Robin Roberts: I'm Starting Life with a Clean Slate

TV Watch

TV News

By Aaron Parsley

11/20/2012 at 09:40 AM EST

Robin and Sally-Ann Roberts

Courtesy Robin Roberts

A recent visit to the hospital for a "tune-up" took an emotional toll, but Good Morning America host Robin Roberts says she has a lot to be thankful for as she continues to recover from a Sept. 20 bone marrow transplant.

"It's a journey that kind of zigzags, and there are complications and things like that, but I feel good. I feel stronger every day," she told her sister and donor, Sally-Ann Roberts, in a segment that aired on WWL-TV Eyewitness News in New Orleans Monday and on GMA Tuesday.

Since being diagnosed with a rare blood disorder, myelodysplastic syndrome, Roberts says the love and support from friends, family and fans is very much appreciated.

"I have felt the prayers. I have felt people lifting me up," she said. "I put no small measure on that as the reason that I'm doing as well as I am."

Although Roberts lost her mother, Lucimarian Tolliver Roberts, in August, she described what it has been like to face life without her.

"This is the first time that I have been through any traumatic experience without her physically being here, and it has weighed on me," Roberts told her sister, who asked if she believed their mother stayed alive to say goodbye and be sure her daughters would be okay.

"I do believe it was her way of making sure that all of her children could be taken care of," she continued. "She was there when I took my first breath and what an honor it was to be there when she took her last."

As Roberts reaches a new milestone on Friday – her 52nd birthday – she has a hopeful and inspiring outlook on life and the challenges it has dealt her.

"I look at it as a clean slate," she said. "How many people can say at this point in their lives that they get do-over, that they get a chance to start again? And that's how I feel. We're all a little bit stronger – a little bit stronger than we think we are. And that's all we need."

And besides that, she added, "My great doctor ... told me recently I'm going to get to go to early bird special. I'm going to get to go out [and] be around people!"

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New push for most in US to get at least 1 HIV test

WASHINGTON (AP) — There's a new push to make testing for the AIDS virus as common as cholesterol checks.

Americans ages 15 to 64 should get an HIV test at least once — not just people considered at high risk for the virus, an independent panel that sets screening guidelines proposed Monday.

The draft guidelines from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force are the latest recommendations that aim to make HIV screening simply a routine part of a check-up, something a doctor can order with as little fuss as a cholesterol test or a mammogram. Since 2006, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also has pushed for widespread, routine HIV screening.

Yet not nearly enough people have heeded that call: Of the more than 1.1 million Americans living with HIV, nearly 1 in 5 — almost 240,000 people — don't know it. Not only is their own health at risk without treatment, they could unwittingly be spreading the virus to others.

The updated guidelines will bring this long-simmering issue before doctors and their patients again — emphasizing that public health experts agree on how important it is to test even people who don't think they're at risk, because they could be.

"It allows you to say, 'This is a recommended test that we believe everybody should have. We're not singling you out in any way,'" said task force member Dr. Douglas Owens of Stanford University and the Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System.

And if finalized, the task force guidelines could extend the number of people eligible for an HIV screening without a copay in their doctor's office, as part of free preventive care under the Obama administration's health care law. Under the task force's previous guidelines, only people at increased risk for HIV — which includes gay and bisexual men and injecting drug users — were eligible for that no-copay screening.

There are a number of ways to get tested. If you're having blood drawn for other exams, the doctor can merely add HIV to the list, no extra pokes or swabs needed. Today's rapid tests can cost less than $20 and require just rubbing a swab over the gums, with results ready in as little as 20 minutes. Last summer, the government approved a do-it-yourself at-home version that's selling for about $40.

Free testing is available through various community programs around the country, including a CDC pilot program in drugstores in 24 cities and rural sites.

Monday's proposal also recommends:

—Testing people older and younger than 15-64 if they are at increased risk of HIV infection,

—People at very high risk for HIV infection should be tested at least annually.

—It's not clear how often to retest people at somewhat increased risk, but perhaps every three to five years.

—Women should be tested during each pregnancy, something the task force has long recommended.

The draft guidelines are open for public comment through Dec. 17.

Most of the 50,000 new HIV infections in the U.S. every year are among gay and bisexual men, followed by heterosexual black women.

"We are not doing as well in America with HIV testing as we would like," Dr. Jonathan Mermin, CDC's HIV prevention chief, said Monday.

