there are ranges of supporting turkey which is terrific and making sure the migrants and refugees are at the heart of the solution, not some issue because politicians feel under pressure. >> thank you very joining us from istanbul. flash floods triggered mudslides in california leaving motorists stranded and people trapped in the homes and brought huge

downpours north of la and part of the interstate to close and firefighters have been rescuing drivers stranded in their cars and no reports of any injuries or death. and we will bring in rob to ask him if it's the start of the rainy season for california yet. >> well, it's entirely possible that is the case. these pictures that you have just seen precede what has been on air, this is the rain that fell very quickly, coming down in valleys and washes out a great deal of mud and have what they call a southwest monsoon in california but usually it's a bit further inland to the drier states and in the summer. it's a different phenomenon altogether and i think you probably already know why. these were the clouds that as they built and coming up, from the south notably where the water is very warm in the gulf of california, exceedingly warm but not just in the gulf of california, it's an el nino year and the water piles up against the coast of the western side of the u.s. and south america where

it should be cold. now, this tongue of warm stretches all the way back to the central part of the pacific just south of hawaii and it has been here that the hurricanes have formed this year. quite an active pacific hurricane season and that is likely to carry on, el-nino two but that is california side and only part of the story. for the rest of the u.s. the weather is more like normal and sweeping in from the northeast is a rather familiar looking feature which could be, could be just a start of winter. certainly going to bring snow to the northeast of canada but the temperature drop across the great lakes will be noticeable for toronto and eventually for new york. >> still ahead on al jazeera shaping kenya's economy and the ground plan will impact the informal sector and graffiti artists on home land criticizing the show and how former world

one mcillroy got on with the pga opener and we will have all the details coming up, in sports. ♪

♪ top stories on the al jazeera news hour israeli security is high in occupied east jerusalem as the muslim fry prayer takes place in a compound, weeks of violence between israelis and palestinians and prompted a u.n. security council meeting to take place in a few hours and syrian troops with jets attacked south

of aleppo and the targeted area is close to a main road heading to the capitol damascus and on thursday at least 75 people were killed in another government offensive in homs. president barack obama has reversed plans to withdrew most american soldiers in afghanistan by next year and now says soldiers will stay on until at least 2017 and said the extension was necessary because of the fragile security situation. well, the increasing instability in afghanistan has been the focus of a regional summit of russia and central asia nations and president vladimir putin and counterparts in the former soviet states agreed to create a joint task force to defend the external borders and rory is joining us from moscow and first tell us what you know about this joint task force worry. >> reporter: well, there have been a couple of relevant documents signed in kazakhstan on friday and the first is a document allowing for greater

military cooperation between the cis member states and the second is a bit more relevant to what we are talking about here. it's a document that if i can read the announcements on it would allow for a grouping of border forces and other institutions from cis member states designed to resolve crisis situations on the external borders. now, what they are talking about is a deal for the years 2016-2020 and essentially it would allow them to better control and better police the external borders of the cis. beyond that we don't really know much yet. there is still a lot of questions about how exactly this force would be comprised and whether for example it would be a standing body of troops or whether it be a coalition that could be pulled together in a

crisis situation when it was needed. now, we understand that russia is at the moment considering whether or not to send troops back to patrol the kazakhstan, afghanistan border, that is something it did up until 2005 when the agreement to do so lapsed. so that is something that fills in to this whole environment really of security concerns. >> and what other issues, right, what other issues have the leaders so worried? >> reporter: well, i mean if i can read you a quote from the kazakhstan president says it's under mining, the established foundations of world order. and really it signifies how concerned president and leaders of the cis countries are about

what has been going on in afghanistan recently, the push of the taliban into other cities they have not been in for quite sometime and also what is going on in syria as well. and set up by the islamic state and putin says up to 7,000 people from the cis country and russia are currently fighting for i.s.i.l. at the moment in syria and iraq. and he says that the cis countries also have to be prepared for a push from afghanistan fighters and basically afghanistan into cis countries. this is something that is firmly in the minds of all the cis leaders at the moment. >> rory thanks for the update from moscow. researchers have found the ebola virus can remain in body fluids of survivors for up to nine months, experts say the early findings are inconclusive and

cannot rule out sexual transmission of ebola and poses questions to which the ebola crisis in west africa has actually been contained. liberia, guinea and sierra leone the three west african countries at the center of the ebola crisis have all declared themselves ebola free and sierra leone was the last to do so last week, more than 11,000 people died during the epidemic. but at least 16,000 others who contracted the virus survived and now scientists say there is a risk they can pass on the virus long after their initial ebola diagnosis and we have more. >> reporter: hundreds of ebola survivors may be at risk of carrying the virus for much longer than previously thought, two new studies suggest the disease can exist in the semen of male survivors for at least nine months after the initial infection and further outbreaks of ebola bisexual transmission cannot be ruled out and researchers found a liberian woman was likely to be inspected

