Yemen Finds Dreamland of Architecture

Abstract: SANA, Yemen — It has been almost 800 years since Saleh Qaid Othaim’s house in the heart of the Old City was built from hand-cut stones and traditional alabaster decorations. Yet on a recent morning, Mr. Othaim watched contentedly as a group of men renovated the place using exactly the same ancient methods and materials. Workers mixed the moist chocolate-brown masonry known as teen while a master builder supervised, a dagger hanging from his belt. There was no scaffolding, no helmets, no whine of machines: only the scraping of trowels and masonry, interrupted at last by the call to prayer in the high desert air. “I don’t care how long it takes,” said Mr. Othaim, a government worker. “The most important thing is that it be done in a traditional way.” The capital’s Old City is one of the world’s architectural gems, a thicket of unearthly medieval towers etched with white filigree and crowned with stained-glass windows. But more unusual than their mere survival is the fact that the traditional building arts continue to thrive here. Elsewhere in the Middle East, many older houses are being ripped down to make way for bland steel-and-glass high-rise buildings. The hyper-modern skyline of Dubai, United Arab Emirates, with its mismatched skyscrapers looking as if they were hurled down at the Persian Gulf from outer space, is being emulated in Beirut and other cities. Yemen is different. For all its many woes — wars , a water crisis and the rise of Al Qaeda — the country’s adherence to ancient traditions often makes it feel like a refuge. Even outside the Old City, the bands and crescents of medieval Yemeni architecture can be seen on many newer buildings and homes, along with the translucent alabaster windows known as gammariyas. The traditions stayed alive largely because of Yemen’s deep poverty and long isolation. Until 1962, north Yemen had been ruled for almost a millennium by xenophobic imams who tried to shut out all foreign influence. The country largely missed the urban renewal phase of Arab history, in which kings and presidents cleared out ancient neighborhoods and markets in an effort to bring their nations into the modern age. By the early 1980s, when Yemen was still emerging from its medieval slumber, preservation was already in vogue. There was much to preserve. This country has been famous for its unique architecture ever since Sabaean rulers built the skyscraper palace of Ghumdan 1,800 years ago, celebrated by one medieval poet thus: It rises, climbing into the midst of the sky twenty floors of no mean height wound with a turban of white cloud and girdled in alabaster. Architects rediscovering the Old City soon found there was more than beauty at stake. The traditional houses were also more durable and effective than concrete-based modern houses, and better suited to the climate. “The traditional houses have many environmental advantages,” said Abdulla Zaid Ayssa, the director of the government office that oversees all building and renovation in the Old City. The traditional plaster, joss, does not erode stones over time the way cement does, Mr. Ayssa said, and is more durable. Qadad, a stone-based insulation material used in roofs and bathrooms, is much stronger than modern equivalents. The old stones and insulation techniques are calibrated to the sharp temperature shifts of night and day in Sana’s desert climate, so that the sun’s warmth fully penetrates a house’s walls only at day’s end, and is then retained through the night and no longer, Mr. Ayssa said. They are also much more soundproof and private than concrete. “They experimented for hundreds of years to find these techniques,” Mr. Ayssa said. “By comparison, nowadays we are building houses with a very stupid concept.” Yemen did not preserve everything. Only a few decades ago, there were 10 or 12 massive gates to the Old City; now only one remains. Some zealous republicans associated the older architecture with the reign of the imams, and thought it should be destroyed. Still, Yemen kept far more than many other Arab countries did and, in 1986, Unesco, the United Nations culture agency, recognized the Old City as a World Heritage site , helping to secure money for its maintenance. Mr. Ayssa’s office helps subsidize the continued use of traditional materials and methods, which often cost more than modern ones. To prevent the Old City from becoming a mere museum, the government built a modern sewerage system in the 1980s. It cobbled the ancient earthen streets, which had led one Italian writer to call the city a “Venice of dust.” Now it is almost too crowded, and the authorities find themselves struggling to suit the city’s architecture to new ways of living. The ground floors that were once used for camels and goats have been largely refitted as stores. Those shops are undermining the central market, the social and cultural heart of the Old City. Still, local residents seem wedded to the traditional architecture and the rituals that go with it. “Everything is changing in the city, but still, generation after generation, it continues,” said Mahmoud Qais al-Arousi, a 65-year-old builder, as he stood watching his workers mix masonry outside Mr. Othaim’s home. The building, he pointed out, still has scrape marks on its stone corners from where horse-drawn carriages would pass by. It was once inhabited by Nasser Salahuddin, a local notable who died 720 years ago. With Mr. Arousi were his three sons, all of them apprentices to him. The building trade goes back hundreds of years in his family, he said, and his sons are planning to continue it. “I learned by following every step my father made — the stones, the hizams,” Mr. Arousi said, referring to the distinctive horizontal belts running around Yemeni houses. “My sons are doing the same.”

Yemen
Architecture
Historic Buildings and Sites


Britain Names New Director of MI6 Spy Agency

Abstract: LONDON — Britain has named Alex Younger, an economics graduate and former soldier, as the next director of MI6, known officially as the Secret Intelligence Service, the British equivalent of the Central Intelligence Agency. Mr. Younger, 51, who has worked with MI6 since 1991, will replace John Sawers, who spent most of his career as a top diplomat, serving as ambassador to Egypt and the United Nations, as well as the senior foreign-policy adviser to Prime Minister Tony Blair. Mr. Younger, who takes over in November, has served in Europe, the Middle East and Afghanistan. The head of MI6 is known as “C,” after the first head of the agency, Mansfield Cumming, not “M,” as Ian Fleming had it. The chief is the only member of MI6 whose name is published, and the service operates in secrecy. Britain publicly admitted its existence only in 1994. The government biography gave few details about Mr. Younger other than that he is married, has children, enjoys music, sailing and mountaineering. It said he had been in charge of intelligence operations for the last two years and had worked on security for the London Olympics in 2012. Even the photograph the government released of Mr. Younger was slightly out of focus.

MI6
Alex Younger
John Sawers
Great Britain
Spying and Intelligence Agencies
Appointments and Executive Changes


A Plan in Case Robots Take the Jobs: Give Everyone a Paycheck

Abstract: Let’s say computers come for most of our jobs. This may not seem likely at the moment; computer scientists and economists offer wildly varying ideas for how deeply automation will affect future employment . But for the sake of argument, imagine that within two or three decades we’ll have morphed into the Robotic States of America. In Robot America, most manual laborers will have been replaced by herculean bots . Truck drivers, cabbies, delivery workers and airline pilots will have been superseded by vehicles that do it all. Doctors, lawyers, business executives and even technology columnists for The New York Times will have seen their ranks thinned by charming, attractive, all-knowing algorithms. How will society function after humanity has been made redundant? Technologists and economists have been grappling with this fear for decades, but in the last few years, one idea has gained widespread interest — including from some of the very technologists who are now building the bot-ruled future. Their plan is known as “universal basic income,” or U.B.I., and it goes like this: As the jobs dry up because of the spread of artificial intelligence, why not just give everyone a paycheck? Imagine the government sending each adult about $1,000 a month, about enough to cover housing, food, health care and other basic needs for many Americans. U.B.I. would be aimed at easing the dislocation caused by technological progress, but it would also be bigger than that. While U.B.I. has been associated with left-leaning academics, feminists and other progressive activists, it has lately been adopted by a wider range of thinkers, including some libertarians and conservatives . It has also gained support among a cadre of venture capitalists in New York and Silicon Valley, the people most familiar with the potential for technology to alter modern work. Rather than a job-killing catastrophe, tech supporters of U.B.I. consider machine intelligence to be something like a natural bounty for society: The country has struck oil, and now it can hand out checks to each of its citizens. Image The Atlas Robot from Boston Dynamics Credit Boston Dynamics These supporters argue machine intelligence will produce so much economic surplus that we could collectively afford to liberate much of humanity from both labor and suffering. The most idealistic thinkers see the plan as a way to foster the sort of quasi-utopian future we’ve only encountered in science fiction universes like that of “Star Trek.” As computers perform more of our work, we’d all be free to become artists, scholars, entrepreneurs or otherwise engage our passions in a society no longer centered on the drudgery of daily labor. “We’re talking about divorcing your basic needs from the need to work,” said Albert Wenger, a venture capitalist at Union Square Ventures, a proponent who is working on a book about U.B.I. “For a couple hundred years, we’ve constructed our entire world around the need to work. Now we’re talking about more than just a tweak to the economy — it’s as foundational a departure as when we went from an agrarian society to an industrial one.” Sam Altman, president of the tech incubator Y Combinator, recently proposed to fund research into U.B.I. The firm has received thousands of applications for research funding, Mr. Altman said; it plans to select winning recipients within a few weeks, and ultimately Y Combinator plans to spend “tens of millions” of dollars on research to answer some of the most basic questions about life under U.B.I. Mr. Altman said these questions range from the most practical — how much U.B.I. would cost the country, and whether we could afford it — to deeper issues concerning people’s motivation and purpose in what you might call a “postwork” age. When you give everyone free money, what do people do with their time? Do they goof off, or do they try to pursue more meaningful pursuits? Do they become more entrepreneurial? How would U.B.I. affect economic inequality? How would it alter people’s psychology and mood? Do we, as a species, need to be employed to feel fulfilled, or is that merely a legacy of postindustrial capitalism? There is an urgency to the techies’ interest in U.B.I. They argue that machine intelligence reached an inflection point in the last couple of years, and that technological progress now looks destined to change how most of the world works. “People have been predicting that jobs would go away for a long time, and usually what happens is they just change,” Mr. Altman said. But even so, “during those periods of change, things can be quite disruptive,” and at the very least, U.B.I. may be able to smooth out the transition period. We may already be seeing the disruptions. Though the macroeconomic statistics suggest the United States has recovered from the last recession — job growth in 2015 reached levels not seen since the 1990s — surveys show that many Americans feel vulnerable and anxious about their jobs and finances . Wage growth is sluggish , job security is nonexistent, inequality looks inexorable, and the ideas that once seemed like a sure path to a better future (like taking on debt for college) are in doubt . Even where technology has created more jobs, like the so-called gig economy work created by services like Uber, it has only added to our collective uncertainty about the future of work . Image Sam Altman. founder and partner at Y Combinator, which provides seed funding for start-ups. Credit Martin Klimek “All of a sudden people are looking at these trends and realizing these questions about the future of work are more real and immediate than they guessed,” said Roy Bahat, the head of Bloomberg Beta, the venture capital firm funded by Bloomberg L.P. A cynic might see the interest of venture capitalists in U.B.I. as a way for them to atone for their complicity in the tech that might lead to permanent changes in the global economy. After all, here are rich people who both actively fund and benefit from creating highly profitable companies that employ very few people. It doesn’t help that you have some investors who’ve been terrifically tin-eared about the perils of globalization and the modern economy (see musings from Paul Graham on inequality , Marc Andreessen on colonialism and Thomas J. Perkins on class resentment .) But my conversations with techies interested in U.B.I. revealed a sincerity and sophistication about the idea. They aren’t ashamed or afraid of automation, and they don’t see U.B.I. merely as a defense of the current social order. Instead they see automation and U.B.I. as the most optimistic path toward wider social progress. “I think it’s a bad use of a human to spend 20 years of their life driving a truck back and forth across the United States,” Mr. Wenger said. “That’s not what we aspire to do as humans — it’s a bad use of a human brain — and automation and basic income is a development that will free us to do lots of incredible things that are more aligned with what it means to be human.” Like much of what venture capital firms work on, basic income is a pie-in-the-sky notion. Though it has enjoyed recognition among wonks and some political momentum in Europe , not a single American presidential candidate has expressed even passing interest in the idea. It has also been hampered by some very basic practical questions: How much should we give out in monthly income? Can the country afford that? Proponents say these questions will be answered by research, which in turn will prompt political change. For now, they argue the proposal is affordable if we alter tax and welfare policies to pay for it, and if we account for the ways technological progress in health care and energy will reduce the amount necessary to provide a basic cost of living. They also note that increasing economic urgency will push widespread political acceptance of the idea. “There’s a sense that growing inequality is intractable, and that we need to do something about it,” said Natalie Foster, the co-founder of Peers, an organization that supports sharing-economy workers. Andrew L. Stern, a former president of the Service Employees International Union, who is working on a book about U.B.I., compared the feeling of the current anxiety around jobs to a time of war. “I grew up during the Vietnam War, and my parents were antiwar for one reason: I could be drafted,” he said. Today, as people across all income levels become increasingly worried about how they and their children will survive in tech-infatuated America, “we are back to the Vietnam War when it comes to jobs,” Mr. Stern said. “We’re entering a universal, white-collar, middle-class anxiety, which drives political change faster than poor people tend to drive change.”

