well. you know. this is really an attack on itself is a lot of misunderstanding of what free speech is supposed to be about the context it's hugely important setting the stage for a serious debate up front at this time on al jazeera. more than four hundred people killed in less than a week during the bombardment of syria's eastern into. what we need to. station. and we needed desperately but russia blocks efforts by the u.n.

security council to call for a thirty day ceasefire across the country. for example rob and this is there a line from our headquarters here in doha coming up in the next thirty minutes. our movies stars our politicians there are all more protected than our children at school all the head of the largest gun lobby in the u.s. breaks his silence about the deadly florida school shooting. also pressure mounts on donald trump's former aides paul manifolds gates as they face dozens more charges of bank and tax fraud. and australia's deputy prime minister barnaby joyce steps down after weeks of pressure over an extramarital affair.

welcome to al-jazeera good to have your company it's been under siege by syrian government forces for five years but the last five days have been the worst so far for civilians in the rebel held klav of eastern ghouta near the capital damascus relentless bombardment killed dozens more on thursday bringing the number of dead to more than four hundred more than a thousand people have been injured the military has dropped leaflets over the area urging residents to leave and calling on opposition fighters to hand themselves over meanwhile the un security council is struggling to pass a resolution on a ceasefire to allow aid into the area there's opposition from russia which claims information from the ground in eastern guta has been fabricated by the syrian opposition james bays will have more on that in a moment but first let's go to assam a binge of it from eastern guta. the

smallest coffins the heaviest busy jew dirty air in there doesn't every day for a parent saying goodbye to little children is not easy. almost every family has lost someone the number of the dead is so high that trenches are being dug for quick burial. if people linger outside for too long the risk becoming victims of the next one. living rooms and offices are now makeshift morgues. for those who survived the attacks medical facilities unmotivated. doctors without borders says thirteen hospitals have been hit in three days. since sunday the syrian government and its allies have stepped up their strikes in terms of the converging on the scene then. you are supposed to be been a for deescalation zones agreed upon by russia iran and turkey but the syrian government says it's targeting what it calls dentists in an area known to four hundred thousand people and russia denies it's

involved in the relentless bombardment of civilians. the situation really leaves much to be decided well as you know the responsibility for the situation in east rests with those who support the terrorists tunnels like these of inclusion for rebels who have stopped multiple attempts to storm the eastern front in the past year off numbers and their supplies have been cut off but their reza say they will not surrender without a fight. or capabilities a week but god willing we will deal with this the regime will lose again would face similar attacks and it didn't fall and now again we will survive this. besieged city and say none of the words from people in power have done much to protect them . messages for help from easton who have been nonstop street after street bodies and parents have been trying to pull their children out of the rubble the united nation calls it hell on earth for besieged people in east and abandoned by the

outside world they might as well be living on another planet. as people in eastern continued to die in the security council they continue to argue more words of division and no sign of desperately needed action. the regime wants to keep bombing and gassing these four hundred thousand people and the assad regime is counting on russia to make sure the security council is unable to stop their suffering and those willing have could use that kind of you time is right to discuss frankly what is occurring around the mask a suburb the massive psychosis in global media outlets in coordination disseminating in recent days the same rumors this in no way do anything to help improve an understanding of the situation. he said a false narrative was being presented to taint the reputation of his country this despite the fact he'd heard the un's top humanitarian official detail exactly what

was being inflicted on eastern ghouta. airstrikes mortars rockets barrel bombs custom emissions chemical weapons. suicide bombs snipers double tap attacks on civilians in the essential infrastructure they did. including hospitals and schools. outside the un the campaign group highlighted the scale of the seven year long conflict and try to shame the security council into action inside the building here in the corridor was there were frantic negotiations to try and bring a draft resolution calling for a thirty day cease fire to a vote online is a problem you know many people think of it. the scheme went into another call in those eleven by the time they gathered in the security council chamber it was clear russia wanted amendments and wouldn't let the resolution pass in its current form

