Author: KnowledgeHippo

A day after the United Nations Security Council approved a U.S.-backed cease-fire proposal for the Gaza Strip, the focus turned Tuesday to the willingness of Israel and Hamas, under mounting international pressure to end the war, to agreement.Each side made positive but vague statements about the ceasefire plan and accused the other of prolonging a war that has devastated Gaza. But neither said they would formally embrace the proposal, which was presented last month in a speech by President Biden and was the basis of a 14-0 Security Council vote on Monday.Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, touring the region…

In early 2021, Representative Byron Donalds, R-Florida, and his wife, Erica, took the stage at an event organized by the Truth & Freedom Coalition, a group pushing to introduce Christianity into public schools and other institutions and whose leader has described homosexuality as the work of Satan.The pair were warmly welcomed as allies in the cause. Ms. Donalds was singled out for opening a charter school in Florida. As a state legislator, Mr. Donalds had created a school voucher program that, in the words of one speaker, allowed children to “get a biblical worldview education.”Mr Donalds addressed the group with…

A South Florida jury has found Chiquita Brands responsible for eight murders committed by a right-wing paramilitary group the company helped fund in a fertile banana-growing region of Colombia during the country’s decade-long internal conflict.A court on Monday ordered the multinational banana producer to pay $38.3 million to 16 family members of farmers and other civilians killed in separate incidents by the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia — a right-wing paramilitary group that Chiquita funded from 1997 to 2004. .The company has faced hundreds of similar lawsuits in US courts filed by families of other victims of violence by the…

Elon Musk dropped his lawsuit Tuesday against OpenAI, maker of the online chatbot ChatGPT, a day before a state judge in San Francisco was to consider whether it should be dismissed.The lawsuit, filed in February, had accused the artificial intelligence start-up and two of its founders, Sam Altman and Greg Brockman, of violating OpenAI’s founding agreement by prioritizing commercial interests over the public interest.A multibillion-dollar partnership OpenAI signed with Microsoft, Mr. Musk claimed, represented an abandonment of the company’s promise to carefully develop artificial intelligence and make the technology available to the public.Mr. Musk had argued that the charter said…

President Biden wants more of America’s cars and trucks to run on electricity, not natural gas. His administration has pushed that goal on multiple fronts, including tough new auto emissions regulations and plenty of new subsidies to help American consumers shave up to $7,500 off the cost of a new electric vehicle.Aides to Mr. Biden agree that electric vehicles — which sell for more than $53,000 on average in the United States — would sell even faster here if they were less expensive. As it happens, there is a wave of new electric vehicles that are significantly cheaper than what…

The Biden administration proposed on Tuesday to remove medical debt from the credit reports of more than 15 million Americans, making it easier for them to qualify for auto, home and small business loans.The proposed rule, which will go through a public comment period, will not take effect immediately. It would prohibit health care providers from sharing medical debt with loan providers and prohibit those providers from factoring in medical information when it comes to making loans.Vice President Kamala Harris said the move would improve “the economic health and well-being of millions of Americans.””One of the most significant consequences of…

While almost every other document is accessible online, a lost passport is one of the last such emergencies that can derail an international trip.Here’s a guide to replacing a lost passport depending on how quickly you need it, how much money you have to spare and where you live. (The process for last-minute renewals of expired passports, by the way, is quite similar.)If you have at least three weeksYou’ll be fine. On the State Department website at travel.state.gov/passports, first report the loss of your passport, then follow the process for a replacement. On the website, you’ll find a list of…

Five years ago, when her party won 6 percent of the vote in the European Parliament elections, Giorgia Meloni tried to pop a bottle of sparkling wine, but the cork fell awkwardly among some supporters.This week Ms Meloni, now Italy’s prime minister, emerged a big winner in the election and she and dozens of members of her Brothers of Italy party celebrated at a five-star hotel in Rome where waiters carried bottles of wine in silver basins filled with ice. The hard-right party took almost 29 percent of the vote. The victory was all the more significant because Ms. Meloni…

Harvard said Tuesday it will now avoid taking positions on issues that are not “relevant to the core operation of the university,” accepting recommendations from a faculty committee that urged the university to dramatically scale back its messaging on issues of the day.If put into practice, Harvard will no longer issue formal statements of empathy, as it did for Ukraine, after the Russian invasion, and for the victims of the Hamas attacks on Israel, for example, on October 7.”In issuing formal statements of empathy, the university runs the risk of appearing to care more about some parties and events than…

Federal Reserve officials are entering an uncertain summer. They are not sure how quickly inflation will fall, how likely the economy is to slow, or how long interest rates must remain high to ensure that rapid price increases are completely eliminated.What they do know is that, for now, the labor market and the broader economy are holding up even in the face of higher borrowing costs. And given that, the Fed has a safe play: Do nothing.That’s the message central bankers are likely to send at their two-day meeting this week, which ends on Wednesday. Officials are expected to leave…