AP News in Brief at 11:04 p.m. EDT

Death toll rises from Helene while supplies are rushed to North Carolina and Florida digs out

PERRY, Fla. (AP) — Authorities struggled to get water and other supplies to isolated, flood-stricken areas across the U.S. Southeast in the wake of Hurricane Helene as the death toll from the storm rose to nearly 100.

A North Carolina county that includes the mountain city of Asheville reported 30 people killed due to the storm, and several other fatalities reported in North Carolina Sunday pushed the overall death toll to at least 91 people across several states.

Supplies were being airlifted to the region around the isolated city. Buncombe County Manager Avril Pinder pledged that she would have food and water into Ashville — which is known for its arts, culture and natural attractions — by Monday.

“We hear you. We need food and we need water,” Pinder said on a Sunday call with reporters. “My staff has been making every request possible to the state for support and we’ve been working with every single organization that has reached out. What I promise you is that we are very close.”

Officials warned that rebuilding from the widespread loss of homes and property would be lengthy and difficult. The storm upended life throughout the Southeast. Deaths also were reported in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and Virginia.

___

An Israeli airstrike hits central Beirut for the first time in nearly a year of conflict

JERUSALEM (AP) — The first apparent Israeli airstrike on central Beirut in nearly a year of conflict leveled an apartment building early Monday, hours after Israel hit targets across Lebanon and killed dozens of people as Hezbollah sustained heavy blows to its command structure, including the killing of its leader, Hassan Nasrallah.

The airstrike hit a multistory residential building, according to an Associated Press journalist at the scene. Videos showed ambulances and a crowd gathered near the building in a mainly Sunni district with a busy thoroughfare lined with shops.

The airstrike killed at least one person and wounded 16, said an official with Lebanese Civil Defense, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. He said the person killed was a member of the al-Jamaa al-Islamiya, or the Islamic Group, a Sunni political and militant group that is allied with Hezbollah.

The group is not known to have played any meaningful role in the current conflict between Israel and Hezbollah.

A Palestinian leftist faction in Lebanon said three of its members were killed in the airstrike. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine said in a statement early Monday that its military and security commanders in Lebanon, and a third member were killed in the attack.

___

Who were the 7 high-ranking Hezbollah officials killed over the past week?

BEIRUT (AP) — In just over a week, intensified Israeli strikes in Lebanon killed seven high-ranking commanders and officials from the powerful Hezbollah militant group, including the group’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah.

The move left Lebanon and much of the Mideast in shock as Israeli officials celebrated major military and intelligence breakthroughs.

Hezbollah had opened a front to support its ally Hamas in the Gaza Strip a day after the Palestinian group’s surprise attack into southern Israel.

The recent strikes in Lebanon and the assassination of Nasrallah are a significant escalation in the war in the Middle East, this time between Israel and Hezbollah.

Lebanon’s most powerful military and political force now finds itself trying to recuperate from severe blows, having lost key members who have been part of Hezbollah since its establishment in the early 1980s.

___

Harris trolls Trump at an LA fundraiser full of celebrities, says her crowds ‘are pretty big’

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris poked at Republican Donald Trump during a fancy fundraiser on Sunday, telling donors that as she campaigns around the country her “crowds are pretty big” — before heading to Nevada for a rally at the same venue where the GOP nominee appeared two weeks ago.

During the presidential debate, Harris appeared to get under Trump’s skin when she said people were leaving his rallies early because of his rambling speeches. And she’s kept it up on the campaign trail.

She also has moved into what Trump considers his terrain — immigration — with a Friday visit to the border town of Douglas, Arizona. It was her first trip to the U.S.-Mexico border since taking over for President Joe Biden atop the Democratic presidential ticket.

Harris’ four-day West Coast trip has been crafted with dual purposes: She was opening and closing with stops in Sun Belt battlegrounds — Arizona and Nevada — where the vice president is trying to shore up support as Trump pounds her relentlessly over illegal migration. And her mid-stay in California was devoted to hauling in campaign contributions from donors in her blue home state.

Harris’ border visit in Arizona seemed to irk Trump. The GOP leader has spent two days railing about the vice president during his rallies, upping his personal attacks against her, claiming she was responsible for a border “invasion,” and stirring up unfounded fears that she’d usher in lawlessness if elected.

___

Austria’s Freedom Party secures first far-right national election win since World War II

VIENNA (AP) — The Freedom Party secured the first far-right national parliamentary election victory in post-World War II Austria on Sunday, finishing ahead of the governing conservatives after tapping into anxieties about immigration, inflation, Ukraine and other issues. But its chances of governing were unclear.

Preliminary official results showed the Freedom Party finishing first with 29.2% of the vote and Chancellor Karl Nehammer’s Austrian People’s Party was second with 26.5%. The center-left Social Democrats were in third place with 21%. The outgoing government — a coalition of Nehammer’s party and the environmentalist Greens — lost its majority in the lower house of parliament.

Herbert Kickl, a former interior minister and longtime campaign strategist who has led the Freedom Party since 2021, wants to be chancellor.

But to become Austria’s new leader, he would need a coalition partner to command a parliamentary majority. Rivals have said they won’t work with Kickl in government.

The far right has benefited from frustration over high inflation, the war in Ukraine and the COVID-19 pandemic. It has also built on worries about migration.

