Congress approves US$9.7b aid for storm Sandy victims

WASHINGTON: The US Congress finally approved emergency disaster aid for victims of Hurricane Sandy on Friday, but only after a delay that sparked East Coast Republican outrage against their own party leadership.

The House voted 354-67 to provide the Federal Emergency Management Agency with US$9.7 billion to pay the flood insurance claims of thousands of victims of the killer October storm that devastated coastal communities.

The legislation, just a wedge of a much larger package sought by the White House, then breezed through the Senate by voice vote, and goes to President Barack Obama for his signature.

"We should not have parades down the street because this bill has passed," said Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, who has spearheaded efforts to speed up congressional approval for aid.

"The major work of helping the victims of Sandy is still ahead of us. The bad news is that we had to even go through this dog and pony show in the first place."

The Senate had approved a comprehensive US$60.4 billion Sandy aid package last week, but Republican House Speaker John Boehner, who was stung by fractious negotiations over the deal to avert the fiscal cliff crisis, refused to bring it to the floor.

The delay enraged Democrats and Republicans alike in the New York and New Jersey delegations.

Friday's bill boosts borrowing authority for the depleted National Flood Insurance Program, which is meant to cover the roughly 120,000 Sandy-related claims filed to date.

FEMA has said the program would have run dry next week without additional funds.

Even as Boehner has since vowed to bring the remaining US$51 billion of the package to a vote on January 15, bitter debate is likely to continue, and Schumer expressed worry about the package's future.

"To be a bride and left at the altar once is bad enough. To be left twice would be unconscionable," he said.

Republican congressman Rodney Frelinghuysen of New Jersey told the House that the bill was "the first step of what we need to do to rebuild lives."

"It's been 70 days and many have been living in misery and heartache," he said.

Several lawmakers, including Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, pointed to the swift action by Congress to fund relief efforts in the aftermath of deadly Hurricane Katrina.

"We were there within days," Reid said of the 2005 disaster that ravaged the Gulf Coast. "It's too bad that it's taken so long" for Sandy.

Boehner had scrambled to tamp down fury over the delay on aid to victims of the storm, which killed 120 people and destroyed tens of thousands of homes and businesses in New York, New Jersey and neighbouring northeastern states.

Obama had joined New Jersey's outspoken Republican Governor Chris Christie in leading the charge against Boehner's delay, which Christie described as "absolutely disgraceful."

The outrage quickly gained the national spotlight, and Boehner wasted little time announcing the two-part vote.

"This is not a handout, this is not something we're looking for as a favour," Republican congressman Peter King of New York, who had lashed out at Boehner when he learned of the delay, told the House.

"What we're asking for is to be treated the same as victims (from) other natural disaster victims have been treated."

Some Republicans including Senator Marco Rubio from Florida, a hurricane-prone state which has received billions in federal disaster aid, voted against the Sandy bill in the Senate, claiming it was stuffed with "pork" -- funding for projects or elements unrelated to Sandy relief.

Darrell Issa, the powerful Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee, continued in that vein Friday, saying "we need to get the pork out" and pointing to funding in the Senate bill that went to programs in Alaska, clear across the country from the Sandy disaster zone.

Issa expressed hope the new legislation would be a "clean bill" focused exclusively on Sandy relief.

- AFP/jc

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Till legislation, guidelines must to end Khap terror against matrimonial alliance: Supreme Court

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday said it intended to lay down guidelines to curb khap panchayat-dictated violence against couples marrying inter-caste or in same gotra till the government enacted a suitable legislation to deal with the menace.

Dealing with a PIL detailing the violence in various states, mainly in northern India, directed at the behest of khap panchayats, a bench of Justices Aftab Alam and Ranjana P Desai said till the government enacted a legislation, a draft of which has been submitted by the Law Commission, a guidelines on the foot steps of Vishaka judgment would fill the legal void.

"On the lines of Vishaka judgment, till such time legislation is enacted, we will issue whatever direction which is legal and proper," the bench said and suggested that the guidelines could be implemented as a pilot project in few of the worst affected districts where khap dictated violence against matrimonial alliances had been recurring.

