From okay goes groundbreaking videos. To the web sir web series creaty star trek fans. We talk to the creators in friday arts. We begin tonight with concerns over a growing threat from the Islamic State group. The United Kingdom raised its terror alert level to severe today. That means they believe an attack there is highly likely. But the white house says there are no plans to raise the threat level in the u. S. Libby casey reports. John, the u. S. Puts the number of citizens who have traveled to syria since the time this issue began to 400. The British Government raised its level from substantial to severe. That means the that an attack is highly likely but not imminent. Prime minister David Cameron said, it would make it easier to take passports away from people traveling to syria. To stop those who do go from returning and to deal decisively from those who are already here. Ill be making a statement in the house of commons on monday. This would stop people from traveling and new legislation to make it easier to take peoples passports away. Reporter this comes a week after the release of a video of james foley by what appears to be a british citizen. We have been shocked by the voice of what increasingly seems to have been a british terrorist recorded on that video. It was clear evidence not that any more was needed that this is not some foreign conflict thousands of miles from home that we can hope to ignore. Reporter the u. S. Is not raising its security level. Secretary of Homeland Security, jay johnson put out a statement saying that at present the u. S. Department of Homeland Security and the fbi are unaware of any specific credible threat to the u. S. Home land from i. S. I. L. But he did warn that the Islamic State group also known as i. S. I. L. Remains a serious threat. Obama Administration Press secretary josh ernest says there are heightened challenges. One observes fro observations that part of the british concern is according to published reports there are a number of individuals who have gone to the region to fight i. S. I. L. The reports of american citizens is somewhat lower. Reporter the National Security council confirmed the death of dig lak mc Douglas Mcarthur mccain. While the u. S. Still says its weighing its options, air strikes continued in frawk, destroying four Islamic State vehicles near the mosul dam. That brings the number of air strikes in iraq this month to 110 and thats in addition to the humanitarian relief provided to the yazidi people. John. Libby casey. Trained u. S. Military personnel head of deployments in afghanistan and in pakistan and you are in washington tonight, welcome. Frohana can you hear me . Yes, i can. Terrific. Let me start by asking you this. Do you sense that the Islamic State needs in some way to strike the United States or the west soon . I dont think that i mean, as a white house officials have indicated, there certainly is no imminent threat to the United States this point. That doesnt mean there isnt grave concern. But i think that there has been a pattern of americans taking part in terrorist organizations dated as far back as is the sophie yesophiesoafyet. C. Air strikes alone wont defeat the enemy. A much fuller response is demanded from the word. Syrian opposition are facing i. S. I. S. On the front lines, we need to disrupt and degrade i. S. I. S. s capabilities and we must strengthen our own defenses in cooperation in protecting our people. The president also says we need to strengthen regional allies. Who is he talking about and what needs to be done . Well, i think theres been a great deal of discussion in the news media and also within the u. S. Government about allied forces and while a great deal of attention has been on supplieding Kurdish Forces and supplying weapons and advisory training to the iraqi army that is still a long term process. In fact there needs to be congressional budget and support for that which probably wont take place until 2015. What is a short Term Solution . There are other what i call outside actors which is part of this policy of engagement. By that i mean you have gulf countries. You have the larger middle east. If you look at the other fighters, as much as theres attention on the westerners, about 3,000 european nationals that are taking part within the Islamic State, you have to take a look at the majority of the fighters are actually coming from the arab countries, tunisia, lebanon, jordan, other south Africa States including egypt. These are the countries that have a stake in a stable iraq and syria. The United States has been caught flatfooted after 9 11, in some cases with intelligence, is it like starting over again with the Islamic State or not . Well, the Intelligence Community has its limitations and particularly in this instance. When you look at the chaotic situation like syria, cia assets can only come in and out of the country. There arent well established forces and of course in order to gain force to target and identify the terrorist threat you really need good intelligence on the ground and thats one of the greatest limitations in this war. Iraq is another story. I would like to go back and say that one of the things that is lack in the vacuum in iraq is also the partnership that was established when merrick spent more than a decade in iraq with the sunni tribes. The maliki government had isolated and marginalized them to the extent