BIRMINGHAM, Ala.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec 23, 2024--
Hibbett, Inc., a leading Birmingham-based premium footwear and athletic-inspired fashion retailer, today announced a special donation to Children’s of Alabama in partnership with global sports brand, PUMA. On Monday, December 16 th, team members from Hibbett and PUMA visited Children’s of Alabama in Birmingham, one of the largest pediatric medical centers in the country, and presented a donation of $20,000 and more than 1,300 items.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20241223210152/en/
“We are honored to join forces with PUMA for the fifth year in a row by supporting the incredible mission of Children’s of Alabama,” said Sarah Sharp-Wangaard, VP Marketing, Hibbett. “The unwavering dedication of their staff in providing compassionate care to families in need, inspires us deeply. Through our donation this year, we hope to help ensure that the Children’s Social Services Team has an abundance of resources to continue making a meaningful impact on the lives of children and their families throughout the year.”
“We are incredibly grateful to the teams at Hibbett and PUMA for their efforts to ensure that patients and their families have essentials to make their stay at the hospital the most comfortable it can be,” said Crawford Daniel, Community Development Coordinator at Children’s of Alabama. “This collaboration and support enables the care team at Children’s to provide family-centered care to ease patient and caregiver stress.”
This year, Hibbett and PUMA joined together and presented Children’s of Alabama, Social Services with a financial donation of $20,000 along with a combination of PUMA branded men’s, women’s and children’s shoes, shirts and shorts valued at $5,000 and 1,000 fidget toys valued at $3,500. The contributions support essential Children’s of Alabama programs like the Care Closet, Sugar Plum Shop and Children's Hospital Intervention and Prevention Services (CHIPS Center).
The Care Closet helps alleviate some of the stress for more than 400 families in crisis each year. Families often arrive at the hospital emergency room with little time to prepare. The Care Closet provides complimentary essentials they might need like toiletries, apparel, footwear and toys to help entertain children and siblings during an emergency, so they can focus on their child’s care.
During the holiday season, Children’s of Alabama hosts the Sugar Plum Shop to bring some holiday cheer, providing an average of 260 patient families with gifts to help ease the burden of a child being hospitalized during the holiday season. Children's Hospital Intervention and Prevention Services (CHIPS Center) promotes hope and healing for youth affected by child abuse and neglect. The specialty-trained staff at the CHIPS Center provide thousands of counseling sessions for children and families in need each year.
To learn more or donate to Children’s of Alabama, please visithere.
About Hibbett, Inc.
Hibbett, headquartered in Birmingham, Alabama, is a leading athletic-inspired fashion retailer with nearly 1,000 specialty stores, located in 36 states nationwide. Hibbett has a rich history of convenient locations providing personalized customer service and bringing access to premium product, coveted footwear & apparel from top brands like Nike, Jordan, adidas & New Balance in underserved communities. Consumers can browse styles, find new releases, shop Toe-2-Head fits and make purchases online or in their nearest store by visiting www.Hibbett.com. Hibbett is owned by JD Sports Fashion plc, a leading global omnichannel retailer of Sports Fashion brands. Follow us @hibbettsports on Facebook, Instagram and X and @Hibbett on TikTok.
About Children's of Alabama
Since 1911, Children’s of Alabama has provided specialized medical care for ill and injured children, offering inpatient, outpatient and primary care throughout Central Alabama. Ranked among the best children’s hospitals in the nation by U.S. News & World Report, Children’s serves patients from every county in Alabama and nearly every state. Children’s is a private, not-for-profit medical center that serves as the teaching hospital for the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) pediatric medicine, surgery, psychiatry, research and residency programs. The medical staff consists of UAB faculty and Children’s full-time physicians, as well as private practicing community physicians.
About PUMA
PUMA is one of the world’s leading sports brands, designing, developing, selling and marketing footwear, apparel and accessories. For 75 years, PUMA has relentlessly pushed sport and culture forward by creating fast products for the world’s fastest athletes. PUMA offers performance and sport-inspired lifestyle products in categories such as Football, Running and Training, Basketball, Golf, and Motorsports. It collaborates with renowned designers and brands to bring sport influences into street culture and fashion. The PUMA Group owns the brands PUMA, Cobra Golf and stichd. The company distributes its products in more than 120 countries, employs about 20,000 people worldwide, and is headquartered in Herzogenaurach/Germany.
