Author: NY TIMES

Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank are welcoming Ramadan with little of the usual cheer. Amid Israel’s ongoing attacks in Gaza and rising violence in the West Bank, the holy month’s festive decorations and celebratory mood are being replaced by feelings of helplessness and despair.“There’s no joy,” said Hana Karameh, a mother of five from the city of Hebron.Ramadan this year will be “incomplete,” she said. Usually, on the night before the first fast of Ramadan begins, they would pray together with their neighbors and gather for suhoor — the pre-dawn meal — while children shot off fireworks.On Sunday night,…

A U.N. official said a truck carrying aid was turned around in Gaza this week because it contained scissors included in medical kits for children, calling attention to what aid groups have said is a laborious Israeli inspection process that is slowing down crucial humanitarian assistance.Philippe Lazzarini, the head of UNRWA, the main U.N. agency providing support for Palestinians in Gaza, said the truckload had been refused because medical scissors had been added to a list of items the Israeli authorities consider to be “dual use,” or having both civilian and military purposes.COGAT, the Israeli agency overseeing aid deliveries into…

The rivalry between SEC foes LSU and South Carolina reached new heights when a feud broke out in Sunday’s conference championship game.Gamecocks center Kamilla Cardoso has been suspended for the first game of the NCAA Tournament after multiple players were ejected, the SEC confirmed Competitor on Monday.Wondering what happened between these two national title contenders and how it might affect their March Madness trips? Here’s a rundown of Sunday’s scrimmage and what it could mean going forward:What is the history like?In a tight contest between the national title contenders in late January, South Carolina came back from trailing by five…

Annie Wu Henry hasn’t gotten a notification on her phone in two years. Calls go straight to voice mail. Apps vibrate their updates into the ether. Texts pile up silently. Same with emails. They have to wait until she decides to look at her device next.That’s because of Do Not Disturb mode, a phone setting that acts as a modern-day away message for smartphone users, cautioning those who contact you that you’re likely to take a while to return their messages.“It’s expectation setting,” said Ms. Henry, a 28-year-old digital strategist who worked to elect Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania. “If…

During a leadership crisis in 2015, Reddit asked Steve Huffman, one of its founders, to return to run the social media platform.Mr. Huffman, who was working on a travel site, was not eager to come back. Reddit was a headache. It was experiencing a revolving door of chief executives. Its sprawling community of users was combative with management. Reddit’s ownership was also complicated, and its technology was lagging behind competitors.“I ran into the burning building,” Mr. Huffman said in a 2017 podcast describing his return.This month, Reddit is poised to reach the stock market in one of the first tech…

House lawmakers are expected to vote starting at around 10 a.m. on Wednesday on legislation meant to force ByteDance, the Chinese internet company, to sell its wildly popular social media app TikTok.The vote would be the latest development in a yearslong cold war between the United States and China over who controls valuable technology from computer chips to artificial intelligence. Lawmakers and the White House have expressed concerns that TikTok’s Chinese ownership poses a national security risk because Beijing could use the app to gain access to Americans’ data or run a disinformation campaign.If the House passes the bill, it…

Messiaen was a hobby ornithologist, and was charmed by Loriod’s name, which sounded like “loriot,” or “oriole,” one of the birds that would make its way into his “Catalogue.” And although they began to spend a lot of time together, on and offstage, their romance didn’t start right away. Many have read Messiaen’s trilogy of works inspired by the Tristan and Isolde myth — “Harawi,” “Turangalîla” and “Cinq Rechants” — as a sublimation of his feelings for Loriod. She loved him, but he was married to Claire Delbos, who was ill and in a nursing home; Loriod would drive Messiaen…

When Mohammed Sweirky prepared to leave for a work trip in January to repair telecommunications infrastructure that had been destroyed in northern Gaza, his wife and children pleaded with him not to go.Fighting between Israeli troops and Hamas members was still raging in the area, said Mr. Sweirky, who is a technician for Paltel, the largest telecommunications company in Gaza, and his family worried he might not return. But he said he felt he had no choice given that residents there desperately needed their phone services restored.“It was painful to say bye,” said Mr. Sweirky, 50, who fled Gaza City…

For Germany — a country that knows something about how extremists can hijack a government — the surging popularity of the far right has forced an awkward question.How far should a democracy go in restricting a party that many believe is bent on undermining it?It is a quandary that politicians and legal experts are grappling with across the country as support surges for Alternative for Germany, a far-right party whose backing now outstrips each of the three parties in the governing coalition.Not only is the AfD the most popular party in three states holding elections this year, it is polling…

A singed eyebrow or two did nothing to extinguish Mr. Neeley’s enthusiasm for jewelry. By age 14, he was participating in art shows across Colorado, including one in Telluride, where the actress Daryl Hannah bought a piece from his first collection.It was around this time, in the late 1990s, when Mr. Neeley paid his first visit to the Tucson gem shows and met Mr. Avery, the lapidary, a fellow Coloradan.In Tucson early this year, Mr. Avery reminisced with Mr. Neeley about that first encounter, when the young rock hound purchased an aquamarine. “I remember your father was with you,” Mr.…