Honey Boo Boo Gets Trashy and Some Really Cute Dumb Ways to Die

We realize there’s only so much time one can spend in a day watching new trailers, viral video clips, and shaky cell phone footage of people arguing on live television. This is why every day The Atlantic Wire highlights the videos that truly earn your five minutes (or less) of attention. Today:

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So, we’re not quite sure what kind of spirit moved artist Jason Mecier to create a Honey Boo Boo portrait from 25 pounds of trash. But it did. And we’re thankful (sort of?): 

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And thank god for YouTube. Besides going to America’s shopping malls, how else would we find terrible parents and gullible children? And how else would we know that we were entertained by these fascinating creatures? 

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RELATED: ‘What Makes You Beautiful’ Gets Beautiful

Now that the Dark Knight trilogy is over, aren’t you in the mood for something lighter? Another prequel? How about a fan-made video (which we’re guessing took hours and hours and footage from the 90s and beyond) which imagines all Dark Knight‘s characters in high school?

OMGosh Melbourne Metro this is like the cutest video on earth! You guys are adorable, like we’re talking totes adorable squeeeee—Oh wait. We take that back. We take all of it back. 

Wireless News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Buzzmakers: Lindsay Lohan Comes Clean & Janeane Marries

What had ET readers buzzing this week?

1. Janeane Garofalo: I Didn't Know I was Married!

Sometimes what happens in Vegas actually does stay in Vegas -- at least for two decades. Funny girl Janeane Garofalo is claiming she's been married for 20 years, and didn't even know it!

The Reality Bites actress told the New York Post that she and Big Bang Theory producer Rob Cohen decided to wed at a Las Vegas drive-thru chapel but never thought it would stick. "Rob and I got married, for real, which we had to have a notary dissolve not 30 minutes before we got here tonight," Garofalo said at the New York Comedy Festival reunion for The Ben Stiller Show. "We were married for 20 years until this evening."

Garofalo, 48, further explained, "We got married drunk in Vegas. ... We dated for a year, and we got married at a drive-through chapel in a cab. [We thought], 'You have to go down to the courthouse and sign papers and stuff.' So, who knew? We were married, and apparently now that [Rob] is getting married for real, his lawyer dug up something." Cohen, 63, joked, "I'm gonna get all of that Reality Bites money!"

2. Miley Cyrus: My Dad Knows Nothing

In speaking with ET's Christina McLarty, Miley Cyrus cleared up rumors that she and fiance Liam Hemsworth were planning multiple weddings, started by her dad.

According to Miley, she hasn't even set one wedding date, let alone the three ceremonies that Billy Ray told Us Weekly were going to take place.

"My dad knows nothing," Miley says, pointblank. "I think he's getting cabin fever from [Superstorm Sandy]. He got stuck in his hotel and now he's making up crazy things." Billy Ray has been in NYC, performing in a Broadway production of Chicago.

The 19-year-old singer/actress goes on to admit that the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

"He does what I do: When he's sitting in a press thing, he's like, 'Let's make this fun. Let's make some stuff up,'" Miley says.

Even with this recent flub, Miley does thank her parents for doing a good job of raising her, saying, "My parents have never been super strict, and people could think that's bad or good, but people that judge me or say that I'm, like, crazy -- they don't know half the stuff their kids are doing."

3. Stephanie Bongiovi Drug Charges Dropped

Stephanie Bongiovi, Jon Bon Jovi's 19-year-old daughter, will not be charged after reportedly overdosing on heroin in her dorm at Hamilton College in New York.

According to a statement from the Kirkland Town Police Department, a female [presumably Bongiovi] was found unresponsive by an ambulance crew sent to the college early Wednesday, after a report that a female had apparently overdosed in the school's largest dorm.

Although Bongiovi and 21-year-old Ian Grant were charged with drug possession, the charges have now been dropped.

