'Just crazy': Outrage on the Web over photo capturing subway death

By Scott Stump, TODAY contributor A photo on the cover of Tuesday's New York Post depicting a man struggling to climb off a subway track before he was fatally struck by a train has drawn heated reactions — specifically chastising the paper and the photographer. Queens man Ki Suk Han, 58, died after he was pushed on the tracks by an unnamed attacker moments before an oncoming train arrived at the 49th Street N, R, Q subway platform in Manhattan on Monday afternoon, according to police. On Tuesday afternoon, police confirmed they had someone in custody in connection with the attack. The photographer who shot the chilling image, New York Post freelancer R. Umar Abbasi, has sparked outrage on social media from those wondering why he did not do something to help pull Han off the track instead of taking pictures. Story: Man questioned in case of NYC subway rider pushed to his death Abbasi told the New York Post that he started running toward Han and hitting the flash on his camera while shooting photos, hoping to catch the attention of the train's driver. "The most painful part was I could see him getting closer to the edge. He was getting so close,'' Abbasi told The Post. "And people were running toward him and the train. I didn't think about [the attacker] until after. In that moment, I just wanted to warn the train – to try and save a life." In the Twitterverse and elsewhere, many are not buying that explanation. One is hard-pressed to find anyone defending Abbasi's actions.  "Getting a conductor's attention with a flash — and maybe even blinding him with it — doesn't seem like the way you'd necessarily help someone that's clinging to the subway platform,'' wrote The Atlantic's Alexander Abad-Santos. ]]>

Man questioned in NYC subway rider's death

View more videos at: http://nbcnewyork.com. By Shimon Prokupecz and Jonathan Dienst, NBCNewYork.com Police have a man in custody believed to be the suspect who pushed a subway rider to his death on the subway tracks at 49th Street in Manhattan after an argument. The man's name was not immediately released. He is being questioned, a law enforcement official told NBC 4 New York. He is suspected of pushing 58-year-old Ki-Suk Han off the platform at the N, Q, R station Monday afternoon. Han was hit by a southbound Q train and died. Witnesses told police the suspect was mumbling to himself before he and Han began arguing on the platform.  A bystander recorded part of the fight between the two men and turned the video over to police, who released it to the public Monday night, and received several tips. The man who allegedly pushed Han is heard cursing and saying, in substance, "Leave me alone... stand in line, wait for the R train and that's it." He then pushed Han onto the tracks, police said. Han tried to climb back up onto the platform but died after getting trapped between the train and the platform's edge.  Witness Patrick Gomez, who was in the station, says he heard a "thud that didn't sound normal" when the train pulled into the station. "People are just standing there in fear and shock, not really knowing what's going on," he said. "Some people started running out of the platform, others just stood there." Read more news on NBCNewYork.com  He says police evacuated the platform within minutes. Mark Lennihan / AP Police stand outside a New York subway station after a man was killed there on Monday. Subway pushes are unusual. Among the more high-profile was the January 1999 death of Kendra Webdale. A former mental patient admitted he shoved her to her death. Following that, the state Legislature passed Kendra's Law, which lets mental health authorities supervise patients who live outside institutions to make sure they are taking their medications and aren't a threat to safety.

