Author name: Maaz

  x A jet of steam rises with a hiss as a red hot poker plunges into a bowl of cider. A garlanded woman spears a piece of toast with a long fork and lodges the offering among the branches of a tree. Then, amid shouts from the watching crowd, the torch-lit ceremony ends with […]

  x The first senior Trump administration official was expected to visit Ukraine, a day after Russia released an American prisoner in a development that President Trump called a positive signal for cease-fire talks. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s trip comes amid anxiety in Kyiv and among American allies about whether U.S. support for the Ukrainian

  x Booing during “The Star-Spangled Banner” at sports games in Canada. “Buy Canadian” signs multiplying at grocery stores amid a brewing boycott of U.S. goods. Cross-party calls to find new friends and customers on the global stage. President Trump may have paused his plans to impose crushing tariffs on Canada, pulling the two countries

  x President Trump again reiterated his proposal for the United States to take over Gaza, telling reporters on Air Force One on Sunday that the strip of land was “a big real estate site” that the United States was “going to own.” He also mentioned building “some beautiful sites for the people, the Palestinians,

  x Israel’s military withdrew Sunday from a key corridor dividing the Gaza Strip, leaving nearly all of the territory’s north as required by a tenuous cease-fire agreement with Hamas. The military’s departure from the Netzarim Corridor in Gaza came as the Israeli government sent a delegation to Qatar over the weekend to discuss the

  x Hamas released three more Israeli hostages on Saturday as part of an exchange for Palestinian prisoners, in a highly theatrical handover in which the men were made to give speeches effectively at gunpoint. The hostage release is the fifth in a tense series of exchanges that are part of a 42-day cease-fire deal

  x A Trump administration envoy to the Middle East pressed Lebanon’s new leaders on Friday to ensure that Hezbollah does not become part of the government, as it grapples with a fragile cease-fire and violence that could undermine its push for stability. The United States deputy envoy to the Middle East, Morgan Ortagus, said

  x The Israeli defense minister said Thursday that he had ordered Israel’s military to draft a plan to allow Gazans to voluntarily leave the enclave, a move that comes after President Trump’s proposal for a massive resettlement of Palestinians and a U.S.-led takeover of the territory. It was far from clear whether the proposal

  x President Trump’s declaration on Tuesday evening that the United States could “take over” the Gaza Strip and that its Palestinian population could be permanently displaced was immediately criticized in the Middle East and beyond. At a joint White House news conference with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, Mr. Trump said, “The U.S.

  x An international panel of 14 neonatal and pediatric specialists on Tuesday raised grave doubts about the evidence used to convict the British nurse Lucy Letby, who was found guilty in 2023 of murdering seven babies at the hospital where she worked. In a dramatic news conference in London, the chair of the panel,