by ebola survivor six months after he was infected, another study funded by the world health organization centers for disease control and the sierra leone government found trays of ebola virus in semen group of 93 survivors. >> clearly this is something that does not happen extremely frequently especially considering how me bowl cases there have been over all in the epidemic. however, we do want to really make sure that this is something that is really addressed as much as we possibly can because any new case of ebola could spark another epidemic. >> reporter: the study is on going and more conclusive results expected later and researchers cannot say how long signs of ebola might exist or if traces of the virus in bodily fluid are live or infectious and cannot answer if women survivors can also carry the virus. >> we are looking at things like sweat, oral fluids, vaginal fluid, breast milk. we would like to look at all of

these different fluids to be able to understand if virus might be present in them after a person has recovered from ebola virus disease. >> reporter: there has been growing concern about relapse after a british nurse who survived in sierra leone fell critically ill again. >> i was frightened and ebola is unpredictable. >> reporter: treated as an exceptional case, doctors say they have not recorded any other survivor who had a relapse. the ebola epidemic killed more than 11,000 mostly guinea, liberia and sierra leone and people who lived through the out break fear the virus will return still remains, al jazeera. let's speak to dr. ben neuman a neurologist in the uk and joining us from there and dr. neuman let's talk about the british nurse effected by ebola and doctors treating her are in

uncharted tarterry and what does the relapse mean for her as well as other ebola survivors? >> so it's not a relapse the way you would normally think of that. what has been happening it turns out she had the same virus all this time. it's just between her first illness which lasted about a month and her most resent illness was a period of about eight months where she was essentially symptom free yet still had a little virus inside her. this is very unusual, it never happened before in humans and she actually had the virus three times as long as the next person we know of but it is the same thing that happens in the natural host of ebola which is a bat and seem to carry it for their entire lives so the virus is set up to do this but it has not happened in humans before and i guess that maybe is the surprise here. >> is it too premature to treat it as an exceptional circumstance as other doctors are saying? >> it is for now. but it definitely bears watching because if it's happening to her there are maybe 20,000 other

people over in west africa right now who could be in the same boat. they could have the same risks. and unless somebody is keeping an eye on that there is a possibility that ebola comes back again and nobody wants that. >> what about the research, dr. neuman that has been put forward now saying ebola can remain in the body in fluids, in fact, of survivors for up to nine months, what does that exactly mean? >> yes, and there is another paper published at the same time that showed that ebola can be sexually transmitted six months after a person thought they were better. it means that there is a small risk of transmission out there but with all those survivors in west africa right now we would see a lot more ebola if this were a real sort of high-level risk but for this virus to infect it has to get in the body in the right way and enough virus has to find the right sort of cell and maybe that has not happened very effectively which is a good thing.

>> all right, dr. ben neuman thanks for joining us from redding. scrap i scrapping this for women who had a controversial procedure and opened up the pelvis while giving birth and lawrence lee reports on one survivor says hospital doctors experimented on her and contains graphic descriptions which some people may find upsetting. >> reporter: nor ra may still be working and actually she may have done many things with her life but all taken away from her when she was only 18 is when she went in the hospital for what she assumed was a routine delivery of her first child but it seems the doctors and nurses, the nuns and priests in attendance had other ideas. she says a nurse deliberately tried to put her fetus in the wrong position to allow the surgeon to operate on her. >> she came back and pressed really hard on the baby go right

around in a circle and go the wrong way. >> reporter: this was this 1971 at our lady of law hospital north of dublin it is not any more but then it was a leading center and a teaching hospital for missionaries who take their beliefs and medical skills to africa and what happened next is clear as day and thought she was a subject of an experiment faced by a surgeon with a hacksaw. >> told me down and told me to push the baby out while he sawed me so i pushed the baby out and she came out head first, normal and then must have pushed out all the blood and went all over him and all over the nurses and students who were there watching what was going on and carrying on. >> it's horrible. >> it is and i never seen so much blood, it was like a

fountain and i knew i was going to die. >> reporter: the hacksaw was the implement of choice used in mattie hospitals against hundreds and hundreds of women in ireland and only in ireland throughout the 20th century. doctors knew all about a c-section but the church evidently felt that would limit the number of babies a woman could have in a society which medical practice was driven by church law sawing open a woman's pelvis would allow her to have more children regardless of the impacts on her body and her mind. >> it ruined me mentally and physically. >> reporter: there are hundreds of women who are survivors of this. the irish had a scheme to limit pay out to a maximum $180,000 and demanded women gave up any legal action against doctors, church or state. the assessor refused to hear victim's testimonies and nora is subject to no investigation and

