Good morning. We’re covering climate change in Australia, a Times investigation into U.S. airstrikes in Syria and a possible motive for the assassination of the Haitian president.

Climate crises batter Australia

Many of the same areas that suffered through the Black Summer bush fires in 2019 and 2020, the worst in the country’s recorded history, are now dealing with prodigious rainfall during the wettest, coldest November since at least 1900.

Hundreds of people across several states have been forced to evacuate. Many more are stranded on floodplain islands with no way to leave except by boat or helicopter, possibly until after Christmas.

And with a second year of the weather phenomenon known as La Niña in full swing, meteorologists are predicting even more flooding for Australia’s east coast, adding to the stress from the pandemic and a recent rural mouse plague of biblical proportions.

Quotable: “It feels constant,” said Brett Dickinson, a 58-year-old wheat farmer who lives in northwest New South Wales, about a six-hour drive from Sydney. “We’re constantly battling all the elements — and the animals, too.”

Related: The planet is getting its own “black box” in case climate change destroys humanity. The steel vault — which will be located in Tasmania, an Australian island state — will create an archive that could be critical to piecing together the missteps that led to our self-destruction.

U.S. unit killed Syrian civilians

A single top secret American strike cell launched...

Read Full Story: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/12/briefing/your-monday-briefing-flooding-in-...