The CDC recommends at least one routine test for everyone ages 13 to 64, starting two years younger than the task force recommended. That small difference aside, CDC data suggests fewer than half of adults under 65 have been tested.

"It can sometimes be awkward to ask your doctor for an HIV test," Mermin said — the reason that making it routine during any health care encounter could help.

But even though nearly three-fourths of gay and bisexual men with undiagnosed HIV had visited some sort of health provider in the previous year, 48 percent weren't tested for HIV, a recent CDC survey found. Emergency rooms are considered a good spot to catch the undiagnosed, after their illnesses and injuries have been treated, but Mermin said only about 2 percent of ER patients known to be at increased risk were tested while there.

Mermin calls that "a tragedy. It's a missed opportunity."

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France to answer ratings downgrade with reforms

PARIS (Reuters) - France said on Tuesday it would respond to a Moody's credit downgrade by pushing on with reforms but complained the ratings agency had overlooked steps already taken to revamp the euro zone's second-largest economy.

France lost its prized triple-A badge from the Standard & Poor's in January and so Monday's move by Moody's was not surprising but it underlined doubts about Socialist President Francois Hollande's ability to fix France's public finances.

The downgrade also highlighted the divergence with the top-rated regional powerhouse Germany whose finance minister called it a "small warning" to its most important euro zone partner.

Moody's said on Tuesday that it would assess the triple-A ratings of the euro zone's EFSF and ESM bailout funds in light of the French downgrade.

However, its one-notch rating cut to Aa1 with a negative outlook did not affect the perceived status of French bonds which, along with German debt, are seen as a safe haven from the crisis in southern Europe.

"Moody's raised concerns about France's capacity to reform and so it is up to us to show that this time we are going to carry out reforms," Finance Minister Pierre Moscovici, leading a government offensive to play down the move, told journalists.

"The rating change does not call into question either the economic fundamentals of our country, the efforts undertaken by the government or our creditworthiness."

The government is planning the toughest belt-tightening effort in 30 years in 2013 but must also try and halt a growth slow-down that has seen unemployment surge to 13-year highs.

Moody's said it kept a negative outlook on France due to structural challenges and a "sustained loss of competitiveness" in the country, where business leaders blame high labor charges for flagging exports. It also cited "sizable exposures" of its banks to weak, southern euro zone countries.

"The first driver ... is the risk to economic growth, and therefore to the government's finances, posed by the country's persistent structural economic challenges," Moody's said.

The downgrade sent the euro 0.30 percent lower to 1.2770 against the dollar late on Monday but the currency recovered some ground to trade at 1.2810 at 1230 GMT Tuesday.

The benchmark French 10-year government bond yield - which has been trading at historic lows and offering Hollande crucial access to cheap borrowing - was little changed at 2.12 percent versus 2.08 percent before the downgrade.

Deutsche Bank economist Gilles Moec said the fact the downgrade was largely priced-in did not take the pressure off Hollande to show he will pursue more reforms, with an overhaul of rigid hiring and firing rules seen as the most pressing.

"Public opinion in France - as well as the market ultimately - will expect a reaction from the executive," Moec said. "The market ... is giving France the benefit of the doubt, but a further clarification of the policy stance is becoming urgent."

NEGATIVE OUTLOOK

Moody's said it could downgrade France again if efforts to free up the rigid labor market and overhaul an economy where public spending accounts for 57 percent of output ran into trouble.

"We would downgrade the rating further in the event of an additional material deterioration in France's economic prospects or in a scenario in which there were difficulties in implementing the announced reforms," Moody's lead France analyst Dietmar Hornung told Reuters.

He said more big shocks from the euro zone debt crisis would also exert downward pressure on the rating.

The downgrade follows concerns raised by the IMF that France could be left behind as Italy and Spain reform at a faster pace.

But analysts see French bonds remaining resilient for now.

"The French debt market is highly liquid and remains a favored venue for international investors, particularly in a world where 'double-A' is becoming the norm among Western states," Barclays France director Franklin Pichard said.

Yet with Germany one of the few major economies to retain a triple-A rating, the move is likely to reinforce Berlin's role as the capital calling the shots in the 17-country euro zone.

Michael Grosse-Broemer, parliamentary whip of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's ruling CDU party, told Reuters the downgrade gave fresh impulse to France to fulfill its reforms.

Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said the move should not be overdramatized but it was a warning for everyone in Europe to live up their responsibilities.

