Brian A Zarate

BEIRUT (Reuters) - The Palestinian militant group Hamas informed its ally Hezbollah it had agreed to a proposal for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and the leader of the powerful Lebanese group welcomed the step, two sources familiar with the matter said on Friday. A Hamas delegation headed by the group's deputy leader Khalil Al-Hayya briefed Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah about the latest developments at a meeting in Beirut, the sources said. Iran-backed Hezbollah said in a statement earlier that Nasrallah and Hayya had discussed the latest developments in negotiations aimed at reaching a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. Hezbollah and Israel have been trading fire for nearly nine months in hostilities that have played out in parallel to the Gaza conflict, raising fears of an all-out war between the heavily armed adversaries. Hezbollah has said its campaign of rocket and drone attacks on northern Israel has aimed to support Palestinians under Israeli bombardment in Gaza. O

A newborn baby girl who was abandoned in a Texas ditch and left to die went unidentified for 23 years until authorities say they recently identified and charged her mother. The infant has been referred to as “Angel Baby Doe” by the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office since her body was discovered on November 18, 2001. The child was found wrapped in a jacket with her umbilical cord still attached off the side of a road between the towns of Alvarado and Burleson, Texas, south of Fort Worth, the Texas Attorney General’s Office said in a news release Monday. Authorities say she was born alive and likely outside of a medical facility. A person living in the area found the baby as they picked up cans along the side of the road, according to the release.

The driver of a pickup truck that fatally plowed into a group of revelers celebrating the Fourth of July at a New York City park Thursday evening was a substance abuse counselor who penned a book on helping others overcome addiction, according to law enforcement sources Daniel C. Hyden, 44, of Monmouth Junction, New Jersey, was identified Friday as the driver who struck revelers at Manhattan's Corlears Hook Park in Manhattan. Three people were killed and eight others were injured, one critically. New York Police Chief of Department Jeff Maddrey said Thursday responding officers “did smell some alcohol, but we are still in the process of doing testing.”

message for U.N. and other humanitarian officials who asked what was needed: “Anything that would allow a human being to survive.” Tevin Andrews, who was in the devastated island of Carriacou Friday where Beryl first made landfall as the earliest category 4 storm in the Atlantic, also said when asked whether there was flat space for humanitarian workers to set up tents: “The whole island is flat.” Simon Springett, the top U.N. humanitarian official for the eastern Caribbean and Barbados, who listened to Andrews’ call and relayed his remarks to U.N. correspondents said he didn’t want to sound over-dramatic, “but the islands were really dramatically, catastrophically, catastrophically hit.” He said Beryl's fierce rains and wind late Monday in Carriacou knocked out desalination plants, cell towers, and fiber optic cables, left roads impassable, and destroyed probably 95% of housing along with local businesses and income-generating activities.