Lawsuit: Boy Scouts failed to stop pedophile

By James B. Kelleher, Reuters CHICAGO - A former Boy Scout who says he was sexually assaulted when he was 10 by his now-imprisoned former troop leader sued the Boy Scouts of America on Tuesday, citing recently released files the group secretly maintained on suspected molesters in its ranks. The lawsuit claims that the Boy Scouts allowed Thomas Hacker, a Scout leader barred from the group after a 1970s felony sex abuse conviction in Indiana, to rejoin as a volunteer in Illinois in the 1980s, and he went on to molest more boys, including the plaintiff. Hacker was arrested in 1988 and convicted in 1989 of the aggravated sexual assault of an 11-year-old member of his troop in the southwest suburbs of Chicago. Now 75, Hacker is serving two concurrent 50-year prison terms as a result of his conviction. His defense attorney in the 1989 case called him "a classic pedophile - and sick beyond that," according to a Chicago Tribune story at the time. The lawsuit filed Tuesday by a man identified only as John Doe claimed that Hacker sexually assaulted him when he was 10 years old  -- after Hacker re-joined the Scouts in Illinois. "While we have not seen this lawsuit, we deeply regret that there have been times when Scouts were abused, and for that we are very sorry and extend our deepest sympathies to victims," Boy Scouts of America spokesman Deron Smith said in a statement. The suit draws on details unearthed this fall when the Boy Scouts of America, one of the country's largest youth organizations, was forced by an Oregon Court to release internal documents they kept on scout leaders and volunteers who were suspected sexual predators. The files go back almost to the organization's founding in 1910 and were known as the "red files," the "perversion files" and the "ineligible volunteer files." Boy Scouts release secret child abuse files Roughly 20,000 pages of files, spanning from 1965 to 1985, were released this fall by order of the Oregon Supreme Court, after a jury in the state found the Scouts liable in a 1980s pedophile case and ordered it to pay nearly $20 million in damages. Ineligible volunteer list Lawyers involved in the Illinois case said it is one of the first to be filed with evidence gleaned from the massive document release. The records released this fall on about 1,200 "ineligible volunteers" contained a detailed dossier on Hacker.  That dossier included a warning from a Scout leader in Indiana to national officials that Hacker had been "arrested for homosexual activity with many boys both in Scouting and through the school in which he was teaching." Hacker was subsequently convicted of the felony sexual assault of a 14-year-old boy in the junior high school in Indiana where he worked. In a letter from the national office to the Indiana Scout council, a top official wrote: "Under no circumstances do we want registered in Scouting," according to the complaint. Lawyer releases list of alleged Boy Scout molesters Hacker was added on the secret "ineligible volunteer" list the national organization maintained, according to the lawsuit. But a decade later when he left Indiana and moved to Illinois and became active again in Scouting, no one conducted a background check or ran his name against the list of known and suspected pedophiles. That failure, the lawsuit claims, shows the Boy Scout's efforts to prevent pedophiles from infiltrating its ranks "did not function as it was intended, was flawed, and in many cases ineffective." The Boy Scouts of America says it now requires even suspected cases of child molestation to be reported immediately to law enforcement and says keeping the old files secret protects victims. Last week, a Texas appeals court sided with the group, saying the Scouts did not have to turn over its post-1985 files describing sexual abuse complaints against volunteers. "The Boy Scouts have taken the view that keeping these files secret protects the children," said Christopher Hurley, the Chicago attorney representing John Doe in the case filed Tuesday. "But in this case it obviously didn't work. It may protect the molesters and the Boy Scouts, but it's not in the best interests of children." The BSA's Smith said that in the past 30 years the group has added background checks and training programs, and requires law enforcement to be told when there are "even suspicions" of abuse. More content from NBCNews.com: Disability-compensation claims for veterans lag as 'VA backlog' worsens More than 20,000 students to miss school as teachers in Chicago suburb strike 'You killed Jesus' scrawled on Hanukkah menorah Video: Friend goes to get beer, finds kittens in freezer Witnesses: Man pushed to his death on NYC subway tracks after argument Follow US news from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook Copyright 2012 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