With France's 2-trillion-euro economy teetering on the brink of recession, Hollande surprised many this month by granting 20 billion euros in annual tax relief to companies, equivalent to a 6 percent cut in labour costs, to spur competitiveness.

The government also plans 30 billion euros in budget savings next year to trim its deficit and has promised reforms next year to add flexibility to rigid labour laws.

"Certain criticisms are too strong or are too late. I would have preferred that the bold and unprecedented decisions on the crisis were better received," Moscovici said of Moody's.

He said it was unfair to flag concerns over French banks as they have cut exposure to troubled euro states such as Greece.

"I don't expect (the downgrade) to have an immediate knock-on impact today on access to and cost of funding," said Espirito Santo analyst Andrew Lim of any impact on the banking sector.

But he said France's exposure to Spain, Italy and peripheral Europe should be kept in mind.

As far as government borrowing goes, France has completed its issuance for 2012. Demand is strong from foreign buyers, who hold 55 percent of its long-term bonds, but the downgrade could be a trigger to bet on yields rising next year.

"Our view is the market is teeing itself up to short France in 2013. It's the trade everyone wants to get into," said Lyn Graham-Taylor at Rabobank in London.

(Additional reporting by Blaise Robinson, Alexandre Boksenbaum-Granier and Andreas Rinke; Writing by Mark John; editing by Anna Willard)

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Israel says prefers diplomacy over Gaza invasion option

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel bombed dozens of targets in Gaza on Monday and said that while it was prepared to step up its offensive by sending in troops, it preferred a diplomatic solution that would end Palestinian rocket fire from the enclave.

As international pressure mounted for a truce, mediator Egypt said a deal to end the fighting could be close.

Twelve Palestinian civilians and four fighters were killed in the air strikes, bringing the Gaza death toll since fighting began on Wednesday to 90, more than half of them non-combatants, local officials said. Three Israeli civilians have been killed.

After an overnight lull, militants in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip fired 45 rockets at southern Israel, causing no casualties, police said. One damaged a school, but it was closed at the time.

The deaths of 11 Palestinian civilians - nine from one family - in an air strike on Sunday - drew more international calls for an end to six days of hostilities and could test Western support for an offensive Israel billed as self-defense after years of cross-border rocket attacks.

Israel's military did not immediately comment on a report in the liberal Haaretz newspaper that it had mistakenly fired on the Dalu family home, where the dead spanned four generations, while trying to kill a Hamas rocketry chief.

Echoes of explosions in Gaza mixed with cries of grief and defiant chants of "God is greatest" at the funeral of the four children and five women killed in the attack that flattened the three-storey house. Their bodies were wrapped in Palestinian and Hamas flags and thousands turned out to mourn them.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was due to arrive in Cairo to weigh in on ceasefire efforts led by Egypt, which borders both Israel and Gaza and whose Muslim Brotherhood-rooted government has been hosting leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, a smaller armed faction in the Palestinian enclave.

Israeli media said a delegation from Israel had also been to Cairo for the truce talks. A spokesman for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government declined comment on the matter.

"Israel is prepared and has taken steps, and is ready for a ground incursion which will deal severely with the Hamas military machine," a senior official close to Netanyahu told Reuters.

But he added: "We would prefer to see a diplomatic solution that would guarantee the peace for Israel's population in the south. If that is possible, then a ground operation would no longer be required. If diplomacy fails, we may well have no alternative but to send in ground forces."

The official's language echoed that of U.S. President Barack Obama, who said on Sunday it would be "preferable" to avoid a move into Gaza. Obama also said Israel had a right to self-defense and no country would tolerate missiles raining down on its citizens.

Egyptian negotiators could be close to achieving a deal between Israel and the Palestinians to stop the fighting could be close, the Egyptian prime minister said.

"I think we are close, but the nature of this kind of negotiation, (means) it is very difficult to predict," Hisham Kandil said in an interview in Cairo for the Reuters Middle East Investment Summit.

Egypt's foreign minister is expected to visit Gaza on Tuesday with a delegation of Arab ministers to express solidarity with the Palestinians.

In scenes recalling Israel's 2008-2009 winter invasion of Gaza, tanks, artillery and infantry have massed in field encampments along the sandy, fenced-off Gaza border and military convoys moved on roads in the area.

Israel has also authorized the call-up of 75,000 military reservists, so far mobilizing around half that number.

WORLD CONCERN

The Gaza fighting has stoked the worries of world powers watching an already combustible region.