___

Stuck NASA astronauts welcome SpaceX capsule that’ll bring them home next year

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — The two astronauts stuck at the International Space Station since June welcomed their new ride home with Sunday’s arrival of a SpaceX capsule.

SpaceX launched the rescue mission on Saturday with a downsized crew of two astronauts and two empty seats reserved for Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who will return next year. The Dragon capsule docked in darkness as the two craft soared 265 miles (426 kilometers) above Botswana.

NASA switched Wilmore and Williams to SpaceX following concerns over the safety of their Boeing Starliner capsule. It was the first Starliner test flight with a crew, and NASA decided the thruster failures and helium leaks that cropped up after liftoff were too serious and poorly understood to risk the test pilots’ return. So Starliner returned to Earth empty earlier this month.

The Dragon carrying NASA’s Nick Hague and the Russian Space Agency’s Alexander Gorbunov will remain at the space station until February, turning what should have been a weeklong trip for Wilmore and Williams into a mission lasting more than eight months.

Two NASA astronauts were pulled from the mission to make room for Wilmore and Williams on the return leg.

___

Behind the loudest issues, the UN is a world stage for disputes that are often out of the spotlight

The world’s greatest stage is the sprawling Midtown Manhattan complex where leaders meet each year to discuss humanity’s future.

The United Nations’ most powerful body — the Security Council — is paralyzed by disputes, so this year’s most varied speeches were delivered before the 193-member General Assembly.

Like the 15-nation Security Council with its five vetoes, the UNGA devoted much time to the Middle East, Russia, Ukraine and Sudan. But the more democratic institution also turned global attention to topics little-known outside individual countries and regions.

A look at some of the issues that countries brought to the world stage — or ignored — during their time on the global stage:

Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo spoke Tuesday and asserted that his country is moving beyond its dark past of U.S.-backed dictatorship, civil war and human-rights violations, saying that “corruption drowns its roots in a past of authoritarianism, repression and political violence … but we’re freeing ourselves.” He turned to Ukraine, Gaza and Sudan, U.N. reform and migration before focusing on a definitively local issue, the longstanding border dispute between Guatemala and Belize.

___

Trump escalates attacks on Harris’ mental fitness and suggests she should be prosecuted

ERIE, Pa. (AP) — Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump escalated his personal attacks on his Democratic rival, Kamala Harris, on Sunday by repeating an insult that she was “mentally impaired” while also saying she should be “impeached and prosecuted.”

Trump’s rally in Erie, Pennsylvania, took on similar themes as an event one day earlier that he himself described as a “dark speech.” He told a cheering crowd Sunday that Harris was responsible for an “invasion” at the U.S.-Mexico border and “she should be impeached and prosecuted for her actions.”

“Crooked Joe Biden became mentally impaired,” he added. “Sad. But lying Kamala Harris, honestly, I believe she was born that way. There’s something wrong with Kamala. And I just don’t know what it is, but there is definitely something missing. And you know what, everybody knows it.”

With just over a month until the election, Trump is intensifying his use of personal and offensive attacks, even as some Republicans say he’d be better off sticking to the issues.

His suggestions that political enemies be prosecuted are particularly notable for their departure from norms in the U.S. in which the justice system is supposed to be protected from political influence. In recent weeks, Trump has threatened prosecutions of Google for allegedly giving priority to “good stories” about Harris and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

___

Kris Kristofferson, singer-songwriter and actor, dies at 88

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Kris Kristofferson, a Rhodes scholar with a deft writing style and rough charisma who became a country music superstar and an A-list Hollywood actor, has died.

Kristofferson died at his home on Maui, Hawaii, on Saturday, family spokeswoman Ebie McFarland said in an email. He was 88.

McFarland said Kristofferson died peacefully, surrounded by his family. No cause was given.

Starting in the late 1960s, the Brownsville, Texas native wrote such country and rock ‘n’ roll standards as “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down,” “Help Me Make it Through the Night,” “For the Good Times” and “Me and Bobby McGee.” Kristofferson was a singer himself, but many of his songs were best known as performed by others, whether Ray Price crooning “For the Good Times” or Janis Joplin belting out “Me and Bobby McGee.”

He starred opposite Ellen Burstyn in director Martin Scorsese’s 1974 film “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore,” starred opposite Barbra Streisand in the 1976 “A Star Is Born,” and acted alongside Wesley Snipes in Marvel’s “Blade” in 1998.

___

AP Top 25: Alabama overtakes Texas for No. 1 and UNLV earns its 1st ranking in program history

Alabama returned to No. 1 in The Associated Press college football poll for the first time in two years on Sunday following its dizzying victory over Georgia, making this 16 of 17 seasons the Crimson Tide has held the top spot at some point.

UNLV, unbeaten through four games for the first time in its Division I history, cracked the rankings for the first time ever just days after losing its starting quarterback over a NIL dispute. The Rebels are tied for No. 25 with Texas A&M.

Alabama received 40 of 63 first-place votes and leapfrogged three teams to take over No. 1 from Texas, which tussled with Mississippi State deep into the second half as a five-touchdown favorite and slipped to No. 2. The Longhorns got 19 first-place votes, well off last week’s 44.

Ohio State remained No. 3 with four first-place votes. Tennessee, which had an open date, moved up a spot to fourth. Georgia, whose only three losses since 2021 have come to Alabama, dropped to No. 5.

Oregon, Penn State, Miami, Missouri and Michigan rounded out the top 10.