Stranded motorists were pulled from cars stuck on flooded Northern California roads as thunderstorms arrived Sunday as part of a massive winter storm that could be the biggest to slam the region in more than a decade.
Crews cleared trees and debris following mudslides caused by steady rain accompanying the system that could dump 15 inches in foothill areas as it gained strength throughout the day. Several feet of snow was expected at higher elevations in the Sierra Nevada.
Authorities reported rescues in Marin and Sonoma counties, including an operation along U. S. 101 where several people were plucked from submerged vehicles. No injuries were reported.
Officials urged residents to avoid driving through standing water and to stay off rural roads, where rescues could be difficult.
All roads leading to Yosemite National Park’s valley floor remained closed amid fears that the Merced River could overflow its banks and cause major flooding.
« It’s kind of surreal how empty the park is. There’s nobody here, » said Gary Kazanjian, a freelance photographer who spent the night in Yosemite and drove out Sunday as part of a caravan of stragglers.
Authorities were watching rising water levels of several Northern California rivers, including the Cosumnes, Truckee, American and Russian.
Forecasters also warned of strong winds. A woman was killed Saturday by a falling tree on a San Francisco Bay Area golf course. Firefighters on Sunday rescued a man pinned under a toppled tree in Golden Gate Park. The homeless man had minor injuries and was taken to a hospital to be checked.
The storm surge stretching all the way from Hawaii — called an atmospheric river — comes as California enters its sixth year of drought. Each drop of rain is welcomed, but officials said several more big storms are needed to replenish depleted groundwater supplies.
The strong wet season began in October with more rain falling than in three decades, mostly in Northern California. Los Angeles, which will likely get the brunt of the latest system early Monday, is experiencing its wettest winter in six years, forecasters said.
The storm’s relatively mild temperatures will drive up the snowline to above 9,000 feet throughout the Sierra Nevada, causing runoff in the lower elevations, said Zach Tolby, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Reno, Nevada.
Flooding could rival the winter of 2005-06 that sent 5 feet of water into an industrial area in Sparks, Nevada. Crews worked to secure storage drums filled with hazardous materials to stop them from floating away as they have in past floods.
Another storm is forecast for Tuesday and with the ground already saturated, rain won’t seep into the soil quickly enough and extra runoff could end up in already swollen rivers and creeks, officials said.

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The four soldiers killed in Sunday’s deadly vehicular ramming attack in Jerusalem were identified as 20-year-old Lt. Yael Yekutiel of Givatayim; 22-year-old cadet Shir Hajaj of Ma’aleh Adumim who was posthumously promoted to lieutenant; 20-year-old cadet Shira Tzur of Haifa, posthumously promoted to second- lieutenant; and 20-yearold Erez Orbach of Alon Shvut, posthumously promoted to the rank of second-lieutenant.
A statement from Moshe Savile, acting head of the Gush Etzion Regional Council, said that “at this moment we are all with the Orbach family. The family has been has long been engaged in public activities and unfortunately this is not the first time the extended family is dealing with pain and loss.
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A little over a year ago, Alon Shvut lost another victim to an act of terrorism, and now we are dealing with losing another member of its community to a senseless act of terror. The Gush Etzion family embraces the family.”
Hajaj was serving in the intelligence force, and was a top student at her high school in Ma’aleh Adumim. She had three sisters, one older and two younger. She will be buried at 2 p.m. on Monday in Jerusalem’s Mount Herzl military cemetery.
Sec.-Lt. Erez Orbach’s funeral will take place on Monday at 11 o’clock at the cemetery in Kfar Etzion.
The funeral of Lt. Yael Yekutiel will take place Monday at the capital’s Kiryat Shaul cemetery at 3 p.m.
The funeral of Second Lt. Shira Tzur will take place Monday at Haifa’s military cemetery at 2 p.m.
The families of Orbach and Tzur requested that their funerals be closed to the press.
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There has been an increased security presence at airports across the country this weekend after a shooting at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport left five people dead and another six people injured.
The suspected gunman, Esteban Santiago, a 26-year-old former National Guard soldier, flew from Anchorage, Alaska, connecting through Minneapolis and on to Fort Lauderdale on Friday morning with a gun legally checked in his luggage. He allegedly told the FBI that he took that gun and loaded it in a bathroom of Terminal 2 at the Fort Lauderdale airport and then opened fire in the baggage claim area.
At New York City airports, Port Authority Police deployed officers with heavy tactical weapons, positioned armored vehicles outside terminals, stepped up K-9 patrols and increased random bag checks.
In Los Angeles, police went into « high visibility mode » with officers patrolling terminals with long guns.
Boston Logan maintained a rigorous security plan, including tactical units, commercial vehicle inspections and roadway blockades.
Airports as varied in size as Philadelphia, Minneapolis, Tampa and San Diego have increased visible security on what’s called the « soft side » of the airport — those public areas before Transportation Security Administration checkpoints like check-in counters and baggage claim areas.
In the wake of terror attacks last year in those public parts of airports in Brussels and Istanbul and a shooting at a TSA checkpoint at LAX in 2013, some security experts have suggested that a consistent presence of specially trained, armed officers stationed in those areas could help.
« It could serve not only as a deterrent but also speed up response times should a situation arise such as the one that occurred in Fort Lauderdale, » John Cohen, a former counterterrorism coordinator at the U. S. Department of Homeland Security and ABC News contributor said.
