CBS News
At least 187,000 Gaza children vaccinated for polio so far, U.N. says
United Nations officials on Wednesday hailed limited pauses in the fighting between Israel and Hamas to allow children’s polio vaccinations as rare moments of hope in the nearly yearlong war in Gaza.
The U.N. World Health Organization says 187,000 children in Gaza have been vaccinated for polio, with an eventual goal of 640,000. WHO and its partners launched the campaign this week after Gaza recently reported its first polio case in 25 years — a 10-month-old boy — now paralyzed in a leg.
The boy’s mother, Neveen Abu El Jidyan, told CBS News in an interview last week that she has been able to do very little for her son, Abdul Rahman, since he contracted polio.
“We haven’t given him any treatments. We live in a tent and there is no medication,” El Jidyan, 35, told CBS News on Aug. 27.
“Abdul Rahman was supposed to take his vaccination on the first day of the war, and our home was targeted and his medical booklet was left at home,” she said. “As we were moving from one place to another, I couldn’t give him the vaccination.”
Israel has said the vaccination program will continue through Monday and last eight hours a day.
EYAD BABA/AFP via Getty Images
Top U.N. officials on peacebuilding and humanitarian affairs spoke Wednesday at a meeting requested by Israel, which was backed by its allies, veto-holding permanent council members France, Great Britain and the United States. Israel’s ambassador on Wednesday focused on the hostages taken during Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks on Israel that launched the war and the recent killing of six captives.
Algeria, which sits on the 15-member council until next year, also requested that the U.N. body meet to discuss the broader situation in the Palestinian territories.
Both Rosemary DiCarlo, U.N. undersecretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs, and Edem Wosornu, director of the Operations and Advocacy Division at the U.N.’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, spoke about the polio-inspired pauses in fighting as rare rays of hope, as did the representatives of France, Britain, the U.S. and other nations.
“It does not have to be this way. Indeed, over the past few days, there have been signs that humanitarian objectives can inspire positive steps,” Wosornu told the council.
“This vaccination campaign demonstrates that it is possible to allow humanitarian actors to act on the ground,” French Ambassador to the U.N. Nicolas de Rivière told the council. “That must become the rule.”
Health officials expressed alarm about diseases spreading in the besieged territory as the war has created a humanitarian catastrophe, with people crammed into squalid tent camps and dirty wastewater flowing through the streets.
Ambassador Samuel Zbogar of Slovenia, which is president of the Security Council for September, told reporters on Tuesday that there is “a rising anxiousness in the council” about the lack of a cease-fire and hostage release deal to halt the violence.
The Security Council approved a resolution in June endorsing a cease-fire plan aimed at ending the war, with Russia abstaining.
“It has to move, one way or the other,” Zbogar said about fulfilling the deal or finding other options.
The Oct. 7 Hamas attacks killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took about 250 people hostage. The Israeli military’s retaliation has killed over 40,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its count.
Watch CBS News
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.
A picture is emerging of the suspect who officials say pointed a high-powered rifle at former president Donald Trump on a Florida golf course Sunday afternoon.
Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, was armed with an AK-47-style rifle and was 300-500 yards away from Trump when members of the former president’s Secret Service detail spotted him, according to Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw. Routh was a few holes ahead of where the president was golfing at the Trump International Golf Course in West Palm Beach, officials said.
Members of the Secret Service detail opened fire at Routh, according to law enforcement officials. It’s not clear if Routh fired any shots. Bradshaw said a witness saw a man jumping out of the bushes and fleeing in a black Nissan. The car was pulled over and the driver detained and identified as the suspect. Law enforcement found the rifle, a scope, two backpacks with ceramic tile and a GoPro camera in the bushes at the scene.
The FBI and U.S. Secret Service are investigating the incident, which the FBI said “appears to be an attempted assassination of former President Trump.”
As the investigation continues, here’s what we know about Routh:
Stephany Matat / AP
A decades-long criminal history
Routh’s most recent address is listed in Hawaii, but he spent most of his life in North Carolina, according to property records. Routh owned Camp Box Honolulu, a shed-building company, according to his LinkedIn profile. The account also says that he studied at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University and graduated in 1998.
Records show his problems with the law go back to the 1990s and include less serious charges, like writing bad checks. But in 2002, he was charged with a felony — possession of a weapon of mass destruction — according to North Carolina Department of Corrections records.
Between 2002 and 2010, Routh was also charged with a number of misdemeanors, including a hit-and-run accident, resisting arrest and a concealed weapons violation, records show.
Suspect criticized Trump online
Routh voted Democratic in the 2024 primary election in North Carolina, and he voted in person, according to the North Carolina State Board of Elections. He appears to be registered as an unaffiliated voter.
His X account, which has now been suspended, included a number of posts about Trump.
“@realDonaldTrump While you were my choice in 2106, I and the world hoped that president Trump would be different and better than the candidate, but we all were greatly disappointment and it seems you are getting worse and devolving,” he wrote in a June 2020 post. “I will be glad when you gone.”
He also referenced the July 13 assassination attempt on Trump in multiple posts, suggesting that President Biden and Vice President Harris should visit the injured and attend the funeral of the Pennsylvania rally-goer who was killed.
A Facebook account under Routh’s name was no longer online on Sunday evening.
Ukraine supporter
Routh was passionate about fighting for Ukraine, even traveling overseas to fight in the country’s war against Russia in 2022.
“I am coming to Ukraine from Hawaii to fight for your kids and families and democracy.. I will come and die for you,” he wrote on X.
In one post on LinkedIn, he shared a photo of himself in Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital.
A CBS News review of Routh’s social media shows his pro-Ukraine views seeped into his public statements as well. He urged people, even those who didn’t have military skills, to take up arms for Ukraine. He was interviewed by several news organizations, including The New York Times and Semafor in 2023, and Newsweek Romania in 2022. He was quoted about his efforts to recruit volunteer fighters to aid Ukraine in its fight against Russia’s invasion, though it wasn’t clear whether he had succeeded.
“This is about good versus evil,” he told Newsweek Romania.
contributed to this report.
Watch CBS News
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.