Same players, same disputes in fiscal cliff debate

NEW: House Democrats try to force a vote on Obama's tax plan Frustration mounts as a deal to avoid the fiscal cliff remains out of reach FedEx chief: Top business leaders look at Washington with "dismay" Polls show Americans would blame Republicans if no agreement emerges Washington (CNN) -- If insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different result, then continuing negotiations on a deal to avoid the fiscal cliff might amount to little more than crazy talk. The same players are arguing about the same issue -- taxes -- in a repeat of budget showdowns of the past two years that failed to reach a comprehensive agreement. President Barack Obama's re-election in November, coupled with a perceived desire by congressional leaders to shed their reputation of dysfunction, raised expectations for a possible deal. However, with four weeks to go until the automatic tax hikes and spending cuts of the fiscal cliff get triggered, the two sides remain unable to resolve a central issue -- whether wealthy Americans should pay more taxes than they do now. Opinion: Beware the fiscal cliff deniers Johnson: 'Pres. Obama show us your plan' GOP deal rejected by White House Fred Smith, the chief executive officer of FedEx Corp., considered a bellwether on the economy, told CNN Tuesday that he and other top business leaders "look at the situation in Washington with complete amazement and dismay." "The problem is the ideological pinnings on both sides of this argument are so difficult to bridge," Smith said, adding it will "be hard for them to get a deal." Polls show that more Americans will blame Republicans, instead of Obama and Democrats, if the nation goes over the fiscal cliff without a deal. A Washington Post/Pew Research Center survey released Tuesday put the margin at 53%-27% in citing Republicans or Obama. A CNN/ORC International poll released last week showed 45% would blame congressional Republicans compared to 34% who would blame Obama. All signs point to a continuing standoff, at least for now. No formal negotiating sessions are known to be scheduled, though private talks between aides might be continuing behind the scenes. Obama and House Speaker John Boehner did not speak or get photographed together at Monday night's White House holiday reception for members of Congress, though one GOP source cautioned against reading anything political into the lack of interaction at a social event. At issue are competing proposals by Obama and House Republicans that coincide in some areas but differ on the tax-rate question. Republicans make budget counter-offer Obama demands the House immediately pass a measure already approved by the Senate to extend tax cuts for families making less than $250,000 a year while allowing rates to return to higher Clinton-era levels for wealthier households. Both sides agree that the 98% of Americans making less than $250,000 a year should avoid a tax hike when the tax cuts from the Bush administration expire on December 31, Obama and Democrats argue in calling for the House to guarantee that outcome now by passing the Senate measure. Once that happens, he and Democratic leaders promise, they will work out compromises on other deficit reduction steps sought by Republicans, such as reforms to the Medicare and Medicaid entitlement programs as part of further spending cuts. House Republicans led by Boehner made a major counter-proposal Monday, offering a series of steps to reduce the nation's chronic federal deficits by $2.2 trillion over 10 years. The GOP leaders gave ground by calling for $800 billion in deficit reduction through tax reform, including an unspecified amount from eliminating some deductions and loopholes. At the same time, they rejected the Democratic call for higher tax rates on wealthier Americans, contending the move would inhibit economic growth by raising taxes on small business owners, many of whom declare business profits on their personal income tax returns. The White House and Democratic leaders immediately rejected the Republican approach, saying it would require middle-class taxpayers to assume a greater burden while easing rates on the rich. "While their proposal may be serious, it is also a non-starter," Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid said Tuesday. "They know any agreement that raises taxes on the middle class in order to protect more unnecessary giveaways for the top 2% is doomed from the start." Conservative Republican Sen. Tom Coburn predicted rejection of the GOP proposal would doom any chance of an agreement. Opinion: GOP, break Grover Norquist's grip on you "I'm certain that if this is not good enough for the White House, we will go over the fiscal cliff," Coburn told CNN Monday night, adding the GOP offer was a compromise on taxes and spending compared to previous negotiations of the past two years. Another leading conservative voice in the Senate, Jim DeMint of South Carolina, criticized Boehner and other House GOP leaders for even offering more revenue as part of an agreement. "Republicans should not concede that the problem is not enough revenues," DeMint said Tuesday. "We need to continue to make the case that the government's too big, it's spending too much money and we don't need to be voting as