In the absence of any prospect of permanent peace between Israel and Hamas and other Islamist factions, mediated deals for each to hold fire unilaterally have been the only formula for stemming bloodshed in the past. But both sides now placed the onus on the other.

Izzat Risheq, aide to Hamas politburo chief Khaled Meshaal, wrote on Facebook that Hamas would enter a truce only after Israel "stops its aggression, ends its policy of targeted assassinations and lifts the blockade of Gaza".

Listing Israel's terms, Vice Prime Minister Moshe Yaalon wrote on Twitter: "If there is quiet in the south and no rockets and missiles are fired at Israel's citizens, nor terrorist attacks engineered from the Gaza Strip, we will not attack."

Yaalon also said Israel wanted an end to Gaza guerrilla activity in the neighboring Egyptian Sinai, a desert peninsula where lawlessness has spread during Cairo's political crises.

Israel bombed some 80 sites in Gaza overnight, the military said, adding in a statement that targets included "underground rocket launching sites, terror tunnels and training bases" as well as "buildings owned by senior terrorist operatives".

Netanyahu has said he had assured world leaders that Israel was doing its utmost to avoid causing civilian casualties in Gaza. At least 22 of the Gaza fatalities have been children, medical officials said.

Before leaving for Cairo, Ban urged Israel and the Palestinians to cooperate with all Egyptian-led efforts to reach an immediate ceasefire.

But a big rocket strike might be enough for Netanyahu to give a green light for a Gaza invasion, despite the political risks of heavy casualties before a January election he is favored to win.

Although 84 percent of Israelis supported the current Gaza assault, according to a Haaretz poll, only 30 percent wanted an invasion. Nineteen percent wanted their government to work on securing a truce soon.

Israel's declared goal is to deplete Gaza arsenals and force Hamas to stop rocket fire that has bedevilled Israeli border towns for years.

The rockets now have greater range, becoming a strategic weapon for Gaza's otherwise massively outgunned militants. Several projectiles have targeted Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. None hit the two cities and some of the rockets were shot down by Israel's Iron Dome interceptor system.

As a precaution against the rocket interceptions endangering nearby Ben-Gurion International Airport, civil aviation authorities said on Monday new flight paths were being used.

There was no indication takeoffs and landings at Ben-Gurion had been affected.

Hamas and other groups in Gaza are sworn enemies of the Jewish state which they refuse to recognize and seek to eradicate, claiming all Israeli territory as rightfully theirs.

Hamas won legislative elections in the Palestinian Territories in 2006 but a year later, after the collapse of a unity government under President Mahmoud Abbas the Islamist group seized control of Gaza in a brief and bloody civil war with forces loyal to Abbas.

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Wii U Launch Day: Everything You Need to Know

For Nintendo fans, the big day has arrived. Nintendo‘s newest console, the Wii U, began selling at midnight on Sunday morning across the United States.

[More from Mashable: Meet the Super Fan Who Waited in Line for a Month for a Wii U [VIDEO]]

The Wii U boasts high definition graphics and an innovative, new tablet controller called the GamePad. The GamePad can act as a second screen, either mirroring or displaying asynchronous content from the console. The GamePad can also function without the television even turned on.

Nintendo hosted a launch event at its Nintendo World store in Rockefeller Center in New York on Saturday night. Some fans had been lined up for a week or longer to pick up a console, and as the countdown ticked down to midnight, the line wrapped around the building. The event was attended by Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Amie, who addressed the crowd, as well as other Nintendo executives.

[More from Mashable: Marijuana Vending Machine Maker’s Stock Skyrockets and Everybody Freaks Out]

But demand for the console may not reach the insatiable levels of the 2006′s Wii launch, which sold out in stores across the country preceding the holidays. At 11:30 a.m., a Nintendo World employee said they still had consoles in stock, though there was a line of 30 people outside. Mashable was able to pick up a Wii U in a Brooklyn Target with no lines at 9:30 a.m.

We collected peoples’ photos and tweets of their experiences waiting in line across the country with Storify.

We want to hear your stories. Are you picking up a Wii U today? Drop a note in the comments or tweet a picture with the hashtag #wiiulines.

Assassin’s Creed III

A version of the latest chapter in the Assassin’s Creed saga, a week after it was released on other console.

Click here to view this gallery.

This story originally published on Mashable here.

