the situation is and is prone to any kind of escalation on the other side we have similar you know statements coming out from iran from the islamic revolutionary guard corps also in terms of a strong retaliation against u.s. interests in the region in the event of war so what a good byproduct of this kind of ask elating war of words might be is that diplomacy is very much important and there is an urgency for diplomacy and maybe the signs in terms of the omani of foreign minister traveling today to iran and discussing some regional issues and oman has played a kind of a mediating role between the u.s. and iran in the past so maybe this is a good sign about the urgency of diplomacy and this will really activate a lot of you know possible scenarios to go for a diplomatic settlement or at least some talks between iran and the united states

you talk about. let's just finally bring in then the regional players like saudi arabia like israel who would love to see the u.s. bring terror on to its knees and saudi arabia has called for 2 emergency meetings to discuss escalating tensions but there's so much disunity among gulf arab states will anything be a cheat. well it is true that the g.c.c. remains you know disunited and disses also you know not going to change probably in the in the short term at least and so in terms of having a security you know group that is quite forceful against iran this is something you know this is quite an unlikely scenario but in any case none of the iranian adverse trees in the region can also bear the consequences of a large scale military attack that would put of the entire region into fire. if i told him that i thank you very much for your insight thank you. lots more so to

come here on the news hour including u.s. carmakers for the nonsense major job cuts we'll take a look at what's behind the move. and how upcoming elections are exposing europe's deep divisions. in a sport we'll tell you about the american celebrating the 4th major bowl title of his career. now the white house is accusing the palestinians of shamefully trying to block their future palestinians haven't been invited and said they wouldn't take part in a conference organized by donald trump's son in law jared cushion is expected to unveil the u.s. president's long awaited blueprint for palestine and israel in bahrain next month events being held to outline economic aspects of the plan the palestinian prime minister says they haven't been consulted about the conference says any u.s. plan would probably favor israel and be financial blackmail for the palestinians

well you know the cabinet stresses that it wasn't consulted about the reported workshop and neither about the content nor the outcome and or the timing it clarifies that the financial crisis that the palestinian national authority is living through today is a result of the financial war that is being waged against us in order to win political concessions we do not submit to blackmail and we do not trade our political rights for money well i white house correspondent kimberly halkett joins us live now from washington kimberly so the white house has not responded to this palestinian rejection what more they've been saying. yeah a statement coming from the white house special representative for international negotiations jason green blatt saying that the white house essentially find it difficult to understand why the palestinian authority would reject a workshop designed to radically transform lives and a path to a brighter future goes on to say that they have essentially accused the palestinian authority of blocking that brighter future that history will judge the palestinian

authority for passing up this opportunity and now they go on to say in the statement that the economic plan in the eyes of the white house is ambitious but achievable has the potential to unlock what they call a prosperous future but at the same time the statement of the very end goes on to acknowledge that really this private sector growth that is expected to create this economic opportunity is really only possible when final status issues are addressed and that is what is noticeably absent in the announcement of this plan the fact that there is this sort of introduction of this plan for an economic workshop but not of the issues with regard to you know palestinian sovereignty land claims borders none of that has been mentioned so many people are questioning how this could even move forward. how important is this so-called deal of the center to president trump the administration i mean how big a deal is it politically can really. well donald trump has always

been one that wants to sort of portray himself as being able to achieve what no one else could achieve he constantly whether it's on trade the economy likes to compare himself to his predecessor rock obama look i did what you couldn't do the problem is in all of this if this white house is really sincere about trying to achieve middle east peace between the israelis and the palestinians something that has not been achievable by previous presidents and in recent history it certainly isn't making the overtures like it really intends to try and do that for example the declaration of moving the u.s. embassy from tel aviv to jerusalem in 2017 that's what really shut things down in terms of this plan the fact that the palestinian authority the palestinian leader said look at we're not even to deal with you now so the white house has been moving forward on this plan without any consultation of palestinian leaders and then the other thing in all of this is in the backdrop of it is jared cushion are sort of

the one that has been working in conjunction been tapped by the white house to deal with this given the fact that he is it's known that he's got a very close relationship of business ties with mohamed bin salomon the saudi crown prince who of course the cia has implicated in the murder of the journalist enough . the white house has never held him accountable despite promising to do so and that of course the fact that there are also has ties to family ties to benjamin netanyahu the israeli prime minister all of this seems to sort of lean to one side very decidedly leaving many people to question the sincerity of this white house when it says in claims it's trying to achieve peace but its actions really don't indicate so committed thank you. to syria now at least 10 civilians have been killed in asteroids and shelling and in that province russian forces are continuing to carry out raids there but moscow says syria has declared a unilateral cease fire on the chappelle reports. in the town of kafir novel