For this purpose, petitioner Shakti Vahini's counsel Ravi Kant suggested Haryana districts of Jind and Rohtak and Baghpat in western Uttar Pradesh. The bench summoned the Additional Director General of Police (law and order), Haryana and Inspector General of Police, Meerut Zone, along with the Superintendents of Police of the three districts to the court on January 14 to discuss framing of guidelines and their implementation.

The Vishaka judgment, delivered on August 13, 1997, by a bench of then CJI J S Verma and Justices Sujata V Manohar and B N Kirpal, laid down guidelines for government and private employers to stop sexual harassment of women at work places. The guidelines still hold good as the law of the land as no legislation had been enacted on this issue even after 15 years.

Additional solicitor general Indira Jaising supported laying down of guidelines by the court till a legislation was enacted but stressed that NGOs and social activists, who were instrumental in successful implementation of Vishaka guidelines, needed to be involved in monitoring the police action to prevent crimes against couples marrying against the wish of their parents or against the dictates of khaps.

Jaising said the government had received representation from various khap panchayats demanding amendments to the Hindu Marriage Act to ban 'sagotra' marriages, but the Centre had rejected their demand.

When amicus curiae Raju Ramachandran suggested a moderate approach, the bench said, "We do not want to delay the matter any longer." However, it said in a judicial proceeding it was imperative that the views of the khap panchayats were heard.

"We are getting the views on khap panchayats from those who are adverse to them. We may share the views but we must hear from them about their views on this issue. We may at the end of the day reject their views as unconstitutional. But it will be more satisfying in a judicial proceedings if the khaps were heard more so because all the parties before the court are hostile to them," the bench said.

Petitioner's counsel Ravi Kant said he had been researching in the three worst affected districts and would be able to send the message to two prominent khaps - Meham Chaubisi and Sarv Khap Panchayat - that the court intended to hear their views.

dhananjay.mahapatra@timesgroup.com

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FDA proposes sweeping new food safety rules

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Food and Drug Administration on Friday proposed the most sweeping food safety rules in decades, requiring farmers and food companies to be more vigilant in the wake of deadly outbreaks in peanuts, cantaloupe and leafy greens.

The long-overdue regulations are aimed at reducing the estimated 3,000 deaths a year from foodborne illness. Just since last summer, outbreaks of listeria in cheese and salmonella in peanut butter, mangoes and cantaloupe have been linked to more than 400 illnesses and as many as seven deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control. The actual number of those sickened is likely much higher.

The FDA's proposed rules would require farmers to take new precautions against contamination, to include making sure workers' hands are washed, irrigation water is clean, and that animals stay out of fields. Food manufacturers will have to submit food safety plans to the government to show they are keeping their operations clean.

Many responsible food companies and farmers are already following the steps that the FDA would now require them to take. But officials say the requirements could have saved lives and prevented illnesses in several of the large-scale outbreaks that have hit the country in recent years.

In a 2011 outbreak of listeria in cantaloupe that claimed 33 lives, for example, FDA inspectors found pools of dirty water on the floor and old, dirty processing equipment at Jensen Farms in Colorado where the cantaloupes were grown. In a peanut butter outbreak this year linked to 42 salmonella illnesses, inspectors found samples of salmonella throughout Sunland Inc.'s peanut processing plant in New Mexico and multiple obvious safety problems, such as birds flying over uncovered trailers of peanuts and employees not washing their hands.

Under the new rules, companies would have to lay out plans for preventing those sorts of problems, monitor their own progress on those safety efforts and explain to the FDA how they would correct them.

"The rules go very directly to preventing the types of outbreaks we have seen," said Michael Taylor, FDA's deputy commissioner for foods.

The FDA estimates the new rules could prevent almost 2 million illnesses annually, but it could be several years before the rules are actually preventing outbreaks. Taylor said it could take the agency another year to craft the rules after a four-month comment period, and farms would have at least two years to comply — meaning the farm rules are at least three years away from taking effect. Smaller farms would have even longer to comply.