over the past two years with russian military help the syrian government represented by ambassador bashar jaffrey has turned the tide of the war now using russian diplomatic gade the assad regime wants finally to win it whatever it takes including civilian casualties and outright lies it do you to know that you are killing civilians in eastern quote not only when we are saying that many of these faking us are staged by you. by your cousins. by you know by the terrorist by the syrian moderate opposition there was a sense of exasperated and despair that we some don't buy sweden's ambassador but i do think that we are tested today not just as representing our countries but as human beings and that is a massive responsibility a test for now they have failed james pays zero in the united nations. well

u.s. president all trump is not backing away from his controversial proposal to some teachers on a suggested they should be paid a bonus he's under intense public pressure to pass tougher gun laws following last week's my shooting at a florida high school our white house correspondent kimberly how. arming teachers in the classroom is a controversy ally dhea being promoted by president donald trump to prevent school shootings if you harden the sights you're not going to have this problem because these guys who lack courage will never go into those schools he says he wants to encourage educators to become comfortable with the gun even offering bonuses for those with firearms skills i want my schools protected just like my banks are protected truck made the comments on thursday at another white house listening session following the shootings in parkland florida that left seventeen people dead

most of them teenagers. since the school shooting fellow students have made their voices heard and brought pressure to bear on tribe and other right of center politicians to tighten gun restrictions arming teachers is not what they have in mind that's their plan anyway mark barden lost his son in two thousand and twelve in the sandy hook school shooting school teachers have more than enough responsibilities right now. then to have to have the awesome responsibility of lethal force to take a life on twitter trump attempted to clarify his position and floated other proposals such as background checks for those buying a gun raising the legal purchasing age to twenty one and again suggesting the end of the sale of so-called bump stocks that increase a weapons fire power not all but some of those ideas are at odds with the biggest gun rights group in the united states with national rifle association or n.r.a.

pushing back against any effort to limit gun ownership the elites don't care not one whit about america's school system for them. it's not a safety issue it's a political issue they care more about control and more of gun owners agree every right to protect ourselves protect our children so if they're properly trained why not be able to use that i think that it would send a message across the nation that we are taking it this into our own hands we're fighting back and we will be the first line of defense and while there is support for at least some of donald trump's proposals even the most basic limits on gun ownership will require congressional approval of accomplishment that in the past has proved difficult can really help get al jazeera washington its nama its at the sheriff's deputy who was on the school where the shooting happened apparently

waited outside the building for four minutes without going inside he's not resigned an investigation is underway what i saw was a deputy arrived at the west side of building twelve take up a position and he never went in when the. yes he was. when an address the killer killed the killer. more charges have been filed against president trump's former campaign chairman and his business associate paul mother forte and rick gates face additional criminal charges of bank and tax fraud special counsel robert mueller the thirty two count indictment on the state in october one of fourteen gates were charged with conspiracy to launder money both of pleaded not guilty well is investigating possible collusion between the truck campaign and russia during the twenty sixteen

election handed to castro has more from washington d.c. . it is important to point out that the name donald trump is not anywhere mention in these new charges that are filed these thirty two counts account for money laundering of about thirty million dollars as well as filing false income tax statements they predate the time that these two men accused of these crimes rick gates and paul manna for it had joined on to the trump campaign however the significant part is the timing of filing these charges were cate's had been reportedly been ingo in negotiations with investigators to possibly flip and cooperate with the investigation for c. ably it's in exchange for a lighter sentence to give investigators more information that could help them bring down bigger fish the fact that these charges were filed against him is an indication that perhaps those negotiations have stalled and this is

a chance for investigators to show just how much information they have stacked up against these two men bigger picture here though is as the investigation continues into russia's meddling in the twenty six thousand u.s. elections and perhaps the role that trumps campaign had in this that investigators are closing in they're finding more details that they are showing on paper here and certainly casts even a darker shadow on the administration well still ahead here on al jazeera greek politicians of the investigation accused of taking bribes from a swiss drug company plus. the art of the exhibition in lebanon highlighting the plight of syrian children do stay with us.