Robot
Jobs
Artificial intelligence
US Economy


Reyes Has Something to Chase: Mets’ First Batting Crown

Abstract: MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — Like many athletes, Jose Reyes says he does not concern himself with individual accolades. Still, he is well aware that he has the opportunity this season to earn a singular place in Mets history. After the Mets’ 7-4 victory Tuesday night at Sun Life Stadium, Reyes’s batting average stood at .334, leading the National League, just ahead of Ryan Braun of Milwaukee Brewers at .333. Matt Kemp of the Los Angeles Dodgers, at .319, is well behind in third place. If Reyes, who was 3 for 6 Tuesday but who has been slumping of late, can stay ahead of Braun, he could become the first Met to win a batting title in the club’s five-decade history. For a team that has battled hard this season but is still under .500, it would add some distinction to a long, challenging and often frustrating campaign. “If it happens, I mean, it’s great, because not too many people have the opportunity to win a batting title in the big leagues,” Reyes said before Tuesday’s game. Reyes said his troublesome left hamstring had given him more than enough to occupy his mind this season. On top of that, he said, he has come to realize as he has grown older that allowing himself to think about his individual statistics — he is always among the leaders in triples and stolen bases — had usually hampered his performance on the field. Still, Reyes, 28, said he did know that no Met before him had won a National League batting title. For that matter, no Met has been proclaimed the league’s most valuable player. In contrast, the team has won four Cy Young Awards, three by Tom Seaver, which reflects the fact that historically, the good Mets teams have been better known for their pitching than for their hitting. And although three Mets — Dave Kingman, Darryl Strawberry and Howard Johnson — won National League home run titles, none did it emphatically. Each finished with fewer than 40 home runs. Going into this season, Reyes’s highest full-season average as a Met was the .300 he put together in 2006, when the Mets nearly reached the World Series. He has 155 hits in 464 at-bats, including 27 doubles, 5 home runs and a major-league-leading 16 triples. More than anything, though, a cluster of September singles would probably give him the best chance to beat out Braun. “I know it would mean a lot for him,” third baseman David Wright said of Reyes. “And I think it would mean a lot to us as an organization.” Wright, who was named the National League’s player of the week Tuesday, added: “You never want to be in a position this time of year where you’re rooting for individual awards. But obviously, when you have a guy going for the batting title, you root for him and you want to see him get it.” The Mets have had distinguished batting averages in their history. The highest was John Olerud’s .354 in 1998. But the Colorado Rockies’ Larry Walker bested him by 9 points that season. Then there was Cleon Jones, who hit .340 in 1969 as the Mets won a championship. But he was surpassed by Pete Rose of the Cincinnati Reds, who hit .348, and Roberto Clemente of the Pittsburgh Pirates, who hit .345. More recently, Wright hit .325 in 2007, falling 15 points short of Matt Holiday’s winning mark for the Rockies. Although Wright was clearly enthusiastic about Reyes’s quest, Manager Terry Collins said he saw it differently. “I only care about his health,” Collins said of Reyes. “That’s all I care about right now.” Reyes has twice been sidelined with hamstring injuries since the beginning of July, and Collins said the fact that he was now back in the lineup was more significant than where he stood in relation to Braun in the batting race. “He picks our guys up just by being in the lineup,” Collins said. “If he wins the batting title, I think it would be absolutely tremendous. But we can’t worry about it.” Reyes’s average peaked at .355 on July 19, after his first game back from his initial stint on the disabled list. But it has fallen slowly since then as he endured a second hamstring injury and another trip to the disabled list. He has hit .272 in 26 games since July 19, an indication that the D.L. stints have disrupted his hitting. “I’m a little bit jumpy at home plate right now,” Reyes said. “I don’t want to say I’m feeling great, but it’s coming.” Almost with that in mind, Wright predicted that Reyes, his full-time partner on the left side of the infield since 2005, would move past Braun if he could regain the rhythm he had at the plate earlier in the season. “If Jose goes out there and just does what he’s capable of, he’s going to win it,” Wright said. Reyes versus Braun. For Mets fans, and players, it’s something to watch in a season in which little else is at stake.

Baseball
Reyes Jose
New York Mets
Awards Decorations and Honors


Grand Slam by Cruz Gives Rangers 2-0 Edge Over Tigers

Abstract: ARLINGTON, Tex. — Nelson Cruz’s slump hurt enough, but even after he hit a game-tying home run in the seventh inning, the Detroit Tigers figured it was safer to pitch to him in the ninth than to Mike Napoli as they desperately fought to take the Texas Rangers into extra innings Monday night. Disrespectful? Perhaps, if only because Detroit hoped he would hit into a double play. But then Cruz was drilled immediately by a fastball from closer Jose Valverde, adding injury to insult and loading the bases. As his right wrist swelled and turned black and blue, Cruz wondered if his role in Game 2 of the American League Championship Series was finished. “When I got hit, I thought it was worse,” Cruz said. “The adrenaline would have had to be really bad to come out of this game and not feel the pain. In that situation, you just want to stay in.” The Tigers escaped that jam, but two innings later, with the bases loaded, the Tigers had no choice but to face Cruz. He responded with the first game-ending grand slam in postseason history , blasting a 1-2 slider into the left-field seats and lifting the Rangers to a 7-3 victory . Texas has lived on the edge this postseason, entering the game with three consecutive one-run victories. Now the Rangers have won five in a row over all, giving them a huge statistical edge in the series. Since the best-of-seven format for the A.L.C.S. was started in 1985, teams winning the first two games have advanced to the World Series 19 of 25 times. Detroit will host the next three games Tuesday through Thursday. “They earned it, and we didn’t quite get it done,” Tigers Manager Jim Leyland said. “We haven’t been able to come up with any big hits.” He added, “If you keep giving a team like that that many opportunities, they’re going to get you eventually.” Cruz had mostly whiffed on his chances thus far and was 2 for 18 (.111) in this year’s postseason entering Monday. But one of those hits was a solo home run in Game 1 that provided the winning margin in the Rangers’ 3-2 victory . He also proved to be a catalyst in Game 2; he finished 3 for 4 with two home runs, a double and five runs batted in, including his leadoff homer in the seventh off Detroit starter Max Scherzer that tied the score, 3-3. “It probably will be a long series,” Rangers Manager Ron Washington said. “You got two teams competing that will not quit. We had the bases loaded earlier in the game and didn’t get it done. That time, we got it done. It was a heck of a ballgame, and we had to pull out all the stops.” The Rangers finally broke through after Ryan Perry took over from Valverde in the 11th. The cleanup hitter, Michael Young, who also came into the game 2 for 18 in this postseason, led off with a single, and Adrian Beltre followed with a single. Napoli then drilled a line single to right-center that right fielder Andy Dirks appeared to misplay, loading the bases for Cruz. “On the first two pitches, I was too aggressive,” Cruz said of his at-bat. “I just told myself to slow down and try to hit the ball to the outfield.” He did more than that. It was not, however, the first time a postseason batter hit a ball over the fence with the bases loaded to end a game. The Mets’ Robin Ventura seemingly hit a grand slam in the 15th inning of Game 5 of the 1999 National League Championship Series, but the play was ruled a single because Ventura was mobbed before he could round the bases. The Rangers nearly won it in the ninth inning against Valverde. Texas loaded the bases with nobody out when Beltre doubled, Napoli was walked intentionally to set up a double play and Cruz took the first pitch on his right wrist. “He was scared, because he got hit in the wrist,” Washington said of Cruz after he was hit by Valverde. “It was black and blue. After the doctor checked him and told him he was fine, Nelson got up and did it for us like he’s done during the course of the year when he was healthy.” But just as they did against the Yankees, Valverde and the Tigers escaped. With the crowd of 51,227 at the Ballpark in Arlington on its feet and madly waving white rally towels, David Murphy lofted a fly ball to short left that might have been deep enough for Beltre to try to score. Beltre, who was 3 for 5 with a run batted in, made a fake toward home plate but stayed at third. Mitch Moreland then hit a weak grounder to first baseman Miguel Cabrera, who fielded the ball and fired it to catcher Alex Avila to force Beltre out at home. Avila then fired back to Cabrera, who was able to tag out Moreland despite an off-target return throw. “It was a great two games that could have went either way,” Leyland said. “We couldn’t get the key hits, and they were able to.” The Tigers threatened with two outs in the ninth inning, putting runners on second and third, when closer Neftali Feliz was brought in to pitch to Cabrera. Feliz intentionally walked him, then got designated hitter Victor Martinez to pop out to short left-center field. Before then, Scherzer had pitched four scoreless innings with a 3-2 lead supplied by Ryan Raburn’s three-run homer in the third inning. Texas starter Derek Holland walked 4 of the first 10 batters, and allowed three runs and four hits. But Detroit could not get a hit after he walked the bases loaded in the second inning. Texas jumped to a 2-0 lead in the first inning. Elvis Andrus singled, and Josh Hamilton followed with a run-scoring double. Beltre then ripped another double, driving in Hamilton.