Gaming News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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RuPaul's Drag Race Season 5 Contestants Announced

TV Watch

By Maggie Coughlan

11/19/2012 at 09:30 AM EST

Start your engines ... RuPaul's Drag Race is back!

Fresh on the heels of RuPaul's All Stars Drag Race, the fifth season ofRuPaul's Drag Race is slated to premiere in January 2013.

Not only will 14 contestants from around the world compete for the coveted title of America's Next Drag Superstar, there's also $100,000 cash at stake.

"As we start our fifth season, I'm thrilled to announce that Britney Spears, Demi Lovato, Mariah Carey, Nicki Minaj and Keith Urban will not be joining us as full time judges," RuPaul said in a statement. "Don't get me wrong, I love them all. But we're gonna keep it all hood up in here. Because that's what makes RuPaul's Drag Race the best damn show on TV."

The season five contestants are Alaska, Alyssa Edwards, Coco Montrese, Detox, Honey Mahogany, Ivy Winters, Jade Jolie, Jinkx Monsoon, Lineysha Sparx, Monica Beverly Hillz, Penny Tration, Roxxxy Andrews, Serena ChaCha and Vivienne Pinay.

Get a sneak peek of the new queens below – and try not to gag on all the eleganza.

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EU drug regulator OKs Novartis' meningitis B shot

LONDON (AP) — Europe's top drug regulator has recommended approval for the first vaccine against meningitis B, made by Novartis AG.

There are five types of bacterial meningitis. While vaccines exist to protect against the other four, none has previously been licensed for type B meningitis. In Europe, type B is the most common, causing 3,000 to 5,000 cases every year.

Meningitis mainly affects infants and children. It kills about 8 percent of patients and leaves others with lifelong consequences such as brain damage.

In a statement on Friday, Andrin Oswald of Novartis said he is "proud of the major advance" the company has made in developing its vaccine Bexsero. It is aimed at children over two months of age, and Novartis is hoping countries will include the shot among the routine ones for childhood diseases such as measles.

Novartis said the immunization has had side effects such as fever and redness at the injection site.

Recommendations from the European Medicines Agency are usually adopted by the European Commission. Novartis also is seeking to test the vaccine in the U.S.

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Wall Street set to climb on optimism over budget talks

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wall Street was set to rise sharply at the start of a holiday-shortened week on Monday on signs of progress in talks to resolve the fiscal crunch.

Leading Democratic and Republican lawmakers expressed confidence on Sunday that they could reach a deal to avert the "fiscal cliff" even as they laid down markers on raising taxes and spending cuts that may make any agreement more difficult. European stocks also reacted by rising 1/2 percent a 3 1/2-month low.

Democratic Senator Dick Durbin said on CNN, "What I hear is a perceptible change in rhetoric from the other side."

Also appearing on CNN, Republican Representative Tom Price said, "Every member of our caucus appreciates that this fiscal crisis, this challenge that we have, is ever closer." Opinion polls show that Republicans would shoulder more of the blame if the country goes over the fiscal cliff.

"A deal that doesn't face healthcare spending head on and also raises taxes of substance with economic growth mediocre is not a good deal. This said, the markets will celebrate any deal in the short term but will likely deal with the economic consequences in 2013," said Peter Boockvar, managing director at Miller Tabak & Co in New York.

S&P 500 futures rose 12.9 points and were above fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by taking into account interest rates, dividends and time to expiration on the contract. Dow Jones industrial average futures added 101 points and Nasdaq 100 futures rose 25.5 points.

U.S. financial markets will be closed on Thursday for the Thanksgiving holiday.

UBS introduced a cautious outlook with a year-end 2013 price target on the S&P 500 at 1,425.

"While the 'fiscal cliff' may be avoided, we believe that the most difficult policy issues will be pushed into the future, constraining earnings growth and stock multiples."

"Our cautious stance is predicated upon a belief that a number of macro uncertainties — the most important of which stem from long-term U.S. fiscal imbalances — will hamper earnings growth and constrain valuations in 2013," said Jonathan Golub, strategist at UBS in New York.

Investors awaited data on existing-home sales for October, due at 10 a.m. (1500 GMT). Economists in a Reuters survey forecast an annualized 4.75 million units, a repeat of the September total. Investors also eyed the November NAHB housing market index, also at 10 a.m. (1500 GMT).

Shares of Lowe's Cos Inc , the world's No. 2 home improvement chain, rose 5.5 percent to $33.73 in premarket trade on Monday after the company reported higher-than-expected quarterly profit and raised its full-year sales forecast.