Citing section 220.78 titled "Witness or victim of drug or alcohol overdose" of New York State Penal Law -- which states that a person who seeks health care for someone who is experiencing a drug or alcohol overdose or other life threatening medical emergency, as well as the individual who has overdosed or who was experiencing such life threatening medical emergency, can't be prosecuted for the possession of heroin weighing less than 8 ounces or possession of any amount of marijuana -- police said that neither Bongiovi or Grant can be charged.

There has been no statement from Jon Bon Jovi at this time.

4. Dina Lohan Addresses Cocaine Accusation

Did Lindsay Lohan lie about her mother having an alleged cocaine problem? Dina Lohan sets the record straight for ET's Christina McLarty.

"Absolutely lied. We were having an argument, it escalated," explains Dina of their October altercation which was recorded by her father, Michael Lohan. "She just wanted to hurt me at that moment. You know, mothers [and] daughters, we fight."

Dina tells Christina that it pained her to see that private family moment "go public and viral." As for accusations that she uses cocaine, Dina replies, "I hate cocaine. I don't do cocaine."

After Lindsay proclaimed that she was not being truthful about her accusations against her mother about cocaine use, Dina says, "I'm so proud of her for telling the truth because it destroyed me. I mean, I cried for weeks. It just hurt me so bad and she knew how horrible that was, and she came clean and told the truth that she lied. I'm very proud of her for that, which is very difficult to have to do."

Dina adds, "There's so much more to the story than the public sees, and it takes its toll on my children and myself, and we're just trying to move forward." Watch ET for more with our exclusive Dina Lohan interview.

5. Big Bang Cast Leads Call Me Maybe Flash Mob

Fans of The Big Bang Theory might logically assume that the cast of the hit CBS comedy has as many laughs on-screen as off. But now there is concrete proof as Kaley Cuoco just revealed in this clip of cast and crew members surprising showrunners with a flash mob of Carly Rae Jepsen's viral hit Call Me Maybe!

Kaley explains on The Big Bang Theory's Facebook page that the idea was hers and that she recruited her sister Bri to choreograph the impromptu number, which occurred during a taping on October 23 in front of a live audience.

The clip shows how the prank was carried out with secrecy and precision, with the cast re-assembling on the set immediately after the flash mob to resume taping and to hear star Jim Parsons sum up the event with one of his character Sheldon Cooper's favorite words, "Bazinga!"

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EU drug regulator OKs Novartis' meningitis B shot

LONDON (AP) — Europe's top drug regulator has recommended approval for the first vaccine against meningitis B, made by Novartis AG.

There are five types of bacterial meningitis. While vaccines exist to protect against the other four, none has previously been licensed for type B meningitis. In Europe, type B is the most common, causing 3,000 to 5,000 cases every year.

Meningitis mainly affects infants and children. It kills about 8 percent of patients and leaves others with lifelong consequences such as brain damage.

In a statement on Friday, Andrin Oswald of Novartis said he is "proud of the major advance" the company has made in developing its vaccine Bexsero. It is aimed at children over two months of age, and Novartis is hoping countries will include the shot among the routine ones for childhood diseases such as measles.

Novartis said the immunization has had side effects such as fever and redness at the injection site.

Recommendations from the European Medicines Agency are usually adopted by the European Commission. Novartis also is seeking to test the vaccine in the U.S.

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Wall Street Week Ahead: Going off "cliff" with a bungee cord

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The 1987 crash. The Y2K bug. The debt ceiling debacle of 2011.

All these events, in the end, turned out to be buying opportunities for stocks. So will the "fiscal cliff," some investors say as they watch favorite stocks tumble during the political give-and-take happening in Washington.

The first round of talks aimed at avoiding the "fiscal cliff" caused a temporary rise in equities on Friday, signaling Wall Street's recent declines could be a buying opportunity. The gains were small and sentiment remains weak, but it suggests hope for market bulls.

Though shares ended moderately higher on Friday, it was not enough to offset losses for the week. The S&P was down 1.5 percent, while both the Dow and the Nasdaq fell 1.8 percent.

The S&P 500 is down more than 5 percent in the seven sessions that followed President Barack Obama's re-election. Uncertainty arose as attention turned to Washington's task of dealing with mandated tax hikes and spending cuts that could take the U.S. economy back into recession.