The new rules, which come exactly two years to the day President Barack Obama's signed food safety legislation passed by Congress, were already delayed. The 2011 law required the agency to propose a first installment of the rules a year ago, but the Obama administration held them until after the election. Food safety advocates sued the administration to win their release.

The produce rule would mark the first time the FDA has had real authority to regulate food on farms. In an effort to stave off protests from farmers, the farm rules are tailored to apply only to certain fruits and vegetables that pose the greatest risk, like berries, melons, leafy greens and other foods that are usually eaten raw. A farm that produces green beans that will be canned and cooked, for example, would not be regulated.

Such flexibility, along with the growing realization that outbreaks are bad for business, has brought the produce industry and much of the rest of the food industry on board as Congress and FDA has worked to make food safer.

In a statement Friday, Pamela Bailey, president of the Grocery Manufacturers Association, which represents the country's biggest food companies, said the food safety law "can serve as a role model for what can be achieved when the private and public sectors work together to achieve a common goal."

The farm and manufacturing rules are only one part of the food safety law. The bill also authorized more surprise inspections by the FDA and gave the agency additional powers to shut down food facilities. In addition, the law required stricter standards on imported foods. The agency said it will soon propose other overdue rules to ensure that importers verify overseas food is safe and to improve food safety audits overseas.

Food safety advocates frustrated over the last year as the rules stalled praised the proposed action.

"The new law should transform the FDA from an agency that tracks down outbreaks after the fact, to an agency focused on preventing food contamination in the first place," said Caroline Smith DeWaal of the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

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Pharmacy Blames Cleaners in Meningitis Outbreak

Jan 4, 2013 11:41am

Credit: Minnesota Department of Health/AP Photo

The pharmacy at the heart of the fungal meningitis outbreak says a cleaning company it hired should share the blame for the tainted steroid injections that caused more than 600 illnesses in 19 states, killing 39 people.

Click here to read about the road to recovery for fungal meningitis victims.

The New England Compounding Pharmacy, which made the fungus-tainted drugs, sent a letter to UniFirst Corp., which provided once-a month cleaning services to the Framingham, Mass., lab, “demanding” it indemnify NECC for the meningitis outbreak, according to a UniFirst filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“Based on its preliminary review of this matter, the company believes that NECC’s claims are without merit,” UniFirst wrote in its quarterly filing.

The New England Compounding Center recalled 17,000 vials of tainted steroid injections on Sept. 26 before recalling all drugs and shutting down on Oct. 6.

The Food and Drug Administration investigated NECC’s lab and found that a quarter of the steroid injections in one bin contained “greenish black foreign matter,” according to the report.  The FDA also identified several cleanrooms that had bacterial or mold overgrowths.

UniFirst’s UniClean business cleaned portions of the NECC cleanrooms to NECC’s specifications and using NECC’s cleansing solutions, UniFirst spokesman Adam Soreoff said in a statement. It provided two technicians once a month for about an hour and a half.

“UniClean was not in any way responsible for NECC’s day-to-day operations, its overall facility cleanliness, or the integrity of the products they produced,” Soreoff said. “Therefore, based on what we know, we believe any NECC claims against UniFirst or UniClean are unfounded and without merit. ”

Click here for our fungal meningitis outbreak timeline, “Anatomy of an Outbreak.”

NECC was not immediately available for comment.

The House of Representatives subpoenaed Barry Cadden, who owns NECC,  to a hearing in Washington, D.C. on Nov. 14. He declined to testify when members of Congress pressed him on his role in ensuring that the drugs his company produced were safe and sterile.

“On advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer on the basis of my constitutional rights and privileges including the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States,” he said at the hearing.

Members of Congress also questioned whether the FDA could have prevented the outbreak.

Compounding pharmacies, which are intended to tailor drugs to individuals with a single prescription from a single doctor, are typically overseen by state pharmacy boards rather than the FDA because they are so small. However, in 2006, the FDA issued a warning letter to NECC, accusing it of mass-producing a topical anesthetic cream, and jeopardizing another drug’s sterility by repackaging it.

