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Army Major General, Troops Quarantined After Ebola Aid Trip
Nearly 7 in 10 Americans are angry at the direction the country is headed and 53% of Americans disapprove of President Barack Obama's job performance, two troubling signs for Democrats one week before the midterm elections, a new CNN/ORC International Poll shows.
Democrats are battling to try and save the Senate majority, while hoping to prevent more losses in the House, which the GOP controls by a 234 to 201 margin.
In the Senate, Republicans need a net gain of six seats, and several state polls in the past month of contested races show that Democrats are in danger of losing control of the majority, and thus Congress. Currently, Democrats control the Senate by a 55-45 margin with two of those seats held by independents that align themselves politically with Democrats.
Libya Evacuation Decision 'Minute by Minute,' U.S. Official Says
The U.S. military has doubled the number of aircraft standing by in Italy if needed to evacuate Americans from the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli, Libya, CNN has learned.
A decision to evacuate as violence in the Libyan capital grows is "minute by minute, hour by hour," a defense official told CNN on Monday.
Fierce fighting swept across the city Sunday after armed men stormed the country's interim Parliament. Sporadic bursts of gunfire and blasts could still be heard on the outskirts of the capital Monday evening.
The violence appeared to be some of the worst since the 2011 revolution that ousted longtime leader Moammar Gadhafi.
In a move that could further inflame an already tense situation, the speaker of the interim parliament, Nuri Abu Sahmain, who is backed by Islamist forces, ordered troops known as the "Central Libya Shield Forces" to deploy to the capital Monday, the Libyan state news agency LANA reported.
The forces, mostly from the city of Misrata, east of Tripoli, are considered to be among the most powerful Islamist-affiliated militias. They have had long-running rivalries with the heavily armed Zintan militias when both groups were based in the capital.
Meanwhile, the Saudi ambassador to Libya announced that his country's embassy and consulate in Tripoli closed Monday because of the violence, and the staff has left Tripoli, according to the official Saudi Press Agency. The sites will reopen when the situation stabilizes, Ambassador Mohammed Mahmoud Al-Ali said, according to the report.
Turkey took similar measures, shutting down its consulate in Benghazi, Turkey's semi-official Anadolu news agency reported.
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U.S. Suspends Public Operations at Embassy in Yemen
Citing recent attacks, the United States on Wednesday announced that it has suspended public services at its embassy in Sanaa, Yemen.
"Due to recent attacks against Western interests in Yemen, we have temporarily suspended operations of our Embassy in Sana'a to the public," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement. "We continue to evaluate the security situation every day, and we will reopen the embassy to the public once it is deemed appropriate."
She described the move as a "precautionary step."
The temporary suspension of operations is due to a reemergence of a threat from several weeks ago that the United States thought it had disrupted, according to a U.S. official with specific understanding of the current situation.
A credible threat to the U.S. Embassy emerged around March, the official said, in the same time frame that a video appeared showing some 100 al Qaeda operatives in Yemen, including several who had broken out of jail the month before.
The United States thought that threat had been disrupted by a number of Yemeni actions, including, but not directly related to a series of U.S. drone strikes and Yemeni military operations in early April.
But in recent days, the threat stream has reemerged, the official said. It is currently assessed to be credible and somewhat specific in terms of the embassy being the target, according to the source.
The United States is still attempting to corroborate the threat and determine whether there is a specific time and date, as well as any other specific locations.
A second U.S. official said the suspension of the embassy activity was based on credible information about threats to Western interests. The senior official was not sure whether the threat was embassy-specific. There have been no evacuations of the embassy.
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Pressure Mounts for U.S. to Help Find Kidnapped Nigerian Schoolgirls
The United States is offering its help, but making clear that the Nigerian government must take the lead in finding more than 200 schoolgirls kidnapped by the Islamist militant group Boko Haram.
Officials told CNN the Obama administration is sharing intelligence with Nigerian authorities and could provide other assistance, but there is no planning to send U.S. troops.
With a World Economic Forum gathering set to begin Wednesday in Abuja, the Nigerian government came under mounting pressure to save the girls abducted in the country's remote northeast and threatened with being sold into slavery.
On a trip to Africa, Secretary of State John Kerry said the United States "will do everything possible to support the Nigerian government to return these young women to their homes and to hold the perpetrators to justice."
In Washington, U.S. officials offered few specific details on American help being provided.
"We are going to keep working with the Nigerians privately on that," State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf told reporters. "Obviously they have come out very publicly and said that they are, you know, making every effort to find these girls. I just don't think we are going to outline how we are helping them. What we are focused on is making sure they can find (the girls) and bring them home to their families."
See the latest on this story on "Early Start."
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Official: Navy SEAL Team Pulled Out When It Couldn't Capture Suspect Alive
U.S. Navy SEAL Team Six pulled out during a raid in Somalia to capture suspected Al-Shabaab leader Ikrima when it became clear that he couldn't be taken alive, a senior U.S. official told CNN.
"Their mission was to capture him. Once it became clear we were not going to (be) able to take him, the Navy commander made the decision to withdraw," said the official, who has direct knowledge of the entire Somalia operation but declined to be identified publicly.
The official said the SEALs faced heavy opposition and an intense firefight broke out, leading to the withdrawal.
The mission's aim - to capture Ikrima - is the reason the team went in rather than using a drone to attack the heavily guarded seaside villa, the official said.
Another U.S. official told CNN the Navy SEALs reported seeing children at the compound, part of the reason the mission was stopped during the firefight.
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