captioning sponsored by wnet >> sreenivasan: on this edition for sunday, august 20: joint military exercises between the united states and south korea are set to begin. in our signature segment, iraqis try to piece their lives back together after the isis occupation of mosul. and, the passing of two comedy legends. next on "pbs newshour weekend." >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: bernard and irene schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family. dr. p. roy vagelos and diana t. vagelos. the j.b.p. foundation. sue and edgar wachenheim, iii. the anderson family fund. rosalind p. walter, in memory of abby m. o'neill. barbara hope zuckerberg.

corporate funding is provided by mutual of america-- designing customized individual and group retirement products. that's why we're your retirement company. additional support has been provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. from the tisch wnet studios at lincoln center in new york, hari sreenivasan. >> sreenivasan: good evening. thanks for joining us. the fallout continues over president trump's shifting remarks on last saturday's white nationalist rally in charlottesville, virginia. of 52 republican u.s. senators, only one-- south carolina's tim scott-- appeared on any of the sunday morning news shows today, and his comments on the president were far from laudatory. >> this nation responds to moral authority, when we believe that our president has the entire nation's best interests at heart. his comments on tuesday that erased his positive comments on

monday started to compromise that moral authority that we need the president to have for this nation to be the beacon of light to all mankind. >> sreenivasan: republican governor john kasich of ohio appealed to those around the president to rein in his incendiary remarks. >> people around him have to get to him-- including his own family-- to say, "okay. you need to show leadership. you need to bring the country together." >> sreenivasan: and former obama administration homeland security nfederate monuments.s posed by >> my concern as the former secretary of homeland security is we see white nationalists now-- uh, neo-nazis using these symbols as rallying points modern day and that has to be addressed. defense secretary james mattis said today that a reduction in u.s. troops participating in joint military exercises with south korea this week is not related to increased tensions with north korea. more than seventeen thousand us troops are expected to be a part of the ulchi freedom guardian

drills that start monday and last for ten days. 25,000 participated last year. north korea called the bi-annual exercises "reckless behavior driving the situation into the uncontrollable phase of a nuclear war." for some perspective, i am joined from denver colorado by ambassador christopher hill, the chief u.s. negotiator with north korea from 2005 until 2009, who has also served as u.s. ambassador to south korea. >> of unrelated, that we are decreasing the number of troops? >> yeah, i think it is unrelated. i mean over the years we've had more troops and fewer troops. it kind of dendz what they ar depends what they are exercising. i think these are exercises that are aimed at protecting south korea and pursuant to the u.s. commitment in the u.s. republic

of korea loinls wher alliance we to their protection if they are attacked. >> sreenivasan: this is clearly for them a source of some consternation every time they happen. >> well maybe it isn't because yes they have complained about these exercises ever since they first started but they also know because they have pretty smart people looking at these things that these are defensively orient id exercises, work closely with our counterparts in connection with a north korean invasion. >> sreenivasan: give us a sense of the readiness that exists along the peninsula in japan and el where, obviously ratcheted up over the last couple of weeks and the firing of the test missiles in the first place.how ready and prepared are these countries to

stop a missile that takes off from north korea to hit anyplace we care about? >> antiballistic missile technology is not as sharp as that of ballistic missile technology, including the so-called thaad system, the terminal high altitude defense team. thought among those people that believe we're about to be involved in a missile war with north korea let alone a nuclear war but we need to continue to upgrade these systems. >> sreenivasan: as we do these military drills how realistic is any kind of military option against the north considering how many people live in seoul just 35 miles from the border? >> to launch a so-called preemptprepreemtifer strike, noh

korea is a pretty dug in country. got all kinds of tunnels and places underground to store things. one, that would be pretty difficult. there are south koreans in range of north korean artillery tubes and while we have tremendous antibattery capability, i don't want to be a north korean firing an artillery shell at the south because within seconds we would eliminate that installation. but nonetheless they would be able to get a number of these shots off and we would have rather substantial civilian casualties. and frankly we'd be into a second korean war. >> sreenivasan: intor christopheambassador crifer chrl tharchghtsd so much. >> sreenivasan: read five things you should remember before you watch the solar eclipse on monday. visit www.pbs.org/newshour. ntrasting appeals.y died this

