After the 7.7-magnitude earthquake on Friday, the internet was filled with videos, images and social media posts documenting the damage in Thailand. But across the border in Myanmar, where the devastating quake was centered, there has been a far murkier picture about the scale of the diaster. Information from Myanmar has been harder to come … Read more
The Israeli military ordered residents near the Lebanese capital of Beirut to evacuate on Friday for the first time since a U.S.-brokered cease-fire went into effect months ago after rockets were fired on northern Israel. Avichay Adraee, a spokesman for the Israeli military, posted a map on social media with a single building in the … Read more
Torn, folded, stitched and bound into a book of property records from the 1500s, rare tales of Merlin shapeshifting into King Arthur’s court and Sir Gawain gaining power from the sun had gone unnoticed for centuries, stacked among the records of an English manor and then among the millions of volumes of a university library. … Read more
In central Bangkok, throngs of panicked residents ran outside when the earthquake hit. Afterward, sidewalks, plazas and sidewalks were packed with crowds of office workers, shopkeepers and tourists who remained outside for fear of aftershocks and structural damage to the buildings. Videos posted on social media, and confirmed by The New York Times, showed one … Read more
In a major bet last summer, Ukraine launched a daring offensive on Russian soil, the first invasion of Russia since World War II. That incursion into the Kursk region stunned Moscow and provided a much-needed morale boost for Ukrainians, but after months of fierce fighting, Russia has recently clawed back almost all of the territory … Read more
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth used his first trip to Asia to try to reassure allies that the United States was committed to deterring Chinese “threats” to the region, while also again defending his recent actions in disclosing American battle plans in a group chat. Speaking at a news conference in Manila, the capital of … Read more
The silent season is drawing to a close. All winter, there was little birdsong to lift my heart. The occasional caw of a crow, the chickadee-dee-dee of a chickadee, the big song of the little Carolina wren that now stays on our Pennsylvania farm all winter. But no courtship call of great horned owls, no … Read more
A new TV series airing for the holy month of Ramadan is stoking sectarian tensions in the Middle East with the story of a divisive figure in Islamic history who is revered by Sunni Muslims but reviled by many Shiites. The series, “Muawiya,” tells the story of Muawiya ibn Abi Sufyan, a major figure in … Read more
One of the biggest corporate donors to the populist Reform U.K. party has sold almost $2 million worth of transmitters, cockpit equipment, antennas and other sensitive technology to a major supplier of Moscow’s blacklisted state weapons agency, documents show. From 2023 to 2024, the company, part of the British aerospace manufacturer H.R. Smith Group, shipped … Read more
For years, the threat of a Russia intent on expansion has loomed over much of Europe. It is not just the war in Ukraine. Moscow has also stationed military forces in friendly countries and fanned the flames of destabilizing political movements across the continent. Now, as the Trump administration strikes a conciliatory tone toward Russia … Read more