Some see the market's move as an overreaction to hyperbolic headlines about policy gridlock in Washington, believing stocks may start to rebound in what should be a quiet few days ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday next Thursday.

"It just doesn't seem to make any sense that you suddenly wake up the day after the election and realize we've got a fiscal cliff," said Krishna Kumar, partner at New York hedge fund Goose Hollow Alpha Advisors.

Not long ago the S&P was on target for its second-best year in the last 10, riding a 17 percent advance in 2012. That's been halved to about 8 percent, which isn't bad but disappointing compared with just a month ago.

Investors have been selling the year's winners. Apple is down 25 percent from its peak above $700. General Electric is down 14 percent; Google has lost 16 percent. Overall, the stocks that make up the top 10 percent of performers in the month prior to Election Day have been the worst performers since, according to Bespoke Investment Group of Harrison, New York.

"I think it's a good opportunity to be long stocks at these levels," said Kumar.

Hikes on capital gains and dividend taxes are on the line, and Obama has dug in his heels on what he sees as a mandate to make the tax code more progressive.

He seems to have the upper hand in dealings with Congress because Republican lawmakers don't want to see tax rates increase, which is what will happen if no solution is found by the beginning of 2013. Republicans don't want to take the blame for driving the economy over the cliff.

The current crisis is similar to last year's fight to raise the U.S. debt ceiling, which led to the downgrade of the United States' top credit rating in early August 2011.

During the dealings, the S&P 500 lost 18.8 percent between its peak in July 2011 and its bottom in August. As the market slid, the political standoff badly hurt investors' confidence in Washington, setting off a spike in volatility.

In the end a deal was announced that raised the ceiling and put off longer-term fiscal decisions until January 1, 2013, setting the stage for today's "fiscal cliff" crisis.

After staying flat through September 2011, the S&P 500 jumped 31 percent between its October low and the end of March.

BUY THE DIP?

Gridlock in Washington and all that could possibly go wrong with the economy if a deal is not reached have grabbed the headlines, but the negotiations leave room for stock market gains. Congressional leaders said Friday they will work through the Thanksgiving holiday recess to find a solution.

"The debate over how to solve (the fiscal cliff) may be more productive than is commonly recognized," said Brad Lipsig, senior portfolio manager at UBS Financial Services in New York.

"The U.S. is facing a major debt overhang, and serious steps toward addressing it might ultimately be viewed as a positive for future growth," he said. "The market may recognize this and, after a time of hand wringing, recover from the concerns with a renewed sense of optimism."

The recent selling took the S&P 500's relative strength index - a technical measure of internal strength - below 30 this week, indicating the benchmark is oversold and due for a rebound.

The RSI in four of the 10 S&P sectors - utilities, telecoms, consumer staples and technology - is below 30 and the highest RSI reading, for the consumer discretionary sector, is below 40, suggesting a bounce is in store.

"What I want to do is what we did during the decline following the budget negotiations in the summer of 2011: The lower the stock market goes, the more I want to own stock," said Brian Reynolds, chief market strategist at New York-based Rosenblatt Securities.

"If we go off the cliff it will be with a bungee cord attached," he said.

KEEP CALM AND HEDGE

Volatility is expected to rise through the end of November and to spike in late December if no agreement on the fiscal cliff is reached in Congress. Alongside comes opportunity for those with high risk tolerance.

"Recently, volatility has increased in the market overall. You can't really pick it up in the VIX yet, but I think as we get through November, I think you're likely to see the VIX be at a relatively higher level," said Bruce Zaro, chief technical strategist at Delta Global Asset Management in Boston.

In 2011, the VIX averaged 19.2 in July and 35 in August. So far this month the average is 17.8 and it is expected to spike if negotiations on the cliff drag into late next month.

"Looking at the range of possibilities, I would say any of them would be better than sitting here waiting. I would even put going off the fiscal cliff in that category," said Jill Cuniff, president of Seattle-based Edge Asset Management Inc, which manages about $20 billion.