Detroit Tigers
Texas Rangers
Baseball
Playoff Games
Cruz Nelson


Social Democrats Formally Nominate Merkel Rival

Abstract: BERLIN — As if it weren’t challenging enough to run against a chancellor viewed as Europe’s most powerful leader, Angela Merkel ’s main rival in next year’s national election has come under fire since his nomination for the nearly $1.7 million he earned from speaking fees in the past three years. But Peer Steinbrück, who was formally nominated by the Social Democratic Party on Sunday to run for chancellor, demonstrated in a wide-ranging speech to party delegates that he was unwilling to let either hurdle hamper his campaign. He characterized Ms. Merkel as a dividing force who has isolated Germany from its European partners and whose policies have widened the rift between rich and poor. Mr. Steinbrück is a 65-year-old economics expert who served as finance minister in Ms. Merkel’s first government, in coalition with the Social Democrats from 2005 to 2009, and he rejected another such tie-up of the country’s two main political parties. “I am not available for a grand coalition,” Mr. Steinbrück said. “I want Germany to find a new, social equality. I want change instead of stagnation.” His biting humor and sharp wit were on display at a convention convened for the purpose of formally electing him as the party’s candidate. But he also displayed a humble, more personal side, acknowledging the loss of support because of the scandal surrounding his private earnings. “I thank you for bearing this burden for me and with me,” he told the more than 580 delegates. “I have not only had criticism from your ranks, but much solidarity — more than I ever thought I could expect.” Long considered unpopular among Social Democratic women and the party’s more traditional, working-class left wing, Mr. Steinbrück reached out to them, emphasizing fair pay, social equality, education and increased regulation of financial markets as central issues for his campaign. It appeared to pay off, with more than 93 percent voting in his favor. “Economic policy is only good as long as it helps people,” Mr. Steinbrück said. “The market has to justify itself before democratic and social life, and not the other way around.” Germany is one of the few European countries not to have had a change of government since the start of the sovereign debt crisis in 2008. Most recently, French voters swung to the left, ushering in a Socialist president, François Hollande. Whether Germans are ready to follow suit is unclear. In times of trouble, they have tended to avoid change, and Ms. Merkel is widely seen as having guarded German prosperity in the face of economic turbulence across Europe. A survey published last week showed the chancellor’s ratings suffering a week after news broke that the second round of financial assistance to Greece would cost German taxpayers 700 million euros, or about $905 million. Analysts said they were not sure the Social Democrats’ focus on social justice would be enough to unseat Ms. Merkel. “They found an issue that they can use to win points against the conservatives,” said Karl-Rudolf Korte, a professor of political science at Duisburg-Essen University. “Whether they can succeed in making it relevant in a year that will be more focused on security than justice will be the big question.”

Germany
Steinbruck Peer
Merkel Angela
Social Democratic Party (Germany)
European Sovereign Debt Crisis (2010- )


Working for Needs of Others, Ridgefield Woman Seen on the Side of the Angels

Abstract: Ridgefield Park “ASK Mary,” people say around here. “Maybe she can help.” They are talking about Mary Hirschman, 88, a one-woman charity machine who has been quietly helping others so long she has become a local institution. There is an older man in the building who needs help. Tell Mary. There is a family that doesn’t have enough to eat. Does Mary know? Maybe it was her early experiences that made her so sensitive to hardship and suffering. She arrived in this country in 1926, a 6-year-old farm girl from Germany sent off to school without knowing a word of English. During the Depression her father, who owned a delicatessen in the Bronx, sent her to collect from customers. She went home crying, after hearing their sad stories. At 16, she was expelled from school after she had an epileptic seizure there. More likely, though, her drive to help others was inborn. Mrs. Hirschman cannot explain it herself, except to say: “It’s natural. I’m just geared to do it. Anything I hear about, I do.” She also is not above getting on the phone to complain to politicians about poor government services or to ask for an accounting of where the people’s money is going. In this corner of Bergen County, Mrs. Hirschman is known as the woman who — for the past 28 years, without title, salary or sponsor — has organized a monthly charter bus trip from Ridgefield Park to Atlantic City and dedicated the proceeds to charity. Mrs. Hirschman uses money she nets from the undertaking (round-trip fare is $30) to subsidize needy individuals or nonprofit groups. Her bus fills up through word-of-mouth. There is no advertising. Most of the passengers, though not all, are regulars, and many are elderly. As the bus heads south on the Garden State Parkway, she will rise from her customary seat in the back and, despite her arthritis and bad hips, move forward to make her announcements. “I’ll say, ‘Last month I spent $200 on food’ or ‘I bought clothing for the homeless in Hackensack,’ ” Mrs. Hirschman said recently. “Then, if there’s something someone needs, like a dresser, I’ll let them know. Someone always contacts me afterward and says, ‘I have a dresser you can use.’ ” The bus trips started in 1980, when she joined several civic groups fighting for senior housing in Ridgefield Park. As a first step, the groups were required to raise seed money. At the time Mrs. Hirschman was living in the house she and her husband, Harold, bought when they moved from New York in 1964. He was a textile worker, and she worked part-time at a clothing store in Harlem. (Now widowed, with two children in Wyckoff and Freehold, she lives in a condo in town.) Mrs. Hirschman proposed raising money by sponsoring a charter bus trip to Atlantic City. The first run was so successful, a second was scheduled and a third. After the senior housing complex, Ryan Lombardi Towers, opened its doors, the trips continued. There were always people in need. By then Mrs. Hirschman had been appointed to the board of the Southeast Senior Center for Independent Living, a regional activity center in Englewood offering a broad range of programming for the elderly. One day, a cook there took her aside. “Mary, maybe you want to know, the people at Bright Side didn’t get a hot meal last night,” she said, referring to a boarding home that took in low-income health care clients in Teaneck. Mrs. Hirschman drove to the boarding home and got out of her car. “There were people standing outside,” she said. “I asked them how they liked it there, and how there were treated, and what they had to eat for dinner the night before.” The residents told her they enjoyed living there, she said, but confirmed they had eaten sandwiches. She returned the next day, asking the same questions. Then she rang the bell. “Unannounced, she just showed up and asked my head nurse to show her around, with no explanation,” Elizabeth Davis, the executive director, recalled. “We were happy to do it. Then she came to me and said: ‘O.K., I like this place. I’m going to help you out.’ ” Bright Side Manor needed a new stove, so Mrs. Hirschman found one at a commercial kitchen supply store. She drove a hard bargain with the store owner, who agreed to sell it at a steep discount. She subsidized part of the cost herself and raised money for the balance. That was in 1995. These days Mrs. Hirschman remains a frequent visitor at Bright Side Manor, which has been converted into a cheerful nonprofit assisted-living facility. While friendly and chatty, she is not there to provide companionship to its 65 residents. Mrs. Hirschman is there to see if anyone needs anything. Every fall, one or two graduate students from the Columbia University School of Social Work intern at Bright Side. Ms. Davis makes sure they meet Mrs. Hirschman. Ms. Davis said: “I’ll introduce her and say: ‘Mary is an example of what a social worker should be. She’s a real advocate and a mover and shaker. She’s not formally trained, but she does what a social worker should be doing, which is to make sure people’s needs are being met. We have many volunteers, but she is our special angel.”