that now they became part of the terrorist network that is posing a great threat today. Frahana stand by, i want to carry on our conversation further. The biggest concerned how this group having a convention will affect. Bisi onileere has more. Reporter many people have been talking out against the Islamic State and what it stands for. Theres a shared feeling the Islamic State does not represent the majority of muslims. A lot of people here saying this group is unjust and inhumane. This group is attracting thousands of muslims from across the country here to detroit and a lot of them have strong opinions about i. S. I. S. The u. S. Recently identified nearly dozen americans who have joined rebel forces in syria. I have the opportunity to speak to oan organizer to an organizer here about a troubling report and efforts to combat recruiting. I home that they dont target the lone wolf disenfranchised muslims that are not with the main muslim community, who feel they need meaning in life for going overseas and joining this group. Reporter organizers say that is far from the truth they are about peace and unity. This is a four day event. It features workshops as well as a number of speakers including former president jimmy carter and michigan governor rick schneider. Bisi onileere al jazeera, detroit. Lets bring back frahana kazi. How can muslims across the world fight the Islamic State . The Islamic State has a very Important Message and that message is centered around the message of charity. We need help from you, come help our brothers fight the Assad Government which is corrupt and evil. That message is considered very legitimate to many muslims. That message i wouldnt say that americans would necessarily sympathize with it but they would understand that message. The counternarrative would be that that war and that fight is unislamic. In other words that terrorist organization, the Islamic State is use unislamic means and is not representing islam itself. Therefore it is an illetting jihad. I think most americans have a hard time understanding the recruits, the people who left america to go fight. What dont we know about this group and these recruits . I think a lot of attention has been paid on the Islamic State, slick online recruitment campaign, their use of twitter and other websites such as justpasted, where theyre able to post their videos, to particularly new muslim converts. I would say this is not a new tactic, not innovative, we have seen this before when we think of al qaeda or John Walker Lind who joined the taliban. I would say that this was able to find individuals who just came to islam. They this is an identity struggling. These individuals struggle on the one hand with am i loyal to the west or should i be loyal to islam . If im loyal to islam, particularly if you are a recruit and a convert to the faith, should i not go and fight in favor of islam . Not only those predisposed to violence but new muslim converts who feel that they have now that theyve suddenly come to this faith or a sense of greater belonging and purpose, they have to go to the middle east and they have to explore islam. This is a carbon pattern among many particularly american male muslim converts. Its hard for many of us to understand. Frahana its great to have you on the program. Thank you very much. Thank you. We have much more on the Islamic State coming up, at the half hour, 11 30 issue, 8 30 passage. Now to the growing issue of the ukraine, no doubt russia has sent weapons into the territory. Simon mcgregor wood has more. Natos met in executive session. The language was strong. Despite moscows hollow denials, it seems true that russian equipment has crossed over into eastern and southeastern ukraine. This is not an isolated action but part of a dangerous pattern. Reporter on thursday, nato produced these Satellite Photos which proved that Russian Troops and equipment are now operating on ukrainian soil. One day a move to join nato would infuriate russia. Reintroducing eastern ukraines cause to becoming a part of nato. It was ukraines desire to strengthen their ties to europe that has begun this issue. Significantly he hypotheticalled any decision ukraine took would be respected. Each and every nation has an inherent right to decide itself on Security Policies and its alliance affiliations. Reporter in moscow, the russians are still denying everything. It was Sergey Lavrovs turn, he poured accusations on this. Not once have facts been presented to us. There have been reports of photographs from space showing Russian Troops but as it turned out it was a computer game and the images were taken from there. Reporter europes Foreign Ministers are meeting in milan. Tightening and widening sanctions on russia is a real possibility. Eu officials on saturday in brussels will express their support by hosting ukraines petro poroshenko. Simon mcgregor wood, al jazeera. Paul brennan takes us to a small strategic city on the black sea. Reporter novoazovsk is a small city on the black sea. The fighters who now occupy it refuse to be filmed. The residents were almost as reticent. But a few were prepared to express their fears. Translator im worried. I want everything to be fine. I want to have everything in order, and peaceful sky above us. Reporter ukraine uh and its western and its western allies, combined force of separatist fighters and regular russian soldiers. Effectively