syrian civil defense workers search for survivors local activists say residential neighborhoods like this one were attacked 10 times through the night by airstrikes russia says it targeted opposition fighters who fired rockets at it's him aiming an air base while activists say these strikes took a maternity hospital out of service 18 other health facilities have been damaged or destroyed. since the russian backed syrian government offensive of it began last month with daylight people began searching for what they could salvage but many simply won't leave the elderly disabled and mothers trying to support their families alone have little choice but to stay why mother in isn't why i'm going to that that what can i do and how will the small children live all these women they don't have anyone where will we go. this town is meant to be in a deescalation zone covering it live province and nearby areas but over the past 3

weeks most airstrikes have struck this area here the u.n. says along with an increase in fighting on the ground they've displaced at least 180000 people mostly from northern hama and southern it lip they've been driving north into an ever smaller area mostly under the control of his former affiliate in syria. h.t.s. . but those who have moved from cover nobile to the nearby city of marjah tell newmont have not found safety. but syria and russia say they are targeting h.t.s. and not civilians or civilian infrastructure but on the ground it's clear many of syria's most vulnerable people are being displaced again and again and it's thought this could be the beginning of a long campaign by the syrian government to recapture the last rebel stronghold putting millions of lives at risk and chapelle al jazeera. a major redundancies about amounts to forward the u.s. com makers cutting $7000.00 workers and offices worldwide that's 10 percent of its

salaried stuff and ford is saving $600000000.00 a year as it gives up to build more electric vehicles of the future michael martinez is a reporter for automotive news website covering forward and tesla he joins us via skype from detroit michigan how much of a surprise are these job cuts and why now do you think. it's not that much of a surprise ford announced these actions back in november however this is the 1st time we're finally getting details about the numbers they've sort of taken their time to make these cuts going to department by department and they want to hold off on giving a fair number until they themselves had a better idea of just how many will be let go and what michael what is the future then with electric cars and drive cars i mean is forward ideally placed in that market space. well they like to think they are in there that's changing almost by the day and they need to make these decisions now so they have the money to invest as an example

a couple weeks ago for invested 5 $100000000.00 into an electric truck startup called so you can see they're saving $600000000.00 a year by laying off all these people and you can see sort of the price tag that some of these investments cost i'm just playing the bigger picture for us michael i mean how much trouble is the u.s. car industry actually in i mean ford isn't the only car maker to have made huge job cuts recently definitely it's interesting because normally when you hear about car companies and job cuts it's because these companies have been forced to do so because problems have gotten so out of hand 10 years ago in the great recession general motors and chrysler went bankrupt and ford was also in tough financial shape these days they're all solidly profitable car sales are not at record levels anymore but they're still very strong however they're making these preemptive cuts so they can have a strong business in the future and they don't get to be as bad as where they were 10 years ago michael is this likely to have a broader political impact i mean job cuts are never a good thing for donald trump who likes to talk about jobs on the economy

definitely the president has not yet tweeted about ford as far as i've seen but this will definitely be a talking point on the campaign trail over the next couple of years you look at ford's cross-town rivals general motors it's made the decision to close a couple plants and the president has hammered them for that decision repeatedly michael martinez thank you very much for talking to us thank you south africa's former president jacob zuma has appeared in court hoping that judges will throw out corruption charges against him zuma is accused of fraud money laundering america tearing some of those charges relate to a controversial arms deal exposed while he was deputy president prosecutors say he received money to cover up in legal purchases of combat equipment for the south african navy for me that miller was outside the court and peter marks book. jacob zuma supporters have been waiting patiently won't take to hear from the former president he's expected to address the people here only time from now and that's off to

a court proceeding straight pietermaritzburg wrapped up on the 1st day of arguments where zuma story is arguing that he didn't start stand trial this is for a number of reasons one of them is that jacob zuma was charged to mold in a take it a go and even though those charges were thrown and then reinstated his lawyers arguing that given the amount of time that's cost the trial should have happened at that time and should proceed now oh his lawyers also claim that the charges against jacob zuma are politically driven and they also say that he has been spied on illegally by the government now these are the arguments his lawyers will use in the coming days as they try to convince the court the jacob zuma shouldn't stand trial people outside certainly believe the former president they say he's innocent they say he's here to support him as long as he meets if they're here until the end