Israel Faces a Hard Sell in Bid to Shift Policy

Abstract: JERUSALEM — The new government of Israel is seeking to reorient the country’s foreign policy, arguing that to rely purely on the formulas of trading land for peace and promising a Palestinian state fails to grasp what it views as the deeper issues: Muslim rejection of a Jewish state and the rising hegemonic appetite of Iran . Advisers to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are drafting policy suggestions aimed at forming a framework that he plans to present to President Obama at their first summit meeting, in Washington on May 18. In addition, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman left Sunday for Europe on his first official visit, and on Tuesday, President Shimon Peres is to meet with Mr. Obama in Washington. Such an ambitious effort to reformulate the conflict will be, by all accounts, tough to sell for two reasons. First, even though the standard approaches have not yielded success, no alternative has emerged. Second, the Obama administration has repeatedly backed the two-state solution, as have the Europeans. In other ways, too, this White House has seemed to be closer in outlook to Europe than the past administration was. Israel’s effort to switch the discussion to Iran is likely to be met in Washington and in European capitals with the assertion that it is precisely because of the need to build an alliance to confront Iran that Israel must move ahead vigorously with the Palestinians as well as with the Syrians. “President Obama views the region as a whole, and trying to isolate each problem does not reflect reality,” said a senior American official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the American policy was still in formation. “It will be a lot easier to build a coalition to deal with Iran if the peace process is moving forward.” A senior Israeli official, who also would speak only if not named because Israeli policy was being formed, said he believed that when Mr. Netanyahu met Mr. Obama, he would acknowledge that ultimately the goal was a Palestinian state. But it is expected that he would say that such a state was far in the future because Palestinian institutions and economic development required a great deal of work — as well as investment from Arab states — and that Palestinian education and public discourse needed to be more oriented toward coexistence. Mr. Lieberman is to begin his trip in Rome, seeing Foreign Minister Franco Frattini on Monday, and then travel to Paris, Prague and Berlin for similar meetings. He is one of the most controversial senior members of the Israeli government. As a candidate, he called for a loyalty oath aimed at Israeli Arabs. In addition, his public speech has been tough, sometimes brutal. And he himself lives in a West Bank settlement. Israel’s own diplomats view his arrival as their chief with circumspection, especially because his predecessor, Tzipi Livni, was admired by her colleagues in Europe. Whenever she went to Paris, for example, she saw not only the foreign minister but also President Nicolas Sarkozy. So far, Mr. Sarkozy has not agreed to see Mr. Lieberman this week. “I tell people who worry about Lieberman that I worry too,” a senior Israeli diplomat said, requesting anonymity to speak freely of his boss. “But after I stop worrying I tell myself, you have to be fair, you have to give this guy a chance to express himself as the foreign minister of Israel, not just as a candidate.” Yigal Palmor, a Foreign Ministry spokesman, said that Mr. Lieberman had been scheduled to meet with all 27 European Union foreign ministers this month at a summit meeting, but that Mr. Lieberman had asked for a delay so the government could come up with its policy guidelines. The European Union agreed. It seems likely that the plan that Mr. Netanyahu will present to Mr. Obama will have a strong regional component in an attempt to fend off pressure on Israel to accept the Arab League peace plan, which calls on Israel to return to the 1967 borders as well as to accept a right of return for Palestinian refugees to Israel. The new Israeli government completely rejects both. Mr. Lieberman is one of the strongest advocates for rethinking Israel’s approach and rejecting what he views as failed past formulas. He wants tough sanctions against Iran as the first step. He told The Jerusalem Post in an interview published last week that the aim of the policy review was to make progress on Palestinian economic and political developments and “to take the initiative” in the region. “People try to simplify the situation with these formulas: land for peace, two-state solution,” Mr. Lieberman told the newspaper. “It’s a lot more complicated.” He added that the real reason for the deadlock “is not occupation, not settlements and not settlers.” Nor, he said, is it the Palestinians. The biggest obstacle, he said, is “the Iranians.” He, like the entire Israeli leadership, argues that since Iran sponsors Hezbollah in southern Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza, both of which reject Israel’s existence and seek its destruction, the key to the Palestinian solution is to defang Iran and stop it from acquiring the means to build a nuclear weapon. Increasingly, the Arab world — especially Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan — seems worried about Iran as well. American officials who have recently visited those countries said that their leaders spoke about Iran in ways that were almost identical to what they heard from officials in Jerusalem. Therefore, the opportunity for a regional alliance against Iranian influence is great. But, they say, for Arab leaders to work alongside Israel on this, even quietly, requires demonstrable Israeli movement on ending its occupation of the West Bank by freezing or reducing settlements and handing over more power to the Palestinians. Israel dislikes that formulation, arguing that the two issues need to be addressed separately. If they are linked, it is in the opposite way from what the West says. In other words, Israel says the occupation can be ended most easily once Iran is put in its place because then there will be much less risk of Iranian weapons being used against Israel from neighboring territory. Meanwhile, Israel says it cannot be expected to freeze settlement growth entirely. The American, European and Arab response is that for Iran to be checked, every nation needs to do its part, and Israel’s part is to work toward ending the occupation, stopping settlement construction and fostering the creation of a Palestinian state. When a senior American official was told that the Israelis did not view the Iranian and Palestinian problems as linked, he replied simply, “Well, we do.”

Israel
Palestinians
Iran
International Relations
Netanyahu Benjamin
Lieberman Avigdor
Obama Barack


Florida: Sentence for Lionel Tate Is Upheld

Abstract: An appeals court has upheld a 30-year probation violation sentence for Lionel Tate , who for a time was the youngest person to be sentenced to life in an American prison. The ruling Wednesday by the Fourth District Court of Appeal in West Palm Beach sets the stage for Mr. Tate’s trial on robbery charges that could carry another life term. Mr. Tate, 20, had sought to have the sentence thrown out based on procedural mistakes. Mr. Tate was 12 at the time of the 1999 beating death of 6-year-old Tiffany Eunick. An appeals court overturned his murder conviction in 2004, and he was released but was on probation. In May 2005, the police said, Mr. Tate robbed a pizza delivery man, and he was found to be in possession of a gun even before that, a violation of his probation.

Tate Lionel
Decisions and Verdicts
Sentences (Criminal)
Murders and Attempted Murders


New York Subpoenas 5 Energy Companies

Abstract: Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo of New York has opened an investigation of five large energy companies, questioning whether their plans to build coal-fired power plants pose undisclosed financial risks that their investors should know about. Mr. Cuomo, using the same state securities law wielded by his predecessor, Gov. Eliot Spitzer, to investigate corruption on Wall Street, sent subpoenas late Friday to the top executives of the five companies, seeking internal documents. The companies, which have projects in various states, are AES Corporation , Dominion, Dynegy, Peabody Energy and Xcel Energy. It is rare, if not unique, for a securities law to be used for an environmental purpose, in this case the fight against new coal-fired power plants. The plants’ main emission, carbon dioxide, has been linked by scientists to global warming . In letters accompanying the subpoenas, the attorney general’s office asked whether investors received adequate information about the potential financial liabilities of carbon dioxide emissions that exacerbate climate change. “Any one of the several new or likely regulatory initiatives for CO2 emissions from power plants — including state carbon controls, E.P.A.’s regulations under the Clean Air Act, or the enactment of federal global warming legislation — would add a significant cost to carbon-intensive coal generation,” the letters said. They added, “Selective disclosure of favorable information or omission of unfavorable information concerning climate change is misleading.” Mr. Cuomo’s move represents a new tactic in an expanding campaign against some of the more than 100 coal-fired power plants currently under consideration. The nationwide anti-coal effort is being directed by a coalition of environmental groups, shareholder activists and state officials in the Northeast and on the West Coast, including in New York and California. In an interview, Mr. Cuomo said, “The concept here is using the securities laws to investigate whether the economic risks of these plants are being disclosed — the economic risks which are dovetailing with the environmental concerns.” Katherine Kennedy, a special deputy attorney general in the environmental protection bureau who worked for the Natural Resources Defense Council for 19 years, added that power plants produced about 30 percent of carbon emissions in the United States, so “it seemed like a logical place to begin.” Mr. Cuomo said, “It’s a priority for us.” Two of the five companies disputed Mr. Cuomo’s assertions. Representatives of the other companies postponed comment until they could examine the letters and subpoenas. The power plant investigation was the second last week in which Mr. Cuomo issued subpoenas under the Martin Act, a 1921 state securities law that predates the creation of the federal Securities and Exchange Commission. The New York law grants the attorney general broad powers to compel testimony and subpoena records. Until Mr. Spitzer used the law as a weapon against corruption on Wall Street, it was obscure. In June, The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page called for its repeal, arguing that “it is a law that allows a prosecutor to punish, or even ruin, any financial company regardless of evidence or motive.” In the case of the five energy companies, Mr. Cuomo said, “This is a very straightforward, consistent use of the act because it’s about disclosure to investors.” For five years, environmentally oriented shareholder groups have been filing resolutions seeking similar disclosures — including one with Peabody Energy — said Dan Bakal, the director of electric power programs for Ceres, a Boston-based coalition of investors and environmental groups focused on the environmental impacts of corporate actions. “This ratchets up the pressure on companies to provide more information as the risks become more and more material,” Mr. Bakal said. Peabody Energy, he added, had increased its disclosure somewhat following shareholders’ requests. Vic Svec, a spokesman for Peabody, said in an e-mail message yesterday that the company included climate change disclosures “in multiple places” in its public financial filings. Mr. Svec also said the letter was inaccurate “in claiming that we operate power plants.” He said Peabody is a minority partner in a planned Illinois plant. Mr. Svec called the New York action “outrageous,” adding, “The legal system was designed to protect — not harass — those such as Peabody who are providing clean energy solutions for America.” Representatives of Dynegy, Dominion and AES said the documents were under review. Xcel Energy is building a coal-fired plant in Colorado that was cited in the letter from the attorney general. A company spokeswoman, Mary Sandok, said in an e-mailed statement: “The plant under construction in Colorado is being built under an agreement we reached with national, state and local environmental groups, including the Sierra Club and Environmental Defense. Our financial disclosures are adequate.” Data from the federal Energy Information Administration shows that about half the country’s electrical generation comes from coal. For the next two or three years, new capacity will be coming largely from natural gas. But coal, which is now the cheapest fuel — absent expensive technology, still in its experimental stage, to control carbon dioxide emissions — is projected to be the dominant fuel for new electricity from 2009 onward. The fight against new coal-fired plants has been waged by environmental groups in tandem with their fight at the state, regional and national levels to cap emissions of greenhouse gases in all sectors of the economy. A group of 10 Northeastern states, including New York, is adopting a program that would cap emissions and allow trading of pollution allotments among projects in those states. California already has developed rules, which are being copied by New York, Vermont and 10 other states, to reduce heat-trapping gases from passenger vehicles. Those rules were endorsed in a ruling by a federal district judge in Vermont last week — in a case in which Mr. Cuomo’s staff participated. But this is Mr. Cuomo’s most significant foray into the arena of climate change since taking over in January from Mr. Spitzer, who was one of the most high-profile occupants of the attorney general’s office. Before he started, Mr. Cuomo acknowledged Mr. Spitzer’s formidable shadow; a Cuomo campaign ad last year said his predecessor had left “big shoes to fill” and featured people holding up the foot-measuring scales used by shoe salesmen. This year, Mr. Cuomo, who is a former federal housing secretary and son of a former governor, has himself made waves nationwide. He shined a harsh light on close ties between some universities and student lenders , and he is now expanding Mr. Spitzer’s aggressive use of the Martin Act in new areas. Mr. Cuomo’s office said last week that the attorney general had also invoked the Martin Act and issued subpoenas in his investigation of the oversight of the state’s $154 billion pension fund during the four-year tenure of Alan G. Hevesi as state comptroller.