"But we don't believe Congress will let that happen; there's going to be some middle ground here."

(Reporting by Rodrigo Campos and Jonathan Spincer, additional reporting by Caroline Valetkevitch; Editing by Kenneth Barry)

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Jerusalem and Tel Aviv under rocket fire, Netanyahu warns Gaza

GAZA (Reuters) - Palestinian militants nearly hit Jerusalem with a rocket for the first time in decades on Friday and fired at Tel Aviv for a second day, in a stinging challenge to Israel's Gaza offensive after an Egyptian bid to broker a truce.

The attacks came just hours after Egypt's prime minister, denouncing what he described as Israeli aggression, visited the Gaza Strip and said Cairo was prepared to mediate.

Israel began bombing Gaza on Wednesday with an attack that killed the Hamas military chief. It says its campaign is in response to Hamas missiles fired on its territory. Hamas stepped up rocket attacks in response.

Israeli police said a rocket fired from Gaza landed in the Jerusalem area, outside the city, on Friday.

It was the first Palestinian rocket since 1970 to reach the vicinity of the holy city, which Israel claims as its capital, and was likely to spur an escalation in its three-day old air war against militants in Hamas-run Gaza.

Rockets nearly hit Tel Aviv on Thursday for the first time since Saddam Hussein's Iraq fired them during the 1991 Gulf War. An air raid siren rang out on Friday when the commercial centre was targeted again. Motorists crouched next to cars, many with their hands protecting their heads, while pedestrians scurried for cover in building stairwells.

The Jerusalem and Tel Aviv strikes have so far caused no casualties or damage, but could be political poison for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, favored to win re-election in January on the strength of his ability to guarantee security.

"The Israel Defence Forces will continue to hit Hamas hard and are prepared to broaden the action inside Gaza," Netanyahu, signaling a possible ground campaign, said hours earlier.

A Hamas source said the Israeli air force launched an attack on the house of Hamas's commander for southern Gaza which resulted in the death of two civilians, one a child.

Officials in Gaza said 22 Palestinians had been killed in the enclave since Israel began the air offensive with the declared aim of stemming surges of rocket strikes that have disrupted life in southern Israeli towns.

The Palestinian dead include eight militants and 14 civilians, among them seven children and a pregnant woman. Three Israelis were killed by a rocket on Thursday.

A solidarity visit to Gaza by Egyptian Prime Minister Hisham Kandil, whose Islamist government is allied with Hamas but also party to a 1979 peace treaty with Israel, had appeared to open a tiny window to emergency peace diplomacy.

Kandil said: "Egypt will spare no effort ... to stop the aggression and to achieve a truce."

But a three-hour truce that Israel declared for the duration of Kandil's visit never took hold. Israel said more than 35 rockets launched from the Gaza Strip hit its territory and 86 were intercepted by the Iron Dome anti-missile system.

Israel denied Palestinian assertions that its aircraft struck while Kandil was in the enclave.

TEL AVIV ROCKET

Israel Radio's military affairs correspondent said the army's Homefront Command had told municipal officials to make civil defense preparations for the possibility that fighting could drag on for seven weeks. An Israeli military spokeswoman declined to comment on the report.

The Gaza conflagration has stoked the flames of a Middle East already ablaze with two years of Arab revolution and a civil war in Syria that threatens to leap across borders.

It is the biggest test yet for Egypt's new President Mohamed Mursi, a veteran Islamist politician from the Muslim Brotherhood who was elected this year after last year's protests ousted military autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood are spiritual mentors of Hamas, yet Mursi has also pledged to respect Cairo's 1979 peace treaty with Israel, seen in the West as the cornerstone of regional security. Egypt and Israel both receive billions of dollars in U.S. military aid to underwrite their treaty.

Mursi has vocally denounced the Israeli military action while promoting Egypt as a mediator, a mission that his prime minister's visit was intended to further.