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Abbas sees Palestinian unity as Fatah rallies in Gaza

GAZA (Reuters) - President Mahmoud Abbas predicted the end of a five-year split between the two big Palestinian factions as his Fatah movement staged its first mass rally in Gaza with the blessing of Hamas Islamists who rule the enclave.

"Soon we will regain our unity," Abbas, whose authority has been limited to the Israeli-occupied West Bank since the 2007 civil war between the two factions, said in a televised address to hundreds of thousands of followers marching in Gaza on Friday, with yellow Fatah flags instead of the green of Hamas.

The hardline Hamas movement, which does not recognize Israel's right to exist, expelled secular Fatah from Gaza during the war. It gave permission for the rally after the deadlock in peace talks between Abbas's administration and Israel narrowed the two factions' ideological differences.

The Palestinian rivals have drawn closer since Israel's assault on Gaza assault in November, in which Hamas, though battered, claimed victory.

Egypt has long tried to broker Hamas-Fatah reconciliation, but past efforts have foundered over questions of power-sharing, control of weaponry, and to what extent Israel and other powers would accept a Palestinian administration including Hamas.

An Egyptian official told Reuters Cairo was preparing to invite the factions for new negotiations within two weeks.

Israel fears grassroots support for Hamas could eventually topple Abbas's Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank.

"Hamas could seize control of the PA any day," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday.

The demonstration marked 48 years since Fatah's founding as the spearhead of the Palestinians' fight against Israel. Its longtime leader Yasser Arafat signed an interim 1993 peace accord that won Palestinians a measure of self rule.

Hamas, which rejected the 1993 deal, fought and won a Palestinian parliamentary election in 2006. It formed an uneasy coalition with Fatah until their violent split a year later.

Though shunned by the West, Hamas feels bolstered by electoral gains for Islamist movements in neighboring Egypt and elsewhere in the region - a confidence reflected in the fact Friday's Fatah demonstration was allowed to take place.

"The success of the rally is a success for Fatah, and for Hamas too," said Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri. "The positive atmosphere is a step on the way to regain national unity."

Fatah, meanwhile, has been riven by dissent about the credibility of Abbas's statesmanship, especially given Israel's continued settlement-building on West Bank land. The Israelis quit Gaza unilaterally in 2005 after 38 years of occupation.

"The message today is that Fatah cannot be wiped out," said Amal Hamad, a member of the group's ruling body, referring to the demonstration attended by several Abbas advisers. "Fatah lives, no one can exclude it and it seeks to end the division."

In his speech, Abbas promised to return to Gaza soon and said Palestinian unification would be "a step on the way to ending the (Israeli) occupation".

(Editing by Dan Williams, Alistair Lyon and Jason Webb)

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Pakistani warlord's death a 'major development': US

WASHINGTON: The Pentagon welcomed reports Thursday that a prominent Pakistani warlord was killed in a drone strike, saying his death would represent a "major development."

Local officials in Pakistan said Mullah Nazir, the main militant commander in South Waziristan, was taken out when an unmanned US aircraft fired two missiles at his vehicle.

But a Pentagon spokesman could not confirm the account.

"If the reports are true, then this would be a significant blow, and would be very helpful not just to the United States but also to our Pakistani partners," spokesman George Little told reporters.

Nazir sent insurgents to Afghanistan to wage war on NATO-led troops and operated out of the tribal zone where militants linked to the Taliban and Al-Qaeda have bases on the Afghan border.

Pakistani officials said the drone strike on Wednesday killed Nazir and five of his loyalists, including two senior deputies.

Nazir, one of the highest-profile drone victims in recent years, had a complicated relationship with the Pakistani government, having agreed to a peace deal with Islamabad in 2007. Pakistani officials had hoped he could counter Pakistani Taliban insurgents.

He was understood to be close to the Al-Qaeda-linked Haqqani network, a faction of the Afghan Taliban blamed for some of the most high-profile attacks in Kabul and elsewhere in Afghanistan in recent years.

"This is someone who has a great deal of blood on his hands," Little said. "This would be a major development."

Washington has long urged Islamabad to crack down on the Haqqani network without success.