Networking equipment company Cisco Systems Inc said it will buy privately held cloud networking company Meraki for $1.2 billion in cash as part of its cloud and networking strategy. Cisco shares were up 1.3 percent at $18.22 in premarket trade.

General Motors Co and its local Chinese partners, intensifying competition in China in the no-frills car market, on Sunday formally opened another plant for its low-cost Baojun brand. GM shares were up 1.5 percent at $24.20 in premarket trade.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc is taking its first legal step to stop months of protests and rallies outside Walmart stores, targeting the union that it says is behind such actions.

Citigroup Inc has agreed to pay $360 million to the brokerage estate of Lehman Brothers to resolve a dispute over $1 billion in collateral that the investment bank was forced to post in the days leading up to its bankruptcy in 2008. [ID:nnL4N08Z125] Citigroup shares were up 1.5 percent at $35.49 in premarket trade.

Hope that U.S. politicians would find common ground to steer clear of the "fiscal cliff" boosted stocks on Friday, though the gains were not enough to offset the week's losses.

(Reporting by Angela Moon; Editing by Kenneth Barry)

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Israel, Gaza fighting rages on as Egypt seeks truce

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel bombed Palestinian militant targets in the Gaza Strip from air and sea for a fifth straight day on Sunday, preparing for a possible ground invasion while also spelling out its conditions for a truce.

Palestinians launched dozens of rockets into Israel and targeted its commercial capital, Tel Aviv, for a fourth day. The "Iron Dome" missile shield shot down two of the rockets fired toward Israel's biggest city but falling debris from the interception hit a car, which caught fire. Its driver was not hurt.

In scenes recalling Israel's 2008-2009 winter invasion of the Gaza Strip, tanks, artillery and infantry massed in field encampments along the sandy border. Military convoys moved on roads in the area newly closed to civilian traffic.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was ready to widen its offensive.

"We are exacting a heavy price from Hamas and the terrorist organizations and the Israel Defence Forces are prepared for a significant expansion of the operation," Netanyahu said at a cabinet meeting, giving no further details.

Palestinian officials said 56 Palestinians, most of them civilians, including 16 children, have been killed in small, densely populated Gaza since the Israeli offensive began, with hundreds wounded. More than 500 rockets fired from Gaza have hit Israel, killing three civilians and wounding dozens.

Israel unleashed intensive air strikes on Wednesday, killing the military commander of the Islamist Hamas movement that governs Gaza and spurns peace with the Jewish state.

Israel's declared goal is to deplete Gaza arsenals and press Hamas into stopping cross-border rocket fire that has bedeviled Israeli border towns for years and is now displaying greater range, putting Tel Aviv and Jerusalem in the crosshairs.

AIR STRIKE ON MEDIA CENTRES

In air raids on Sunday, two Gaza City media buildings were hit, witnesses said. Eight journalists were wounded and facilities belonging to Hamas's Al-Aqsa TV as well as Britain's Sky News were damaged.

An employee of Beirut-based al Quds television station lost his leg in the attack, local medics said.

The Israeli military said the strike targeted a rooftop "transmission antenna used by Hamas to carry out terror activity", and that journalists in the building had effectively been used as human shields by the group.

Three other attacks killed three children and wounded 14 other people, medical officials said, with heavy detonations regularly jolting the Mediterranean coastal enclave.

Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi said in Cairo, as his security deputies sought to broker a truce with Hamas leaders, that "there are some indications that there is a possibility of a ceasefire soon, but we do not yet have firm guarantees".

Egypt has mediated previous ceasefire deals between Israel and Hamas, the latest of which unraveled with recent violence.

A Palestinian official told Reuters the truce discussions would continue in Cairo on Sunday, saying "there is hope", but that it was too early to say whether the efforts would succeed.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will be in Egypt on Monday for talks with Mursi, the foreign ministry in Cairo said. U.N. diplomats earlier said Ban was expected in Israel and Egypt this week to push for an end to the fighting.

Asked on Israel Radio about progress in the Cairo talks, Silvan Shalom, one of Netanyahu's deputies, said: "There are contacts, but they are currently far from being concluded."

Listing Israel's terms for ceasing fire, Moshe Yaalon, another deputy to the prime minister, wrote on Twitter: "If there is quiet in the south and no rockets and missiles are fired at Israel's citizens, nor terrorist attacks engineered from the Gaza Strip, we will not attack."