Coal
Energy and Power
Cuomo Andrew M
Environment
New York State
AES Corp
Dynegy Incorporated
Xcel Energy Incorporated


Bratton Tells Police Academy Graduates They Face a Time of Change

Abstract: It was nine days after two police officers were killed in December when a class of recruits last graduated from the New York Police Academy. Grief coursed through the crowd that day, and boos met Mayor Bill de Blasio when he rose to address more than 800 new officers seated in Madison Square Garden, their shields wrapped in black mourning bands. That moment of solemnity contrasted sharply with the mood on Thursday, as another class of recruits was preparing to graduate from the academy. “This is a joyous day,” Police Commissioner William J. Bratton said on Thursday morning, surrounded by his command staff as they awaited the start of the ceremony at Madison Square Garden. The momentum, he said, is “shifting” after a year in which his department was engulfed in turmoil. Image Police Officer Trinesha Alford was among the graduates. Of the 822 new officers, about 9 percent are black. Credit Chang W. Lee/The New York Times Yet, minutes later, standing onstage in front of 822 graduates, Mr. Bratton did not shy away from the reality the new officers face. He called it “a time of great change,” as the country continues to wrestle with questions about race, inequality and the fairness of the criminal justice system. The new officers, Mr. Bratton said, will be looked upon to “heal wounds with communities that feel we have not done enough to keep them safe” and to stand at the center of a continuing “profound concern about the criminal justice system.” But beyond those broad points, the commissioner used the moment, and his speech, to look inward, at his work in reshaping a police department that he is leading for the second time in two decades. The new officers, he told them, will be better equipped, given the kind of training that he never received when he was entering policing in 1970, in Boston as Patrolman Bratton, badge No. 1190. “I get what you’re going into,” Mr. Bratton told the officers. “That’s why I’ve worked so hard to improve your training, to ensure that as you go into the streets of New York these next six months, you go into every precinct and every transit district station house, you will work with field training officers, partners, who can be there to mentor you, who can be there to guide you, who can be there to tell you right from wrong, an experience that many of your predecessors did not have.” Image The police academy graduates two classes a year. Credit Chang W. Lee/The New York Times Remaking the Police Department has been an incremental effort for the new administration, interrupted by periodic surges in street violence and by institutional inertia and resistance. And more work remains, Mr. Bratton said. His commanders are dismantling Operation Impact , which has sent rookie officers on foot into some of the city’s most crime-plagued areas — neighborhoods unfamiliar to many of them. Increasingly, decisions about deployment are being delegated down the chain of command. Arrests for low-level offenses are diminishing, as overall crime continues to decline. But the department, at the same time, is revisiting its policies on fundamental functions, including surveillance and use of force, and trying to address its long-running struggle to more closely reflect the communities where officers serve. Of the 822 graduates on Thursday, about 9 percent were black, and that share has generally been declining, even as numbers for other minority groups have been rising. Mr. Bratton said that a new class of 1,200 recruits, set to enter the police academy on July 8, will be about 15 or 16 percent black. “We’re committed to that, by working with our Guardians Association,” Mr. Bratton said, referring to a fraternal group of black officers that helps the department attract black men and women. Image Officer Juliana Day and friends after her graduation on Thursday. Credit Chang W. Lee/The New York Times This class, Mr. Bratton said, is the first to graduate after six months at a new 32-acre training academy in Queens, and the expectations are high. But he said he had another message for them: Do not forget to have fun. That lighter sentiment was evident from the start. The department’s Jazz Ensemble played “Mustang Sally,” among other songs. Patrick J. Lynch, the recently re-elected president of the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, smiled from the dais, onstage, and waved to friends. Mr. Bratton took time to note that the graduates included Brendan Maple, the son of Jack Maple, who was his friend and a renowned crime strategist who rose to be a deputy commissioner during Mr. Bratton’s first stint, and the son of Joseph Fox, chief of the department’s Transit Bureau. At the end of his remarks, the commissioner read a few lines from a letter a sergeant, Dan Edenfield, had written to him in May after the funeral for Officer Brian Moore , who was shot in Queens after trying to stop a man he suspected of being armed. The sergeant’s words, Mr. Bratton told the new officers, reflected “the type of career that I want you to have.” “Brian is the epitome of a noble police officer,” Mr. Bratton said, his voice choking with emotion, as he held the typewritten letter. “His enthusiasm, work ethic and professionalism was second to none.” Even amid the seriousness of the job, Mr. Bratton said, continuing to read from the letter, “Brian still managed to create a positive environment where being a police officer was enjoyable and fun.”

Police
Crime
NYPD
William J Bratton
NYC
Black People,African-Americans


An Ode to Bach’s Genius in the Key of Stradivarius

Abstract: FORT WORTH — Bach’s Concerto in D minor for two violins filled the conference room in the administrative corridor of the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra office building. The interpretation was a mix of power, eloquence and swiftness. Applause emanated from behind the closed doors to the room after Michael Shih, the concertmaster, and Swang Lin, the senior principal associate concertmaster — without any other members of the orchestra — stroked their bows across the strings of their violins on the final note. The extemporaneous recital was a preview of Thursday’s performance in the new sanctuary at the Arborlawn United Methodist Church in Fort Worth, where Mr. Shih and Mr. Lin will make their public debut as featured soloists playing two extremely rare and incredibly expensive Stradivarius violins. The Fort Worth symphony is thought to be one of only a few American orchestras with more than one Stradivarius violin, a fact made more remarkable by the story of the men who are playing them. Mr. Shih, 41, and Mr. Lin, 50, went to the same elementary school in Taipei, Taiwan — Guangren Catholic — and shared one of the same music teachers growing up, yet they did not become friends until they arrived in Texas decades later. They had bumped into each over the years — at the Aspen Music Festival in 1990 and at the Asia Society in New York in 1999 — but it was not until 2001, when Mr. Shih joined the symphony where Mr. Lin had been since 1991, that they forged a true friendship. “You know the game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon?” Mr. Lin asked. “Separation,” Mr. Shih corrected. “The classical music world is not that big of a community,” Mr. Lin continued. “You can find common friends” — he snapped his fingers — “just like that.” The two men took divergent paths to Texas. Mr. Lin, shy and thoughtful and a diehard Cowboys fan, served in the military before emigrating to the United States and attending the Eastman School of Music. Mr. Shih, a boisterous but tidy high school presidential scholar who came to America not knowing any English, moved here with his mother after seventh grade and went on to the Juilliard School. Both men have played violin since they were young. “But when it comes to the Strad, it takes a different skill level, a different approach,” Mr. Lin said. “You have to draw the sound out. It took me a long time to learn.” Antonio Stradivari, an Italian luthier who lived from 1644 to 1737, constructed these violins (and some guitars, cellos and harps) with a distinctive scroll that is a telltale for appraisers. He labeled each instrument Stradivarius, the Latin version of his last name. Of the 1,116 Strads he made, about 600 still exist. “One of the things that really makes it different is that while a lot of modern instruments sound great under the ear, close by, the Stradivari really projects out there,” Mr. Shih said. “It has a laser-beam focus.” Mr. Shih’s Davis Stradivarius, on loan to the Fort Worth symphony from Mitzi and Bill Davis of Fort Worth since 1981, dates to 1710. It is thought to be worth $4 million to $8 million, The Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported in 2010. Mr. Lin’s Eugenie, ex-Mackenzie Stradivarius, loaned by an anonymous donor last August, is from 1685. (The Fort Worth symphony declined to comment on either instrument’s value.) The Dallas Symphony Orchestra used to have the Eugenie, giving it two Stradivarius violins for a brief period. It was on loan to the Dallas symphony’s concertmaster, Emanuel Borok, who took it with him when he retired in August 2010. “It was obviously an artistic loss,” said Gary Levinson, senior associate concertmaster, who plays the Strad that remains in the Dallas symphony’s possession. The Eugenie, ex-Mackenzie’s owner lent the instrument to Mr. Borok in 1993 after his own Stradivarius was stolen. (The purloined violin, which was eventually recovered, is the one Mr. Levinson now plays.) But the donor’s heart had always been with the Fort Worth symphony, where the Eugenie was before it was in Mr. Borok’s possession. And the donor later developed a kinship with Mr. Lin. “Swang and I play Words With Friends every night,” the donor said. And so it was that two violins crafted more than 300 years ago in Cremona, Italy, brought Mr. Lin and Mr. Shih to the Fort Worth symphony conference room, where they performed $10 million music on works of art that seem too precious to play, but become unplayable if they are not used. When asked about the Stradivarius “blind taste test” — an experiment recently written about by NPR that concluded professional musicians could not tell the difference between a Stradivarius and another violin — Mr. Lin and Mr. Shih defended the Stradivarius. They criticized the test’s inhibiting environment, a hotel room, saying a Stradivarius is meant for a grand room, like the Arborlawn’s sanctuary. “Playing the Strads,” Mr. Shih said, “which were made around the same time that Bach was working, in the setting where he worked all his life, a church, we will strive to create something that will be closer to what Bach’s audiences experienced.”