* Photo courtesy of Children’s of Alabama
Hibbett and PUMA present $20,000 to Children's of Alabama, Social Services (Image courtesy of Children's of Alabama)
Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip overnight killed at least 20 people, Palestinian medics said Monday.
One of the strikes killed eight people including two kids in a tent camp in the Muwasi area, which Israel designated a humanitarian safe zone but has repeatedly targeted. The casualties were reported by Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis, which received the bodies.
The Israeli military says it only strikes militants, accusing them of operating among civilians. It said late Sunday that it had targeted a Hamas militant in the humanitarian zone.
The war began when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel in October 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking around 250 hostage. Around 100 captives are still inside Gaza, at least a third of whom Israel believes are dead.
Israel’s air and ground offensive has killed more than 45,200 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The ministry says women and children make up more than half the dead but does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its tally. The military says it has killed over 17,000 militants, without providing evidence.
Here’s the latest:
JERUSALEM — Israel's military said Monday it intercepted a drone launched from Yemen before it entered Israeli territory, days after a long-range rocket attack by Yemen's Houthi rebels hit Tel Aviv, injuring 16 people from shattered glass.
The military said no air raid warning sirens were sounded Monday. Israel says the Iran-backed Houthis have fired more than 200 missiles and UAVs, or unmanned aerial vehicles, during the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
The Houthis have also been attacking shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden — attacks they say won’t stop until there is a ceasefire in Gaza.
The attacks on shipping and Israel are taking place despite U.S. and European warships patrolling the area. On Saturday night and early Sunday, the U.S. conducted airstrikes on Yemen. Last week, Israel launched its own airstrikes on Yemen, killing at least nine people, and a Houthi missile damaged a school in Israel.
DAMASCUS, Syria — A Qatari delegation visited the Syrian capital on Monday for the first time in more than a decade and met with the country's top insurgent commander, who said strategic cooperation between Damascus and Doha will begin soon.
Qatar, along with Turkey, has long backed the rebels who now control Damascus, and the two countries are looking to protect their interests in Syria now that former President Bashar Assad has been overthrown.
The Qatari delegation was headed by the minister of state for foreign affairs, Mohammed al-Khulaifi, who met with Ahmad al-Sharaa, leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, the insurgent group that overthrew Assad on Dec. 8.
Al-Sharaa was quoted as saying by Syrian media that they have invited the emir of Qatar to visit Damascus adding that relations will return to normal soon. Al-Sharaa said Qatar will back Syria during the transitional period and the two countries will soon start “wide strategic cooperation.”
Al-Sharaa also met Monday with Jordan’s Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi as well as a Saudi official.
Unlike Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Jordan had relations with Assad’s government until he was removed from power.
JENIN, West Bank — The Palestinian Authority says a second member of its security forces has been killed in the West Bank town of Jenin during clashes with Palestinian militants.
Brig. Gen. Anwar Rajab, the spokesman for PA security forces, said 1st Sgt. Mehran Qadoos was killed on Monday by “outlaws” in the volatile northern town, where the security forces launched a rare crackdown earlier this month. A member of security forces also was killed on Sunday.
An Associated Press reporter in Jenin heard heavy gunfire and explosions, apparently from a battle between the security forces and Palestinian militants. There was no sign of Israeli forces in the area.
Militant groups had earlier called for a general strike across the territory, accusing the security forces of trying to disarm them in support of Israel’s half-century occupation of the territory.
The Western-backed Palestinian Authority is internationally recognized but deeply unpopular among Palestinians, in part because it cooperates with Israel on security matters. Israel accuses the authority of incitement and of failing to act against armed groups.
The Palestinian Authority exercises limited authority in population centers in the West Bank. Israel captured the territory in the 1967 Mideast War, and the Palestinians want it to form the main part of their future state.
Israel’s current government is opposed to Palestinian statehood and says it will maintain open-ended security control over the territory. Violence has soared in the West Bank following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack out of Gaza, which ignited the war there.
JENIN, West Bank — Palestinians in the volatile northern West Bank town of Jenin are observing a general strike called by militant groups to protest a rare crackdown by Palestinian security forces.