a russian invasion. For at least three days now the separatist militia of the donetsk peoples republic have been in charge of novoazovsk. People who are concerned should get in touch with local militia commandant. The checkpoint which is much closer to mariupul. What is unclear is what the ultimate ambitions are. Still 10 kilometers from novoazovsk, the crossing is open and the fighter calling himself the frenchman showed evidence of recent fighting. The fighters deny they are from russia. Translator there are no russians here. Theres no russian equipment coming through here. Were fighting with the machinery the Ukrainian Army abandoned. Reporter in their path lies the important city of mariupul, helping the Ukrainian Army dig defensive trenches at the city limits. But having presented what it says is comelings evidence compelling evidence, still reluctant to respond with direct involvement of their own. Paul brennan, al jazeera, novoazovsk. News this evening, that ebola has spread to a fifth west african country. At a hospital in dakkar senegals capitol receiving treatment. But the virus is mutating. Tarek bazil reports. One of two other labs in the country equipped to test for ebola was closed this week after a member of staff caught the virus. The new facility has only been open a few days but already its in high demand. In the past you would like to test ebola you would have to send specimens overseas. The test results would be issued only after a few days or sometimes even after a week if not even longer pfer. Here wafter we receive the specs we can issue the results within three to five hours. Reporter in guinea u. N. Agency unicef has donated motor bikes to the workers to deal with outbreaks. It has already changed the lives of thousands of children. You can imagine that there are thousands of children who are made vulnerable by the ep dem it. Reporter if its epidemic. Reporter Clinical Trials in the u. S. Are likely to start in the u. S. Next week. In u. K. Next month. Vaccine testing is up to ten years. Glaxo smith kline says it hopes to finish the first test vaccine. The chimpanzee virus and two human test virus have shown to be safe. The ebola virus is mutating fast and this could blunt the effectiveness of diagnosic test. Youve got to be careful when you first put it into humans to make sure above all that its safe, that there are no unexpected adverse reactions. And thats the reason you go in very slowly with very few people and you follow them carefully. Reporter with a number of new cases in guinea, sierra leone and liberia so far, the w. H. O. Warns it could take months to years to bring this under control. Californias new plan to safely and humanely keep inmates behind bars. What could be one of the 3 million syrian refugees. Call. The United Nations is calling on cs concluded minorities especially African Americans are unfairly targeted. The u. N. Panel says the shooting of an unarmed black teenager by a white policeman in ferguson, missouri is not isolated. The death of 18yearold Michael Brown sparked several weeks of protest and violence. Also today this Police Officer who was suspended for pointing a semi automatic rifle at ferguson residents has resigned. Ray al bers wabers was put on indefinitely leave when the cell phone video went viral. Heufneds police chief has houstons police chief has asked for funding to put knowledge helmet cameras on his officers. Cruel and unusual punishme punishment. Jennifer london reports. Reporter in the California State Prison system they call this a forcible extraction. Inmate a as this mentally ill prisoner is called has refused this is inmate i. Guards say he too refused orders to take medication so force was needed to remove him from his cell. They were trained to do just what they did but that is what is horrific to me. No one was disciplined for that. They acted according to the rules. Reporter michael bean served as lead counsel representing the 35,000 mentally ill inmates in the collaboration lawsuit in Class Action Lawsuit in the California Department of corrections. Video has aired what has now been determined a violation of inmates rights of cruel and unusual punishment. How people are treated people with disabilities and Mental Illness in our system. And i think people are revolted by what they saw. Reporter the videos and photos like this one showing inmates in changes were all part of beens case but its not just use of force in the prisons that were challenged in court. Here at the California Medical Facility outside scroavment, mentally sacramento, inmates are held in isolation. Without group therapy, the use of day rooms or access to prison yards. Prison Officials Say this kind of treatment is sometimes necessary. Sometimes things dont go the way we want them to go and a mentally ill inmate may turn violent. In situations like that, staff are are allowed to escalate and use pepper sprays. Videotapes are very, very troubling but there are a lot of other issues going on too. About not getting adequate care, not having proper Suicide Prevention protocols and so on. There needs to be an attitude change and there needs to be a real commitment by the state to really fix these problems. Reporter last december, staff said they were making steps to improve. But to ensure all inmates especially the mentally ill are treated fairly. Jennifer london, al jazeera, sacramento, california. Coming