North America

WASHINGTON (AP) — Scientists have found a way to help Alzheimer’s drugs seep inside the brain faster — by temporarily breaching its protective shield.

The novel experiment was a first attempt in just three patients. But in spots in the brain where the new technology took aim, it enhanced removal of Alzheimer’s trademark brain-clogging plaque, researchers reported Wednesday.

LAS VEGAS (AP) — A Nevada judge was attacked Wednesday by a defendant in a felony battery case who leaped over a defense table and the judge’s bench, landing atop her and sparking a bloody brawl involving court officials and attorneys, officials and witnesses said.

In a violent scene captured by courtroom video, Clark County District Judge Mary Kay Holthus fell back from her seat against a wall and suffered some injuries but was not hospitalized, courthouse officials said.

PERRY, Iowa (AP) — Multiple people were shot inside a small-town Iowa high school early Thursday as students prepared to start their first day of classes after their annual winter break, authorities said.

The suspect in the shooting in Perry, Iowa, has died of what investigators believe is a self-inflicted gunshot wound, a law enforcement official told The Associated Press. The official was not authorized to publicly discuss details of the investigation and spoke to The AP on condition of anonymity.

UNITED NATIONS, Jan 3 (Reuters) - Members of the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday called on Yemen's Houthis to halt their attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, saying they are illegal and threaten regional stability, freedom of navigation and global food supplies.

Addressing the council's first formal meeting of 2024, members also demanded that the Houthis release the Galaxy Leader, a Japanese-operated cargo ship linked to an Israeli company, and its crew, which the group seized on Nov. 19.

WASHINGTON, Jan 3 (Reuters) - The U.S. has not observed acts in Gaza that constitute genocide, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Wednesday, after South Africa launched genocide proceedings at the International Court of Justice over Israel's military operation in the Palestinian enclave.

"Those are allegations that should not be made lightly ... we are not seeing any acts that constitute genocide," Miller said at a regular news briefing. "That is a determination by the State Department," he added.

WASHINGTON, Jan 3 (Reuters) - A senior official in the U.S. Education Department stepped down on Wednesday, citing President Joe Biden's handling of the conflict in Gaza, the latest sign of dissent in the administration as deaths continue to grow in the war.

Also on Wednesday, 17 Biden re-election campaign staffers issued a warning in an anonymous letter that Biden could lose voters over the issue.

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday appealed a ruling by Maine’s secretary of state barring him from the state’s primary ballot over his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. is “confident” that Palestinian militant groups used Gaza’s largest hospital to hold “at least a few” hostages seized during their bloody Oct. 7, 2023, attack and to house command infrastructure, an American intelligence assessment declassified Tuesday and shared by a U.S. official found.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden is starting the campaign year by evoking the Revolutionary War to mark the third anniversary of the deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol and visiting the South Carolina church where a white gunman massacred Black parishioners — seeking to present in the starkest possible terms an election he argues could determine the fate of American democracy.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The federal government’s gross national debt has surpassed $34 trillion, a record high that foreshadows the coming political and economic challenges to improve America’s balance sheet in the coming years.

The U.S. Treasury Department issued a report Tuesday logging U.S. finances, which have become a source of tension in a politically divided Washington that could possibly see parts of the government shutdown without an annual budget in place.