Extremists
UNESCO exhibit in Venice focuses on rebuilding Mosul sites
The United Nations’ cultural agency has opened an exhibit detailing plans to restore multicultural landmarks in the Iraqi city of Mosul, underlining the role of architecture in helping heal wounds. The exhibit, “Revive the Spirit of Mosul,” will be featured on the sidelines of the 17th International Architecture Exhibition, which opened Saturday after a one-year pandemic delay under the title: “How will we live together?” The Venice Biennale’s central question resonates in particular in Iraq, which is experiencing turbulent change, and the old city of Mosul, where 80% of the city’s monuments were destroyed by extremists during the city’s 36-month occupation by the Islamic State group. Iraq is one of three countries participating for the first time at the Biennale, with an exhibit by Rashad...
Coronavirus: Concern grows over potential superspreader event during US Capitol riot
Concerns are mounting about the health of lawmakers and other people in the Capitol last week, after the first member to test positive for the Coronavirus (COVID-19) since Wednesday’s chaos, said she believed she was exposed in a crowded hiding place with hundreds of other legislators. Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman, D-N.J., tested positive on Monday while experiencing mild symptoms, and said in a statement that she believes she caught the virus from her fellow lawmakers while hunkering down as Capitol Police struggled for hours to contain a Trump-inspired mob attack on the Capitol. Lawmakers were trapped in a room near the Capitol with hundreds of others, in some cases for hours, where at least one person who later tested positive for the coronavirus was present. The Office of the Attending P...
Jerusalem church suffers damage in arson near Garden of Gethsemane
Israeli police on Friday arrested a man for trying to set fire to an east Jerusalem church by the Garden of Gethsemane, the site revered by Christians as the place where Jesus prayed before he was crucified. The 49-year-old Israeli suspect poured flammable liquid inside the Church of All Nations, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said. The man then set it alight, a separate police statement said, before the church guard detained him. “Preliminary investigation and the suspect’s details strengthen the assessment that the background to the incident was criminal,” police said, suggesting investigators believed it was not a hate crime. Reuters pictures showed a charred bench and a small blackened portion of the mosaic floor of the Catholic church, which overlooks Jerusalem’s walled Old City. “T...
