NPR News Now - NPR News: 11-22-2024 6PM EST

Episode Date: November 22, 2024

NPR News: 11-22-2024 6PM ESTLearn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hey, it's Aisha Harris from Pop Culture Happy Hour. If you love NPR podcasts, you'll want the new NPR Plus podcast bundle. Enjoy an all-you-can-eat selection of NPR Plus podcasts with sponsor-free listening and bonus episodes. Plus, you'll be supporting public radio. Check it out at plus.npr.org. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Jack Spear. U.S. envoy Amos Hoekstein has left Israel after meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Hoekstein had been in the region trying to negotiate a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon. NPR's Kat Lansdorf reports from Tel Aviv. Hoekstein didn't brief media in Israel before departing, but in Lebanon earlier this week, he called talks, quote, very constructive. Hoxine had extended his stay in Beirut by an extra day and made what he called additional progress in talks with the Lebanese parliament speaker who's been negotiating on Hezbollah's behalf.

In Israel, Hoxine met with Netanyahu and Israel's new defense minister, Yisrael Katz. Israel launched an invasion into southern Lebanon more than seven weeks ago after Hezbollah and Israel had been trading cross-border fire for nearly a year. Kat Lanzdorf, NPR News, Tel Aviv. Flash demonstrations by white supremacist groups are on the rise across the nation. NPR's Windsor Johnston reports experts are calling these displays a trend linked to changing demographics and deep political divisions. The flash demonstrations are usually small groups made up of mostly masked men who show

up in communities waving offensive banners, white power flags, and chanting hateful rhetoric. Aaron Siegel is with the Anti-Defamation League Center on Extremism. He says these groups then use videos of the displays to recruit or inspire others on social media. Marches that we've seen over the past couple of years, they really hit every part of the country. If there is a divisive debate, that often can influence where they will show up. The Anti-Defamation League says more than 750 flash demonstrations have taken place in the U.S. since 2020, with more than half

of them occurring within the last 18 months. Windsor-Johnston NPR News. A second major atmospheric river is bearing down on California today, elevating flood risks in areas that have already experienced more than a foot of rain, as were David Romaro of Member Station KQED reports. With rain totals of more than 12 inches across cities like Santa Rosa about an hour north of San Francisco the storm will likely continue to break records. National Weather Service meteorologist Dylan Flynn says the storm is

going to surpass the rainiest three days in Santa Rosa since record keeping began. It doesn't compare this is the first time we've ever seen this much rain, specifically in Sonoma County, since 1902. Authorities are closely watching several rivers in Northern California that could overflow their banks. Tree companies across Sonoma County are receiving an influx of calls for down limbs on houses, crushed cars, and smashed fences. For NPR News, I'm Ezra David Romero in San Francisco. German auto technology and services company Bosch is the latest large multinational company to announce job cuts. The company says it plans to axe as many as 5,500 jobs in the next several years.

It continued headwinds hitting the auto industry. You're listening to NPR News in Washington. The Supreme Court is agreeing to step into a major battle over the $8 billion a year the federal government spends to subsidize phone and internet services in schools, libraries and rural areas. Justices today saying they've agreed to review an appellate court ruling that struck down as unconstitutional the so-called Universal Services Fund. Federal Communications Commission collects money from telecom providers

who then pass those costs on to consumers. The Biden administration appealed the lower court ruling, though the case is not likely to be argued till March when a new administration will be in office. Folk singer Arlo Guthrie announced the death of his longtime friend, Alex, Alice Brock. As NPR's Mandelita Albarco reports, she inspired Guthrie's 1967 Anywar

Thanksgiving anthem. Arlo Guthrie's 18-minute ballad starts off about his friend Alice Brock, a school librarian living in an old church in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. In his musical monologue, Guthrie tells about being arrested and jailed for dumping out Alice's trash on Thanksgiving Day. Then he was almost drafted for the Vietnam War. You want to know if I'm moral enough to join the army, burn women, kids, houses and villages after being a litter bug. Alice's restaurant became an anti-war anthem, inspiring a movie and a cookbook. It brought fame to the son of folk singer Woody Guthrie and to Brock, a restaurateur, artist and illustrator.

Mandelit Del Barco, NPR News. Critical futures prices moved higher today. Oil up a dollar and 14 cents a barrel to 71.24 a barrel in New York. I'm Jack Spear, NPR News in Washington.