A Palestinian official close to Egypt's mediators told Reuters Kandil's visit "was the beginning of a process to explore the possibility of reaching a truce. It is early to speak of any details or of how things will evolve".

Meanwhile, Israel has begun drafting 16,000 reserve troops, a possible precursor to invasion. Tanks and self-propelled guns were seen near the border area of Friday.

Hamas fighters are no match for the Israeli military. The last Gaza war, involving a three-week long Israeli air blitz and ground invasion over the New Year period of 2008-2009, killed more than 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians. Thirteen Israelis also died.

Tunisia's foreign minister was due to visit Gaza on Saturday "to provide all political support for Gaza" the spokesman for the Tunisian president, Moncef Marzouki, said in a statement.

The United States asked countries that have contact with Hamas to urge the Islamist movement to stop its rocket attacks.

Hamas refuses to recognize Israel's right to exist. By contrast, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who rules in the nearby West Bank, does recognize Israel, but peace talks between the two sides have been frozen since 2010.

Abbas's supporters say they will push ahead with a plan to have Palestine declared an "observer state" rather than a mere "entity" at the United Nations later this month.

(Additional reporting by Ori Lewis, Ari Rabinovitch, Jeffrey Heller and Crispian Balmer in Jerusalem; Writing by Jeffrey Heller and Douglas Hamilton; Editing by Peter Graff)

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Exclusive: Facebook offering e-retailers sales tracking tool

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Facebook Inc wants more credit for making online cash registers ring.

Facebook will begin rolling out on Friday a new tool which will allow online retailers to track purchases by members of the social network who have viewed their ads.

The tool is the latest of the new advertising features Facebook is offering to convince marketers that steering advertising dollars to the company will deliver a payoff.

Facebook, with roughly 1 billion users, has faced a tough reception on Wall Street amid concerns about its slowing revenue growth.

“Measuring ad effectiveness and outcomes is absolutely crucial to all types of businesses and marketers,” said David Baser, a product manager for Facebook’s ads business who said the “conversion measurement” tool has been a top customer request for a long time.

The sales information that advertisers receive is anonymous, said Baser. “You would see the number of people who bought shoes,” he said, using the example of an online shoe retailer. But marketers would not be able to get information that could identify the people, he added.

The conversion tool is specifically designed for so-called direct response marketers, such as online retailers and travel websites that advertise with the goal of drumming up immediate sales rather than for longer-term brand-building.

Such advertisers have long flocked to Google Inc’s Web search engine, which can deliver ads to consumers at the exact moment they’re looking for information on a particular product.

But some analysts say there is room for Facebook to make inroads if it can demonstrate results.

“The path to purchase” is not as direct on Facebook as it is on Google’s search engine, said Debra Aho Williamson, an analyst with research firm eMarketer. But she said that providing information about customer sales conversion should help Facebook make a stronger case to online retailers.

“It lets marketers track the impact of a Facebook ad hours or days or even a week beyond when someone might have viewed the ad,” said Williamson. “That allows marketers to understand the impact of the Facebook ad on the ultimate purchase.”

Marketers will also have the option to aim their ads at segments of Facebook’s audience with similar attributes to consumers that have responded well to a particular ad in the past, Baser said.

Online retailer Fab.com, which has tested Facebook’s new service, was able to reduce its cost per new customer acquisition by 39 percent when it served ads to consumers deemed most likely to convert, Facebook said. Facebook defines a conversion as anything from a completed sale, to a consumer taking another desired action on a website, such as registering for a newsletter.

NEW OPPORTUNITIES

Shares of Facebook, which were priced at $ 38 a share in its May initial public offering, closed Thursday’s regular session at $ 22.17.

In recent months, Facebook has introduced a variety of new advertising capabilities and moved to broaden its appeal to various groups of advertisers.

Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg said in October that Facebook saw multi-billion revenue opportunities in each of four groups of advertisers: brand marketers, local businesses, app developers and direct response marketers.

Facebook does not disclose how much of its ad revenue, which totaled $ 1.09 billion in the third quarter, comes from each type of advertiser. Pivotal Research Group analyst Brian Wieser estimates that brand marketers and local businesses account for the bulk of Facebook’s current advertising revenue.