Republicans to pay for the Democrat welfare state." The Republican offer was signed by Boehner, House Republican leader Eric Cantor and the chairmen of committees involved in budgeting and tax issues. All have taken part in the various rounds of negotiations with the White House and congressional Democrats since 2010, including failed deficit reduction talks, debt ceiling brinksmanship that sparked last year's unprecedented downgrade of the U.S. credit rating, and a special committee that was unable to reach agreement on a deficit reduction plan. Obama's re-election and Democratic retention of their Senate majority last month ensured their side's participants in the fiscal cliff talks would remain the same. The current negotiations take place amid the lame-duck session of Congress before the newly elected legislators arrive in January. Possible outcomes include an agreement now to avoid the fiscal cliff and devise a framework for further negotiations in the new Congress on a broader deficit reduction deal. Coburn, however, worried that politics will continue to trump reason in Washington. "I'm okay to compromise even on some of my issues if in fact we'll solve the problem," he said Monday night. "But what we have is a game being played ... for the extreme right wing and the extreme left wing in this country rather than coming together and leading and solving the problem." The GOP proposal includes $800 billion from tax reform, $600 billion from Medicare reforms and other health savings and $600 billion in other spending cuts, House Republican leadership aides said. It also pledges $200 billion in savings by revising the consumer price index, a measure of inflation. It followed a weekend of harsh exchanges between the sides, with each claiming the other wasn't sincere about striking a deal to avoid the fiscal cliff, a scenario many economists say would hurt the U.S. economy. Five ways to fix the fiscal cliff White House spokesman Dan Pfeiffer criticized the Republican offer for not meeting "the test of balance." "Until the Republicans in Congress are willing to get serious about asking the wealthiest to pay slightly higher tax rates, we won't be able to achieve a significant, balanced approach to reduce our deficit," Pfeiffer said. The White House has made clear Obama will veto any measure that fails to increase tax rates on the wealthy. However, aides have signaled a possible willingness to negotiate the specific rate increase. Republicans offered the plan amid pressure for a House vote -- which Boehner has so far prevented -- on the Senate measure. Democrats launched a procedural effort Tuesday to try to force a vote. While some Republicans have signaled their support for making sure tax rates stay at current levels for most Americans, the discharge motion by Democrats to essentially overrule Boehner's opposition to bringing up the Senate tax measure was expected to fail. "Out of 435 members of the House, we only need a couple dozen Republicans to sign the discharge petition," House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said in urging her colleagues to support the move. " ... Either sign the petition, urge the speaker to bring the bill to the floor, or explain to your constituents why you do not want them to have this $2,000 tax break." Listen: WWJD... about taxes? In line with his stances during his first term and reelection campaign, Obama's deficit-reduction plan would increase taxes by almost $1 trillion over 10 years, a significant portion of a $4 trillion overall deficit-reduction goal. It also would close loopholes, limit deductions, raise the estate tax rate to 2009 levels and increases tax rates on capital gains and dividends. The Obama plan includes $50 billion in stimulus spending for programs intended to create jobs, such as repairing roads and bridges. Republicans object to any increase in tax rates, even for the wealthiest Americans. Instead, they want additional revenue to come from broader tax reform that lowers rates but eliminates loopholes and deductions. Democrats respond that closing some tax loopholes for the wealthy would fail to generate enough revenue to contribute significantly to deficit reduction. Coburn, however, rejected that argument. "That's baloney," he said. "It's easy to get $800 billion out of the wealthy in this country by limiting deductions and taking away options that specifically benefit only the well-off in this country." Experts have said failing to reach a fiscal cliff deal and devise a framework for a broader deficit reduction package to be negotiated when the new Congress is seated in January will cause economic turmoil. The non-partisan Tax Policy Center estimates that middle-class families would pay about $2,000 a year more in taxes without action. The CNN/ORC International poll last week showed 56% of respondents said higher taxes were a fair tradeoff if it helps lower-income people, while 36% said taxes should be kept low to create jobs. Another survey, by ABC News and the Washington Post, showed two thirds of respondents support Obama's call for holding down tax rates for everyone except the wealthiest Americans. Defense companies see cuts coming even with a budget deal CNN's Ashley Killough, Adam Levy, Deirdre Walsh, Jessica Yellin and Greg Botelho contributed to this report.