up a show of force from the mexican government. A new military development is on the streets of towns, why they may not feel safer. And the trend to go small when it comes to apartments. This is al Jazeera America. Im John Siegenthaler in new york. Coming up, the u. K. On high alert over the Islamic State. The potential threats to the u. S. Plus fighting back against drug cartels. The new heavily armed troops on the streets on small town mexico. And smaller cheaper apartments. Why the trend might cost big City Residents in the long run. Our top story tonight, britain has raised its terror alert to severe because of the risk posed by the Islamic State group. The are Prime Minister of of this country says the group is even greater threat than al al qaeda. The return could bring violence to europe and other parts of the world. But the white house says there are no plans to raise the u. S. Terror threat level now. Add at i since 81 judge, the operation is to since june. Jonathan betz joins us with more on that, jonathan. John, the United Kingdom is very worried about its citizens going to syria and returning home launch ugh attacks. As britain raises its alert level. We will respond calmly and with purpose. Reporter the United States is taking a very different approach. It is my understanding now there are no plans to change it. Reporter growing threat over the Islamic State group. It is one we have been monitoring and focused on for quite some time. Reporter the white house says its strategy is voxg. Other than 100 air strikes in iraq, pentagon says the approach must go beyond military involvement. The threat that i. S. I. L. Poses. Cure for the depression is you have to submit reporter 3,000 westerners have joined the fight in syria many with nor american or european passports. That does give them freedom of movement that could allow them to come back to the west and carry out acts of violence. Reporter especially troubling for United Kingdom, 500 of their citizens are thought to be in england, much more than the 100 americans believed to be there. But of the 100 americans believed to be there, only five have been located. Biggest threat to the u. S. Since 9 11. You cant rule out anything with these individuals. And thats certainly the way the Intelligence Community is playing it. Theyre not taking any chances on any of them. They recognize that each and every one of them could be a serious threat. Reporter tracking these fighters in chat rooms but a big issue seemed to be social media. Many are silent and those are of particular concern to the authorities, john. Thanks jonathan. Four strikes near the mosul dam, destroyed several vehicles. 110 air strikes have been carried out across iraq since the beginning of august. The United Nations is attempting to negotiate the release of 44 peace keepers that were abducted by the armed syrian group yesterday, on the syrian side of the golan heights. Violence continues unchecked inside syria, make stability inside the region unachievable. The u. N. Is calling the crisis in syria the biggest humanitarian crisis of all time. Another 6. 5 million are displaced within the country. That is nearly half of all syrians forced to abandon their home in order to survive. U. N. Says it costs over 3. 7 billion to take care of those refugees. After being abandoned, she came here with her two sons for fear theyd get detained in syria and left her husband and daughters behind. This is where they start their lives as refugees. They have been handed some basic items and now theyre on their way to see where theyre going to live for what could be an extended benefit. She is disappointed when she gets to her prefabricated home because it has no flooring. Unable to construct cement floors, refugees are expected to cover the sand with plastic sheeting. Her first day, she session she is also facing grim she says she is facing grim challenges. First i have to get used to living in this home. Then i have to get used to my neighbors. I may not feel comfortable with them and im worried. Reporter the vast refugee camp could become the largest in the world. A lot of effort went into the planning of the camp but it needs much more funding to become fully operational. The camp is four months old and the 11,000 refugees living here still dont have electricity. The plan was to provide this service in all the prefabricated units but the group has not received enough International Aid to do so. Translator the most important things are we need electricity and proper flooring for our homes. If we dont get these i expect many people here will return to syria. The u. N. Refugee agency says it will have to scale down if the u. N. Does not properly support refugees. But the large number of refugees around the world is not helping either. The issue is with mushrooming around the world, including this one, we are affected by this. Reporter the fact that 3 million syrians are anonymity displaced outside their country is depressing and the political solution for the conflict also seems a remote possibility. Al jazeera, el zara camp. Comes after a wave of kidnappings in some unexpected places. Rachel levin reports from via brava, mexico. Reporter this is last place you would expect these men and women instead of the usual tourists and mexican elite in these streets its soldiers. Thats why in the past month, more than a dozen kidnappings were reported and a