Good morning. We’re covering a fragile truce between Israel and Iran, and a journey across Syria as it rebuilds. Plus, Australia’s “Flying Padres.”
Details revealed about the U.S. strikes on Iran as a truce heldA classified U.S. report found that the strikes on three of Iran’s nuclear sites set its capability back by only a few months, as a cease-fire between Israel and Iran appeared to be holding yesterday. Here’s the latest news. The preliminary report showed that the bombing had sealed off the entrances to two of the facilities but had not collapsed their underground buildings, officials familiar with the details said. The findings suggest that President Trump’s statement that Iran’s nuclear sites were obliterated was overstated. A White House spokeswoman called the classified assessment “flat-out wrong.” The details of the cease-fire remain unclear. Israel’s military lifted emergency restrictions imposed during the conflict, and Iran’s president hailed “the end of a 12-day war that was imposed on the Iranian people” in an address to the nation. Iran and Israel both mounted attacks overnight on Monday, and then presented competing narratives about who was at fault. Trump lashed out at both countries for launching the strikes after he had announced an end to their brief war. Within hours, however, Trump praised both nations for seeking an end to the fighting and took credit for delivering it in a post on Truth Social. “It was my great honor to Destroy All Nuclear facilities & capability, and then, STOP THE WAR!”
Trump is attending the NATO summitPresident Trump departed yesterday for the annual NATO summit at The Hague in the Netherlands, where, he told reporters on Air Force One, “we’ll solve a new set of problems.” The fragile cease-fire between Israel and Iran will most likely dominate the agenda, even as Russia continues to pummel Ukraine. Trump is also expected to claim a long-sought victory and assert that all NATO allies have agreed to increase military spending to 5 percent of their gross domestic product. But not all countries have agreed. Analysis: For most of NATO, the looming issue is Russia, but in the interest of keeping Trump happy, discussion of that elephant in the room is expected to be muted. Mark Rutte, NATO’s secretary general, has gone out of his way to flatter Trump, and publicly champion his spending demand as “a really, really important moment for America and Europe, and the world.”
A journey across the new SyriaAfter one of the most brutal wars of this century, a new Syria is rising from the disastrous legacy of the toppled dictator Bashar al-Assad. The people are free, but the toll is grim — more than half a million killed and millions more displaced. My colleagues traveled for weeks over hundreds of kilometers of pockmarked highways and dirt roads, speaking with masked gunmen, jubilant children and scores of other Syrians as they rebuild their lives. Here’s what our reporters saw, from Damascus, the capital, to a village where Assad’s plunderers “stole all the roofs.”
Niall and Michelle Gibson are the latest in a long line of “Flying Padres” — chaplains who have flown across the vast and sparsely populated Northern Territory of Australia since the final days of World War II. The Gibsons make their stops in a rickety, 20-year-old Cessna-182. They handle the usual services, like baptisms, weddings and funerals, but often, they drop in just to lend an ear to people for whom isolation is a daily reality. Lives lived: Arnaldo Pomodoro, the Italian artist whose fractured, monumental spheres adorn public spaces around the world, died at 98. CONVERSATION STARTERS
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Does art require artists?With nothing more than a few prompts, generative A.I. can churn out a work of art that looks as if it came from a professional. Many artists are worried about their future, and wonder whether art made by machines can be as meaningful as that made by humans. Christoph Niemann, an illustrator, considered many of the conundrums and opportunities A.I. creates for artists in this lavishly drawn piece for The Times Magazine. He concluded that the human making art can impart a unique value to it, writing, “My survival as an artist will depend on whether I’ll be able to offer something that A.I. can’t: Drawings that are as powerful as a birthday doodle from a child.”
Cook: Esquites are an off-the-cob take on elotes, grilled Mexican corn slathered with a creamy sauce. Listen: Pharrell Williams produced “Let God Sort Em Out,” the new album by the rap duo Clipse. Read: Bob Dylan’s latest release is a book of black-and-white drawings. Travel: Island-hopping on ferries in the Caribbean can be a lot mellower than taking a cruise. Test: Can you name the cities in these book titles? |