Drone bombing raids in Pakistan are run by the CIA and not by the Pentagon. Although an open secret, the CIA does not publicly discuss the drone air war, which officials believe has severely weakened Al-Qaeda's leadership in Pakistan.

According to figures compiled by a Washington think tank, US drone strikes against Islamist militants decreased in Pakistan's tribal regions for the second year in a row but intensified in Yemen.

In Pakistan, 46 strikes were carried out in 2012, compared to 72 in 2011 and 122 in 2010, the New America Foundation said, based on its compilation of reports in international media.

But Yemen saw an equally dramatic spike in the covert bombing runs, with strikes against Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) militants rising from 18 in 2011 to 53 in 2012.

- AFP/jc

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Amendment to anti-rape law to top agenda in MHA meet today

NEW DELHI: Timeline to fill police vacancies, rationalization of VIP security, modernization of forces including networking of police stations across the country and imparting special training to cops for handling cases relating to sexual offences against women will dominate the agenda of the meeting of chief secretaries and top cops of states here on Friday.

Convened in the backdrop of the Delhi gang-rape incident, the day-long meeting will also deliberate on possible amendments which can be brought in to make the existing laws much more stringent against rapists and also against offenders of crime against Schedules Castes and Schedule Tribes.

"Though the final decision about amending the law will be taken after submission of the Justice (retired) J S Verma Committee report, we will seek the opinions of director generals of police and chief secretaries of states," said an official, privy to the agenda of the meeting.

He said the suggestions emerged in the meeting would be passed on to the Verma panel.

The much-awaited Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and System (CCTNS) project to create an integrated database for enhancing efficiency and effectiveness of policing and sharing data among 14,000 police stations and over 6,000 higher offices across the country will formally be launched by the home minister Sushilkumar Shinde on the occasion.

The project includes creation of a nationwide networking infrastructure for the IT-enabled state-of-the-art tracking system that will revolve around investigation of crime and detection of criminals.

Issues relating to crime against women and atrocities on SCs\STs will be discussed in two different sessions where senior officials from the home ministry — led by home secretary R K Singh — would chalk out strategies to prevent such offences across the country.

"Discussion on amendments in the SCs and STs (prevention of atrocities) Act is also part of the agenda. Focus will be on building consensus around strengthening institutional mechanism and creating standard operating procedures to prevent crime against women and weaker sections of the society," said the official.

State would also be asked to focus on imparting 'special' training to cops for handing cases relating to sexual assault against women and emphasize on setting up of fast-track courts in consultation with respective High Courts for trying pending rape cases.

States have been asked to come with data on police vacancies as most of them failed to recruit cops despite being requested by the Centre in every high-level meet on security at the time when over one-fifth of the country's sanctioned police force remains just on paper.

Latest figures show that all states and Union Territories (UTs) had collectively reported police vacancy to the tune of nearly 4.20 lakh during 2011. The actual strength of the police force in the country as on December, 2011, was 16.60 lakh as against the sanctioned strength of 20.86 lakh, with Uttar Pradesh leading the pack in reporting police vacancies. The other states which report huge vacancy include Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Haryana and West Bengal.

"Since the shortage of cops for actual policing is compounded by excessive deployment of police personnel for VIP security, the states will be asked to rationalize the system in such a manner that only those get State security who actually need it," said the official.

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CDC: 1 in 24 admit nodding off while driving

NEW YORK (AP) — This could give you nightmares: 1 in 24 U.S. adults say they recently fell asleep while driving.

And health officials behind the study think the number is probably higher. That's because some people don't realize it when they nod off for a second or two behind the wheel.

"If I'm on the road, I'd be a little worried about the other drivers," said the study's lead author, Anne Wheaton of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In the CDC study released Thursday, about 4 percent of U.S. adults said they nodded off or fell asleep at least once while driving in the previous month. Some earlier studies reached a similar conclusion, but the CDC telephone survey of 147,000 adults was far larger. It was conducted in 19 states and the District of Columbia in 2009 and 2010.

CDC researchers found drowsy driving was more common in men, people ages 25 to 34, those who averaged less than six hours of sleep each night, and — for some unexplained reason — Texans.

