In Gaza, Israel has launched a new offensive on the southern city of Khan Younis, attacking dozens of sites after warning people to flee but offering no safe alternative. This is a mother, fleeing yet again with her family.

Umm Raed Abu Elyan: “We are running from the fire. We are running with our children from fear.”

Journalist: “Where are you going now?”

Umm Raed Abu Elyan: “God knows. We are walking now. They said to go to the humanitarian areas, but there is no safe place here in Gaza. It is all destroyed and damaged.”

In Gaza City, multiple children were among at least 15 Palestinians killed in more Israeli strikes targeting schools. At least 30 others were wounded.

Palestinian man: “These are your targets, Netanyahu? Children? Only God can help us. He was playing at Abdel Fattah School. He is an innocent child. They say we are terrorists. Look what Netanyahu is doing. Look at the Arab world. Only God can help us.”

Amid the mounting death and destruction, leaders of Qatar, Egypt and the U.S. have called on Israel and Hamas to return to ceasefire talks. The official death toll in Gaza is nearing 40,000, but the true toll is likely far higher.

In election news, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz addressed the United Auto Workers in Wayne, Michigan, Thursday, where they appeared alongside UAW President Shawn Fain. The UAW has endorsed the Democratic ticket in the November election. This is Kamala Harris.

Vice President Kamala Harris: “And, look, even if you’re not a member of a union, you better thank unions for that five-day workweek. You better thank unions for that eight-hour workday. You better thank unions for that vacation time. So I’m here to say thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you to the sisters and brothers of UAW for all you are and all we will do over these next 89 days.”

In Florida, Donald Trump held a rambling press conference from Mar-a-Lago, where he attacked Harris and made a number of false claims, including that nobody was killed in the January 6 Capitol insurrection and that Democrats believe in killing babies.

Donald Trump: “The Democrats are really the radical ones on this because they’re allowed to do abortion on the eighth and ninth month and even after birth.”

Despite these comments, Trump downplayed the issue of abortion in the upcoming election. Trump also claimed he almost “went down” in a helicopter ride with former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown and that Brown said “terrible things” about Kamala Harris. Willie Brown quickly refuted both these lies. Trump also claimed he had the largest rallies, at one point comparing his January 6 “Stop the Steal” rally to Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech on the National Mall.

Also on Thursday, Trump agreed to debate Kamala Harris on ABC News on September 10 and called for two additional debates. Harris told reporters she was glad her opponent had finally agreed, adding, “Hope he shows up.”

In other campaign news, Kamala Harris’s national security adviser Phil Gordon denied reports that Harris would consider an arms embargo on Israel. The embargo is a key demand of Palestinian rights defenders. We’ll have more on this later in the show with Layla Elabed, co-chair of the Uncommitted National Movement.

In more election news, the consumer advocate group Public Citizen called out the Federal Election Commission Thursday after the agency announced it will not regulate AI “deepfakes” in political ads before November. Public Citizen called it a “shameful abrogation of [the FEC’s] responsibilities.” The group pointed to a recent post by X owner Elon Musk showing an AI-altered image of Kamala Harris. Musk’s post was in violation of his company’s own rules against posting misinformation without context.

Tech giants Microsoft and Palantir announced they are merging their government cloud computing and AI tools to service U.S. defense and intelligence agencies. Palantir’s clients include Immigration and Customs Enforcement, various police departments and the government of Israel.

In Texas, Republican Governor Greg Abbott signed an executive order Thursday requiring hospitals to obtain patients’ immigration status. Abbott claims the move would help Texas calculate the cost of providing healthcare to immigrants. Rights groups slammed Texas’s latest attack on immigrant communities, which is likely to face legal challenges. The Border Network for Human Rights in El Paso blasted Abbott for “using immigrants as scapegoats for his failed policies and political frustrations.”

Here in New York, a 63-year-old climate activist and musician was arrested Thursday and now faces up to seven years in prison for performing a piece by Bach during a protest outside the headquarters of Citibank. John Mark Rozendaal, a professional cellist, was arrested alongside 14 other peaceful protesters, who encircled Rozendaal to shield him from the police while he performed in the public plaza. Rozendaal spoke briefly before he started playing Bach’s “Suites for Cello.”

John Mark Rozendaal: “We’re here for freedom of speech. I’m playing music here today because we are taught that the purpose of music is to sober and quiet the mind and make it susceptible to divine influences.”

His words were interrupted as his fellow activists urged him to start playing as police approached. The protest was part of the “Summer of Heat on Wall Street” campaign, which has been targeting Citibank with peaceful demonstrations all summer. Some 500 people have been arrested since the actions started.

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus has been sworn in as head of Bangladesh’s caretaker government just days after the ouster of Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina following weeks of student-led protests. Yunus, a longtime critic of Hasina, took the oath during a ceremony at the presidential palace in the capital Dhaka Thursday.