the one and only jerry lewis, and a pioneer black artist, dick gregory. first, jerry lewis, who along with movie-mate dean martin, and then by himself, ruled the hollywood box office for years in the '50s and '60s with his zany, hyper-manic, slapstick brand of humor. lewis died today at his home in las vegas, after battling health problems for decades. jerry lewis debuted at the age of five, singing "brother, can you spare a dime" in his parents' vaudeville act. together with martin, and later starring by himself, lewis was in more than 60 films. the martin and lewis team turned out 16 pictures together, including such hits as "the caddy." >> what would you do without me? what would you do, boy? what would you do with you when i'm gone? >> i'd sell my car and hock my ring and go right out and hire ba-bing. that's what i'd do without you, that's what i'd do. >> sreenivasan: others together included "my friend irma,"" sailor beware," "hollywood or bust," and more than a dozen others. after they parted ways in 1956, lewis continued on screen starring in films that became all-time comedy classics like"

the sad sack," "the geisha boy," and "don't give up the ship" in the late '50s. >> fourty-four and a half degrees, left rudder! no, make that fourty-four and a third! sixty-two and two-fifths right rudder! >> sreenivasan: they were followed in quick order by 196"" bellboy," and the unforgettable "the nutty professor" three years later. >> the additive was specifically three parts carbon, five parts hydrogen, one part nitrogen, and three parts oxygen. >> which, of course, is? >> nitroglycerin. >> the results were? >> negative. >> and? >> noisy. >> noisy? >> sreenivasan: the "bellboy" and "the nutty professor" also were some of the films lewis directed himself. while busy making films, lewis also found time to host the annual labor day muscular dystrophy telethon for more than 40 years, raising more than $1 billion to fight the disease. even after his star waned in this country, lewis remained

wildly popular in europe, especially in france, which awarded him the legion of honor in 1984. lewis also battled personal demons. he was addicted to the painkiller percodan for more than a decade, to deal with chronic pain from his comedic pratfalls. in his last film appearance, lewis played nicolas cage's father in "the trust," released last year. jerry lewis, hollywood legend, was 91 years old. and dick gregory, who helped break the comedy color barrier and then used laughter to morph into biting and satirical commentary on social and racial issues, died in washington last night after a short illness. gregory emerged from poverty in st. louis in the 1960's to find unconventional, unexpected fame as one of the first black standup comics that had crossover appeal with white audiences, paving the way for such other black comic greats as richard pryor. one of his big breaks came in 1961, when he found himself on" the tonight show." gregory was able to make people,

white and black, laugh about sensitive race issues, once saying "i gave the country a new way out-- healthy racial jokes"" >> baseball is a great sport for my people; it's the only sport in the world in which a negro can shake a stick at a white man and not start a riot. >> sreenivasan: but comedy wasn't gregory's only passion. he would go on hunger strikes to protest the vietnam war, police brutality, native american rights and was frequently arrested. gregory was shot in the leg while trying to defuse the watts riots in 1965. he can even be heard on beatle john lennon's anti-war song," give peace a chance." and gregory also tried politics, running unsuccessfully for both mayor of chicago and for president of the united states in 1968. gregory was still telling jokes on the comedy circuit until weeks before his death. dick gregory was 84 years old.

>> sreenivasan: tal afar is one of the last islamic state strongholds in iraq, and u.s.- backed iraqi troops today launched the battle to retake it. tal afar is about 50 miles west of mosul, which fell to iraqi forces only last month. mosul was once home to more than one million people. but after three years of isis occupation and a brutal 9-month battle to reclaim it, the city has been reduced to rubble. in tonight's signature segment, "newshour weekend" special correspondent marcia biggs and videographer alessandro pavone went to mosul and its outskirts to hear the stories of those who survived the siege. a warning: some viewers may find portions of this story disturbing. >> reporter: this is what is left of mosul's old city, the last stand of isis after a brutal nine-month siege. entire neighborhoods flattened by airstrikes, thousands dead under the rubble. and for those who escaped mosul alive, this is their foreseeable future.

the united nations estimates the battle for mosul displaced more than 700,000 civilians. most are living in the 20 or so camps in the area, run by the iraqi and kurdish governments with support from the u.n. and aid agencies, sleeping in tents where temperatures reach 120 degrees fahrenheit. shayma ali escaped mosul old city with her husband and three children. when we met her, she was too scared to show her face. she said during the nine-month siege, there was no work, no food and constant shelling. her family survived by eating birdseed and drinking rainwater. >> ( translated ): newborn babies were dying from hunger, and when we took the children to the isis hospital to get them some food, they told us, "if they die, it's for the sake of god." those were very bad days. >> reporter: as the iraqi army fought to liberate her neighborhood, she says, isis