however the prosecutors in this case it jacob zuma has been responsible holt's in laying the case it's taken this long because of some of the tactics he was employed those but spokesman that he's managed to get and they believe that jacob zuma assumer rather should be held accountable for what so that frequency of calling the arms deal in that jacob zuma received payments from a french omes manufacturer tallest to use political protection when they were supposed to provide a provide frigates to the south african navy. almost 200000 people are displaced right now in but enough asa according to the united nations they were forced to leave their homes because a volunteer in the northern border region with mali a warning that nicholas haas reports from bashar contains graphic images. they keep coming carrying what they can for lani herders victims of attacks by their own

neighbors they bear witness of unspeakable violence 17 year old are a lost his parents and 2 siblings all hacked to death. there is no justice if we go to the police to denounce the killers they put us in jail it's as if we are the criminals mobile phone footage has emerged from a morgue in neighboring mali these are bodies of men killed because of their suspected link to armed groups they are the latest victims of intercommunal violence that is spreading across the us to hell both the group at the state and the greater. mean seeks to attract young recruits from the full on the community exploiting grievances against the state and local authorities and encouraging revenge attacks. government believes these armed groups are behind the attacks on catholic churches in schools in the north of the country. a devout

christian and primary school teacher from the northern region fled to the capital after full on the armed men stormed his classroom threatening to kill him if he didn't convert to islam and teach the koran in school i'm not myself but the one that we can never we know our attackers they are for the most part our brothers from burkina faso so it's even more painful to see that this has come to this stage where we are ready to kill each other for what 2 young men displaced and caught in the spiral of violence tearing burkina faso apart nicholas hawke al-jazeera. time for a short break here not just iraq when we come back we'll tell you why the u.n. is want to get its scale back its through their operations in yemen. and google cuts ties with chinese telecoms giant huawei which washington considers on national security threat i don't support the toronto raptors for their way back into the n.b.a. playoffs i know being without story a little bit like. hello

there the weather still quite unsettled over parts of the middle east at the moment but the huge area of cloud here that's working its way through parts of iraq and us towards the caspian sea and then everywhere to the east there's a chance of seeing one t. shirt was and it still stays unsettled as we head through the next couple of days so really we haven't settled down for summer yet sule towards the west it should be a bit dry ambrosia for say beirut to a mix of getting to around $29.00 a bit further towards the south and we've also had a lot of cloud over policy arabian peninsula too in yemen this is what it looked like clearly a lot of rain has fallen there we've had a lot of thunder reactivity down towards the southwest in parts of the country and we've also had quite a few thunderstorms elsewhere out of this area of clouds here abu dabi de bar i we've both seen some heavy showers and we've seen plenty of them over parts of a man including muscat there i think as we head through the next few days is still

a risk of seeing a few more showers and some of them again could turned out to be roll the heavy that have just sticking around really as we head through wednesday a bit further towards the south and things are generally looking a good deal dry ahead this is the parts of madagascar that we've been seeing a few showers we've also seen some clouds make its way over the southern parts of south africa for cape town where we will want to stay a maximum of 60. i never let it be i was born in the same year as this one voice i feel as though the state is my mother should be maybe not a cause of celebration for some a catastrophe for others then not but is still going on they put my sons in jail so every day i feel disgust for the twice over al-jazeera world tells the stories of palestinian and israeli women born in the same year but on opposite sides of this divide born in 48 on al-jazeera world.

stories generate thousands of headlines with different angles from different perspectives giuliana son just a long standoff with international borders is finally separate the spin for the facts the misinformation from the journalism protesters complain about the under reported of police violence the sensationalizing of the demonstrations with the listening post on al-jazeera. welcome back a program out of our top stories here this hour iran has announced it will cut

drupal production of low enriched uranium it comes a week after iran officially ended some of its commitments some of the international nuclear deal which was abandoned by the trump administration. iran's foreign minister has hit back at the u.s. president's latest threat saying it won't be intimidated by what he calls genocidal taunts donald trump tweeted that if iran wants to fight it will be the end of the country he later said he would prefer an economic. invasion and in the last few minutes we've just heard that lee rainie in leadership has reached out to the united nations with a letter diplomatic correspondent james bays joins us live now from the united nations james so this is breaking as we are now on air what more do we know about this letter and what it may mean. well we know what's in the latter because i got a copy of the letter of the iranian mission to the united nations gave me a copy in the last few minutes this is a letter that's been sent by the iranian ambassador based here at the u.n.