Violins
Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra
Texas
Classical Music
Stradivari Antonio
Musical Instruments


Russians Smuggled U.S. Microchips, F.B.I. Says

Abstract: MOSCOW — Russian officials had a muted response on Thursday to a potentially embarrassing revelation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation that it had uncovered a ring of Russian agents that was smuggling microchips out of the United States. The scheme focused on chips and other electronic components that are commonplace enough in the United States to circulate freely in the domestic market. But their export still requires a license, lest the electronics wind up in the foreign military equipment of countries unable to manufacture the components themselves. For Russia , the unraveling of this Houston-based network of chip buyers, if upheld in court, would signify a second major failure in spycraft since 2010, when federal agents arrested a circle of Russian agents posing as American suburbanites. Within weeks, members of that group — including a young woman, Anna Chapman — were traded for four men imprisoned in Russia. The real blow to Russian scientific pride is the suggestion that the country’s military and intelligence agencies are still reduced to stealing commercially available chips from the United States, after years of failing to create a computer industry here. The chips, which the F.B.I. said had been bought by a Houston company called Arc Electronics Inc. that falsely presented itself as a manufacturer of traffic lights, reportedly wound up in such vaunted Russian weapons as MIG fighter jets and anti-ship missiles. The F.B.I. unsealed the indictment on Wednesday against 11 people, all from the former Soviet Union, some of them naturalized American citizens, including the man accused of being the ringleader Alexander Fishenko, co-owner of Arc Electronics, an electrical engineer from Kazakhstan who studied in St. Petersburg, Russia. Eight are in custody; all are accused of various licensing and weapons trading violations punishable with long prison sentences of up to 20 years. Mr. Fishenko is also accused of being a Russian agent. Though the company was in Houston, the case will be heard in the Eastern District of New York because the group shipped microchips to Russia from Kennedy International Airport. Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, took pains on Thursday to note that the defendants had not been accused of espionage, per se. The crime of failing to register as an agent of a foreign government can also apply, for example, to an improperly registered lawyer or lobbyist. The charges “have no relation in any way with intelligence activity,” the Russian Information Agency reported, paraphrasing Mr. Ryabkov. According to the F.B.I., the Russians posed as traffic-light makers — but not very well. A sister company in Russia, Apex System, imported items from Arc Electronics. It was also partly owned by Mr. Fishenko and had pictures of airplanes and missiles on its Web site until the Russians got word of a pending check by the Department of Commerce, whereupon it took them down. In Russia, a subsidiary of Apex was licensed as a supplier to military industry factories, an exhibit filed with the indictment in the Eastern District showed. The F.B.I. said employees of Arc once resorted to imploring their Russian-based counterparts to more cleverly falsify end-user certificates. They should indicate “fishing boats and not fishing/anti-submarine ones.” The Russian inability to make microchips goes back decades and has sapped the confidence of generations of engineers here. In the late Soviet period it bared, dramatically, the ever-widening technological gap with the United States. Russians took to bragging darkly that Soviet microchips here were the biggest in the world. The smuggled American chips, the F.B.I. said, could be used in missile guidance systems, radar, police surveillance equipment or bomb triggers. “While some countries may leverage our technology for financial gain, many countries hostile to the United States seek to improve their defense capabilities and to modernize their weapons systems,” the Houston F.B.I. special agent in charge, Stephen L. Morris, said in a statement. Through the day Thursday, Russian military companies came forward to deny that their products contained American chips, not to speak of those apparently first bought under the pretext they would be used in traffic lights. One unnamed representative of the MIG fighter airplane company told the Russian Information Agency that there were no American chips in its latest, ostensibly high-tech airplane, the MIG-35. “We certainly don’t steal anything from the United States.” Russia has a rich tradition of technology heists for its military industry, dating to the theft of atomic bomb secrets from the United States after World War II .

Russia
Smuggling
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Computer Chips


Realizing His Dream, as a Pitcher

Abstract: ARLINGTON, Tex. — Nick Martinez has always held on to this belief, the one that sustains every amateur baseball player with a dream. “If you’re good, someone’s going to find you, and you’re going to get your shot,” Martinez said last week. “I just always had it in my mind that I was going to play professionally.” Martinez spoke by his locker in the Texas Rangers’ clubhouse, in a row with other pitchers. He took an unusual path to get there, but he is thriving. In seven starts, Martinez is 2-0 with a 1.88 earned run average and has allowed only one home run. He is scheduled to start on Sunday, and again next weekend when the Rangers play at Yankee Stadium. Martinez, 24, is familiar with the Bronx. He is the first player from Fordham to reach the major leagues since Pete Harnisch, who last pitched in 2001. But Martinez pitched just 26 innings for the Rams and was mostly a second baseman, batting .295 over three seasons. While he was growing up in South Florida, his favorite player was Luis Castillo, the Marlins’ second baseman. Martinez came to pitching reluctantly, when his father suggested he take lessons in high school from Juan Alvarez, a neighbor who had pitched in the majors and did some scouting for the Rangers. “In my mind I was an infielder,” Martinez said. “I did that for my dad. He wanted me to take pitching lessons, just in case the situation came where I was on the mound, I wouldn’t hurt myself. I kind of had an idea, mechanically, of what I was doing.” Martinez went to a Jesuit high school in Florida, and Fordham, where he could play as a freshman, was a natural fit. He pitched briefly as a freshman, then asked to be the closer before his junior year to increase his appeal in his draft year. Another pitcher won the primary closing job, but Martinez logged 192/3 innings, with a 2.75 E.R.A. Alvarez had told Jay Heafner, a Rangers scout then based in the Northeast, to keep an eye out for Martinez. Heafner, who had been a two-way player at Davidson, saw him work two innings at the end of a doubleheader. Martinez hit 94 miles an hour on the radar gun and threw strikes. “He didn’t look like a position player trying to pitch,” Heafner said. “He actually looked like a pitcher — clean delivery, and the way his arm worked, the way the ball came out, there was an ease of effort, and his athleticism carried over from playing in the middle of the infield. All that added up to something intriguing.” Image Martinez, playing mostly second base, hit .295 over three seasons at Fordham. He was drafted in the 18th round in 2011. Credit Vincent Dusovic/Fordham Sports Information Martinez filled out a few questionnaires as a position player before the 2011 draft, but only Texas saw him as a pitcher. That was all it took, though, to get the opportunity he always believed in. The Rangers drafted him in the 18th round and signed him for $60,000. Martinez, so far, is the only 18th-rounder from that draft to reach the majors; the Rangers have already released their first-round pick, pitcher Kevin Matthews, who signed for more than $900,000. Martinez has added a changeup, sharpened his slider, revived the curveball Alvarez taught him and kept an unwavering belief that he belongs. “You see a lot of young guys come in and be timid and not really know their role, or just be worried that if they pitch poorly, then they’re going to get sent out,” the veteran starter Colby Lewis said. “Since he was here last year, he’s had that confidence level of knowing he should be here, and he’s able to throw strikes and move the ball around.” Lewis was recovering from hip surgery last spring and believed he was ready to break camp with the Rangers. The team wanted him to start in the minors, though, and put Martinez in the rotation instead. Lewis said he did not even know who Martinez was then, which made sense because Martinez had never officially been part of major league camp. He had pitched a bit as a minor league fill-in but was such an afterthought that Ron Washington, the manager at the time, asked him his name on the mound before his first appearance. Martinez had pitched only five games above Class A, but he made enough of an impression that spring to earn a job. “I didn’t know your name the first time around,” Martinez said Washington had told him. “But I definitely know who you are now. I want to welcome you to the ball club.” In 29 games last season (24 starts), Martinez was 5-12 with a 4.55 E.R.A. He said the experience had helped him understand game plans better now — and as a former hitter, he knows the odds are always in the pitcher’s favor. “Big league hitters, they make a ton of mistakes,” Martinez said. “Even that fastball down the middle, they roll over sometimes.” Martinez should know. His .295 average at Fordham has not translated to the majors. “I’m 0 for 5 in my career as a hitter in interleague play,” he said, smiling. “It’s not working out too great for me so far.” On the mound, though, things are working just fine. Image Jeff Katz, the mayor of Cooperstown, N.Y., is the author of “Split Season,” which chronicles the strike year of 1981. Credit Andrew Sullivan for The New York Times Remembering 1981 Jeff Katz was walking down Main Street in Cooperstown, N.Y., last summer when a familiar face said hello. “How’s it going, Mr. Mayor?” Pete Rose asked, and Katz found him charming. “It’s a superficial analysis, a five-second interaction,” Katz said. “But hey, it’s Pete Rose. That’s so cool.” Katz, who is indeed the mayor of Cooperstown, the home of the Hall of Fame, immersed himself for years in the 1981 baseball season, when Rose was still a superstar and beloved ambassador. Katz’s new book, “Split Season,” published by St. Martin’s Press and released on Tuesday, revisits an era that will seem alien to modern readers. Image It is not just that Rose, who broke the National League hits record that summer, has been barred since 1989 for gambling, or that the Montreal Expos — who nearly won the pennant — cease to exist. The 1981 season lost more than 700 games in June and July to a strike, a foreign concept now in a sport that has not had a work stoppage in more than two decades. “The guts of free agency is really what was on the line,” Katz said. “Had ownership been able to push through their idea of basically making free agency a trade, it would have changed the whole complexion of the future of the game. Free agency would have been killed.” The 1994 strike, which canceled a World Series and stretched into the start of the next season, was more devastating. But for bizarre theater, it would be hard to top 1981, as Katz deftly chronicles. When the season finally resumed, the owners simply restarted the standings, creating first- and second-half champions, divisional playoffs and logistical mayhem — and that was before the Yankees’ principal owner, George Steinbrenner, brawled with two Dodgers fans in the elevator of his Los Angeles hotel during the World Series. (Or so he said.) Katz spoke with many of the strike’s central figures for the book, including Marvin Miller, the union chief who died in 2012, and Ray Grebey, the owners’ lead negotiator, who died in 2013. When Katz meets Hall of Famers around town who were active in 1981, he said, the strong feelings from that season are still fresh. “Their reaction is always, ‘I want to read that,’ ” Katz said. “There’s a passion they feel for that year.” Paper Ballot Fallout Major League Baseball made a logical move this season by eliminating paper ballots for the All-Star Game. Close to 90 percent of all ballots are cast online, the league said, and the decision saves paper and money. Also, without needing to print in advance, the league can include players who were not on opening day rosters, like the Chicago Cubs’ Kris Bryant. But there is one casualty in the new system: Honest young fans cannot vote on their own on a personal computer. If fans under 13 submit their real birth dates when casting ballots that way, the system replies that they are ineligible to vote, with no reason given. That is bound to be confusing for would-be voters, who could reasonably conclude that baseball does not care for their opinions or want them involved in the process. The league said it had no choice. Pat Courtney, the chief communications officer for M.L.B., said that federal law prohibited companies from knowingly collecting personal information online for children under 13 without the consent of a parent or guardian. The league must have a registration process for voting, Courtney said, to prevent hackers from casting mass ballots and disrupting the vote. The ground rules were different when paper ballots were available at ballparks because no registration was necessary. A better alternative for voters under 13, Courtney said, would be to vote through the M.L.B. AtBat mobile app, which is not subject to the same age restrictions. Of course, another avenue to voting for a young fan on a personal computer is to submit a false birth date. That would work, too, as an imperfect solution to a streamlined, but not quite flawless, new system.