hello again as we look at the weather across the levant and western parts of asia and see this area of rain we've got over afghanistan with some snow a higher elevations of see there were twelve us rain but certainly to head up into the hindu kush is going to result in some heavy snow fall elsewhere we've got one or two showers around the caspian sea and cheerio settled weather across the of violence continues with a threat to further rain at times certainly quite a bit of cloud around too and heading into lot of parts we can you see this area of rain developing kuwait through up into northern parts of iraq and even iran seeing some rain at times but recently i've been chippy largely dry highs of eighteen degrees here in the arabian peninsula it's going to be fine i think through much of friday but cloud is going to spill down and with it will come the risk of some rain at times no hearing casserly hardly seen a drop of rain all the way through the winter but i think could begin to change from subtly almost through the coming week a much more unsettled picture and certain across parts of saudi arabia we could

well see some heavy rain at times through into southern parts of africa we've had some very heavy showers across the eastern cape those are dying away at the moment but still some heavy downpours like you affect in zimbabwe and through towards zambia we come through in the maybe it should be fine with highs of thirty one expected in winter. what if they don't get it or. they must go to. a lot of limits. on the nineteenth of december twenty sixth mahmoud hussein was detained by the egyptian authorities he remains behind bars without a trial al-jazeera world investigates his case and media repression in egypt journalism is not a crime at this time on al-jazeera. welcome

back you're watching al-jazeera times the whole robin a reminder of our top news stories the syrian military has dropped leaflets over eastern calling on residents to leave for their own safety and opposition fighters to hand themselves over more than four hundred people have died in the rebel held enclave during five days of bombardment meanwhile the united nations security council will vote on friday on a draft resolution demanding a thirty day truce in syria to allow any deliveries and medical evacuations it's facing opposition from russia which is accusing the media of a massive disinform ation campaign. and more charges have been filed against former

aides to the trump campaign paul manifold a break gates face tax and bank fraud charges in october they were charged with conspiracy to launder money both of pleaded not guilty. now australia's embattled deputy prime minister barnaby joyce has resigned after weeks of pressure over an extramarital affair with a former staff member who's also facing separate sexual harassment allegations joyce will step down in cabinet but will remain in parliament protecting the one seat majority of malcolm turnbull's coalition government he's also quitting as the leader of the national party the junior coalition partner nigel ition partner joyce who'd campaigned on family values left his wife after twenty four years of marriage and is expecting a child with his former media secretary but i will say is that on monday morning at the party room i will step down as the leader of the national party and deputy prime minister of the street now that inform the acting prime minister

mathias cormann of this i've inform my colleagues. of this and there are a couple of other things that i'd like to clear the site with but i want to thank the people of new england i'm so humble that the day to day whilst walking round the. table and i don't want. other sneaking suspicions on the device for me but i was so good at offering their support. the people of tamworth the same the people the small towns i'm so humbled and i thank you for the overwhelming support people literally running up and someone crying often their support to me and i just say i died deserve the support that you've given me in cork as a senior lecturer of global politics at murdoch university in perth and he says that despite being a relatively popular figure joyce could not withstand the pressure from the scandal

. i think he was hyping it things would die down the people would get tired of of to repeating it the media would start circling him is that i've been doing over the last weeks but it's just shown no signs and it's clearly a distraction for the government that's part of the reason all containable was somewhat sort of disappointed if you know if not a little bit critical of bobby joyce so i think it's mostly just the fact that it's just dragged on so long him elkington bill it was so holy of to be joyce. then clearly i think the mud was sticking as he said so he had to withdraw that's a poet and so it's left malcolm tantalum it in a difficult position that if he didn't count me out criticizing about to be joyce in the first instance it took him some time to move to a sort of critical position with respect to joyce so i think it does once again sort of applying to the problem of malcolm turnbull's having strength of leadership in the extent to which people seeing him is perhaps not the strongest leader that

we've had as prime minister so i think that it will be malcolm acoma who will take it over and. consider that if you know a very conservative person spoke very strongly against same sex marriage during you know recent postal service on so he's a he's a very much conservative morally conservative. leader and and you know content who is generally perceived to be progressive by his within his own party and so i think him on. the side moments of difficulty between marco mccomb act in malcolm's him. see me a greek politicians including two former prime minister facing an investigation into alleged bribes from a swiss drugs company pharmaceutical firm to fall to selectively broad politicians don't do this to raise the price caps on that medicines. from athens the greek parliament has voted to hold a preliminary investigation into whether there are political responsibilities for