The TSA’s responsibility for airport security begins and ends at the TSA checkpoint. Areas before the checkpoint are left to local authorities to patrol and secure.
« Local airport authorities should make it a priority to have uniformed law enforcement officers patrolling these nonsecured areas, » Cohen said. « These officers should be trained to recognize the behaviors of an individual who may be planning or preparing to carry out an attack and should also be trained to respond to a mass casualty attacker or active shooter. « 
Airports nationwide declined to say how long passengers could expect to see these enhanced security measures remain in place, citing security concerns.

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Following are key dates in the battle for Syria’s Aleppo where fierce fighting resumed on Wednesday in a blow to hopes for the peaceful evacuation of the last rebel-held areas.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump in Las Vegas. (File)
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Washington – President-elect Donald Trump accepts the conclusion by U. S. intelligence agencies that Russia tried to interfere in the election that will soon put him in the White House, a top aide said on Sunday.
« He’s not denying that entities in Russia were behind this particular campaign, » incoming chief of staff Reince Priebus said.
That’s more than Trump himself has said, and he hasn’t responded to calls for Washington to retaliate.
Those are decisions, aides said, that Trump will make after he becomes president on January 20, though he and some of his Cabinet nominees could face sharp questioning this week.
Intelligence officials allege that Moscow directed a series of hacks in order to help Trump win the White House in the race against Democrat Hillary Clinton. Trump has expressed scepticism about Russia’s role and declined to say whether he agrees that the meddling was done on his behalf.
« I think he accepts the findings, » Priebus said.
Warm relations with Russia a ‘good thing’
On Friday, US intelligence officials briefed the president-elect on their conclusions that the Kremlin interfered in the 2016 election on Trump’s behalf. Priebus attended along with Trump.
In an interview with The Associated Press after the briefing, Trump said he « learned a lot » from his discussions with intelligence officials, but he declined to say whether he accepted their assertion about Russia’s motives. Trump has said he warm relations with Russia are a good thing and that only « stupid » people would disagree.
« My suspicion is these hopes will be dashed pretty quickly, » Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. « The Russians are clearly a big adversary. And they demonstrated it by trying to mess around in our election.”
Criticism for Trump – from Republican
An unclassified version of the report directly tied Russian President Vladimir Putin to election meddling and said that Moscow had a « clear preference » for Trump over Clinton.
Trump and his allies have bristled at any implication that the meddling helped him win the election. He won the Electoral College vote with 306 votes, topping the 270 votes required to become president.
Accepting those findings would be a positive step, but not enough, said GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who is calling for more penalties against Russia.
« He’s going to be the defender of the free world here pretty soon, » said Graham, a frequent Trump critic. « All I’m asking him is to acknowledge that Russia interfered, and push back. It could be Iran next time. It could be China.  »
Defence Secretary Ash Carter also called for a balanced response by the Trump administration that could be part cyber, part military.
« There has to be a response, » he said.
News conference
Trump hasn’t said whether he’s contemplating any response. Priebus and another Trump adviser, Kellyanne Conway, suggested on Sunday that is a decision ahead.
The developments come during a consequential week for Trump, who will become the nation’s 45th president on January 20.
On Wednesday, Trump is expected to hold a long-delayed news conference on how he’s organising his global business empire to avoid conflicts of interest while he’s president. He has taken sporadic questions and done interviews, but it’ll be his first full-fledged news conference since July 27.
Beginning on Tuesday, the Senate is to hold the first of at least nine hearings this week on Trump’s Cabinet picks — a pace set by the Republican majority. Democrats have complained it’s too fast. The government ethics office says several of Trump’s choices have not completed a full review to avoid conflicts of interest.
Trump has tried to play down the allegations against Russia, alarming some who see a pattern of scepticism directed at US intelligence agencies and a willingness to embrace Putin.
On Friday after receiving a classified briefing on the matter, Trump attempted to change the subject to allegations that hadn’t been raised by intelligence agencies. « Intelligence stated very strongly there was absolutely no evidence that hacking affected the election results. Voting machines not touched!  »
He then declared in a series of tweets on Saturday that having a good relationship with Russia is « a good thing, not a bad thing ». Trump added: « Only ‘stupid’ people or fools » would come to a different conclusion.
Trump had earlier had urged Americans to get on with their lives. Graham took issue:
« Our lives are built around the idea that we’re free people. That we go to the ballot box. That we, you know, have political contests outside of foreign interference.  »
WikiLeaks
There has been no official comment from Moscow on the report, which was released as Russia observed Orthodox Christmas.
US intelligence officials have said that Russia isn’t done intruding in US politics and policymaking.
An unclassified version of the intelligence report said the Russian government provided hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee and Clinton’s campaign chairperson, John Podesta, to the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks.
The website’s founder, Julian Assange, has denied that it got the emails it released from the Russian government. The report noted that the emails could have been passed through middlemen.
Russia also used state-funded propaganda and paid « trolls » to make nasty comments on social media services, the report said. Intelligence officials say Moscow will apply lessons learned from its activities in the election to put its thumbprint on future elections in the United States and allied nations.
The public report was minus classified details that intelligence officials shared with President Barack Obama on Thursday.
Priebus appeared on Fox News Sunday, Carter and Graham on NBC’s Meet the Press, and McConnell was interview on CBS’s Face the Nation.
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