fighters kept her family and six others as prisoners, trapped in one house. >> ( translated ): for five days, we were human shields in a house booby trapped by isis. the bombing was very violent. we lost many relatives. we lost my uncle and two of my cousins. we lost the hope to live. >> reporter: how did you handle this as a mother, how did you talk to your children about what was happening? >> ( translated ): i said to my children, let's pray to god, to get out of here and if we live, i will give you any food you want. don't be afraid if i die or your father dies. someone will give you food and take care of you. >> reporter: that constant fear of death had already defined three years of occupation under isis. this was once a fountain park in the middle of town. there's a pharmacy, food shops, a mosque. isis used a site for public

execution-- iraqi soldiers, doctors who refused to treat isis fighters. all were brought her to be executed in front of a public forced to watch it on the big screen. these isis videos show public punishments routine in mosul. shayma ali says isis executed her father, an iraqi policeman, and brutalized children simply for cursing. >> ( translated ): i swear they cut the head off a nine-year- old. he was playing soccer and missed a goal, and he shouted, "goddamn!" after that, isis went to his family and said we are sorry, but we killed the child to make an example of him. >> reporter: ali stopped sending her children to schools like this one taken over by isis, which used its curriculum to radicalize and indoctrinate children. these isis videos show children being taught about weapons and these are textbooks where tanks and guns were used as examples for math problems.

isis even forced some of the brainwashed children to become soldiers, calling them their" cubs of the caliphate." 12 year old ahmed escaped that fate. did you like school? intabtheb madrasa? >> ( translated ): i like school, but i don't like school with those guys. they were telling us, writing down in the books that "you need to be with us, carry weapons, and fight with us. if you should become a suicide bomber, you will go straight to heaven." >> reporter: ahmed stopped going school and like so many children of mosul he and his brother have not seen the inside of classroom in years. he says he feels safe now in the camp, but can't forget the horrors he witnessed. >> ( translated ): i saw them collect people, and they tortured and killed them. they stoned people to death. at night, i have nightmares where someone comes to capture and kill me. i wake up terrified and shouting. i will remember this forever.

>> reporter: the memories haunt every family we met. mahmud and his six children are also from mosul's old city. his eldest daughter, 17-year-old rahma, once dreamed of being a doctor but school at 14 when her father married her off to a cousin. he hoped that might keep isis from kidnapping her. isis executed her husband and dozens more in april, after they tried to escape the city. >> ( translated ): they arrested him, and then they paraded them all around mosul to scare people. they shot him in the head twice and then they dumped him in the river. >> reporter: two weeks later, the iraqi army told them it was safe to leave their homes. their family and dozens of others were making their way to an army outpost when an isis suicide bomber tried to prevent them from escaping. >> reporter: he shouted where are you going? are you going to the army? i will not let you. he knew that we were going to the army, so he blew himself up. >> reporter: his 14-year-old

daughter, saida, says all she can remember is the screaming of so many mothers and children. >> ( translated ): like a horror film. children cut into two. some of them had shrapnel in them and their mothers were dead in front of them. >> reporter: her mother and four other sisters were killed in the explosion, along with, they say, more than 70 others. the entire family suffered injuries. five-year-old isra still has shrapnel lodged in her head. she hasn't spoken or eaten much since the explosion. ten-year-old shelal lost his toes in the blast and is too embarrassed to play with the other boys in the camp. saida is so traumatized by the murders of her mother and siblings, she rarely leaves the family's tent. instead of going to schools set up in the camp, rahma, the eldest, now takes care of the family. >> ( translated ): i am their sister and their mother now.

i teach them, clean them, take care of them. they remember my mom but they are trying to forget. >> reporter: some children are back in classes like these run by the n.g.o. "save the children." >> ( translated ): i want to be a teacher. because i love school >> reporter: "i want to be a teacher," this girl says," because i love school." this boy wants to be a photographer. it all seemed so normal, children talking about what they want to be when they grow up, until one girl asked me to take her picture." they shot my brother in the head," she said, still smiling for this photo. agencies like save the children and unicef do what they can to help. but they say the need is overwhelming and especially challenging, because more than half of the mosul refugees are under the age of 18. >> what makes me awake sometimes at night is the possibility that we will witness lost generation. >> reporter: maulid warfa is unicef's chief officer in the

region. >> we see children that are coming out from the area that are now retaken. some of them are wounded, some of them are dehydrated, some of them are malnourished, some of them are unaccompanied. it's not one or the other; it's all of them. >> reporter: unicef has been able to reunite over 1300 children with their families. so you still have over a thousand that are unaccompanied? >> yes. and it's not only those 1,000 that are already in the hands of case managers. and there could be many more that are coming. >> reporter: many of them are brought here, to mosul general hospital. isis set fire to it when they left, yet it remains the only functioning hospital left in mosul. surgeon hassan ibrahim says half of the 250 patients he sees every day are children. many have obvious signs of malnutrition. >> ( translated ): all the time they eat nothing but grass and wheat seeds.