two former prime ministers. one former finance minister and seven former health and labor ministers over the last fifteen years they are thought to have been potentially susceptible to charges of either soliciting or accepting bribes and money laundering in other words illegally processing the proceeds of those bribes if they did indeed receive them one of the former health ministers and labor ministers who spoke in his own defense passionately defended his record he was the man who served as labor minister between two thousand and nine and two thousand and eleven the very beginning of greece's economic adjustment program that was the socialist government which started the serious fiscal austerity program that continues to this day and he said that he had found health a health budget that was worth thirteen billion dollars and in his time that was

reduced to about eight billion dollars similarly within that budget the pharmaceutical expenditure that he found he said was worth about seven billion dollars and that was reduced by almost half so how could it be he said that i received bribes to raise the pharmaceutical expenditures of the state i was doing precisely the opposite similar remarks came from all of the other defendants all of them denying the charges against them many of them saying that they're willing for the investigation to proceed in order to clear their names the investigation may take one of two routes could decide that there are political responsibilities in which case under the great constitution it is parliament which must affectively act as a court of law for these politicians or it may decide that parliament will not involve itself in any further investigation and hand the case back to the traditional authorities where they can pursue the charges against these politicians and former

politician. ordinary citizens well staying in the region cyprus has accused turkey of obstructing its offshore gas exploration in the eastern mediterranean turkish cypriots want a revenue sharing agreement to be finalized before any drilling off the divided island can start the whole reports. greek cypriots say it's their sovereign right to explore for natural gas in the eastern mediterranean but in this divided island sovereignty and borders have long been disputed turkey's decision to hold military exercises off the coast of cyprus prevented drilling from proceeding the rig couldn't reach its intended site turkey. using means the not being called for me with international law is trying to hijack you know where you know the. area over the eastern mediterranean. turkey sees it differently it says its interests and the rights of

turkish cypriots are being violated and corrupt says turkish cypriots should have a say in the decision making process and an equal share of the revenue it's a sentiment shared by the breakaway turkish republic of northern cyprus it believes the resources around the island belong to to it. the greek cypriots kicked us out in one nine hundred sixty three and ok by the republic now they are trying to steal what is ours we want a lot of this the potential for natural resources further complicates efforts to resolve what is known as the cyprus problem last year the two sides came closer than ever to a deal but talks collapsed the cypriot government says negotiations can't resume until what it called the turkish blockade and the fact that these actions are cupping now is preventing us from resuming we knew it was here because you cannot you know. when you have these kind or for threats.

experts say the amount of gas in the mediterranean basin is not a game changer it has a lot to do with turkey's role as an energy hub there needs to be a main export route and if this is going to be turkey of course this is strategically very important the international community's reaction has so far been to discourage escalation with the united nations urging a return to the negotiating table the potential for natural resources has brought back attention to the cyprus problem the hope is it will bring the sides closer together but the fear is it will complicate efforts to find a permanent solution. the greek cypriots turkish cypriots turkey they all agree that the island's natural resources belongs to all cypriots apart from that there is little agreement the untapped resources have become a bargaining chip to further political gains in

a decades old problem that her there are on the divided island of cyprus. a remarkable rate of economic growth is being seen in several west african nations including setting down guinea ivory coast i'm gonna now they've undergone a six percent increase on last year much of it's being fueled by freedom of movement and cross border trade as nicholas haq reports from the senegalese capital dhaka. she is a laborer from the south she stealin got my ninja near from congo and alpha jello mason from guinea all our working on this construction site building new office blocks and city girls growing capital. this is no should toll it's the land of opportunity. and every week i send money back to my mom and my little sister. to school thanks to what i said. after having left my family behind i have no regrets to have children senegal i feel comfortable with people who are black africans like