sympathetic politics in dublin are talking about this in the entire scheme. >> what we are saying is these women don't deserve justice, and their life horror didn't count and didn't believe it or trivial relevancy and yes, financial compensation doesn't matter but human rights complying rights. >> reporter: these were unhappy experiences in the past and perhaps nora could spoil herself. nora thinks the doctors were happy for her to die and her pain is not in the past and with her every single day and will be all her life. lawrence lee, al jazeera. millions of volkswagen are

recalled with the entire european fleet because they have software fitted to cheap -- cheat the emission testing. a trade fair taking place at the border city and as rob mcbride says it demonstrates the economic gulf between the two countries. >> reporter: the trade fair which brings together businesses from both sides of the border illustrates just how far apart they are. chinese stalls are bold and brash and consumers among show. and north korea still in a world of strict ideology, a virtual war-time economy with little to sell and it looks like not much sense of how to sell it. sometimes with nothing to sell at all. still from the crowds attending this year's event the hope is north korea is learning from china's relatively free market

ways. >> translator: these are the biggest crowds i have seen. there is more business people than ever before. >> translator: i think from now on there will be more trade between china and north korea. >> reporter: shower head salesman says trade is brisk. >> translator: we have sold a lot to the north koreans and business is good. >> reporter: all around there is evidence of development but little of that business drive seems to reach the other side of the river and into north korea. dan dong is home of the crown friendship bridge an economic lifeline that helps north korea survive. a new bridge project further along the river remains stalled. the bridge now stands as a symbol of the troubled relationship between the two neighbors, work on it was completed a year ago, paid for by china and by now traffic should have been running across it. today there is still no sign of

it opening. the infrastructure on the chinese side is complete. the satellite images from the north korean side show the bridge ending in a field. chinese businesses at this event know this will not be a quick sale. >> translator: we came here to sell to north koreans, we have the right machines and we are hopeful we will sell. >> for the moment this is a bustling partnership of unequals. rob mcbride, al jazeera, china. now to kenya where workers who toil in back street factories fear they will lose out to government plans to modernize the economy and worried about cheap imports flooding their market from countries like china and catherine has the story from nairobi. >> reporter: this is not a job for everyone, it's clouded by the clanging of hammers on metal and glass, roughly 5,000 men and

women spend their days toiling in the blacksmith market in nairobi suburb in the economy and created a one-stop shop for affordable household and commercial appliances. joseph sells this metal boxes and wheel barrows and takes about five hours to make each and they sell at an average of $250. >> the government is helping us to acquire things to make better products for the market. >> reporter: kenya's informal center employees 11.8 million people and contributes about 20% of the economy. some of the blacksmiths here have been doing this for decades and now the government wants to make them part of a plan to inform kenya and make them industrialized by 2030 and they say they are now facing competition from countries.

some economists say it will be hard to grow small businesses if they continue facing unfair competition. >> there is a possibility that the countries that then export those goods that end up on our retail shelves might dangle a little bit of their billions to afghan governments to look the other way. and go back to the same challenge of ignoring this in terms of how to grow their capabilities. >> reporter: on a large scale their plans to create industrial packs along this rail way line that is meant to connect kenya to other east african countries, the government is promising incentives for investors and industrialists who set up shops in their homes. >> the cultural set up of the country is not supporting capability to industrialize and look at an industrial set up

where the education system we inherited saying we were supposed to produce employees. >> reporter: back at the market the blacksmiths keep doing what they have done for years, they are a big part of the 2030 plan but want the government to help them upgrade their operations to make it easier and faster for them to do their jobs, catherine with al jazeera, nairobi, kenya. artists heard by the u.s. t.v. show home land to write graffiti on sets wrote messages criticizing the show and asked to add authenticity to scenes of a syrian refugee camp in lebanon but producers of the show did not check what was actually written and one of the messages in arabic reads home land is racist, another says homeland is not a series. while another reads black lives matter. and we have one of the artists involved and says it sends a message against stereotypes. >> there is no doubt that the show is incredibly well produced with great actors but that is

kind of besides the point. it's still important to address this idea that stereotyping and an entire region of people, a huge region of people to a very shallow and one dimensional perspective is something that is potentially dangerous and we wanted to use this opportunity in a way to claim back our image. >> reporter: well, we have been telling you about the tension that has been going on in the occupied palestinian territories, take a look at these pictures they are from bethlehem where there was tear gas being fired just a moment ago actually during that live shot so there seems to be possibly a confrontation of some sort that could be taking place in bethlehem. right now the background of all of this of course is that israeli restrictions are in place as the muslim worshippers gathered earlier today at the

mosque compound that was this jerusalem for friday prayer and some of the restrictions that have been put in place against palestinians and palestinian men under age of 40 were not allowed to take part. since the beginning of october, since those tensions began 35 palestinians have been killed and seven israelis have been killed as well and that is the scene in bethlehem and keeping an eye out on what is happening there and bring you all the latest news and here with the news hour and still ahead on al jazeera, relations between america and cuba through music. >> what is the right moment. >> madrid rual has a big announcement and all the details coming up, in sport. ♪

