well. that's just a. mess good faith is a traditional dish made by cooking seasoned fresh water car on the fire. cooked it in the marsh and it's often considered iraq's national dish. but prides itself in making the best mess goof with a district dedicated to the dish in its dozens of fish restaurants.

during. story shows how iraq's ancient rivers arsed to close to the heart of its people. today's crisis means that iraq won so abundant in water resources now sixty percent of its fish. but above all it's threatens the roots of iraq's identity. between the two rivers the tigris and the euphrates on which the country and its people have depended for thousands of years. a story of revolution defiance and murder on top of. a major figure in the war against the french occupation of algeria. from one who's brave even impressed

his enemy and who inspired others in the fight for independence after his death that is good because it is a lot of the ben mcgeady the algerian revolutionary on al-jazeera. hello we've got some quiet weather coming into eastern parts of australia over the next couple days and the violent storms around sydney and of course further north we've had the to run show rain fully persistent right neverending right there in

townsville will at long last come to an end here's our area of low pressure which brought that disturbed weather rain is out in the car will see it's making its way away as we go on through the next day i was never really too far away and it's that we'll see some heavy downpours just around the top end as well showers so clinging on around the east coast of queensland for a time they want to shout up towards the sunshine coast perhaps go cuz thirty celsius in sydney should be try and find normal service regimes getting into the mid twenty's for melbourne middle class sliding into tasmania twenty seven celsius for. the tasman some wet weather making its way into the south island of new zealand will see some rather disturbed weather for a time pushing through here but twenty six celsius ahead of that twenty five therefore clint little colder as we go on into monday the showers longest balls if i may view the central parts of the country now for japan has been the wintry weather that's been causing some issues temperatures remain on the low side but it

will least we see dry. rewind returns a can bring your people back to life from start with brand new updates on the best of al-jazeera documentaries live oh as the both of us and know like and the others too then rewind continues with joseph's journey this is a. distro continuos book. from bob good to know. his distance rewind on al-jazeera. called the must much hussein has now been held in pretrial detention for two years what is his crime. why hasn't he been tried yet why hasn't justice been applied in this case is he detained because he said china list as journalism become a crime have moles become

a tool to silence weiss's of truth we will continue our news coverage with professionalism and impartiality our work will remain credible and accurate but journalism is not a crime incarcerating journalists is not acceptable we demand the immediate release of all colleague mahmoud to same and all journalists detained in a gyptian jails free mahmoud's and all his colleagues we stand for press freedom. every dude is being am being weak and you measure the support intelligence agencies are. to do things in secret that are unlawful or politically embarrassing all of the colleagues that i knew chose to retire from the n.s.a. big could not stand by and see all the work that they had done being used for mass

surveillance digital dissidents on al-jazeera. zero. zero i maryam namazie this is the news hour live from london coming up. the u.s. backed fighters say they are launching an offensive to drive i still from its last pockets of territory in syria. venezuelan stream across the colombian border while foreign aid remains stuck caught in a standoff between maduro and the u.s. and the thai political party that wanted the king sr to be its candidate for prime minister backs down after he opposes her nomination. and i'm we are

hearty i'm in doha here with all of your sport a nation is in mourning after ten young footballers were killed in a fire at the flamingo football training ground in brazil we'll have that story and more a few later this news hour. welcome to the program our top story the u.s. backed syrian democratic forces say they are launching the final battle to push i sell out of its last remaining pockets of land in syria kurdish led fighters say the offensive is focused on the village of east india near the border with iraq backed by us as strikes they've cornered eyes still in a small area consisting of just two villages earlier they foresaw faisel attempts to attack a nearby us military base with motorbike omes more than twenty thousand civilians have been evacuated from the area including the families of i saw fight is. going

to. be sealed in the next coming days. most of the terrorist and the foreign in the last two months most with hundred cells were arrested they were forward. there are varying numbers according to civilians who are leaving back to stay maybe around a thousand civilians in between five hundred six hundred terrorists so that means that maybe close to two thousand or three thousand civilians. stephanie decker has more now from istanbul the syrian democratic forces say that it is the most hard core fighters that remain in this area it is a small area of territory it will be significant of course if the announcement comes within the next week or so that's according to u.s. president that obviously territory is over but there is still a huge threat from the group on the ground through sleeper cells car bomb suicide bombings that's been ongoing for some time there's also a huge humanitarian challenge over the last few weeks tens of thousands of people

up to thirty thousand people have fled these areas most of them are families i salute family members they're being screened by the kurds also by foreign special forces that are on the ground and then they're being bussed to camps in kurdish controlled areas of syria the situation there is dire the u.n. saying that over twenty children babies have died of malnutrition it is a desperate situation it has been a desperate situation over the years inside syria and i think we need to be cautious when we talk about the announcement the looming announcement about the fact that i saw was lost its territory in syria and iraq there remain huge challenges ahead all these areas that have seen the fighting have been completely flattened people people's homes have been destroyed there is no infrastructure there is a lot of rebuilding to be done and of course these people that reside in camps the internally displaced will not be able to go home any time soon so yes it is

