so no matter. how does seem to bring you the need and current affairs that matter to you. al jazeera. a growing number of countries place restrictions on travelers from the u.k. over fears of a more contagious strain of corona virus. and there are more kyle this is al jazeera live from doha also coming up. and importantly we're going to supply lucia. in a way. u.s. congressional leaders reached a deal on a $900000000000.00 coronavirus relief package the 2nd biggest economic stimulus in

u.s. history. the south korean capital is expected to announce its toughest covert 19 measures yet as the country struggles to contain a 3rd wave of the pandemic. plus a dangerous business why owners and liquor stores in iraq and living and fair. canada has joined a growing list of countries that are suspending transport links with the u.k. in response to a new more infectious strain of the coronavirus countries include the netherlands germany and poland and of those new restrictions as rushed to catch the last trains out of the u.k. on sunday before the new rules came into place and the measures come amid fears of it spreading to the continent s a has reported one case of the new strain and someone who recently returned from the u.k. present health minister in the variant strain is out of control in his country the

government has put stay at home orders in place in certain areas as the reports from london. with a week to go until christmas goodwill in some parts is being strained to the limit in much of the u.k. a planned relaxation of indoor mixing rules has been cut from 5 days to one day and in england a 3rd of the population is now a new to hear for restrictions people can't mix at school with other households here in central london there are people out and about for a walk but all the shops are shut these new restrictions are going to be devastating for thousands of businesses as well as for families who had planned to get together at christmas. i think that the new strain of the virus is certainly concerning and i think it is the right decision but i just wish it would have been made a few days earlier yeah i'm pretty upset about it i think the lack of planning and the lack of ability to tell people that this is going to happen in advance of when

it did. cause a lot of havoc and confusion there's also a ban all nonessential travel in and out of tier 4 areas that's where the rising coverage $1000.00 cases has been steepest with london's mayor saying the numbers of coronavirus patients in hospital about at levels last seen in the spring the government's put the surge down to a new variant that's much more easily transmitted the new variant is out of control and we need to bring it under control. this news about the new variant has been a an incredibly difficult and frankly an awful year and it's important for everybody to act. essentially act like they might have the virus. but trains out of london were packed on saturday ahead of the deadline and on sunday more travelers headed for the stations raising fears about the mutated virus spreading things like wearing them off it's like to me that social distancing they just reduce your chances of getting infected then they don't stop you getting

infected and i guess that this increased transmissibility shifts the dial a bit back in the favor of the virus those things that mask where exactly this. become a bit less effective. with many questions unanswered about the new strain the netherlands imposed a ban on flights to and from the u.k. other european nations have followed suit at least temporarily saying they have to protect their citizens and their health services that's also the reason the u.k. government's given for the last minute lock down its hinting the new restrictions may have to stay in place for at least 2 months until a far greater number of people have had the covered 19 vaccine nadeem bob al-jazeera london u.s. congressional leaders have agreed on a $900000000000.00 coronavirus relief package for millions of americans extended federal funding to give themselves more time to finalize the deal and prevent a government shutdown i jocasta reports from washington d.c.

nearly at the finish line congress has now given itself another day to finalize the deals both parties say are already in place we can file a report with our nation as needed to hear for a very long time. more help is on the way this bill is a good bill tonight is a good night. but it is not the end of the story it is not the end of the job and anyone who thinks this bill is enough does not know what's going on in america hospitals are full more than 300000 people are dead and $8000000.00 americans have slipped into poverty since may the coburg relief bill would deliver checks of $600.00 to most people and extend unemployment benefits through mid march it would also give more loans to small businesses and offer rental assistance to families on the brink of

