NPR News: 09-07-2026 2PM EDT

0:00Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Louise Skiivone. President Trump's son-in-law and envoy, Jared Kushner, defended a stalled-piece plan for Gaza, calling the territory a, quote, former war zone that's now flooded with aid. And he took aim at Israel's rejection of the plan, and PR's Aya Batrowi has details. Hamas has signed on to Trump's plan to decommission weapons alongside a phased Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. But Israel's Prime Minister has rejected that plan, and Israel's military still launches attacks in Gaza despite a ceasefire. Palestinian health officials say a six-year-old was killed in an airstrike Sunday on her way to school. While on a visit to Ukraine, Sunday, Kushner said this about Israel's policies in Gaza. We agree with them on the end state. They just have a crazy election, and that makes them a little irrational in certain regards, but we're very determined and we're working through these things. Kushner meanwhile touted conditions in Gaza, saying it now has one of the world's lowest malnutrition rates. UNICEF reports a more complex picture, with one out of every eight kids under five,

1:03stunted from malnutrition. Aya Batrowi and Pair News, Dubai. In Germany, the alternative for Germany party has declared victory after winning 43.8% of the vote in the first of several regional elections this fall. As Esmi Nicholson reports, the result puts the far-right party within reach of power at the state level for the first time since World War II. The AFD, which ran a campaign, centered on the policy of remigration, or mass deportation of immigrants, more than double it's share of the vote in the small eastern state of Saxony and helped, compared to five years ago. Chancellor Friedrich Mez is sent to write Christian Democrats more than harbored their share of the vote. The CDU candidate in the state's Vend shortzer congratulated the AFD and said, some say this is a dark day for Saxony and Halt, I call it democracy. The man hoping to become Germany's first AFD state governor, 35-year-old Auresegment, told public broadcaster ARD that the results send a very clear signal to Berlin. But falling just short of a majority, the AFD will need support to form a government.

2:04Most parties refuse to work with a party that German domestic intelligence considers anti-constitutional. For MPR News, I'm Esmi Nicholson in Berlin. The two largest school districts in the US are banning AI usage in classrooms for at least a year. The restrictions affect more than a million youngsters in California and New York. And PR Sequoia Corrillo reports. New York City public schools, elementary and middle school students will not have any generative AI tools in classrooms this fall. The country's largest school district put a one-year pause on any learning tools that utilize the technology. That same day, the second largest district, the Los Angeles Unified School District, also banned AI for all of its students. Both districts said they would use the year to study the impact of AI on young students before making a final decision on whether it could be used in classes going forward. Sequoia Corrillo and PR News. This is NPR News in Washington. Hundreds of thousands of airline passengers saw their flights scratched this weekend after

3:06Indonesia's Anakkrakatoa volcano erupted that dangerous ash cloud forced airlines to cancel flights. The kind of tick season is nearing an end across the US and PR's Ping-Wong report. On a national level, tick bites tend to drop off in September. That's according to data reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But Allison Hinckley, an epidemiologist there, says those in the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, and Upper Midwest regions should still keep an eye out for the black-legged deer tick which remains active through the fall. It's the type of tick that can transmit Lyme disease. So especially in those regions, we think it's still important to take steps to avoid tick bites. Come winter, the ticks are less active, they'll hunker in leaf litter and soil and hibernate through colder months. All researchers are working on methods to reduce tick populations and the disease burdens they carry. Hinckley recommends people were closed treated with tick repellent to prevent tick bites and to remove ticks promptly if they latch, Ping-Wong and PR News.

4:07A suspect in a notorious 2024 cyber theft is expected to plead guilty this week in Washington 22-year-old Melon Lam is accused, along with several others in a case where an individual was scammed out of Bitcoin worth over $240 million. Several co-conspirators have already entered guilty, please. Authorities say the victim was a stranger to the perpetrators who duped a man into turning over the virtual keys to his holdings. Executors say the accused celebrated with a spending spray. I'm Louise Givoni and PR News. Billionaire Mark Cuban has stared into the belly of the beast of America's healthcare system. I mean it's so bad you can go through a long list of really quality hospitals and they don't know their costs. So can Medicare for all be a solution? We take a hard look at the cost of the program along with US healthcare itself. In this, it will hear more stories from the indicator from Planet Money on the NPR app.