♪ just to bring you some breaking news coming out of turkey, the military there saying it shot down an unidentified aircraft for straying into its air space and just reading off the reuters news letter saying shot down a drone near the syrian border and the nationality so far is unknown according to an official and we will bring you more on that as we get it on al jazeera. time for all the sports news. >> thank you so much. we start with major league baseball and new york mets beat the l.a. dodgers to advance to the national league championship series and dodgers had home advantage for game five decider in the first round playoff and murphy had the go ahead home run in the 6th inning and giving new

york 3-2 win and mets will face the cubs next with their best of seven series opener on saturday in new york. >> we knew it was going to be a close game and last thing said you are not hitting and look what we are facing. we came go a five game series and saw kirshaw twice and may not be fair so we will take what we got, we got the wins and that we needed and we will go party for a little while and take a day off and get ready for the nlcs and be a lot of fun. former world number one mcillroy is chasing steel after round one at the pga tournament in california and has bun tournament victory back in 2011, on thursday the american fired a round of 63 to put himself one shot clear of the first round and number 7 rose is still in contention and he recorded a five under 67 and is in a six way tie for 7th and mcillroy is

down in 13th, northern irishman is five shots off the league and four under par, 68. football nations say the president and the fight to clear his name. decision comes after a crisis meeting at the organization's headquarters in switzerland. and bladder was suspended for 90 days last week and investigated over a $2 million payment made to him by the fifa president in 2011 for work done nine years earlier. so where does this leave him? our sports correspondent lee wellings explains. >> this is difficult situation and extremely difficult meeting between the executive committee and of course the 54-member nations and he has been given their backing for now. they say he should have a fair trial. nothing has been proven yet. there is still plenty to be said

about that situation involving whether bladder but what happens going forward, however the situation with fifa is resolved, they need somebody representing them when a new president is due to be announced on february 26 and put someone forward like michael van prog who would stand in the original election and eventually stood to the side and look outside of europe and get behind a candidate from the middle east. this is a really difficult time for them because of course they want to give their support but there was disagreement between representatives in the meaning where he was not there and represented by his lawyers and moving forward even though all 54 nations have released a statement saying they are behind him for now, that can still change in the future. former spain striker and madrid legend will retire and 38-year-old currently plays for the new york cosmo and compete in a tier below major league

soccer and stop playing when the season end in november and retiring with plenty of honors and won the champion league three times on top of six la-league titles. >> difficult decision but in one moment i feel it's the right moment now. and i need to have more time with my family, with my kids to have more time on the weekends at home. >> reporter: and there is much more sport on our website, for all the latest check out al jazeera.com/sport and we have blogs and clips from correspondents rounds the world and that is all your sport for now and back to you. >> thank you very much. time to go to the white house and the latest sign of much improved relations some of cuba's best known musicians have taken the sounds of havana to the most famous address in washington and tom ackerman also

went along to listen to the social club. ♪ more than 500 invited dignitaries swayed to the group's afro cuban rhythms as it opened with their signature toon chin chin and what the group is calling its farewell world tour. >> for nearly two decades this group has been a symbol of the strong bonds between the american and cuba people, bonds of friendship and culture and of course music. so i just hope they enjoy their stay and i hope that i look as good as they do in a few years. >> reporter: 1999 documentary that won an oscar nomination brought the group international recognition and sparked revival of cuba's golden age that predated the 1959 revolution and since then the group has performed several times in the u.s. though not without attracting anti-castro

protesters and even bomb threats and the command performance at the white house follows last july's restoration of full diplomatic relations and reopening of embassys in washington and havana. this week u.s. commerce secretary penny led a delegation of high level officials to havana calling for both countries to take more steps towards improved economic relations and nine u.s. governors from both parties backed obama by urging congress to lift the half century old trade embargo for the benefit of american farmers. meanwhile the havana government has signed a deal allowing sony to distribute over 30,000 cuba recordings including the catalog for worldwide sale. tom ackerman, al jazeera, washington. that is it for the news hour on al jazeera, but back in just a moment with more news, all the day's top stories coming your way, see you in a minute. ♪

>> welcome to al jazeera america. more reporters, more stories, more perspective. >> from our award-winning news teams across america and beyond. >> we've got global news covered.

mosque in east jerusalem after a new out break of violence and a revered holy site set on fire. backed by russian air strikes and bolstered by troops from iran and hezbollah the syrian army expands major offensive in two cities. stuck in the mud and tough commute in southern california after a mudslide washes across several roads leaving hundreds of drivers stranded. ♪ and bringing the rhythm, the cuban band making history by rocking the white house. ♪