me i'll take that any time over being with white people and still far away from my family economist at the international monetary fund see a surge in economic growth in west africa take a look at these numbers across eighteen countries their gross domestic product is a five percent africa sleeping lion economies are now roaring ahead with ghana predicted to grow at nine percent good d'ivoire and sigel at seven percent if you're gonna give a damn near the u.s. president they call it a shit hole and the united states invested sixty five billion dollars in african countries in two thousand and sixteen and that number is expected to rise in two thousand and eighteen. while many europeans in north america still view the continent as poor war torn and desolate african see more opportunities at home than outside the heart. so west africans are on the move but there are seven times more

likely to move within west african countries then go to europe or north america. for the past forty years fifteen countries in west africa if we allow the free movement of people in good within its borders migrants from the region sent thirty three billion dollars to their loved ones last year the problem we have enough is not a problem and there's a lack of organization those people leaving their countries to grow abroad those are the champions those are the rules because even though if you and this is a sprint position think about it are many people would say i'm going to now go across the entire. to go to look for something that other african migrants to europe send more money home than those from within the region. most west africans are moving closer to home for.

opportunities are here and this is where they want to build their lives because hark al-jazeera the car now the lebanese capital beirut is hosting an exhibition highlighting the plight of syrian children artists have tried to interpret the poems of young refugees through art and it aims to raise awareness of the challenges and trauma suffered by millions of displaced children stephanie decker went to take a look. this sculpture of a young boy and girl represents the childhood of millions of syrian children killed injured orphaned or displaced their young thoughts displayed here in beirut through art inspired by their poems. the moment if you want to do anything with the aid agencies they don't call you by your name or your family name they call you by your number this is very upsetting i want to be called by my name ya wrote a poem called a wish this is the artist's interpretation of her dreams the best find the only

this is my goal i have a wish i want to finish my studies and become a lawyer so i can defend the rights of children more i don't want children to suffer like we have suffered. haunting images paint a picture of trauma experiences that have abruptly ended a carefree childhood. i was very upset to leave my country and come here my house changed from a house to a tent instead of walls we have wood and instead of assuming we have a tent cover that is it the dreams of these children and their families are simple it is the dream of millions of other syrians it is an urgent and desperate plea they want the war to end and they want to go home stephanie decker al-jazeera. you're watching all just their arms the whole drama these are all top stories the syrian military has dropped leaflets over eastern calling on residents to leave for their own safety and opposition fighters to hand themselves over more than four

hundred people have died in the rebel held during five days of bombardment. meanwhile the united nations security council will vote on friday on a draft resolution demanding a thirty day truce in syria to allow aid deliveries and medical evacuations it's facing opposition from russia which is accusing the media of a massive disinter mation campaign. and the us president donald trump has told america's largest gun lobby the national rifle association that the us needs to toughen up some rules on gun control he's also said the legal age to buy guns needs to be raised eighteen to twenty one last week seventeen people were killed in a shooting at a high school in florida the debate over gun control has intensified since seventeen people were shot the sheriff who was on duty at the marjory stoneman douglas high school apparently waited outside the building for four minutes without going inside he's resigned and an investigation is underway what i

saw was a deputy arrived at the west side of building twelve take up a position any never went in when the. yes he was he went in address the killer killed the killer more charges have been filed against former truck presidential campaign aides paul manifold and rick gates by special counsel robert mueller the thirty two count indictment includes tax and bank fraud charges in october man a fourteen gates were charged with conspiracy to launder money. australis embattled deputy prime minister barnaby joyce has resigned after revelations of an extramarital affair with a former staff member joyce will step down from cabinet but will remain in parliament safeguarding the government's one seat majority the politician who campaigned on family values left his marriage of twenty four years but his is

expecting a child with his former media secretary he also faces formal sexual harassment complaints which have been referred to the police those were the headlines more news in thirty minutes next al-jazeera rebel geeks to stay with us. once held in one of australia's toughest detention centers now a world renowned surgeon one of many as follows dr moon. as returns to his hometown baghdad to give their beauties the hope of walking again at this time on al-jazeera digital technology is the promise of intimacy an easement and even a longer night. in the ability to keep billions of calculations in our pockets it seems they discovered a need and mention. in which everything in our lives can be increased and tracked and intended. that is convenience profit and surveillance the only. now gentlemen.