Wheaton said it's possible the Texas survey sample included larger numbers of sleep-deprived young adults or apnea-suffering overweight people.

Most of the CDC findings are not surprising to those who study this problem.

"A lot of people are getting insufficient sleep," said Dr. Gregory Belenky, director of Washington State University's Sleep and Performance Research Center in Spokane.

The government estimates that about 3 percent of fatal traffic crashes involve drowsy drivers, but other estimates have put that number as high as 33 percent.

Warning signs of drowsy driving: Feeling very tired, not remembering the last mile or two, or drifting onto rumble strips on the side of the road. That signals a driver should get off the road and rest, Wheaton said.

Even a brief moment nodding off can be extremely dangerous, she noted. At 60 mph, a single second translates to speeding along for 88 feet — the length of two school buses.

To prevent drowsy driving, health officials recommend getting 7 to 9 hours of sleep each night, treating any sleep disorders and not drinking alcohol before getting behind the wheel.

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Online:

CDC report: http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr

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Sandy Hook Parents Cope With Students' Return

Sandy Hook parents put their children on school buses this morning and waved goodbye as the yellow bus rolled away, but this first day back since the pre-Christmas massacre is anything but normal for the families of Sandy Hook Elementary School.

Erin Milgram, the mother of a first grader and a fourth grader at Sandy Hook, told "Good Morning America" that she was going to drive behind the bus and stay with her 7-year-old Lauren for the entire school day.

"I haven't gotten that far yet, about not being with them," Milgram said. "I just need to stay with them for a while."

Today is "Opening Day" for Sandy Hook Elementary School, which is re-opening about six miles away in the former Chalk Hill school in Monroe, Conn.

Lauren was in teacher Kaitlin Roig's first grade class on Dec. 14 when gunman Adam Lanza forced his way into the school and killed 20 students and six staffers.

Roig has been hailed a hero for barricading her students in a classroom bathroom and refusing to open the door until authorities could find a key to open the door.

The 20 students killed were first-graders and the Milgrams have struggled to explain to Lauren why so many of her friends will never return to school.

"She knows her friends and she'll also see on the bus... there will be some missing on the bus," Milgram said. "We look at yearbook pictures. We try to focus on the happy times because we really don't know what we're doing."

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"How could someone be so angry?" Lauren's father Eric Milgram wondered before a long pause. "We don't know."

The school has a lecture room available for parents to stay as long as they wish and they are also allowed to accompany their children to the classroom to help them adjust. Counselors will be available throughout the day for parents, staff and students, according to the school's website.

The first few days will be a delicate balancing act between assessing the children's needs and trying to get them back to a normal routine.

"We don't want to avoid memories of a trauma," Dr. Jamie Howard told "Good Morning America." "And so by getting back to school and by engaging in your routines, we're helping kids to do that, we're helping them to have a natural, healthy recovery to a trauma."

Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy announced at a news conference today that he has created a 15-member Sandy Hook Advisory Commission, which will be led by Hamden Mayor Scott Jackson. The commission will review gun control laws and regulations, school safety and mental health issues.

"It would be stupid for us not to have this conversation," Malloy said, speaking from the State Capitol in Hartford.

Security is paramount in everyone's mind. There is a police presence on campus and drivers of every vehicle that comes onto campus are being interviewed.

"Our goal is to make it a safe and secure learning environment for these kids to return to, and the teachers also," Monroe police Lt. Keith White said at a news conference on Wednesday.

A "state-of-the-art" security system is in place, but authorities will not go into detail about the system saying only that the school will probably be "the safest school in America."

White said at a news conference today that the security presence would be evaluated on a day-by-day and week-by-week basis moving forward.

"We are trying to keep a balance," he said. "We don't want them [the students] to think that this is a police state. This is a school and a school first."

Every adult in the school who is not immediately recognizable will be required to wear a badge as identification, parent and school volunteer Karen Dryer told ABCNews.com.

"They want to know exactly who you are at sight, whether or not you should be there," Dryer said.