Disability-compensation claims lag as ‘VA backlog’ worsens

By Bill Briggs, NBC News contributor The average wait time for wounded veterans to see their disability-compensation claims completed by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has now grown to 262 days — or nearly nine months — according to a federal website and three watchdog groups. VA Secretary Eric Shinseki earlier this year vowed to shrink the so-called "VA backlog" to 125 days by 2015 as the agency finishes transitioning to a digital processing system. Despite that promise, the claims-completion gap has expanded steadily during the past year. The VA's benefits-aspiration web page shows the average claims-processing time was 223 days in October 2011, 246 days in April 2012, 257 days in July and 260 days in August. In fact, the backlog has doubled in size since 2008, congressional members report. The agency called it widening claims backlog "unacceptable" but said it is taking steps to try to fix that problem. "VA has completed a record-breaking 1 million claims per year the last three fiscal years. Yet too many Veterans have to wait too long to get the benefits they have earned and deserve," the VA said in a statement emailed to NBC News on Tuesday. "That's unacceptable, and VA is building a strong foundation for a paperless, digital disability claims system — a lasting solution that will transform how we operate and eliminate the claims backlog. This paperless technology is being deployed to 18 regional offices in 2012, and it will reach all 56 VA Regional Offices by the end of 2013 to help deliver faster, better decisions for Veterans." The move to paperless processing "will ensure we achieve" Shinseki's 2015 goal, the VA said, adding: "Fixing this decades-old problem isn't easy, but we have an aggressive plan that is on track to succeed." In 2011, VA paid nearly $5 billion in compensation to wounded veterans, it reported.  The VA cited four reasons for what it calls "claims growth":  Increased demand — "the result of 10 years of war" and due to many veterans returning "with severe, complex injuries";   in 2010, Shinseki decided the VA claims system should include the recognition of medical conditions related to Agent Orange exposure (240,000 claims were processed in 2011 for such exposure) as well as "Gulf War Illness";  approximately 45 percent of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans are currently seeking compensation for injuries related to their service — and that marks a "historical high" for the VA following wars. Those claims include an average of eight to 10 medical issues per claim, more than double the Vietnam era; the VA says it is doing "better outreach" to veterans "to educate them about the benefits they've earned." Still, the thickening backlog drew fire from veterans advocates and from Capitol Hill. "These delays are indicative of a out-dated system," said Tom Tarantino, chief policy officer of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a nonpartisan, nonprofit group representing more than 200,000 veterans. "The Department of Veterans Affairs promises year after year that they'll reduce the backlog. Instead, it's gotten worse. While the reasons for this are complicated, the fact remains that these continuous delays greatly impact the daily lives of veterans who are waiting for care and benefits," Tarantino said. "Veterans deserve better." Last Wednesday, during a contentious hearing examining the VA's spending and larger accountability, Rep. Jeff Miller, R-Fla., chairman of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs, told VA Deputy Secretary Scott Gould "the truce is over" between Congress and Gould's agency. Miller became visibly frustrated during the hearing after Gould repeatedly said he could not or would not answer specific questions from committee members on spending and the agency's internal discipline over admitted ethical missteps. Told Tuesday that the claims backlog has nearly reached nine-months long on average, Miller said the wait time is another example of VA's failure to keep its promises to veterans. Click here for more military-related coverage from NBC News. "VA continues to tout its disability claims transformation plan to clean up the backlog by 2015. Without any details of the plan ... which continues to increase on a daily basis — and which has doubled in the past four years — I remain highly suspicious of any plan that claims to be able to reverse the problems in this process overnight," Miller said in an email to NBC News. "As Congress has said for many years now, VA needs to look at the root of the problem of the backlog — training, management, oversight, and technology — and work forward from those four points to address this problem," Miller added. "Quick fixes will no longer work, and will continue to make veterans wait months, sometimes years, on end for an answer." While the VA said its pilot paperless program has cut average processing times from 250 days to 119 days at those test offices, veterans in seven other cities were still waiting — as of October — longer than one year, on average, for their disability claims to complete their trek through the VA pipeline, according to the VA's online chart. Those cities — and the average claims-processing times in their VA regional offices are: Waco, Texas (418 days), Los Angeles (394 days), New York City (380 days), Chicago (378 days), Oakland (377 days), Indianapolis (373 days), and Phoenix (365 days), according to the VA site. In October 2011, no veterans were waiting more than a year, on average, for their disability claims to be processed, the VA site shows. In Waco, the average wait during October 2011 was 309 days. That means the backlog has increased in that city by 35 percent during the past year. "Despite promises of an improvement, veterans wait about three months longer than they did in May 2011. In fact, the VA's own numbers show the average wait time veterans face has gotten longer every single month over the last year and a half," said Aaron Glantz, a reporter with the Berkeley, Calif.-based Center for Investigative Reporting. The group keeps its own map, titled "Waiting For Help," which shows the backlog's highs and lows in individual cities. According to CIR's tally, 821,804 veterans now are waiting for their claims to be processed by the VA. That's actually a scrap of good news: it marks a slight decrease from in the number in that queue as compared to Aug. 25, when 899,000 veterans had compensation and pension claims pending.  CIR describes itself as "the nation's oldest nonprofit investigative reporting organization." Glantz acknowledges a personal interest in the backlog that stems from his years (2003 to 2005) working as a journalist in Iraq. "Ever since I returned home, I've been deluged with phone calls and emails from veterans who say they returned home from the war to face a battle with the government for the benefits they earned," Glantz said. "I've seen veterans fall into suicide and homelessness while they wait. "Today, I received a call from a female Iraq war veteran who is living on the street with her 20-month daughter," he added. "She has been waiting for two years for the VA to rule on her disability claim for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder." More content from NBCNews.com: Florida guide uses hunting as rustic therapy for combat veterans Google launches new website to guide veterans into civilian work force Fired-up congressional panel vows strict VA oversight PTSD may be overdiagnosed, but deniers 'wrong,' psychiatrist says Older vets to post-9/11 vets: 'We had it harder' Double amputee to potential congressional foes: 'Bring it' Hearing loss the most prevalent injury among returning veterans Follow US news from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook

As fighting subsides, little left in Aleppo

Rebel forces control most of Aleppo, Syria's largest city There is still sporadic fighting there Some residents have returned, others have only retrieved their belongings Food is in short supply and, as a result, prices have skyrocketed Editor's note: CNN's Arwa Damon and crew are some of the few international reporters in Syria, which has been restricting access of foreign journalists and refusing many of them entry. Read more from CNN inside Syria. Aleppo, Syria (CNN) -- In a small village outside of Aleppo where we are hunkered down for the night, our host apologizes profusely. He doesn't have enough blankets for us and it's bitterly cold. He and his family were forced to flee their home in the city to their unfurnished, humble residence in the countryside with nothing but the clothes they could carry. He spent 25,000 Syrian pounds -- around $300 -- to pay a truck driver just to bring out the bedroom furniture and a TV from their Aleppo home. He couldn't afford another run. We went to stay with his brother, who was also full of apologies because he couldn't offer us tea. The power was out and there was no cooking gas. Terror on Syria's front lines No defenses against chemical weapons Syrians return to homes, but is it safe? In the dark, we chatted about the situation in Aleppo, Syria's largest city. There, airstrikes have transformed buildings into heaps of rubble, and most of the city is now under rebel control. Many Aleppo residents fled when the fighting began, finding themselves crowded into relatives' homes or in refugee camps as winter set in. The bitter cold and financial hardships brought them back. Others, like this family, returned only to retrieve some belongings and then quickly left again. In Aleppo, the battle lines are fluid and, in some neighborhoods, snipers are a constant danger. Where the fighting has subsided, there are other threats. "The incredible cost of living is causing a lot of problems," our host's brother told us. "Criminality has gone up significantly. Each day we are catching thieves, even young boys. People are hungry and cold." Syrian refugees face brutal cold in Lebanon The cost of a canister of cooking gas in this village jumped from 450 pounds to 3,500 -- from about $5 to $45 -- and that's when it's available. "If the situation doesn't improve soon, people are going to start tearing each other apart," he laments. Skyrocketing food prices and shortages mean some Syrian children are eating only one small meal a day, if that. Residents in one Aleppo neighborhood have taken matters into their own hands, collecting money to buy food for the neediest -- but it's never enough. Children elbow and shove each other, the smaller ones trying to wiggle through for a ladleful of cracked wheat cooked in a huge vat in the middle of the street by the neighborhood volunteers. Amid the chaos, little hands try desperately to grab small bags of hummus passing overhead. A block away, residents clamor for bread. Fatme waited in line for three hours. She had fled Aleppo with her family, and returned a month ago when they thought it might be safe. They were wrong. Her husband was wounded by shrapnel in an explosion shortly afterward. "Of course I am afraid," Fatme said. "But what can I do? Are my children not going to eat?" Syria's chemical weapons 'deadly serious' A man inspects rubble in a neighborhood of Aleppo on Sunday, December 2. See photos of the conflict from November. The bodies of three children reportedly killed in a mortar shell attack are laid out for relatives to identify at a makeshift hospital in Aleppo on December 2. Smoke rises from fighting in the Hanano and Bustan al-Basha districts of Aleppo on Saturday, December 1. Syrian-Kurdish women and members of the Popular Protection Units, an armed opposition group to the Syrian government, stand guard during a comrade's funeral in a northern Syrian border village on December 1. Photos: Showdown in Syria Across the city, what were once staples are now luxuries. A child carries away two bowls with the burnt remains of the cracked wheat. It's all too much for one of the volunteers, Abu Abdo. "Until when are we going to live like this?" he cries. "Look, people are eating burnt food!" NATO chief echoes warning over chemical weapons Everywhere in Aleppo, there is evidence that the fighting has taken a heavy toll on the most vulnerable. Close to the bombed-out Dar el-Shifa hospital -- once the city's main field clinic, now a pile of debris -- families pick their way through rubble. Some stop and peer up at what is left, expressions of shock and deep sorrow etched across their faces. Few are able to comprehend what has become their reality. Hamza, 14, gathers with other children near a massive crater filled with grimy water from a burst water main, exploded in a blast a few days before. His parents sent him to fill a container with water after an airstrike cut off their supply. He speaks softly, his arm in a sling. "I was wounded in a strike in the village we fled to," he says simply. Gunfire rings out on the streets of Sakhour, an Aleppo neighborhood that regime forces hope to retake so they can cut off a main artery for opposition forces and reopen a route to Aleppo's airport. Amid the street fighting, a group of women invite me into a house, venting their frustrations and anger. "We know freedom has a price, but how long can we keep on living like this?" one woman asks. Another tells of how her roof caved in from an explosion. "Each time I hear one, I look up and expect to die." Syria shut down Internet, security firm says She and her family moved around three times before they ran out of money. "At least if there was work, anything, it would be a little easier," she says. We know freedom has a price, but how long can we keep on living like this? woman from Aleppo, Syria For many children here, gunfire has become background noise. Khawle, 12, sits on the sidewalk, cradling a neighbor's infant daughter. She doesn't move or stop talking as the gunfire intensifies, simply hugging the baby and rocking back and forth. Others flinch at the sound of each pop and blast of weapons. Every time Saleh Hadidi leaves his house, his 4-year-old daugher clutches his leg and begs him not to go. Metal rods protrude from his bandaged arm, a bullet wound he sustained at a government checkpoint that he says was meant for his daughter. "She was sitting in the front (of the car) when the gunfire started and I put my arm around her," he recalled. "She was drenched in my blood, and the soldiers were screaming, accusing me of being a rebel fighter. They held a gun to my head three, four times and she was screaming, 'Daddy!'" The girl flinches and clasps her hands, looking away as her father recounts that day. As we leave a woman whispers to me, "Sometimes I want to die rather than live like this." Journalist Ammar Cheikhomar contributed to this report.