in new york to the secretary general of the united nations antonio good terrace and to the current president of the security council deanne johnny who is the ambassador of indonesia and presides over the security council for this month of may it doesn't mention the u.s. at any point in this letter it does though talk about the recent alarming security situation in the mysterious intentions of some of those it says are involved then goes on to say that the current situation in action is a lose lose approach and it suggests what it says is a win win approach says the current conflict security environment in the region can be eased and ultimately addressed and it suggests constructive engagement not involving the u.s. but direct talks between iran and the gulf states says that is the way forward it says that such a forum for dialogue in the persian gulf can be set up and it even comes up with

a mechanism for that they've gone back to a security council resolution from more than 30 years ago from 1987 security council resolution 598 and it says that if the secretary general of the united nations was to operationalize the words in that resolution that he get this dialogue between the gulf states the g.c.c. and iran going and iran is making that its proposal to try and solve the current tension in the region james and both sides say they don't want an all out conflict so what's the mood music there at the u.n. and what happens next. well i think there certainly be discussion of this and the indonesians in their role as the president of the security council are very keen to find a bridge in various crises in the world and so i think we'll look at this seriously as will the secretary general of the united nations but of course this is a proposal not directly addressed to the u.s. and leaving the u.s.

out of things and trying to get the saudis and the other gulf states to talk to iran that may not be the way the trumpet ministration want to go clearly the iranians i think being quite clever by leaving the u.s. out of this and yet putting forward what they would say is a pretty constructive proposal the certainly the secretary general's office will be making it clear for some days that they're very uneasy about the current war of words and the real fear that they could be miscalculation that could lead to real serious military problems in the region james bays there are diplomatic and is a live for us on the u.n. in new york james thank you now the united nations says it may be forced to scale back the delivery of humanitarian aid to some parts of yemen and to who think control early this month the world food program wrote to him the leaders after being refused access to those in need the agency says the biggest challenge it

faces is not threats from weapons but what it calls the obstructive role of some who think need as the u.n. says the suspension of aid would be a last resort. the agency will do everything within its powers to ensure that the weakest and most vulnerable especially the children do not suffer he still hopes the good sense will prevail and the suspension will not happen the ultimate responsibility for the welfare of their people lies with the yemeni leadership. now a 16 year old guatemalan migrant has died in the u.s. custody in southern texas the teenage boy was arrested by border patrol agents a week ago and found unresponsive during a welfare check on monday is the 5th margaret child to die in custody since december when the audio castro joins us live now from washington the heidi so what more details are emerging about this young boy's death and how it happened. well generally don't know much the government has not released any details of all about exactly why he died and what sort of factors were country were contributors but

what we can do what we do know by reading between the lines is that this was a 16 year old boy who was traveling either by himself or have been separated from his parents we know this because the agency says the customs and border patrol says they were about to transfer him to a more longer term shelter that's run by the department of health and human services but before that could happen this morning he was discovered and responsive so customs and border patrol has issued a statement saying they are saddened by the loss and come and dolan says to his family but beyond that they have offered very little information for those trying to hold this agency accountable. primarily another question to why this 16 year old child was held in a temporary border patrol station that was only designed to hold children for 72

hours but he was there for 7 days these are the images that we've all seen of the children who are sleeping in these cage like structure surrounded by wires not even having beds to sleep on or rather spending the nights on the concrete floor aaron i mean how much of this latest death put the spotlight back on this ongoing detention of minors that you just mentioned in u.s. immigration centers. it's an undeniable fact now that this is a fatal endeavor what is happening to these children at the border this is now the 5th child to die in the last 6 months in u.s. government custody and all of them have been from guatemala just last week a toddler a 2 and a half year old boy died also in u.s. custody from pneumonia previous to that there have been children who died from other infections including the flu and also from an undiagnosed tumor that can be caused by a severe sinus infection and this is not only those who have died here north of the

border it does not take into account the children who have been turned around by us for a patrol to remain in mexico which is the push of the trump administration also last week a 10 year old girl died in mexico city upon arriving at a government shelter there and we don't even have numbers for those who have never been allowed a chance to seek their asylum claim on u.s. soil who have been forced to wait just south of the border or staying in informal shelters or on the streets of mexico so a lot of unresolved questions but what is clear is that those who are paying the price for these more hardline border policies are the most vulnerable are these children who continue to die are there in washington d.c. how do you think you know ukraine's new president has used his swearing in ceremony to dissolve parliament and trigger a snap election across to europe in new sense and get more now from law into law