a vixen what i'm excited about in this bill and it is really the democratic difference is what it does for america's working families as we see food lines all over the country it was the our legislation that had the initiative for food for nutrition for our children and school and lee and nash seniors as well as america's working families the deal totals 9 $100000000000.00 it is the 2nd biggest economic stimulus in u.s. history only surpassed by the 1st covert relief bill that was passed earlier this year congress is expected to approve on monday and president trump is expected to sign back scenes are also urgently moving across the country modernity is the 2nd vaccine to gain government approval in the u.s. about 6000000 doses have been dispatched to hospitals. we are very confident that

by june anyone in america who wants to have a vaccine will have that opportunity but only 20000000 doses are available before the end of the year not nearly enough to cover all the frontline essential workers and people over 75 who are next in line for shots that means states must decide who to protect 1st as more governors issue restrictions to limit americans movements over the holidays castro al-jazeera washington. in our israel prime minister benjamin netanyahu is calling on all his fellow citizens to get the vaccine he was the 1st to get the dose on sunday as part of a mass inoculation campaign for the national rollout excludes 2 and a half 1000000 palestinians living in the occupied west bank and gaza so reports from western. idea of hope and celebration in israel this people here receive the 1st doses of the pfizer bio and take vaccines.

government ministers hospital managers and health care workers received the early hours of sunday. prime minister netanyahu was the 1st israeli to be inoculated so. it's a very big day for the state of israel we've been living for almost a year with the most difficult pandemic that humanity has seen for the last 100 years and now is the beginning of the way out millions of vaccines will arrive in our small state it's not trivial millions more to come and everyone needs to get vaccinated but as the vaccination program rolls out in israel millions of palestinians in the occupied west bank and gaza are waiting to hear when they'll be vaccinated the palestinian authority says it's in talks with the world health organization and vaccine developers analysts and human rights groups see even if enough doses can be bought the palestinian authority will need international help

to distribute them and we know that they will not be able to or think you are. alone they do 5 hope there and you know i says those. countries or c their partners there were going to and there wouldn't be security as well. there's a record number of covert 19 cases w.h.o. is warning the health care. system there may collapse israel is being asked by human rights organizations to insure all palestinians are also vaccinated in response the israeli government says it may donate doses left over after all israelis have had their us. so for now there are celebrations in israel but in the west bank and gaza there is no way of knowing when palestinians can feel

the same sense of relief every nasser al jazeera westerners. castle's health ministry has approved a vaccine for emergency use against the corona virus though is due to receive the 1st shipments of. text vaccine early on monday cas are recorded 143 new cases of covert 19 on sunday. south korea's capital seoul as impose its toughest coronavirus measures yet as it struggles to contain a 3rd wave of covert 1000 infections a country has been seen as a relative success story in its efforts to combat the virus that has had a recent surge in cases and is reported its highest daily death toll let's cross over to rob mcbride he's standing by for us in seoul and rob 1st let's take a look at these new measures was all day and who's affected by the. it's basically it has just been confirmed that these measures will come into force 2 days from now and it will limit private gatherings of people either indoors or

outdoors to basically 4 people and no more than that these at least toughest restrictions that we've seen being put in place they're obviously being put in place now because there's a real concern about family gatherings for the year end holiday period what that might do to this surge that we're seeing in the number of cases now was going to be just in effect in the soul metropolitan area but it's also been announce now that the neighboring provinces to seoul which basically account for around half of south korea's population will also see the same restrictions what we're also seeing across south korea is an increase in testing the number of testing centers have been set up temporarily temporarily for the past week or so people have been encouraged to come along going to have a free coronavirus test the testing is going on and it is achieving results according to the authorities they are seeing tens of thousands of

people take up this opportunity and they say that they have recorded several 100 cases of people being asymptomatic basically they've been walking around without knowing that they have been infected so it is having. results it is having an effect and hoping the authorities will be keeping this increased testing working through the holiday period into the 1st week in january and south korea had been hailed as a model in the way it dealt with the pandemic why is it now experiencing a 3rd wave and how is this 3rd wave different to the 1st day. what concerns the authorities here is just how widespread it is the 1st and 2nd waves were very specific clusters of things that you could actually target the concern for the authorities is it seems to be so universal across south korea now these numbers of infections that we're not talking about huge numbers you're talking about in the past week around a 1000 cases a day but compared with where south korea was even just

