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NYC Police Commissioner says cops 'feel under attack' from White House, Justice Department

Cops on the beat and their bosses believe they are under attack from President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder, New York City’s police commissioner said Sunday.
Commissioner William Bratton said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the president and the attorney general have to see why police have the anxieties and perceptions they have as law enforcement grapples with the fallout from the Michael Brown and Eric Garner cases.
“They really do feel under attack, rank-and-file officers and much of American police leadership, that they feel they’re under attack from the federal government at the highest levels,” Bratton said. “So that’s something we need to understand also, this sense of perception that becomes a reality.”
 He added, “We have a lot of talking we’re going to have to do here to understand all sides of this issue. This is not a one-sided issue.”
On the program the commissioner also said the rift between New York City cops and Mayor Bill de Blasio is going to take a lot more time to heal.
“However we will be making an effort to sit down and talk with the (police) union leaders, in particular, to deal with their issues,” Bratton said.
On CBS’ “Face the Nation” Bratton criticized his officers for turning their backs on de Blasio Saturday as the mayor eulogized fallen police officer Rafael Ramos.  Hundreds of police officers standing outside the church where Ramos was being laid to rest turned away from TV screens showing de Blasio as he delivered his eulogy.
“I think it was very inappropriate at that event,” Bratton said. “That funeral was held to honor Officer Ramos, and to bring politics or to bring issues into that event, I think was very inappropriate and I do not support it.”
Ramos and his partner were killed Dec. 20 when a gunman ambushed them in their patrol car on a Brooklyn street.

Hamas turns back Gaza war orphans bound for Israel on goodwill trip

Hamas authorities in the Gaza Strip prevented a group of 37 children and their adult chaperones from entering Israel on what would have been a rare goodwill visit meant to foster peace in the region. 
The New York Times reported that the bus carrying the group was forced to turn back at the Erez border crossing, a major checkpoint at the northern end of the Gaza Strip. Hamas spokesman Eyad Bozum told reporters that that the decision was made "to protect the culture of our children and our people" from what he described as "[normalizing] our children with the Zionist occupation." He said Hamas would make sure such a trip "will never happen again."
The children, most of whom have lost at least one parent in fighting between Israel and Hamas were to enter Israel on Sunday and spend a week visiting Jewish and Arab communities and a zoo. They were also going to travel to the West Bank for a meeting with the Palestinian president. Bozum said the children were all between 13 and 16 years old and were to be accompanied by five adults from Gaza.
The two sides fought a 50-day war this summer that caused heavy damage in the coastal enclave. According to the United Nations, the fighting killed more than 2,100 Palestinians, though it is not clear how many of those were civilians. On the Israeli side, the fighting killed 72 people, the vast majority of them soldiers, while rocket attacks disrupted the lives of millions of people.
Yoel Marshak, an Israeli organizer and activist, told the Associated Press that the visit was meant to a show a positive side of Israel and promote peace.
"These children will one day be the leaders of Gaza and they would have remembered this trip and known that we can live in peace, side by side," he said.
Marshak told the Times that a similar trip took place after a conflict between Israeli and Hamas in 2009. On that occasion, Hamas prevented the group from crossing the border twice, but later acquiesced. He said he received written approval for the trip three weeks ago from Hamas and that the cancellation came as a surprise. He said he and other organizers were working to reorganize the trip.
Said Abu Luli, a 13-year-old Palestinian boy whose father was killed in an electrical accident in 2009, said he was disappointed he could not make the trip.
"I was very happy that I will go and was saddened when we were prevented," he said in a telephone interview. "I was hoping to visit the places in the West Bank and our lands in Palestine," he added.

