Author: Reporter

The history of when genocide officially became a crime and what it means for Israel to be accused of it

In the aftermath of World War II and the murder by Nazi Germany of 6 million Jews in the Holocaust, the world united around a now-familiar pledge: Never again. A key part of that lofty aspiration was the drafting of a convention that codified and committed nations to prevent and punish a new crime, sometimes called the crime of crimes: genocide. The convention was drawn up in 1948, the year of Israel’s creation as a Jewish state. Now that country is being accused at the United Nations’ highest court of committing the very crime so deeply woven into its...

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President Biden revisits decaying Wisconsin bridge he vowed to help fix as part of $5B infrastructure plan

The last time President Joe Biden visited Superior, Wisconsin, he warned of the danger posed by the deteriorating John A. Blatnik Memorial Bridge. He pointed out the decades-old corrosion that had weakened the overpass connecting the two port cities in Wisconsin and Minnesota, and vowed to fix it. President Biden is returning to that bridge at the tip of Lake Superior on January 25 to announce nearly $5 billion in federal funding that would upgrade it and dozens of similar infrastructure projects nationwide, as the Democratic president jump-starts an election year push to persuade voters to reward him for...

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Winter Health Explainer: How to avoid getting ill during the cold, flu, and COVID-19 season

Winter is well underway, inflicting its usual array of symptoms like coughs, nasal congestion, fatigue, and fever, and this year a new COVID-19 variant is dominating the scoreboard. COVID-19 is leading hospital admissions among the respiratory viruses, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Since the beginning of January, 25 U.S. states had high or very high levels for respiratory illnesses with fever, cough, and other symptoms. That was down from 37 states in early January, the CDC said. Since the beginning of October, there have been at least 16 million illnesses, 180,000 hospitalizations, and 11,000...

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Winter Health Explainer: How to stay warm in layered clothing and avoid frostbite

As a bout of bitter and deadly cold sweeps the U.S., millions of Americans are being told to dress in layers if they must go outside. In places that rarely experience bone-chilling temperatures, that advice can be confounding. What does it mean to layer up? Is it different from just putting on a coat? Is there a way to do it wrong? People in Minnesota, a state that is no stranger to the cold, have wisdom to share. WHAT IS LAYERING? Layering means wearing multiple pieces of clothing to keep your body comfortable in cold weather. Each layer creates...

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Budget deadlock: White House warns of dire situation in Ukraine as Republicans hold military aid hostage

President Joe Biden’s top budget official warned in stark terms in early January about the rapidly diminishing time that lawmakers have to replenish U.S. aid for Ukraine, as the fate of that money to Kyiv remained held hostage to demands by Republicans over immigration. Shalanda Young, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, stressed that there was no avenue to help Ukraine aside from Congress approving additional funding to help Kyiv – as it fends off Russia’s brutal invasion that is now nearly two years old. While the Pentagon has some limited authority to help Kyiv absent...

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Mstyslav Chernov’s “20 Days in Mariupol” earns first Oscar nomination for 178-year-old Associated Press

“20 Days in Mariupol,” Mstyslav Chernov’s harrowing chronicle of the besieged Ukrainian city and the international journalists who remained there after Russia’s invasion, was nominated for best documentary at the Academy Awards, handing The Associated Press its first Oscar nomination in the 178-year-old news organization’s history. The film, a co-production between the AP and PBS “Frontline,” was shot during the first three weeks of the war in Ukraine, in early 2022. Chernov, a Ukrainian journalist and filmmaker, arrived in Mariupol one hour before Russia began bombarding the port city. With him were photographer Evgeniy Maloletka and field producer Vasilisa...

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