Students and volunteers have come up with a plan to help homeless people with pet washing and vet checkups.

‘Ruff Sleepers’ is a not-for-profit which gets together once a month to provide free check ups, a  dog-washing service and general community catch up.

Co-founder Bronwen Dalton, an Associate Professor of Sydney University of Technology, said "it's an environment where we all come together as dog lovers. It’s not paternalistic, it’s friendly and caring.”

A family of five has carried out a suicide bombing of a police headquarters in Indonesia, following deadly attacks on churches committed by another family on Sunday.

The family members were used as suicide bombers, the eight-year-old girl from the family has survived while her mother, father and two brothers died in the blast.

The family has been linked to local extremist network Jamaah Ansharut Daulah.

Clashes erupted in the border between Gaza and Israel amid the move of the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

40,000 Palestinians gathered in protest at the border where 55 have died and 2,400 wounded.

Israeli military said “the rioters [were] hurling fire bombs and explosive devices at the security fence at Israeli troops and are burning tyres, throwing rocks and launching flaming objects with the intention of igniting fires in Israeli territory."

The designer of the Indigenous flag has spoken out against policing the authenticity of Indigenous art.

Harold Thomas has worked in the art world for more than 50 years and says the only truly authentic indigenous art would be ochre colours on bark.

Thomas said it is important not to allow control of what is and is not Aboriginal art to be policed by a non-indigenous body such as the federal government, who is currently conducting an inquiry into sales of “fake” aboriginal art.

Up to sixty residents are expected to show up to a protest in support of improved safety at an intersection in West End this morning.

The protest is planned to block traffic through the Montague Road and Victoria Street intersection from 8 to 8.30am.

Greens Councillor for The Gabba, Jonathan Sri, says the intersection is “extremely dangerous” and needs traffic lights.

The first of this year’s NAPLAN tests began nationwide on Tuesday.

Each year, the controversial test is supposed to collect data on students’ performance at different schools to be published online, and used to allocate resources.

This comes just as several schools were found to have been encouraging students with below average results to pull out of the test, so as to not affect the school’s data.

Health professionals are planning an urgent move to incentivise an increase in pneumonia vaccination rates among older Australians.

Statistics show a decrease of 50 percent in the number of seniors who take the vaccine to prevent the disease, a disease that claims 200 elderly lives each year.

Pneumonia can be caused by virus, bacteria or fungi causing the small air sacs of the lungs to fill with pus and fluid, making breathing painful, causing coughing and limiting oxygen intake.