significant that this final push is now underway but huge challenges remain ahead. and that's now speak to joshua landis his director of the university of oklahoma center for middle east studies thank you very much for taking the time to speak to us if you're so if you're hearing there i sill has been driven from strongholds it's lost mass amounts of territory in both syria and iraq but does that mean that the group is a spent force well the president trump has been very clear to say that this is the careless it that is being destroyed not isis the terrorist group which will continue to survive and as we know isis members have fled to yemen to libya nigeria they're there they're scattered about the middle east but of course this is the we believe there are several thousand left scattered around iraq in syria and many of them are foreign fighters because the arab an iraqi fighters have been able to sort of slip away into the night and blend into the general population the foreign

fighters have not there are some rumors that benedetti the keylock is there there was a coup against him some people say we're not sure if any of that is correct. and so when you speak about first of all the threat from foreign fighters second of all the fighters that have gone into well sleeper cells if you like perhaps in sort of remote rural areas in the desert or just underground in urban areas what measures has the group taken to become or evolve into a covert network for example that they retain resources they still have access to weapons and money. we believe they do you know that their money is is has been whittled down their heavy weapons have been destroyed but there are there are likely caches around that we've seen in iraq. that there are you know usually over five six bombs suicide bombings and other i.e.d. s.

that are that are go off every week so this you know this is going to be an ongoing battle and it's going to be very important that a local military and police can continue to try to fight against them that there is not chaos following the american withdrawal. but nothing can be done to how is it going to affect u.s. strategy in the region we know that troops are going to be withdrawn as defense secretary jim mattis essentially resigned over this decision on their fear is that whatever gains have been made over the past year or two might be completely lost. and there are those fears and people have been saying this could happen at the problem for the united states is that they don't want their nato partner turkey to move into north syria and take over the american job because they would cut down the white peachy that's the main ally the united states a kurdish ally the united states in northern syria which turkey considers

a terrorist organization and equally the united states is unwilling to organize with the syrian government in the russians that they should move back in because behind them is iran and the united states this is a political third rail in washington everybody iran is a major enemy of the united states in the end the state department national security by they're at really sworn themselves to cut your run down to size so they cannot organize with syria in order to take over this job and to patch up relations with the kurds because that would be a blow to american prestige and what america's sworn to do so in some ways america's preparing to withdraw without any kind of a local deal because they don't like any of the alternatives neither the turks you know the syrian government and that that could leave an opening. for isis thank you appreciate your analysis joshua landis direction center for middle east

studies there in the university of oklahoma pleasure well now in all the stories we're covering seven people have been given a life sentences of a gun and grenade attacks at a tunisian museum and beach resorts in two thousand and fifteen sixteen people were killed in the attacks which i still claim responsibility for other defendants receive prison sentences ranging from six months to sixteen years and twenty seven were acquitted suspected mastermind behind the attacks chance of being a sunday is still at lunch. to venezuela now where the political crisis has turned into a standoff over a consignment of u.s. and sitting on the colombian side of the border the opposition is trying to work out how to get it into the country after the aid was blocked by the venezuelan military on the orders of president nicolas maduro the opposition leader one guy doe is challenging the do it for control of the country is urging the army to let it through but would euro's call the aid a political spectacle staged by the u.s.

to increase the pressure on him well the aid shipment is intended to be the first of many the u.s. and aid agency says it contains enough food to feed five thousand venezuelans for ten days there hygiene kits for seven and a half thousand people including soap and toothbrushes there are also nutritional supplements for the six and a half thousand malnourished children and enough high energy biscuits to feed ten thousand children for a month. but not all the crossing points between venezuela and colombia a closed this is the simon bolivar crossing between the two countries which hundreds of venezuelans and colombians have been passing through over the last few hours it's estimated as many as three million venezuelans have fled the country because of the crisis meanwhile venezuela's state run oil company is taking steps to remove at least two u.s. executives from the board of its u.s. subsidiary citgo petroleum corporation citgo is facing financial and mismanagement

challenges following u.s. sanctions imposed on pay divest last week the move is intended to prevent oil revenue from going to president the douro venezuela's self-proclaimed president is setting up bank accounts with the u.s. debt. that would essentially take income accrued by citgo to finance an interim government. so let's go now to tereza both who is in the venezuelan capital caracas first of all you have a u.s. shipment of a that is just sitting on the border with colombia doing nothing what is the opposition's plan because clearly it can't just sit there forever well that's the big question is how to get aid into the country in a subject that has become.