a few weeks ago it does concern the author already is here that they should try and keep on top of this and control of this there is all already talk of some intensive care units being overstretched and what the government wants to avoid is a complete shutdown it is managed to achieve that since the outbreak began right at the beginning of this year in february it wants to achieve that because the knows the impact on the economy but there is some question now being asked about the way that the austerity is here have handled this and also about the rollout of vaccinations because we're not going to see any vaccines here in south korea until the spring the thinking was when they were planning the vaccination campaign that south korea had this under control it could watch the vaccinations being rolled out elsewhere but now it seems as though that thinking was somewhat misplaced ok well joy is that from seoul thanks very much. hong kong's highest court has ruled the city's governments have the right to ban masks at public gatherings join last

year's protests many anti-government demonstrators one must hide their identities and protect themselves from tear gas quarterfinal a pale went further than a lower court says and held the government's right to impose emergency measures but ruled. unconstitutional and instead to the streets showing the protests in which thousands of arrested. so there has had on al-jazeera. growing anger in northern nigeria whether threat from armed groups is crippling promised livelihoods. and the british will campaign against foreign truck drivers in south africa we take a look at why they're being targeted. hello there the weather looks pretty good across the middle east over the next couple of

days this last settled and dry for the most part we have got basin places of cloud into iran pushing up towards coaxes might catch a shower or 2 into armenia maybe into azerbaijan as well further south is channel retrial it just wanted to show was a possibility to northern parts of saudi arabia a brisk wind blowing through the gulf here so a little lift the dust and sand here in qatar as we go through monday it will so we to choose day temperatures around $23.00 degrees celsius lots of dry to the south of that will and maybe just want to showers just around the southern end of the red sea and i could just bring a shower or 2 into djibouti pushing into ethiopia churchy the showers along the rift valley more heavy downpours there for a uganda pushing over towards rwanda burundi eastern parts of the democratic republic of congo are more of the same as we go on into choose a quite a few showers at this stage pushing into tanzania go somewhere to weather also leaking its way down into one goal as we go through the next day i will say that

western weather coming into namibia very heavy rain here unusually wet weather and that cloud and rain that will bring a possibility of flooding into central pass south africa. the kovi 19 pandemic is threatening one of singapore's most beloved traditions its famous straight story the bad days of 101 east investigates it focused to innovate to survive on al-jazeera. al-jazeera where every.

her again you're watching al-jazeera has a reminder of our top stories this hour a growing number of countries are banning or restricting travel from the united kingdom and trying to stop the spread of a more contagious strain of corona virus identified in parts of the u.k. . congressional leaders in the u.s. have reached a deal on a $900000000000.00 curve in $1000.00 relief package for millions of americans it comes as deliveries of the 2nd approved over $1000.00 vaccine up began across the country. and south korea's capital is impose tough new coronavirus measures as it struggles to contain a 3rd wave of covert $1000.00 infections gatherings with more than 5 people are banned in seoul and to neighboring regions full capacity of critical cases is to be doubled by the end of the year. spyware sold by an israeli private intelligence

firm has been used to hack the phones of dozens of al jazeera journalists as according to research at the university of toronto security watchdog says the unprecedented cyber attack is likely to have been ordered by saudi arabia and the united arab emirates investigators say mobile phones were infiltrated with malicious codes which uploaded data into foreign service without taking any action of wardle's or raises questions around the security of apple i phones or any of my colleague nick clark spoke to bill maher exact who's the lead author of the report and a senior research fellow at the system lab of the university of toronto he says it's difficult to guard against 0 click hacking. certainly our research methodology here at the citizen lab when we track this sort of spyware is typically that we ask journalists dissidents members of civil society to keep an eye out for any sort of suspicious messages suspicious links special attachment and trying to avoid