Hundreds await rescue from crippled ferry in Adriatic Sea

Dozens of ferry passengers in the Adriatic Sea remained stranded and adrift between the coasts of Italy and Albania Monday morning, one day after a fire crippled the vessel. 
Meanwhile, Italian and Greek military and coast guard rescue crews battled gale-force winds and massive waves as helicopters plucked small groups of people and whisked them to safety aboard any of ten mercantile ships waiting nearby. One person has died in the risky rescue operations and at least two others have been injured. 
The BBC reported that an Italian air force pilot who participated in the rescue told state television that his helicopter's cabin filled with smoke from the fire, adding another degree of difficulty to the operation. 
A cargo ship with 49 people evacuated from the Norman Atlantic arrived in the Italian port of Bari on Monday, the first big group to reach land after rough seas forced the initial plan of docking down the coast in Brindisi to be scrapped. Greek Merchant Marine Minister Miltiadis Varvitsiotis said early Monday that 316 people had been evacuated, leaving 161 more on board.
The first to disembark in Bari was an injured man wrapped in a yellow striped blanket and wearing bandages around his bare feet, helped down the ship's ladder by two rescue workers. Other evacuees, many wrapped in blankets, made their way slowly down the ladder with assistance, some thrusting their hands in a victory sign as they waited their turn. Among them were four children. TV crews and relatives gathered on the docks below in near silence.
The evacuees then boarded bright red fire department buses. Officials have said hotels have been booked for them around town.
The Italian Navy said the man who died and his injured wife were transported by helicopter to the southern Italian city of Brindisi. It was unclear how the death and injury occurred, but the Greek Coast Guard said the pair -- both Greek passengers -- were found in a lifeboat rescue chute.
Other survivors had been taken to southern Italian hospitals in smaller numbers in the hours immediately after the rescue operation got underway. Several were treated for hypothermia, some for mild carbon monoxide poisoning and one woman suffered a fractured pelvis, officials said.
Dr. Raffaele Montinaro at the hospital in Lecce said the three children taken there were in "excellent" condition, and emergency room doctor Antonio Palumbo said a pregnant woman was also in good condition.
"For sure they are scared," said Eligio Rocco Catamo, manager of the Copertino hospital. "But I should say that I was impressed by the calm and the serenity they are showing."
A local convent was housing survivors who were released from the hospital.
 Helicopters rescued passengers throughout the night, completing 34 sorties with winds over 40 knots (46 miles per hour). The Greek coast guard said seven people had been airlifted from the ferry to Corfu.
`'Notwithstanding the weather and the darkness, which is another factor, we persisted throughout the entire night," Italian coast guard Admiral Giovanni Pettorino told Sky TG24.
Those remaining on board were given thermal blankets and found places to wait protected from the elements `'even if the conditions remain very difficult," Pettorino said.
Italian navy Capt. Riccardo Rizzotto said the ultimate destination of the stricken ferry was unclear. Some Italian officials said it would likely be towed to an Italian port, even though it was currently closer to Albania.
"The priority now is to rescue the crew and passengers as quickly as possible," Rizzotto said.
The fire broke out before dawn Sunday on a car deck of the Italian-flagged Norman Atlantic, carrying 422 passengers and 56 crew members. All day and night, passengers huddled on the vessel's upper decks, pelted by rain and hail and struggling to breathe through the thick smoke.
The second injury was to a member of the Italian military involved in the rescue operation, Pettorino said.
Pettorino said two Italian tugs tried to attach themselves to the ferry in the evening, but were frustrated by the thick smoke. Eventually the tugs managed to attach the line to stabilize the ferry, ANSA reported.
Passengers described scenes of terror and chaos when the fire broke out as they slept in their cabins.
"They called first on women and children to be evacuated from the ship," Vassiliki Tavrizelou, who was rescued along with her 2-year-old daughter, told The Associated Press.
Dotty Channing-Williams, mother of British ferry passenger Nick Channing-Williams, said she had managed to speak to her son before he and his Greek fiancee were airlifted to safety. She said she had complained to her son that there was no information available for families.
"He said `Well, it's an awful lot worse for us because we're actually standing out here in the pouring rain, and thunder and lightning, and we really just don't know exactly what's going to happen."'

Objects spotted in search for missing AirAsia flight as hope fades for passengers