and over to. thanks dan yes followed amir's lenski is hoping a vote or help his party again its 1st seats in parliament the comedian turned politician says his main priority will be reaching a cease fire deal with pro russia separatists in the east china how reports. an event that only months ago seemed unthinkable gratian of comedian and actor volodymyr zelinsky as president of ukraine. blood human feelings can. only because then the more grainy zelinsky has become president for his character in a popular t.v. series servant of the people it's a schoolteacher whose improbable rise to the presidency is built on a campaign against corruption zelinsky his own rise now taking up the role for real was built not on clear policies but on public distrust in fact little is known about his policies instead ukraine is taking a chance on

a man with no political experience rejecting a political class that many voters feel has failed them corruption remains rife and a war in the east that divides the country continues with no end in sight the landscape the problem here is that people didn't vote for him they voted against the establishment against the other candidates are the people who have been running ukraine for the last 25 years and so and you saw that today in various reports from the ukrainian parliament there weren't massive crowds there supporting zelinsky so selenski popularity isn't really very deep in that sense it's more an anti vote than or a pro vote supporters sees a landscape as a breath of fresh air among these 1st steps a pledge to call early parliamentary elections referred to some m.p.'s as petty crooks and a promise to end the war with russian backed separatists said your thoughts of nice you could i'm ready he said to do everything so that our heroes don't die. that's

something his predecessor petro poroshenko wasn't able to do and while poroshenko did make reforms that helped ukraine stave off economic collapse voters decided he hadn't done enough to rid the country of corruption selenski will be under great pressure to do better. a presidency that breaks with tradition got off to the most nontraditional start a flashy convoy for volodymyr zelinsky who chose to walk the streets to his swearing in ceremony high fives and selfies also not hallmarks of previous administrations all of this clearly styled as a fresh start for ukraine even though no one really knows what president's events queue plans to do or is capable of doing a whole al-jazeera. all ministers from austria's far right freedom party have stepped down that's according to the a.p. a news agency it's a response to chancellor sebastian courts saying he'll propose to the president

that interior minister herbert kick you'll be fired a freedom party had warned it would put out of government if kicker was forced out the party's leader resigned on saturday highest percentage toher was caught on camera apparently offering government contracts to a wealthy russian woman in exchange for political support. italy's deputy prime minister is threatening legal action after $47.00 refugees and migrants disembarked at the port of lampedusa on sunday but oh so vini criticize the move in a facebook video after discovering they'd been brought to shore this part an explicit ban against them survey has proposed new legislation which would find vessels for bringing migrants onto talian soil. the french president has held talks with e.u. council chief donald tusk in paris ahead of european parliament elections on thursday emmanuel macor says the block is in crisis and has urged voters. to curb

the rise of far right parties and talked about to has more. france's european elections is shaping up to be something of a rerun of the 2017 presidential campaign emanuel mark calls pro e.u. centrist party and the. right party of marine le pen opinion polls suggest in the lead for folks the jewel of opposing visions of europe and a reflection of growing divisions in france at this paris market some say they're worried about immigration climate change and the cost of living i'm totally sick of politicians with that big salaries as opposed to defend us workers but they do nothing for us since mccombs been in power was struggling to live it's important to europe because there are countries where populist governments have come to power and it will. continue the far right one france's last european elections in 2014 since then and the immigration populous parties have flourished in europe and

brakes it has rattled the bloc in the pen and the nationalist allies not even the noise is so we're experiencing a historic moment and all the signs show that we are on the eve of great political change in europe the idea of a europe that denies the right of nations to exist your forest area the vision of an imprisoning e.u. have been massively rejected. the french presidents rarely publicly campaign in european elections but macro's breaking with tradition he says europe's in crisis and he's fighting to save it i want reforms e.u. i want to accelerates the integration on some issues i think on currency on digital on climate action we need more europe i want you to be more protection protective for him on your mark all these elections are an opportunity not only to campaign for a united europe but also to try and boost his personal popularity in roles after a particularly challenging here domestically. 6 months period with the

yellow vests and a huge drop in his popularity in the country so these elections are a test for him where there is at stake for him is 1st of all to rebuild his popularity within the country and to be in a position to have some influence on european affairs for the next 2 years the elections might be a chance for mackerel but they are also fraught with risk a win for the president's party in france will bolster him for the remainder of his mandate but if his party loses to the far right it will be a humiliating defeat in france and a setback for example in europe especially butler al-jazeera paris let's head to london back to daryn in doha lauren thank you very much indeed now google's parent company alphabet has suspended some books business with the chinese tech giant hallways saying it's complying with.