Over a dozen other members of Yunus’s Cabinet were also sworn in, including two students who led the uprising against Hasina: Nahid Islam and Asif Mahmud. Adilur Rahman Khan, a prominent Bangladeshi human rights advocate who was sentenced to two years in prison by Hasina’s government, will also be an adviser in Yunus’s interim government. Muhammad Yunus, known as the “banker to the poor,” was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for his work developing microloans. For more, we’ll go to Dhaka after headlines.

In Tunisia, President Kais Saied has fired Prime Minister Ahmed Hachani, replacing him with Tunisia’s social affairs minister, just one year after Hachani assumed the role. It’s the latest shakeup by President Saied in what critics have labeled a constitutional coup and power grab. It comes ahead of Tunisia’s October 6 presidential election, where Saied’s top opponents have been jailed or barred from running. Earlier this week, five presidential election candidates were sentenced to prison, including Abir Moussi, a prominent Saied critic, who was sentenced to two years on charges she insulted the election commission.

In Japan, Nagasaki is commemorating 79 years since the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city, killing an estimated 74,000 people, just days after the U.S. killed 140,000 people when it dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima. This is Nagasaki Mayor Shiro Suzuki.

Mayor Shiro Suzuki: “With no end in sight for Russia’s conflict in Ukraine and fears that the violence in the Middle East may expand, we are currently faced with the possibility of losing the peace we have long taken for granted.”

This year’s ceremony was marked by a diplomatic row after Nagasaki’s mayor declined to invite the Israeli ambassador. In protest, U.S. Ambassador Rahm Emanuel and other Western envoys boycotted the ceremony.

In Thailand, the recently disbanded Move Forward opposition party has regrouped and announced it is now operating as the People’s Party.

Natthaphong Ruengpanyawut: “Without a doubt, we must win the 2027 election. In the next election, our goal is not just to be the leading party like in the 2023 election, but to win and form a single-party government. … The term 'people' in our party’s name is not just a name. According to our slogan, 'by the people, for the people,' we aim to create a country where ultimate power truly belongs to the people.”

The anti-establishment, youth-led Move Forward party won the most seats in the 2023 election but was blocked from taking power.

Catalonia’s Parliament on Thursday confirmed socialist Salvador Illa as head of Catalonia’s new government, ending more than a decade of rule by the separatist movement. Illa is an ally of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.

Illa’s election was said to be upstaged by the surprise vanishing of Catalan separatist leader Carles Puigdemont after he spoke at a rally in Barcelona Thursday and then evaded arrest by fleeing to Belgium. Spanish authorities are demanding explanations from police about how Puigdemont was able to return to Catalonia and then go into exile again.

In Venezuela, President Nicolás Maduro has blocked access to the X social media platform for 10 days amid rising tensions over the disputed results of last month’s presidential election. Maduro accused his rivals of weaponizing the platform against him and accused X owner Elon Musk of spreading hate.

In other developments, Venezuela’s Supreme Court found opposition candidate Edmundo González, who claims he won the election, to be in contempt of court after he ignored a court summons mandating his presence for an audit of the election. This comes as Venezuela’s top prosecutor is launching a criminal probe into González and fellow opposition leader María Corina Machado after the pair called on the military to abandon its support for Maduro and stop cracking down on protesters. Meanwhile, Chile’s leftist President Gabriel Boric said he “does not recognize Maduro’s self-proclaimed victory.”

Back in the U.S., Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker has called on Sangamon County Sheriff Jack Campbell to resign over his mishandling of the fatal July shooting of Sonya Massey, a 36-year-old Black woman. One of Campbell’s deputies shot Massey in her own kitchen after she called 911 for help. Sean Grayson, who is white, has been charged with first-degree murder.

This comes as newly released records show several emergency calls were made from Massey’s home regarding her mental health in the days leading up to the fatal shooting. In one call to 911, Massey’s mother, Donna Massey, reported her daughter was having a “mental breakdown.” Donna Massey goes on to tell the dispatcher, “I don’t want you guys to hurt her,” and said she feared a police officer who is “prejudiced” would be sent to her daughter’s home.

Today marks 10 years since the police killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. His death sparked an uprising led by the Black Lives Matter movement in Ferguson and across the U.S. Brown had graduated high school just eight days before his killing. Brown’s mother Lezley McSpadden was interviewed recently by GMA3, where she said she is still seeking justice for her son. This is part of that interview.

DeMarco Morgan: “How would you like for your son, your baby, to be remembered?”

Lezley McSpadden: “As a great big brother. All of his siblings love him. He would have been a great contribution to this world, had his time not been cut short.”

Brown was killed by white police officer Darren Wilson, but a grand jury and a federal investigation cleared Wilson. St. Louis County Prosecutor Wesley Bell, who just defeated Congressmember Cori Bush in a closely watched primary, also refused in 2020 to press criminal charges against Wilson.

Today, Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights is set to present Brown’s case before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on behalf of Brown’s mother.