The search for missing AirAsia Flight 8501 may have received a boost Monday after an Indonesian officials said that Australian planes had spotted objects in the Java Sea search area.
Jakarta's Air Force base commander Rear Marshal Dwi Putranto told the Associated Press that he was informed Monday that an Orion aircraft had detected "suspicious" objects near Nangka island, about 100 miles southwest of Pangkalan Bun, near central Kalimantan, or 700 miles from the location where the plane lost contact with air traffic controllers early Sunday.
"However, we cannot be sure whether it is part of the missing AirAsia plane," Putranto cautioned, "We are now moving in that direction, which is in cloudy conditions."
Air Force spokesman Rear Marshal Hadi Tjahnanto told Indonesia's MetroTV that an Indonesian helicopter in the eastern part of Belitung island spotted two oily spots on the sea about 105 nautical miles east of Tanjung Pandan -- much closer to the point of last contact. He said samples of the oil would be collected and analyzed to see if they are connected to the missing plane.
False sightings of objects and oil slicks that initially appear to be from a missing plane were among the issues that plagued the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 earlier this year. The fate of that plane, which vanished March 8 with 239 people on board, remains unknown. 
As the search for the Airbus A320 resumed Monday morning local time (Sunday evening Eastern Time), Indonesia's search and rescue chief said it was likely that the plane had crashed with 162 people on board. 
"Based on the coordinates that we know, the evaluation would be that any estimated crash position is in the sea, and that the hypothesis is the plane is at the bottom of the sea," Henry Bambang Soelistyo told reporters.
Flight 8501 vanished Sunday morning in airspace thick with storm clouds on its way from Surabaya, Indonesia, to Singapore. The last communication from the cockpit to air traffic control was a request by one of the pilots to increase altitude from 32,000 feet to 38,000 feet because of the rough weather. Air traffic control was not able to immediately grant the request because another plane was in airspace at 34,000 feet, said Bambang Tjahjono, director of the state-owned company in charge of air-traffic control.
By the time clearance could be given, Flight 8501 had disappeared, Tjahjono said. The twin-engine, single-aisle plane, which never sent a distress signal, was last seen on radar four minutes after the last communication from the cockpit.
First Adm. Sigit Setiayana, the Naval Aviation Center commander at the Surabaya air force base, said 12 navy ships, five planes, three helicopters and a number of warships were taking part in the search, along with ships and planes from Singapore and Malaysia. The Australian Air Force also sent a search plane.
Searchers had to cope with heavy rain Sunday, but Setiayana said Monday that visibility was good. "God willing, we can find it soon," he told The Associated Press.
Sunardi, a forecaster at Indonesia's Meteorology and Geophysics Agency, said Sunday dense storm clouds were detected at up to 44,000 feet in the area at the time.
"There could have been turbulence, lightning and vertical as well as horizontal strong winds within such clouds," said Sunardi, who like many Indonesians uses only one name.
Airline pilots routinely fly around thunderstorms, said John Cox, a former accident investigator. Using on-board radar, flight crews can typically see a storm forming from more than 100 miles away.
In such cases, pilots have plenty of time to find a way around the storm cluster or look for gaps to fly through, he said.
"It's not like you have to make an instantaneous decision," Cox said. Storms can be hundreds of miles long, but "because a jet moves at 8 miles a minute, if you to go 100 miles out of your way, it's not a problem."
Authorities have not said whether they lost only the secondary radar target, which is created by the plane's transponder, or whether the primary radar target, which is created by energy reflected from the plane's body, was lost as well, Cox said.
The plane had an Indonesian captain, Iryanto, who uses one name, and a French co-pilot, five cabin crew members and 155 passengers, including 16 children and one infant, the airline said in a statement. Among the passengers were three South Koreans, a Malaysian, a British national and his 2-year-old Singaporean daughter. The rest were Indonesians, who are frequent visitors to Singapore.
AirAsia said the captain had more than 20,000 flying hours, of which 6,100 were with AirAsia on the Airbus 320. The first officer had 2,275 flying hours.
"Papa, come home, I still need you," Angela Anggi Ranastianis, the captain's 22-year-old daughter pleaded on her Path page late Sunday, which was widely quoted by Indonesian media. "Bring back my papa. Papa, please come home."
At Iryanto's house in the East Java town of Sidoarjo, neighbors, relatives and friends gathered Monday to pray and recite the Quran to support the distraught family. Their desperate cries were so loud, they could sometimes be heard outside where three LCD televisions had been set up to monitor search developments.
"He is a good man. That's why people here appointed him as our neighborhood chief for the last two years," said Bagianto Djoyonegoro, a friend and neighbor.
Many recalled him as an experienced Air Force pilot who flew F-16 fighter jets before becoming a commercial airline pilot.
The missing aircraft was delivered to AirAsia in October 2008, and the plane had accumulated about 23,000 flight hours during some 13,600 flights, Airbus said in a statement.
The aircraft had last undergone scheduled maintenance on Nov. 16, according to AirAsia.
The airline has dominated budget travel in Southeast Asia for years, highlighting its low fares with the slogan, "Now everyone can fly." It flies short routes of just a few hours, connecting the region's large cities. Recently, it has tried to expand into long-distance flying through sister airline AirAsia X.
"Until today, we have never lost a life," AirAsia group CEO Tony Fernandes, who founded the low-cost carrier in 2001, told reporters at Jakarta airport. "But I think that any airline CEO who says he can guarantee that his airline is 100 percent safe, is not accurate."
The A320 family of jets, which includes the A319 and A321, has a good safety record, with just 0.14 fatal accidents per million takeoffs, according to a safety study published by Boeing in August.
Flight 8501 disappeared while at its cruising altitude, which is usually the safest part of a trip. Just 10 percent of fatal crashes from 2004 to 2013 occurred while a plane was in that stage of flight, the safety report said.