Earlier this year, Facebook introduced a similar conversion measurement service for big brand advertisers, such as auto manufacturers, partnering with data mining firm Datalogix to help connect the dots between consumer spending at brick-and-mortar and Facebook ads.

And Facebook has rolled out new marketing tools for local businesses such as restaurants and coffee shops, including a revamped online coupon service and simplified advertising capabilities known as promoted posts.

The new conversion measurement tool is launching in testing mode, but will be fully available by the end of the month, Facebook said.

(Reporting By Alexei Oreskovic; editing by Carol Bishopric)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Dog Whisperer Cesar Millan Reveals Suicide Attempt

Cesar Millan -- who became a TV star by utilizing his "dog whispering" skills -- has revealed that he reached such a low point in 2010 that he tried to commit suicide.

The 43-year-old reality star opens up about the the overdose that left him unconscious and hospitalized in a new documentary, Cesar Millan: The Real Story," which airs November 25 on Nat Geo Wild.

While promoting the documentary, Millan explained to the Associated Press that 2010 was a very rough year. In February of that year, he lost his beloved 16-year-old pit bull Daddy, whom he often used to help troubled dogs become more calm and submissive. In June 2010, Millan's wife of 16 years, Ilusion Millan, filed for divorce.

VIDEO: Dog Whisperer Takes On Kelsey's Troubled Pups

"I felt defeated, a big sense of guilt and failure... I was at the lowest level I had ever been emotionally and psychologically," Millan wrote in June on his official website, without specifically mentioning the overdose. He told the AP that after surviving the overdose, he opted for work, exercise and affection over antidepressants.

In Cesar Millan: The Real Story, he does open up about the loss of his dog. "Daddy was my Tibet, my Himalaya, my Gouda, my Buddha, my source of calmness," Millan said. He also revealed that he's now met the woman he calls "the one," Jahira Dar, and plans to propose to her soon.

In addition to the documentary, Millan's seventh book, A Short Guide to a Happy Dog, is due out January 1. His new Nat Geo Wild show Leader of the Pack will premiere on January 5, after the conclusion of his previous show, Dog Whisperer.

VIDEO: How the Dogs Were Trained For Chihuahua 3

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EU drug regulator OKs Novartis' meningitis B shot

LONDON (AP) — Europe's top drug regulator has recommended approval for the first vaccine against meningitis B, made by Novartis AG.

There are five types of bacterial meningitis. While vaccines exist to protect against the other four, none has previously been licensed for type B meningitis. In Europe, type B is the most common, causing 3,000 to 5,000 cases every year.

Meningitis mainly affects infants and children. It kills about 8 percent of patients and leaves others with lifelong consequences such as brain damage.

In a statement on Friday, Andrin Oswald of Novartis said he is "proud of the major advance" the company has made in developing its vaccine Bexsero. It is aimed at children over two months of age, and Novartis is hoping countries will include the shot among the routine ones for childhood diseases such as measles.

Novartis said the immunization has had side effects such as fever and redness at the injection site.

Recommendations from the European Medicines Agency are usually adopted by the European Commission. Novartis also is seeking to test the vaccine in the U.S.

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Wall Street slips as "fiscal cliff" bargaining begins

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks fell moderately on Friday in an atmosphere of caution as President Barack Obama and congressional leaders began bargaining on a deal to avoid major tax hikes and spending cuts.

The looming "fiscal cliff" has become the market's main focus since Obama's re-election on November 6, sending stocks lower on fears it could knock the economy into recession next year.

The S&P 500 was on track to decline for a fourth day.

"Today is the most important day of the week, as finally the president will have a coffee talk with both Republican and Democratic leaders. While both sides are now using the 'balance' word, the rhetoric seems to have only been on the tax side, which solves little or nothing on the spending side," said Peter Boockvar, managing director at Miller Tabak & Co in New York.

