Author: Reporter

It was neither the place nor the time for a proper goodbye, said Omar Dirawi. Not here, in this dusty field strewn with dead people wrapped in blankets and zipped up in body bags. And not now, as Israeli airstrikes crashed around him for the third week, erasing more of his neighborhood and sundering hundreds of families and friendships. Yet in Gaza’s central town of Zawaideh, the 22-year-old Palestinian photojournalist buried 32 members of his family who were killed in Israeli air raids on October 15. Dirawi’s aunts, uncles, and cousins from Gaza City had heeded Israeli military evacuation...

Thousands of people broke into aid warehouses in Gaza to take food and “basic survival items,” a U.N. agency said on October 29, in a mark of growing desperation and the breakdown of public order three weeks into the war between Israel and Gaza’s militant Hamas rulers. Tanks and infantry pushed into Gaza on October 28 as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced a “second stage” in the war. The widening ground offensive came as Israel pounded the territory from air, land, and sea. The bombardment — described by Gaza residents as the most intense of the war —...

As an Israeli ground offensive in the Gaza Strip looms in its most devastating war yet with Hamas, one of the greatest threats to both its troops and the 2.3 million Palestinians trapped inside the seaside enclave is buried deep underground. An extensive labyrinth of tunnels built by the Hamas militant group stretches across the densely populated strip, hiding fighters, their rocket arsenal, and over 200 hostages they now hold after an unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel. Clearing and collapsing those tunnels will be crucial if Israel seeks to dismantle Hamas. But fighting in densely populated urban areas...

The city of Lewison, Maine, embarked upon a healing process, and a search for answers, on October 28, a day after the body was found of a U.S. Army reservist who authorities said opened fire at a bowling alley and a bar and killed 18 people. Thirteen people were also injured when 40-year-old Robert Card of Bowdoin — a firearms instructor who grew up in the area — was found dead in nearby Lisbon from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Maine Governor Janet Mills at an October 27 news conference called for the healing process to begin. “Like many people...

A sea of hundreds of protesters filled the main concourse of New York City’s famed Grand Central Terminal during the evening rush hour on October 27, chanting slogans and unfurling banners demanding a cease-fire as Israel intensified its bombardment of the Gaza Strip. Wearing black T-shirts saying “Jews say cease-fire now” and “Not in our name,” at least 200 of the demonstrators were detained by New York Police Department officers and led out of the train station, their hands zip-tied behind their backs. The NYPD said the protesters were taken briefly into custody, issued summonses and released, and that...

For many of the university chaplains and faith leaders caring for students angered and shaken by the Israel-Hamas war, the needs are acute, the days intense. The bloodshed has roiled campuses in the United States, at times sparking rival rallies and competing demands. Kaiser Aslam, Muslim chaplain at the Center for Islamic Life at Rutgers University, has been helping students wrestling with complex questions and anxieties — from why there is suffering to whether public advocacy for Palestinians or criticism of Israel could jeopardize future career opportunities or spark other repercussions. Some, he said, are grieving family members killed...