'You killed Jesus' scrawled on Hanukkah menorah

View more videos at: http://nbcmiami.com. By Steve Litz, NBCMiami.com The Hanukkah menorah is a sign of peace and joy, symbolic of a miracle in the Jewish religion. But a menorah in Miami Beach, Fla., has also become an attraction for hate speech, with someone scribbling "you killed Jesus" on the base of the prominent Chabad Hanukkah display. Rabbi Zev Katz, who put up the menorah, is disappointed. "I hoped that people from other religions, we could all get along, we all have what we believe in, respect each other and live with each other," said Katz, of Chabad House in Miami Beach. For more, visit NBCMiami.com At Temple Beth Torah, in the Wellington community near West Palm Beach, there was more anti-Semitism this past weekend. In that incident, somebody painted a swastika along with some offensive words on a dumpster. The Anti-Defamation League condemned both incidents and reported them to the authorities. Desecration cases like these sometimes go unsolved, but authorities use such reports to track any possible hate crime trends. Unfortunately for Rabbi Katz, this isn't the first anti-Semitic attack against his giant menorah. "Twelve years ago someone smashed it, terrible, and we weren't sure if we're going to actually light the menorah the first night of Hanukkah," he said. But they did then, and they will again this Saturday night as Jews ring in the first night of Hanukkah. Organizers said they are expecting 1,000 people to attend. More content from NBCNews.com: Florida guide uses hunting as rustic therapy for combat veterans Police: Kansas City Chiefs linebacker kills girlfriend, then himself Cuba pushes swap: its spies jailed in US for American contractor held in Havana Passengers killed when tour bus hits Miami airport overpass Women warriors pass elite Army training course Teacher lured boys online to get nude pics, cops say 66 species of coral proposed for protection by US