JACKSON — It's not just companies and products that need solid branding. Sometimes entire regions need a "hook." One area of the state is hoping to get just that, and it is looking for immediate results.

JACKSON — Mississippi Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann says the state should strengthen culture and economic ties with Israel. Hosemann met Thursday in Jackson with Opher Aviran, Israel's new consul general to the southeastern United States.

Blackman Township police are looking for a drug thief. They say the suspect broke into the pharmacy at the Center for Family Health on Springport Road Friday night. The thief got away with a large amount of prescription drugs.

Japanese teenager Shoya Tomizawa died after he crashed and was hit by two other riders during Sunday's Moto2 race at the San Marino Grand Prix in the sport's second fatality in eight days.

Torrential rains from a tropical depression caused mudslides that have killed at least 28 people in Guatemala — most of them in separate disasters along the same highway.

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