Pennsylvania: State Attorney General Kathleen Kane Uncertain of Running Again

Abstract: State Attorney General Kathleen Kane said Thursday she did not think she would be eligible to run for a second term next year if her law license remained suspended. Ms. Kane, a Democrat, said she was making plans to seek re-election in hopes her suspension was lifted by the April primary. The State Supreme Court placed her on temporary suspension Monday as she fights criminal allegations she leaked secret grand jury information and then lied about it. The State Constitution requires the attorney general to be a member of the Pennsylvania bar, but experts are divided about how that applies in the case of Ms. Kane’s suspension. She was charged in August with felony perjury and lesser crimes. It is unclear when her case may go to trial, but a conviction before the election could also preclude her from holding office.

Pennsylvania
Attorney general
Perjury
Kathleen G Kane
US Politics
Lawyers
Attorney General Elections


A Shave in Prison Is Expected for Hasan

Abstract: HOUSTON — Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the military psychiatrist sentenced to death this week in the shooting rampage at Fort Hood in November 2009, will be forced to shave his beard on death row, Army officials announced on Friday. Major Hasan, a Muslim, grew the beard for religious reasons in violation of Army grooming regulations and said he did not want to die without a beard because being clean-shaven was a sin. A military appeals court vacated a judge’s order that he be forcibly shaved, and he wore a thick beard and camouflage fatigues throughout his trial. But on Friday he was transferred to Fort Leavenworth, Kan., home of the military’s death row and death chamber, and military officials indicated they were ready to shave him, forcibly if necessary, since the appellate court’s ruling had no bearing on their rules. It was unclear if Major Hasan planned to take any legal steps to prevent military officials from shaving him. Experts in military law said his only recourse was to sue in federal court and seek an injunction by arguing that the Army was violating his religious liberties under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, a 1993 federal law that protects religious observance from government interference. Army corrections regulations state that in forcible shaving, electric clippers must be used and the prisoner “may be restrained with the reasonable force necessary to administer the appropriate action.” The so-called use-of-force team typically includes military police officers who restrain the prisoner, a medical expert to attend to any injuries and a video camera operator who records the event, Army officials said. Image Major Hasan Credit Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Fort Leavenworth officials said that all inmates must abide by Army Regulation 670-1, which includes grooming rules that prohibit soldiers from having beards and goatees, though neatly trimmed mustaches are allowed. Army officials have granted a handful of soldiers exemptions to the beard regulations based on their religious beliefs. But Major Hasan’s earlier request for a religious exemption was rejected by the Pentagon. He was convicted last week of committing the worst mass murder on a military installation in American history, killing 13 people and wounding dozens of others at Fort Hood on Nov. 5, 2009, as part of what he described as a jihad against deploying soldiers. It will be more than a decade, military law experts said, before Major Hasan is likely to be executed, as his case goes through an automatic appeals process and his death sentence, if upheld, awaits presidential approval. Meanwhile, any legal steps Major Hasan takes to keep his beard have been complicated by his decision to act as his own lawyer. He released his Army defense team — the lawyers who had successfully argued for his right to keep the beard during trial — and represented himself thereafter. The former defense team remained by his side during the trial as standby counsel, but they are prohibited as military lawyers from representing soldiers in civil lawsuits against the Army. Ramsey Clark, the former United States attorney general, expressed concern over the beard issue and other aspects of Major Hasan’s case, and was planning to visit Major Hasan at Fort Leavenworth soon, said Major Hasan’s civilian lawyer, John P. Galligan. The 85-year-old Mr. Clark, once a defense lawyer for Saddam Hussein, visited Major Hasan when he was being held near Fort Hood at the Bell County Jail in Belton, Tex.

Nidal Malik Hasan
Fort Hood
Murders
Beards and Mustaches
Corporal punishment
Capital punishment


Message on Pan Am Bomber Cited British ‘Interests’

Abstract: LONDON (AP) — The British government asked for the Lockerbie bomber to be included in a prisoner transfer agreement with Libya because it was in the “overwhelming interests of the United Kingdom” as a major oil deal was being negotiated, a British newspaper reported Sunday. The Sunday Times, citing leaked correspondence between Justice Secretary Jack Straw and his Scottish counterpart, Kenny MacAskill, said the decision was made as “wider negotiations” with the government of Libya continued. Mr. Straw rejected any suggestion that economic considerations played a role in the decision to release the bomber, Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi . “The suggestion that at any stage there was some kind of backdoor deal done over Mr. Megrahi’s transfer because of trade is simply untrue,” Mr. Straw said in an interview with the BBC on Sunday. Mr. Megrahi, 57, who has terminal prostate cancer, was released by Mr. MacAskill this month on compassionate grounds and allowed to return to Libya. He had served eight years of his life sentence for the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988, which killed 270 people. The Sunday Times reported that Mr. Straw had originally tried to keep Mr. Megrahi from being included in the prisoner transfer agreement. But five months later, the newspaper said, as a multibillion-dollar deal between a British oil company and Libya stalled, Mr. Straw wrote Mr. MacAskill to say that there would be no exceptions. “The wider negotiations with the Libyans are reaching a critical stage and, in view of the overwhelming interests for the United Kingdom, I have agreed that in this instance the [prisoner transfer agreement] should be in the standard form and not mention any individual,” the paper quoted Mr. Straw as writing in December 2007. It said the oil deal was ratified six weeks later. In a statement released Sunday, Mr. Straw said it had always been made clear during negotiations with Libya that Scotland would have a right to veto the transfer of any prisoner, including Mr. Megrahi. “The negotiations over a prisoner transfer agreement were part of a wider agreement for the normalization of relations with Libya as part of bringing them into the international community,” Mr. Straw said, adding that the agreement’s terms were “academic,” because Mr. Megrahi was released on compassionate grounds. The statement did not comment on the authenticity of the letters published by The Sunday Times.

Megrahi Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-
Great Britain
Straw Jack


Rex Ryan’s Challenges Cost Jets Against Packers

Abstract: EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Jets Coach Rex Ryan flipped a red flag all of about two feet to the turf, and the home crowd obediently roared. He had lost his first replay challenge 10 minutes earlier, but that was not going to stop Ryan from questioning the officials again. As Ryan saw it, Jets receiver Jerricho Cotchery and Green Bay cornerback Tramon Williams, both clutching the football, fell to the turf at the same time, with Williams prying the ball loose only after the two players hit the ground. “I clearly thought our receiver had possession of the football, or, if worse comes to worse, it would be dual possession, which is the offensive player’s football when they’re on the ground,” Ryan said after the Jets’ dreary 9-0 loss to the Packers on Sunday . The officials did not agree with Ryan, again. Williams was ruled to be in possession of the ball, the play stood, and Ryan was out of replay challenges for the day. But here was the kicker: Ryan would have punted the ball had he won the challenge. It had become apparent to Ryan late in the second half that the game had deteriorated into a grinding battle of field position. He challenged the play because the Packers took over at their 40-yard line, perhaps 30 yards farther upfield than they would have if the Jets had punted. “Makes a huge difference,” he said. Another replay challenge might have come in handy later — especially on a nearly identical play early in the fourth quarter when Green Bay cornerback Charles Woodson swiped the ball from the hands of Jets tight end Dustin Keller. Two lost replay challenges were only part of the reason the Jets lost. But they reflected the effort of a team that did not seem as hungry to win as the Packers. Cotchery stood at his locker after the game criticizing himself for that mistake, among others. “When we hit the ground, I still had control of it,” Cotchery said. “I can’t relax and leave it in the refs’ hands. I’ve got to stick with it.” Ryan used his first replay challenge on the first play of the second quarter. Brad Smith took a direct snap and was clobbered by Green Bay linebacker Frank Zombo as he struggled to get back to the line of scrimmage. Ryan thought Smith was down before the ball hit the turf. But the ball squirted free, and Williams pounced on it to kill a Jets drive at the Packers 34-yard line. Ryan said Smith told him that the ball had popped out after he hit the ground, which would not be a fumble. But the Jets used a replay challenge and a timeout, anyway. “We probably shouldn’t have challenged that one because it was too hard to tell,” Ryan said. Williams said, “When I looked at the ground, I just saw the ball sitting on it, and I knew the ref still had the play going on.” The Jets’ defense somehow kept the team in a shabby game. With 10 minutes 34 seconds remaining, Mark Sanchez threw a short pass to Keller. Woodson said he got to Keller about the same time as the ball, causing Keller to bobble it. Then Woodson wrestled it away. “Hopefully, I’ll have a few more,” Woodson said, smiling. Keller said, “Nothing you can do about it now but learn from the mistake.” Referring to the ball, he said, “It shouldn’t have really been a position for it to come loose like that.” The Jets could not hang on to much of anything on Sunday. Late in the fourth quarter, with the Jets still in position to win the game with a touchdown, Sanchez threw downfield to Cotchery. Just as the ball settled in his hands, Packers safety Charlie Peprah knocked it loose with his helmet. Cotchery said he grumbled to himself, “You’ve got to be kidding me.” “Play after play, they did a great job playing the ball,” he said. Yes, that many plays. It all added up to too many plays that went against the Jets, replayed or not.