>> reporter: this child was brought in with no parents. >> reporter: iraqi soldiers found seven year old ghalib all alone when his neighborhood was liberated, his arm fractured and his body riddled with burns and shrapnel. he was like the other thousands of children who arrive to hospitals with no family. but he was one of the lucky ones, shortly after our visit his mother found him. here he is with his little sister. doctors and nurses here are struggling to cope with few resources, staff, and medicine. this is their makeshift pharmacy. many of mosul's sick and wounded can't even get to the hospital. in a village only two miles away, this woman says her young daughter has dysentery from the water but she's not been able to get her treated. she and others are clamoring at this food distribution site and

say they're starving. >> ( translated ): the warplanes destroyed our houses. we need electricity and water, we need our homes to be rebuilt! we are in the middle of nowhere. >> reporter: back in the camps miles from mosul, the displaced like shayma ai say say their city may be liberated, but their home no longer exists. do you have any idea what you're going to do now? >> ( translated ): our destiny is unknown. and it's impossible to go back to mosul because our houses are gone. our homes, our streets. there is no life in mosul. our neighborhood in the old city is dead. many people died. and the life, it's dead. >> sreenivasan: on pbs newshour weekend next weekend. american businesses are not waiting for government to take their own action on climate change. >> 90% of walmart's overall greenhouse gas impact comes from

its supply change and dozens of their suppliers have already signed on to project gigaton. they're hopin hoping it will haa mega-effect. wung ever those suppliers acknowledge marsinc best known for m & m's and snickers bars, eliminated all greenhouse gas emissions. >> actually 18 acres so iforts pretty big. >> barry parkin mars sustainabilities officer showed us the vast solar farm in new jersey the company built years ago, it nows provides power for the nearby town. the price of renewable energy makes the investment pay off. >> in some cases our costs are

now lower as a result of using renewable energy. >> this is pbs newshour weekend sunday. >> this is "pbs newshour weekend," sunday. >> sreenivasan: in barcelona, spain's royal couple, king felipe and queen letizia, joined mourners at a mass in the world-famous sagrada familia basilica for the 14 people who were killed in last week's terrorist vehicle attacks. this as the search continues for the 22-year-old moroccan man suspected of being the plot ringleader and of driving the van that killed 13 pedestrians in barcelona. spanish police say the suspect rented three vans with his credit card, and the plotters planned to fill them with gas canisters and explode them during the attacks. but the canisters blew up accidentally at a house near barcelona before they could be used. and spanish officials now confirm that seven-year old julian cadman, whose whereabouts had attracted worldwide attention, was one of those killed in barcelona. the boy had been missing since the attack. his mother was seriously injured. the lebanese army claims to have recaptured a third of a key region on its border with syria

that was controlled by the so- called islamic state. the area is the last remaining isis stronghold in the country, held by an estimated 600 militants. troops used rockets, artillery, and helicopters to attack the village of ras baalbek that had been in the islamic state's control since 2014. the army posted an image to its website of its troops waving the lebanese flag, and also the spanish flag as a salute to the victims of the barcelona attack. an estimated crowd of more than 20,000 marched in hong kong today to protest last week's jailing of three young pro- democracy activists and to demand their release. the three, all key leaders of the massive so-called "umbrella movement" pro-democracy demonstrations three years ago, were ordered to serve terms of up to eight months for unlawful assembly. supporters say the sentences were politically motivated and accused china of conspiring with the hong kong judiciary.

finally president trump will give his first formal address to the nation tomorrow night from forth meyer virginia. he's expected to announce his decision for future war in afghanistan. around nova is joining -- and nova is joining up with pbs for the solar eclipse. visit facebook.com/novapbs, that will be followed by eclipse over america at 9:00 eastern. i'm hari sreenivasan, thanks for watching. captioning sponsored by wnet captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org >> pbs newshour weekend is made bernard and irene schwartz.

the cheryl and philip milstein family. dr. p. roy vagelos and diana t. vagelos. the j.p.b. foundation. sue and edgar wachenheim, iii. the anderson family fund. rosalind p. walter, in memory of abby m. o'neill. barbara hope zuckerberg. corporate funding is provided by mutual of america-- designing customized individual and group retirement products. that's why we're your retirement company. additional support has been provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. be more, pbs.

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