NPR News Now - NPR News: 12-26-2024 1AM EST

Episode Date: December 26, 2024

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Support for this podcast and the following message come from Autograph Collection Hotels, with over 300 independent hotels around the world, each exactly like nothing else. Autograph Collection is part of the Marriott Bonvoy portfolio of hotel brands. Find the unforgettable at autographcollection.com. Live from NPR News, I'm Dale Willman. Protests have begun in areas of Syria dominated by the Alawite religious minority. They started after a video spread online apparently showing militants burning a shrine sacred to the group.

NPR's Deah Hadid reports from Damascus. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported the video showed gunmen torching a shrine wholly to Alawites and killing five workers and mutilating their bodies. As the video spread, protests erupted across Syria in areas dominated by Alawites, posing perhaps the most important security challenge yet for the country's new rulers. They assumed power after rebels overran Damascus in early December. The rebels were led by a Muslim group known as HTS, leading to fears among Syrian minorities that they'd be vulnerable to persecution. That fear

is particularly strong among Alawites because many view the minority as having aided the former regime of Bashar al-Assad, who is also an Alawite. Syria's new information minister blamed, quote, hidden hands that sought to divide Syrians. De Hadid, NPR News, Damascus. Japanese automakers are preparing for potential tariffs on their exports under the incoming Trump administration. NPR's Anthony Kuhn reports on how at least one company is already responding to that

possibility. Toyota said Tuesday that it plans to donate a million dollars to President-elect Trump's inauguration, the first time it's contributed to a million dollars to President-elect Trump's inauguration the first time it's contributed to a U.S. presidential inauguration. It announced the move a day after Ford and GM said they'd make similar donations. Trump has proposed 25 percent tariffs on imports from Mexico, where Toyota makes pickup trucks for the U.S. market. But some analysts believe that Trump could skip the tariffs on car exporters who shift production to the U.S.

Or, they add, Trump might have to back away from tariffs if they cause inflation to spike at home. Japan also faces the risk of fallout from a potential U.S. trade war with its main trading partner, China. Anthony Kuhn in PR News, Seoul. The city of Washington, D.C. marked the first night of Hanukkah Wednesday with the lighting of a 30-foot menorah on the ellipse. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas marked the occasion. We can lean into our shared tradition and values as a beacon for what we aspire to. This Hanukkah, let us rededicate ourselves to the light that defines us and the better world

we seek to build. The last time that Hanukkah began on Christmas Day was back in 2005. President-elect Donald Trump took to social media on Christmas Day to say he will nominate a county commissioner in Florida to be his ambassador to Panama. Marino Cabrera is a commissioner in Miami-Dade County. He also worked for Trump's 2020 presidential campaign. Trump's announcement comes just days after he called for the U.S. to regain control over the Panama Canal.

You're listening to NPR News. A fire ban has been issued in the Australian state of Victoria as officials warn of extreme bushfire risk across the southeast of that country. Temperatures are forecast to reach up to 104 degrees Fahrenheit on Thursday. Crews are currently battling a growing blaze at the Grampians National Park, which has been burning for about a week. Phil Mercer of the BBC is in Sydney. We're looking at the emergency authorities warnings warnings in the state of Victoria, and in

the last two or three hours, they have issued significant warnings for several communities. Authorities have been warning for several days that conditions in southeastern parts of Australia could be as bad as they were during that black summer of 2019-20. So today we have that awful conspiracy of hot, dry, windy weather. That's the BBC's Phil Mercer reporting. An Azerbaijani airline carrying 68 people crashed in Kazakhstan on Christmas Day. Officials say 29 people survived but there's no word on their condition. While authorities are not saying what caused the crash, rough weather had caused the plane to

alter its course before the accidents. Russian forces attacked Ukraine's energy and heating and energy infrastructure on Wednesday. It was a Christmas Day attack that President Joe Biden called outrageous. Russia used crews and ballistic missiles along with drones in that attack. Many of them were shot down but at least six people were injured and at least one person was killed. Half a million people in the Harkeev region were also left without heating after that attack.

I'm Dale Willman, NPR News.