An Associated Press reporter in Jenin heard gunfire and explosions, apparently from clashes between militants and Palestinian security forces. It was not immediately clear if anyone was killed or wounded. There was no sign of Israeli troops in the area.
Shops were closed in the city on Monday, the day after militants killed a member of the Palestinian security forces and wounded two others.
Militant groups called for a general strike across the territory, accusing the security forces of trying to disarm them in support of Israel’s half-century occupation of the territory.
The Western-backed Palestinian Authority is internationally recognized but deeply unpopular among Palestinians, in part because it cooperates with Israel on security matters. Israel accuses the authority of incitement and of failing to act against armed groups.
The Palestinian Authority blamed Sunday’s attack on “outlaws.” It says it is committed to maintaining law and order but will not police the occupation.
The Palestinian Authority exercises limited authority in population centers in the West Bank. Israel captured the territory in the 1967 Mideast War, and the Palestinians want it to form the main part of their future state.
Israel’s current government is opposed to Palestinian statehood and says it will maintain open-ended security control over the territory. Violence has soared in the West Bank following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack out of Gaza, which ignited the war there.
BEIRUT — Lebanon’s caretaker prime minister has begun a tour of military positions in the country’s south, almost a month after a ceasefire deal that ended the war between Israel and the Hezbollah group that battered the country.
Najib Mikati on Monday was on his first visit to the southern frontlines, where Lebanese soldiers under the U.S.-brokered deal are expected to gradually deploy, with Hezbollah militants and Israeli troops both expected to withdraw by the end of next month.
Mikati’s tour comes after the Lebanese government expressed its frustration over ongoing Israeli strikes and overflights in the country.
“We have many tasks ahead of us, the most important being the enemy's (Israel's) withdrawal from all the lands it encroached on during its recent aggression,” he said after meeting with army chief Joseph Aoun in a Lebanese military barracks in the southeastern town of Marjayoun. “Then the army can carry out its tasks in full.”
The Lebanese military for years has relied on financial aid to stay functional, primarily from the United States and other Western countries. Lebanon’s cash-strapped government is hoping that the war’s end and ceasefire deal will bring about more funding to increase the military’s capacity to deploy in the south, where Hezbollah’s armed units were notably present.
Though they were not active combatants, the Lebanese military said that dozens of its soldiers were killed in Israeli strikes on their premises or patrolling convoys in the south. The Israeli army acknowledged some of these attacks.
Smoke rises as Palestinian security forces mount a major raid against militants in the Jenin refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Monday, Dec. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)
Palestinians sit in front of closed shops during a general strike called as Palestinian security forces mount a major raid against militants in the Jenin refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Monday, Dec. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)
Journalists take cover from gunfire as Palestinian security forces mount a major raid against militants in the Jenin refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Monday, Dec. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)
Officers from the Palestinian Authority clutch their guns as Palestinian security forces mount a major raid against militants in the Jenin refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Monday, Dec. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)
Armored Palestinian security vehicles are seen on the road as Palestinian forces mount a major raid against militants in the Jenin refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Monday, Dec. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)
Israel's security officers check a damaged car at the site of an attack in east Jerusalem neighborhood of Pisgat Zeev, Israel, Monday, Dec. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the fifth day of testimony in his trial on corruption charges at the district court in Tel Aviv, Israel, on Monday, Dec. 23, 2024. (Debbie Hill/Pool Photo via AP)
Weapons and other equipment seized by the Israeli military during its ground invasion of southern Lebanon are displayed, Monday, Dec. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Georges Elia decorates a Christmas tree inside St. George Melkite Catholic Church, that was destroyed by Israeli airstrike, in the town of Dardghaya in southern Lebanon, Sunday, Dec. 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
A worshipper prays in the Church of the Nativity where Christians believe Jesus Christ was born, ahead of Christmas in the West Bank city of Bethlehem, Monday, Dec. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)
Palestinians pray over the bodies of the victims of an Israeli strike on a home late Saturday before the funeral outside the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah Sunday, Dec. 22, 2024. At least eight people were killed according to the hospital which received the bodies.(AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
Relatives and neighbors, two of them holding guns, walk during the funeral procession of a victim of an Israeli strike on a home late Saturday that killed at least eight people, in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip, Sunday, Dec. 22, 2024. Some families in Gaza are armed to protect their homes from thieves in the camps.(AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