SYRIAN FRONT

Israel's military also saw action along the northern frontier, firing into Syria on Saturday in what it said was a response to shooting aimed at its troops in the occupied Golan Heights. Israel's chief military spokesman, citing Arab media, said it appeared Syrian soldiers were killed in the incident.

There were no reported casualties on the Israeli side from the shootings, the third case this month of violence that has been seen as a spillover of battles between Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces and rebels trying to overthrow him.

Israel's operation in the Gaza Strip has so far drawn Western support for what U.S. and European leaders have called its right to self-defense, but there was also a growing number of appeals from them to seek an end to the hostilities.

British Foreign Minister William Hague said on Sky News that he and Prime Minister David Cameron "stressed to our Israeli counterparts that a ground invasion of Gaza would lose Israel a lot of the international support and sympathy that they have in this situation".

Israel's cabinet decided on Friday to double the current reserve troop quota set for the Gaza campaign to 75,000. Some 31,000 soldiers have already been called up, the military said.

Netanyahu, in his comments at Sunday's cabinet session, said he had emphasized in telephone conversations with world leaders "the effort Israel is making to avoid harming civilians, while Hamas and the terrorist organizations are making every effort to hit civilian targets in Israel".

Israel withdrew settlers from Gaza in 2005 and two years later Hamas took control of the slender, impoverished territory, which the Israelis have kept under blockade.

NETANYAHU IN RE-ELECTION BID

Ben Rhodes, a deputy national security adviser to President Barack Obama, said the United States would like to see the conflict resolved through "de-escalation" and diplomacy, but also believed Israel had the right to self-defense.

A possible sweep into the Gaza Strip and the risk of major casualties it brings would be a significant gamble for Netanyahu, favored to win a January election.

The last Gaza war, a three-week Israeli blitz and invasion four years ago, killed 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians. Thirteen Israelis died in the conflict.

The current flare-up around Gaza has fanned the fires of a Middle East ignited by a series of Arab uprisings and a civil war in Syria that threatens to spread beyond its borders.

One significant change has been the election of an Islamist government in Cairo that is allied with Hamas, which may narrow Israel's maneuvering room in confronting the Palestinian group. Israel and Egypt made peace in 1979.

On Saturday, Israeli aircraft bombed Hamas government buildings in Gaza, including the offices of Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and a police headquarters.

Israel's Iron Dome missile interceptor system has destroyed more than 200 incoming rockets from Gaza in mid-air since Wednesday, saving Israeli towns and cities from potentially significant damage.

However, one rocket salvo unleashed on Sunday evaded Iron Dome and wounded two people when it hit a house in the coastal city of Ashkelon, police said.

(Additional reporting by Maayan Lubell in Jerusalem and London bureau, Writing by Jeffrey Heller)

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Taylor Swift and One Direction's Harry Styles: Are They Dating?

By Patrick Gomez

11/17/2012 at 10:40 PM EST

Taylor Swift and Harry Styles

Janet Mayer/Splash News Online; Don Arnold/Wireimage

Taylor Swift appears to be taking her love life in a new direction.

The "Never Ever Getting Back Together" singer is seemingly taking her lyrics to heart as she moves on from recent ex, Conor Kennedy, and enjoys the company of One Direction hottie Harry Styles.

"I had to literally do a double-take," an onlooker tells PEOPLE of finding Styles, 18, with Swift, 22, on the set of The X Factor Thursday morning.

Styles was on hand to watch Swift rehearse the debut of "State of Grace," which she performed later that night on the Fox reality show.

"He was smiling at her while she rehearsed. When she was done he jumped up on stage, picked her up, put her over his shoulder and carried her off stage," the onlooker says. "The whole crew was really surprised."

The young singers were also spotted by X Factor host Mario Lopez, who says he was slapped on the back by Styles during Swift's rehearsal.

"I said, 'What are you doing here,' " Lopez said on his 104.3 MY FM radio show Friday. "And he sort of [pointed] toward Taylor."

Lopez went on to say he later saw the two "hand-in-hand."

A telling sign of the budding relationship may have been a look Styles shared with his bandmate Niall Horan a week earlier after Horan told PEOPLE his favorite song of 2012 was Swift's "Never Ever Getting Back Together."

When asked if he would ever date Swift, Horan gave a small laugh, looked at Styles and answered with a succinct, "no."

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