clicking on them but also fording them to us so we can potentially get a copy of a spyware but in this case with the 0 click exploit not only does the target not really have a chance to notice or prevent the hacking but we as researchers are sometimes robbed of the opportunity to identify additional targets and additional victims so we think that the targets that we have disclosed $36.00 targets that al jazeera are simply the tip of the iceberg of a much larger global campaign and it also raises questions as a saying not least about the the parent vulnerability of apple i phones yeah well it's interesting you know if you think about your phone i'm sure you're constantly getting notifications things popping up and this is all caused by code which is running continuously on the phone and processing essentially arbitrary messages from the internet and i think that vendors need to do more to try an audit this code to make sure it's free of bugs free of vulnerabilities and 3 of issues and i think to apple's credit you know in i.o.'s 14 in the newer version they added we

understand some mitigations that would hopefully prevent this sort of this sort of hacking in the future and i think that other companies would be wise to also audit their code bases and put in similar sorts of mitigations to prevent this the 0 click hacking. british and european union negotiators are to continue trade talks in the belgian capital brussels on monday past the latest deadline u.k. david frost and michel barnier still have to sort out 2 issues blocks fishing rights in british waters and fair competition rules for businesses here appear in parliament had warned it wouldn't have time to ratify any deal before the official deadline at the end of the year unless it was agreed by midnight sunday brussels time and a deal bricks it would lead to tariffs on goods crossing the border and possible shortages of some foods and medicines in the u.k. . iraq's government is investigating a rise in attacks on shops selling alcohol in the capital baghdad at least one

person has been killed and businesses have been hit with grenades christians say they're being targeted and a calling for better protection child strafford reports. up with army works in this small liquor store in central baghdad every month he sends the money he earns to his family of 10 who live near mosul in northern iraq but every day he lives in fear in recent weeks many shops selling alcohol in the capital have been targeted in bomb attacks and one shop owner was shot dead in a drive by shooting. this mobile phone footage reportedly shows a group of men ran 2nd a store in baghdad no one has claimed responsibility for any of the attacks and no one has been brought to justice who was later everyone is afraid they don't know if the meeting that backs customers are scared to come to shop is only for the money for me and my family i have a life in the police but it's protecting me. the same in consumption of alcohol is

not illegal in iraq but shops like these which are popular with the christian and use e.-d. communities and secular muslims who drink alcohol need a special license the consumption of alcohol in public is illegal in this muslim majority country but its availability is seen by many as a testament to iraq's tolerance towards ethnic and religious minorities. there are signs that may be changing this man who is a christian but didn't want to be identified tells us no one was injured when a booby trapped hand grenade exploded at the entrance to his shop we respect all the religions and sinks in iraq he tells me why can't we be respected to the police say that they are investigating the attacks but they have closed many shops like this one which they say were operating without the necessary license in order to sell alcohol. it's fair to say that the attacks of course. an increasing resentment

especially among the religious minority communities in baghdad. the owners christian he has been threatened many times people from certain political parties have extorted money from him for keeping our eyes on the road in case they place bombs but there is little security on the streets there have been small protests by youth groups against the sale of alcohol in baghdad but many analysts are concerned about iran's growing influence in iraq and they believe those responsible for the attacks may be supported by powerful iran backed groups that they say are increasingly dominating iraq's security and political infrastructure and they are looking to put pressure on the iraqi prime minister. and these attacks are aimed at making me look weak in front of political opposition that have big funding and powerful media behind them especially before the election next year they want to show that the prime minister and government are failing in their security measures. he says many have his fellow drink shop owners are too afraid to