Despite the precautions and preparations, parents will still be coping with the anxiety of parting with their children.

"Rationally, something like this is a very improbable event, but that still doesn't change the emotional side of the way you feel," Eric Milgram said.

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Syria rebels in push to capture air base

AZAZ, Syria (Reuters) - Rebels battled on Thursday to seize an air base in northern Syria, part of a campaign to fight back against the air power that has given President Bashar al-Assad's forces free rein to bomb rebel-held towns.

More than 60,000 people have been killed in the 21-month-old uprising and civil war, the United Nations said this week, sharply raising the death toll estimate in a conflict that shows no sign of ending.

After dramatic advances over the second half of 2012, the rebels now hold wide swathes of territory in the north and east, but are limited in exerting control because they cannot protect towns and villages from Assad's helicopters and jets.

Hundreds of fighters from rebel groups were attempting to storm the Taftanaz air base, near the northern highway that links Syria's two main cities, Aleppo and the capital Damascus.

Rebels have been besieging air bases across the north in recent weeks, in the hope this will reduce the government's power to carry out air strikes and resupply loyalist-held areas.

A rebel fighter speaking from near the Taftanaz base overnight said the base's main sections were still in loyalist hands but insurgents had managed to infiltrate and destroy a helicopter and a fighter jet on the ground.

The northern rebel Idlib Coordination Committee said the rebels had detonated a car bomb inside the base.

The government's SANA news agency said the base had not fallen and that the military had "strongly confronted an attempt by the terrorists to attack the airport from several axes, inflicting heavy losses among them and destroying their weapons and munitions".

Rami Abdulrahman, head of the opposition-aligned Syrian Observatory for Human Rights which monitors the conflict from Britain, said as many as 800 fighters were involved in the assault, including Islamists from Jabhat al-Nusra, a powerful group that Washington considers terrorists.

Taftanaz is mainly a helicopter base, used for missions to resupply army positions in the north, many of which are cut off by road because of rebel gains, as well as for dropping crude "barrel bombs" of explosives on rebel-controlled areas.

"WHAT IS THE FAULT OF THE CHILDREN?"

Near Minakh, another northern air base that rebels have surrounded, government forces have retaliated by regularly shelling and bombing nearby towns.

In the town of Azaz, where the bombardment has become a near nightly occurrence, shells hit a family house overnight. Zeinab Hammadi said her two wounded daughters, aged 10 and 12, had been rushed across the border to Turkey, one with her brain exposed.

"We were sleeping and it just landed on us in the blink of an eye," she said, weeping as she surveyed the damage.

Family members tried to salvage possessions from the wreckage, men lifting out furniture and children carrying out their belongings in tubs.

"He (Assad) wants revenge against the people," said Abu Hassan, 33, working at a garage near the destroyed house. "What is the fault of the children? Are they the ones fighting?"

Opposition activists said warplanes struck a residential building in another rebel-held northern town, Hayyan, killing at least eight civilians.

Video footage showed men carrying dismembered bodies of children and dozens of people searching for victims in the rubble of the destroyed building, shouting "God is greatest". The provenance of the video could not be independently confirmed.

In addition to their tenuous grip on the north, the rebels also hold a crescent of suburbs on the edge of Damascus, which have come under bombardment by government forces that control the center of the capital.

On Wednesday, according to opposition activists, dozens of people were incinerated in an inferno caused by an air strike on a petrol station in a Damascus suburb where residents were lining up for precious fuel.

The civil war in Syria has become the longest and bloodiest of the conflicts that rose out of uprisings across the Arab world in the past two years.

Assad's family has ruled for 42 years since his father seized power in a coup. The war pits rebels, mainly from the Sunni Muslim majority, against a government supported by members of Assad's Shi'ite-derived Alawite minority sect and some members of other minorities who fear revenge if he falls.

The West, most Sunni-ruled Arab states and Turkey have called for Assad to leave power. He is supported by Russia and Shi'ite Iran.

(Additional reporting by Khaled Yacoub Oweis in Amman and Dominic Evans in Beirut; Writing by Peter Graff; Editing by Ruth Pitchford)

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