Football
New York Jets
Green Bay Packers
Ryan Rex


ISIS Fighters Seize Control of Syrian City of Palmyra, and Ancient Ruins

Abstract: BEIRUT, Lebanon — Islamic State militants swept into the historic desert city of Palmyra in central Syria on Wednesday, and by evening were in control of it, residents and the Syrian state news media said, a victory that gives them another strategically important prize five days after the group seized the Iraqi city of Ramadi . Palmyra has extra resonance as home to some of the world’s most magnificent remnants of antiquity, as well as the grimmer modern landmark of Tadmur Prison, where Syrian dissidents have languished over the decades. But for the fighters on the ground, the city of 50,000 people is significant because it sits among gas fields and astride a network of roads across the country’s central desert. As they have swept across Syria and Iraq, Islamic State fighters have destroyed or damaged numerous ancient sites and sculptures, condemning them as idolatry in slickly produced recruitment films, even as they pillage and sell off more portable items to finance their activities. That has raised fears both locally and internationally that Palmyra, a United Nations world heritage site, could also be irrevocably damaged. Aside from the threat of destruction, Palmyra’s vast unexcavated antiquities could also provide significant revenue through illegal trafficking. “The fighting is putting at risk one of the most significant sites in the Middle East,” Irina Bokova, director general of Unesco, said in a statement Wednesday. Video Muhammad al-Shaar, the Syrian interior minister, said that the government, in cooperation with the armed forces, was trying to protect antiquities in Palmyra from the Islamic State. Credit Credit Agence France-Presse — Getty Images As the city’s defenses crumbled, residents described panicked scenes of soldiers and the police fleeing, wounded civilians unable to reach hospitals and museum workers hurrying to pack up antiquities. The loss of Palmyra, just as the United States is scrambling to come up with a response to the loss of Ramadi, the capital of Iraq’s Anbar Province, is sure to renew doubt about the Obama administration’s plans to defeat the Islamic State , also known as ISIS or ISIL. The two successes, at opposite ends of a battlefield sprawling across two countries, showed the extremist group’s ability to shake off setbacks and advance on multiple fronts, less than two months after it was driven from the Iraqi city of Tikrit — erasing any notion that the group had suffered a game-changing blow there. In Iraq, the fall of Ramadi has left the United States military in the uncomfortable position of supporting an attempt to reclaim the city, in Iraq’s Sunni heartland, with the help of Iranian-backed Shiite militias whose participation there Washington had previously opposed. In Syria, a new awkwardness arises. Any airstrikes against Islamic State militants in and around Palmyra would probably benefit the forces of President Bashar al-Assad. So far, United States-led airstrikes in Syria have largely focused on areas far outside government control, to avoid the perception of aiding a leader whose ouster President Obama has called for. There have also been calls from international cultural organizations to protect the ruins — although how that could be done was unclear — to prevent a repeat of Islamic State attacks on other renowned ancient sites in recent months. Iraqi Army Retakes Government Complex in Central Ramadi Efforts to stem the rise of the Islamic State. The fall of Palmyra has also brought to a head, in a new way, the dilemma of Syrians who oppose both the Islamic State and Mr. Assad. The city was partly held for a time by local rebel fighters, before the Islamic State took shape as a major player in the conflict. But they no longer have a presence there, putting some of Mr. Assad’s opponents in the odd position of hoping that his forces can protect the city, and the ruins. “It’s the elephant in the room,” said Amr al-Azm , a former Syrian antiquities official who teaches at Shawnee State University in Ohio. He has joined calls in recent days for international protection for the ruins. That, he said, would effectively mean a military intervention aiding the government he fervently opposes. “I’m really frustrated that I’ve been reduced to this situation,” he said, complaining about Mr. Assad’s success in “pushing this binary on us Syrians and the international community: There is no alternative; it’s either us or a far worse threat.” But no intervention appears likely. People in Palmyra, a relatively remote city, its population swollen with tens of thousands of displaced Syrians, were left on their own, squeezed between government forces and the Islamic State. Residents said that by nightfall, the Islamic State had seized most of the city and was even distributing bread to some residents. Soldiers and the police could be seen fleeing, they said, prompting one cafe owner to exclaim over the phone: “Treason! It’s treason.” Soon after government forces left the city, airstrikes began, residents said. Workers could be seen earlier Wednesday packing up four truckloads of small boxes from the museum on the edge of the ruins, apparently carting away more antiquities in addition to items already removed for safekeeping, said Khaled al-Homsi, a Palmyra resident and anti-government activist who documents damage to the site by combatants. How ISIS Expands The Islamic State aims to build a broad colonial empire across many countries. The Islamic State was coming closer, he said, as a squad of 12 soldiers who had manned a nearby checkpoint appeared to withdraw. As he spoke over Internet chat, a boom could be heard; he said government airstrikes were coming dangerously close to the archaeological site’s medieval citadel. “It’s bad today,” Khalil al-Hariri, the museum’s director, said in a brief telephone conversation, while Syria’s top antiquities director told Reuters that hundreds of objects were being moved to safety. Another museum employee, who had earlier vowed not to leave, said by phone, “Pray for us.” The ancient site is cherished by Syrians on both sides of the original conflict between Mr. Assad and his opponents, which began with political protests in 2011 and metastasized into a multifront war. Local rebels — early in the conflict, before the Islamic State appeared on the scene — once called themselves Grandchildren of Zenobia, referring to an ancient queen of Palmyra who briefly ruled an empire stretching from Egypt to modern-day Ankara, the Turkish capital. In the recent fighting, some government troops had vowed in social media posts that “Zenobia will never fall.” In battles overnight, the militants captured several important locations in the northern part of Palmyra, including two security facilities and the public central bakery, according to anti-government activists, who said they had not yet entered the ruins. “I’m here and still breathing,” Mr. Homsi, who uses a nom de guerre for his safety, said in a text message earlier Wednesday. At the same time, he lamented that more attention had been focused on the threat to the city’s ruins than to its residents. Islamic State fighters massacred captured soldiers and civilians in outlying villages last week, according to Mr. Homsi and a government soldier whose comrades were killed. And Mr. Homsi said several civilians had been killed by government shelling in Palmyra, unable to get treatment at the hospital, which was being used solely for military casualties. Several Palmyra residents said on Wednesday that they were staying indoors and hoping to stay out of the fighting or politics. Asked what he would do if forced to choose between the government and the Islamic State, Mr. Homsi was silent for several seconds. Finally he said, “I will try to remain neutral.” On Wednesday night, he was keeping his head down.

Syria
ISIS,ISIL,Islamic State
Palmyra Syria
Assyrian Civilization
Archaeology,Anthropology
Arts and Antiquities Looting
Historic preservation
Terrorism
Free Syrian Army


Knicks Show Suns What They Were

Abstract: PHOENIX — Amar’e Stoudemire peeked his head around the corner, and first surprise and then satisfaction showed on his face. A large group of reporters had gathered to hear what he had to say in his return here, with a Knicks resurgence under way and the Phoenix Suns still seeking an identity without him. The constant in all this is that the Knicks added Stoudemire, the Suns subtracted him and the decision has reshaped each franchise. “I knew it wasn’t going to be the same once I left,” Stoudemire proclaimed. In retrospect, seven seconds or less did last a pretty long time in Phoenix. That was the maximum amount of time that Mike D’Antoni wanted to elapse before the ball was shot here, creating the system in which Steve Nash dished, Stoudemire dunked and fans cheered. But D’Antoni departed as coach more than two seasons ago, moving to the Knicks, and Stoudemire took the same path over the summer. Since D’Antoni left, the Suns have had two coaches (Terry Porter and Alvin Gentry) and two general managers (Steve Kerr and Lance Blanks). They have brought in a new president (Lon Babby) and gone through several roster makeovers. Phoenix did catch lightning last year, going 54-28 in the regular season and making it to the Western Conference finals before losing to the Los Angeles Lakers. Stoudemire said he believed the Suns could do well again this season, and that his preference was to stay here with a new contract. But he looked elsewhere, and ultimately toward New York, when the Suns asked him to meet playing requirements in the final years of a maximum deal because of concerns about his surgically repaired left knee. With Stoudemire gone, the Suns have retreated. The team is not deep enough nor tall enough to threaten top-tier teams, although it may ultimately find a way to grab one of the conference’s last playoff spots. Still, going into Friday’s game against the Knicks, the Suns were only 14-19. “I wouldn’t use the word rebuilding, but obviously we’re in transition,” Gentry said, before adding in reference to Stoudemire, “We’re a different team than we are when we had him.” Phoenix is no longer the offensive powerhouse it was, and it recently went through a three-game stretch without topping 100 points. It was the first time that had happened since January 2005. The Suns are not even the team they were earlier this season, having sent Hedo Turkoglu and Jason Richardson to Orlando in December in exchange for Marcin Gortat, Vince Carter and Mickael Pietrus. The Suns are 2-6 since that trade, although it did give them future financial flexibility. The deal also served as an admission that the initial trade the Suns made to acquire Turkoglu — a transaction that involved sending away Leandro Barbosa, another D’Antoni mainstay — had failed. In a twist, Babby, a longtime agent before he assumed his current role with the Suns, had negotiated Turkoglu’s current contract. “It was ironic, I suppose,” Babby said of the December deal that sent Turkoglu to the Magic. “But I knew from the time I represented Hedo that his place of greatest success was Orlando.” Now, rumors are resurfacing that Nash could be traded as well, a notion that does not intrigue Babby. “I answer this question once a week,” Babby said. “He’s the sun and the moon and the star of this franchise, and I expect him to remain so.” The most vexing problem for the Suns is coping without Stoudemire, who is averaging 26.4 points and 9.0 rebounds for the Knicks. In debating Stoudemire’s future, the Suns opted to absorb his short-term loss and absolve themselves from the threat of a long-term risk should he sustain another major injury. Meanwhile, Kerr, who is now an analyst for TNT, pointed to a paradox: as things have become tougher for the Suns, they have become easier for Stoudemire. When Stoudemire was in Phoenix, Kerr said, the Suns often had championship aspirations, which raised expectations. The Knicks, after a long run of ineptitude, simply want to qualify for the playoffs. Stoudemire has the Knicks pointed in that direction and as a result, said Kerr, he is treated like a “rock star.” “On the climb, which is where the Knicks are now, people focus on all his strengths,” Kerr said. “His explosiveness, his scoring.” During the last few seasons in Phoenix, Kerr said, “There was a lot of frustration with the fan base because we were so close and couldn’t quite get over the hump.” He added: “At that point, it becomes a matter of detail. And people picked over the details — Steve’s age or Amar’e’s knees or Amar’e’s defense.” Nobody is picking apart Stoudemire in New York. Reunited with D’Antoni, he has moved on. “We’re not the Suns East,” he told reporters on Friday. “Not at all. We’re the New York Knicks.”

Phoenix Suns
New York Knicks
Stoudemire Amare
D'Antoni Mike
Basketball
Trades (Sports)
Coaches and Managers