open their businesses he has no idea why the attack started or when they will stop . by dad attacks have crippled agriculture and other economic activities in northwest nigeria and in the area has dropped by as much as 60 percent. reports from katsina 100 people including schoolchildren have recently been. in northwestern nigeria where armed bandits room free mosque barrios regularly event hardly a day passes without an attack on a village somewhere that leaves either dead or injured and those taken hostage entire villages have been sacked crippling local economies and social activities. if you. spent well over 6 years in terms of trying to control this the

loss of money hours by a family that cannot accept their farms the loss of what you boost the loss of cattle the loss of means of livelihood people who cannot accept their farms the quantum is there to imagine it has negatively. impacted on the lives of our people the violence that began as a localized conflict between farmers and cattle herders in just one area has now escalated to a full blown crisis affecting the whole region and beyond the recent abduction of hundreds of school children by those the government describes as band it underlines the worsening security situation in northwest nigeria. many pharmacy have been forced to leave their land after being unable to pay off their armed groups to find a farmer who can pump about $2.00 to $20.00 heck that's what this is cutie dickon

would be able to fund their farms and it wondered. who are about to. go to bed last 2 to be up to 5 hectares there where both would be important to abandon their land and be inside the town this to take a food again the insecurity the cattle herders association says nearly every member has had some animal story line. here but cattle market there are only a few animals on display raids by armed bandits have depleted stocks and potential buyers are staying away and in the grain section of the market it's a similar picture the northwest is nigeria's main grain and cereal producing region the fighting here sparked fears of food shortages in the months ahead. with attacks now growing in number and sophistication reassuring words from the central government of our little comfort to those facing such violence and the misery

brings comedy drees. northwest nigeria. the government leader of the strain and state of victoria has apologized for a bungled hotel quarantine program that led to most of the country's coronavirus deaths or pork or size the use of private security guards who became infected and spread the virus in the community earlier this year of the 908 deaths from cavan 1820 died in victoria say premier dan andrews and mr the errors were made and the system had been implemented without a clear set of rules. south african presence or opposer is being urged to intervene in a violent campaign targeting foreign truck drivers and these 2 people have died more from johannesburg and a warning that her report does contain images of burn victims that some viewers might find disturbing collins my sukhumi was on a routine delivery when

a car with 3 men inside blocked the road and forced him out of his truck he says he's lucky to be alive the other 3 gave out another on us. and another one in the i don't know if you are you and what is a day my main. come down for a term out or been made or. when i put the male leg down just someone. are you oh. oh. unions representing foreigners working in south africa say gasoline bombs have been thrown at trucks driven by non south africans and dozens of drivers have been shot at stoned and even killed south african union leaders who have condemned the violence insist it is not xenophobia but they say they do want jobs to go to south africans 1st zimbabwe has been vocal about one has been vocal. has been vocal about. their own citizens in

fact literally over there would drop opportunity does there's been committed in their particular country but it can't. be given to. the citizens of that particular time over the years competition for jobs in south africa has caused tensions between locals and those from other parts of the continent but africa economy was struggling even before the call of a 19 pandemic the unemployment rate is down more than 30 percent every year the african this gaping poverty and conflict come here looking for work and a better life economists say instability in the transport sector doesn't help matters the damage to the reputation not only of that particular company but is affected by such violence in the country itself is very massive because then we begin not to be trusted it's not like we're the only people producing anything you know people all over the world they've got options they can go to other countries as well president has been asked by unions and business leaders to intervene in

what is seen as a growing crisis in south africa's trucking industry the fine drivers say they have no choice but to carry on working violence or nonviolence they have families to feed. without reserve these are our top stories a growing number of countries are restricting or banning travel from the u.k. trying to stop the spread of more contagious strain of corona virus seen in parts of the country set her orders have been imposed on millions of british people congressional leaders in the u.s. have reached a deal on a $900000000000.00 over $1000.00 relief package for millions of americans as comes a shipments for the 2nd approved over 1000 vaccine have begun across the country i did to castro has more from washington the house of representatives today voted to give themselves a 24 hour.