If investors like what they hear after the meeting, "the market is very oversold, sentiment is negative and is thus set up for a short-term bounce," he said.

Futures had indicated a higher open after the Wall Street Journal reported White House officials were in discussions that could indicate increased flexibility in negotiations with Republicans. Still, caution remains and the S&P 500 is on track to end the week at least 2 percent lower.

Citing sources familiar with the matter, the Journal said officials were in advanced, internal talks to replace spending cuts set to begin in January with a separate package of spending cuts and tax increases. The White House had no comment on the report.

Democrats and Republicans have recently appeared to dig in their heels into opposing positions, echoing last year's political impasse over raising the U.S. debt ceiling.

The S&P is down 4.3 percent over the past two weeks, with such sectors as financials <.gspf> and materials <.gspm> among the hardest hit.

Energy shares have been stronger as crude oil advanced. A flare-up in violence in the Middle East lifted oil prices on concerns about a possible supply disruption. Brent crude is up 3 percent over the past two weeks.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was down 27.03 points, or 0.22 percent, at 12,515.35. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was down 5.11 points, or 0.38 percent, at 1,348.22. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was down 9.66 points, or 0.34 percent, at 2,827.28.

The S&P and the Dow are currently down about 2.3 percent for the week while the Nasdaq is down about 2.7 percent.

Dell Inc's stock slumped 8.1 percent to $8.80 and was the biggest percentage decliner on the S&P 500 a day after reporting a steep drop in its quarterly profit.

Shares of Penn National Gaming Inc jumped 30 percent to $48.65 after the owner of gaming and pari-mutuel properties said late Thursday it will split its business into two separate publicly traded companies - a gaming focused real estate investment trust and a gaming operator.

Sears Holdings Corp late Thursday reported a quarterly loss that was narrower than expected, but same-store sales fell on weak demand for electronics, sending shares down 14.8 percent to $49.80.

J.M. Smucker Co reported a rise in second-quarter earnings, helped by a drop in commodity costs, but the stock fell 3.4 percent to $82.45.

(Editing by Kenneth Barry)

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War looms over Gaza as death toll rises

GAZA (Reuters) - A Hamas rocket killed three Israelis north of the Gaza Strip on Thursday, drawing the first blood from Israel as the Palestinian death toll rose to 15 in a military showdown lurching closer to all-out war and an invasion of the enclave.

On the second day of an assault Israel said might last many days and culminate in a ground attack, its warplanes bombed targets in and around Gaza city, where tall buildings trembled.

Plumes of smoke and dust furled into a sky laced with the vapor trails of outgoing rockets.

The sudden conflict, launched by Israel with the killing of Hamas's military chief, pours oil on the fire of a Middle East already ablaze with two years of revolution and an out-of-control civil war in Syria. Palestinian allies, led by Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi, denounced the Israeli offensive.

After watching powerlessly from the sidelines of the Arab Spring, Israel has been thrust to the centre of a volatile new world in which Islamist Hamas believes that Mursi and his newly dominant Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt will be its protectors.

The Palestinian Islamist group claimed it had fired a one-ton, Iranian-made Fajr 5 rocket at Tel Aviv in what would be a major escalation, but there was no reported impact in the Israeli metropolis 50 km (30 miles) north of the enclave.

"The Israelis must realize that this aggression is unacceptable and would only lead to instability in the region and would negatively and greatly impact the security of the region," Mursi said, although there was no immediate sign of robust action by Egypt, Israel's most powerful Arab neighbor.

The new conflict will be the biggest test yet of Mursi's commitment to Egypt's 1979 peace treaty with Israel, which the West views as the bedrock of Middle East peace.

The Muslim Brotherhood, which brought Mursi to power in an election after the downfall of autocrat Hosni Mubarak, has called for a 'Day of Rage' in Arab capitals on Friday. The Brotherhood is seen as the spiritual mentors of Hamas.

ASSASSINATION

The offensive began on Wednesday when a precision Israeli airstrike assassinated Hamas military mastermind Ahmed Al-Jaabari, and Israel shelled the enclave from land, air and sea.