new federal police force is being deployed to stop the violence. They are called the gendamerie. They are tasked with assistance. Robbery extortion and kidnapping. Reporter this has always been a Family Community and one of the safest just outside of mexico city. So when Business Leaders started getting kidnapped the federal government started to worry. Fear is keeping many people from enjoying the clear lake and the alpine forests. In the 20 years since gerberto has been serving fresh seafood, he has never had so few customers. Business is down almost 50 . Its been a well kept secret that we have been suffering from violence in a while. The town looks peaceful but if you go to the outkids sometimes you find dead bodies. We dont know why i. T. Took the authorities so long to deploy. Reporter the gendarmerie, Campaign Promise of making mexico safer. But miguel worries that the president s strategy is nothing new. Its been months since the military has been deployed and still not buying luxury speedboats because theyre too scared of drawing attention of criminal gains. Unfortunately were in mexico, doesnt mean well see results, nobody has much faith in the authorities. Making a mission that federal forces say they cant afford to lose. Rachel levin, al jazeera, via de brava mevava mexico. Sent to the border on august 11th by the texas governor, rick perry and they say they will not be paid until september 5th. All next week were going to give you a comprehensive look at the immigration issue and tonight we want to give you a preview of what youll be seeing for one county in southern texas it is a problem compounded by dying grants and a declining police force. Heidi zhoucastro reports. Reporter four deputies who patrol an area nearly the size of rhode island. They, along with a meager staff of dispatchers are the life line for 911 calls from the desert. Too often the caller is dead by the time theyre found so why so many bodies here, 80 miles north of the border . Well, the u. S. Border checkpoint down the highway is key. The sheriff says smugglers will drive immigrants no further than this point, and here is where they will take away through the rough terrain. The nearest town is 15 miles away. I get everything that comes through. But because Brooks County doesnt actually touch the border, it doesnt have authority to deal with what comes across the border. So it sells vehicles. This is the Sheriffs Office dealership. Yes, this is my dealership. 40 go up for auction this last month. This probably brings about 3,000. The money keeps the Police Department live but even this speaks of death. Our one hour special five days along the border airs at 8 00 and 11 00 eastern time. Icelands barbarbunga volcano created a fissure opening, pilots should beware anyway. A much more dramatic explosion from papoa, new guinea. No injuries reported. Some of the ash could move into Australian Air space. Some of the new microapartments have gotten so small they barely fit a bed. Yet Real Estate Developers are rushing to keep up with demand. Now as duarte jeraldino tells us. Evan takes pride in his 295 square foot apartment in upper east side. He rents it for 1800 a month. I had to get it before anyone put their papers in. Reporter as of july, the median apartment rental is 2400 per month. Evan pays more, before zoning regulations wert put into effect, prohibiting developers from creating apartments less than 400 feet. Entire building composed of 55 microunits. At between 260 and 350 square feet, these apartments will be so small they are built in a brooklyn factory and whether complete they are droafn into manhattan and stacked on top of each other. Were standing in whats going to be the hallway. Theyll pay between 949 to 1240 a month. When the units are joined they will have noise transference dead anything in between. It forces an upward escalation in land prices and in urban areas you know one of the Biggest Challenges in producing be Affordable Housing at the time cost of the land. Sarah watson disagrees. Because of the lack of little apartments, single people are forced to get a roox merritt. If its a roommate. The landlord can get much more money for that unit than if a family is representing. Cities around the country are jumping on a microband unit. This unit has two bedrooms and living room and kitchen for less than 630 square feet. Next on the news. To peter, dot dot dot, ringo starr. Coming up next. Next. Finally weve had an eruption from a volcano, the fisher eruption and the ash fall that came from this, it was so minuscule that we didnt see it on the radar. So this is good news. There are some cautious measures being taken for flights coming in and out of iceland. At this point in time, we are not expecting a problem. We expect the winds from leftover hurricane cristobal, saturday night to sunday and that is when the winds would have the potential if there is any ash to push the winds over land from the west to the east. As we get closer to monday the winds will be more be favorable to push any ash fall out over water. But at this point were watching closely. Its good to know weve had some activity there. Certainly as we talk the activity in the United States, labor day, watch out for special storms in the northwest, louisiana, arkansas, mid part of the weekend saturday strong storms with potential of tornadoes in the upper midwest. Al Jazeera America