The 15 killed in Gaza included Jaabari and six Hamas fighters plus eight civilians, among them a pregnant woman with twins, an 11-month old boy and three infants, according to the enclave's health ministry. Medics reported at least 130 wounded.

At Jaabari's funeral on Thursday, supporters fired guns in the air celebrating news of the Israeli deaths, to chants for Jaabari of "You have won." His corpse was borne through the streets wrapped in a bloodied white sheet. But senior Hamas figures were not in evidence, wary of Israel's warning that they are now in its crosshairs.

The Israeli army said 156 targets were hit in Gaza, 126 of them rocket launchers. It said 200 rockets had struck Israel since the start of the operation, 135 of them since midnight.

Israel's Iron Dome interceptor system has so far shot down 81 rockets headed towards residential areas, the military said.

One of those that got through caught its victims before they could reach the blast shelters that are everywhere in the Negev region, prey to sporadic Palestinian rocket attacks from Gaza for the past five years.

Israeli police said the three died when a rocket hit a four-story building in the town of Kiryat Malachi, some 25 km (15 miles) north of Gaza. They were the first Israeli fatalities of the latest conflict to hit the coastal region.

Expecting days or more of fighting and almost inevitable civilian casualties, Israeli warplanes dropped leaflets in Gaza telling residents to stay away from Hamas and other militants.

The United States condemned Hamas, shunned by the West as an obstacle to peace for its refusal to renounce violence and recognize Israel.

"There is no justification for the violence that Hamas and other terrorist organizations are employing against the people of Israel," said Mark Toner, deputy State Department spokesman.

The U.N. Security Council held an emergency meeting late on Wednesday to discuss the Israeli assault, but took no action.

In France, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said: "It would be a catastrophe if there is an escalation in the region. Israel has the right to security but it won't achieve it through violence. The Palestinians also have the right to a state."

"GATES OF HELL"

Israel's sworn enemy Iran, which supports and arms Hamas, condemned the Israeli offensive as "organized terrorism". Lebanon's Iranian-backed Shi'ite militia Hezbollah, which has its own rockets aimed at the Jewish state, denounced strikes on Gaza as "criminal aggression", but held its fire.

Oil prices rose more than $1 as the crisis grew. Israeli shares and bonds fell, while Israel's currency rose off Wednesday's lows, when the shekel slid more than 1 percent to a two-month low against the dollar.

A second Gaza war has loomed on the horizon for months as waves of Palestinian rocket attacks and Israeli strikes grew increasingly intense and frequent. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, favored in polls to win a January 22 general election, said on Wednesday the Gaza operation could be stepped up.

His cabinet has granted authorization for the mobilization of military reserves if required to press the offensive, dubbed "Pillar of Defence" in English and "Pillar of Cloud" in Hebrew after the Israelites' divine sign of deliverance in Exodus.

Hamas has said the killing of its top commander In a precision, death-from-above airstrike, would "open the gates of hell" for Israel. It appealed to Egypt to halt the assault.

Israel has been anxious since Mubarak was toppled last year in the Arab Spring revolts that replaced secularist strongmen with elected Islamists in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya, and brought civil war to Israel's other big neighbor Syria.

Cairo recalled its ambassador from Israel on Wednesday. Israel's ambassador left Cairo on what was called a routine home visit and Israel said its embassy would stay open.

Gaza has an estimated 35,000 Palestinian fighters, no match for Israel's F-16 fighter-bombers, Apache helicopter gunships, Merkava tanks and other modern weapons systems in the hands of a conscript force of 175,000, with 450,000 in reserve.

(Additional reporting by Ari Rabinovitch in Jerusalem, Erika Solomon in Beirut, John Irish in Paris. Marwa Awad in Cairo.; Writing by Douglas Hamilton; Editing by Peter Graff)

(This story was corrected to remove reference to U.N. Security Council calling for halt to violence in paragraph 20. The Council met and India's ambassador, who is president of the body, called for a halt to violence, but he spoke on behalf of India not on behalf of the Council.)

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