continues. Every friday we introduce you to some of the countrys most talented artists, it is part of our friday arts segment, from peter max and susan strohman. Bold strokes are the signature of peter max and they burst open when you visit his studios. Love peace and the paint strokes of peter max. That is his poster from 1967, the summer of love, it catapulted him to fame and made him a lasting intom o lasting s. The swami and everything is a symbol of this love the planet, love the people you dont even like. And one day i decided to do love and my love lady here, it became a very famous poafer and it became a very iconic image. I painted my good good friend jimi hendrix, you see him with the guitar . I do. Hendrix, the beatles, the stones created the sound track for the 60s and peter max created it. Ive had anybody you can imagine has been up here. How is it that you connected with soful musicians . Because woodstock became a symbol of the culture. All these amazing people. We walked by a piano that you gave to ringo . Ringo, ringo came to me and asked me a few years ago to paint opiano. By total coincidence ridgeo came up to ringo came up and asked, can i have a paintbrush . Its ringo love dot dot dot. An ocean line are. The biggest ship in the world, couldnt believe it when it was this big a little bit bigger, i painted it and they loved it. How do you see your place in history . I dont look at it from that point of view very much and its like hard you know, its like hard to sometimes look at things that are supposed to fleece the ego, you know . But please the ego, you know . But i know i always became popular and bring beautiful things to the planet and i hope it continues. So you come up with the music, you record the music and then you do the video, and whats the process . I mean basically i think we make our music and our videos in a pretty similar way. We tried to to put ourselves in this situation with a lot of stuff to play with. You know when were in the studio thats the instruments and core progressions and beats and lyrics. We basically throw a whole bunch stuff together and feel where the emotions are coming out of it. Once in a while you get luis and fury and other things coming together in an amazing bit of saalchemy. We can come up with any project and chase it there. Needing and getting is one of my favorites. It was made originally for the super bowl commercial. But are the sounds that we hear, actually the sounds that were made while you were making that video . Yes. Technically they are the sounds that were made while i mean thats all live what they call diagenic sound. However, there were 20 mics in the car. When we did the final mix there were like seven or 8 bits together can you give an impression of what it sounded like in the cars. It was actually like pabub qween. For 1929 its of course the charleston. But also the anchor yog reaf of the 1920s. Vargas girls, and you see the lamps with the grirl girls holde large balls in their hands. You do that, you do the research and working on the music, we have a wonderful, talk about how the dance should go and then he takes that music and opposite it up for the and opens it up for the dance. I work it out in the room first and then i get the dancers in front of me and teachivity to them. Are you under nowadays compared to 20 years ago, when it comes to a big show like this, the pressure to succeed and the pressure to have a hit because its not easy to produce a show and its not inexpensive. Its a initialing that the musical gets there. Its now different because of the financing. You need a star . What is it take . You know it takes a good story i think. Happy birthday scotty. That is a clip from star trek continues. Thats generating a huge trekie following on its own. How do you communicate with these people . Well, a lot of social networking tools that you would imagine. Facebook, twitter, startrek, its not out of a desire to make a lot of money. Its not born out of a desire to be famous. Its born out of a childhood almost an innocent passion for something that meant so much to you when you were young. You can see how much fun that were having and how much care we put into this overwhelm production. Every Single Person on it loves this ar this genre this area. I think that resonates with all our fans. This is a very special program. Certainly youve made a connection with trekie friends out there. Good luck to all of you and well live long and prosper. And to you. Thanks a lot. Some of our segments on friday night. Thats our program, thank for watching. Im John Siegenthaler. Hope you have a Great Holiday weekend, see you back here next weekend. Al Jazeera America presents. Labor day marathons our government is allowing an invasion our most acclaimed series. Back to back to back. Toughest place. I call that a lot of hard work for next to nothing the system. A Justice System run by human beings can run off the rails and borderland. A lot aof people havent got a clue what goes on near the border al Jazeera America presents labor day marathons this is not over. Velet the. Welcome to the city of culiacan sinaloa, a place that is known as the cradle of drug trafficking. Ahead of you lies a treacherous border crossing. People have died there and so were like practically walking into a death trap. This is the most dangerous part of your trip. So the first day dont kill ki, its the third day that