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Iran vowed on Friday to avenge Israel's killing of senior commanders and other officers of its elite Quds Force at a public funeral held for the dead, raising fears of open war but leaving unsaid how would have reacted or when.US officials in Washington and the Middle East said Friday they are preparing for possible Iranian retaliation for Monday's Israeli airstrike in Damascus, Syria. US military forces in the region have been placed on high alert. Israel also put its military on high alert, canceled leave for combat units, recalled some reservists to air defense units and blocked GPS signals, according to an Israeli official.Two Iranian officials who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to speak publicly said that Iran has placed all of its armed forces o...

In 1817 James Parkinson expressed hope about the disease that bears his name. He thought that sooner or later there would be a discovery and “the progress of the disease could be stopped”.Now, nearly 200 years since Parkinson expressed his hope, and after four decades of unsuccessful clinical trials, a group of French researchers reports the first glimmer of success: a modest slowing of the disease in a year-long study.And the drug they used? A so-called GLP-1 receptor agonist, similar to the hugely popular drugs Ozempic, for diabetes, and Wegovy, for obesity.About half a million Americans have been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, a degenerative brain disease second only to Alzheimer's in prevalence.Symptoms include tremors, slowness, stiffness and difficulty with balance. T...

Lynne Reid Banks, a versatile British author who began her writing career with the best-selling feminist novel “The L-Shaped Room” but found her greatest success with the popular children's book “The Indian in the Cupboard” , died Thursday in Surrey. , England. She was 94.Her death, in a nursing facility, was caused by cancer, said James Wills, her literary agent.Ms Banks was part of a generation of writers, including Shelagh Delaney and Margaret Drabble, who emerged in post-war Britain and whose books explored the struggles of young women seeking personal and financial independence, in stark contrast to the contemporary literature of "angry young men". movement defined by John Osborne and Kingsley Amis.Over the course of her long career, Ms. Banks's character portrayals have of...

Stripe, a payments start-up, is one of the most successful companies to emerge from Silicon Valley in recent times. Last year it reached a valuation of $65 billion. But in the 15 years since its founding, most people have had no chance to invest in it.It's a problem that has plagued retail investors for years, as startups like Stripe, SpaceX and OpenAI reach huge valuations in the private market. Only so-called high-net-worth accredited investors can invest in private technology startups. When companies go public, ten years or more after their birth, their growth is often slowed and their valuations are high.A new fund, Destiny Tech100, is trying to change that with a new solution. It offers an exchange-traded fund that contains shares of 23 private technology companies including ...

Sami Michael, an Israeli writer of Iraqi origin whose novels illuminate the world of Jews from Arab countries and the prejudice and discrimination they, as well as Israeli Arabs, have endured, died Monday in Haifa, the mixed Arab-Jewish city in Israel. where he lived. He was 97 years old.His wife, Rachel Michael, confirmed his death.Like many exiles, Mr. Michael (pronounced mee-KAH-ale) had one foot planted in the country he settled in and the other in the country he left behind. He fled Iraq in 1948 after war broke out between the newly formed nation of Israel and its Arab neighbors, including Iraq. As a Jew and a communist activist, he had been threatened with prison and execution in Iraq.In Israel, he said, he discovered that, as a 23-year-old refugee from the Middle East, he was de...

Outbreaks of avian influenza among dairy cows in several states, and at least one infection among a farm worker in Texas, have raised fears that the virus could be the next infectious threat to people.The influenza virus, called H5N1, is highly pathogenic, meaning it has the ability to cause severe illness and death. But while its spread among cows was unexpected, people can contract the virus only through close contact with infected animals, not each other, federal officials said.“These are actually people who are in environments where they might interact with cattle infected with this virus,” said Dr. Demeter Daskalakis, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the Centers for disease control and prevention.“The risk for most others is very low,” he a...

On a cold March evening, after the sun had set and when most school-age children were reluctantly starting their homework, Felicia Dawkins, 16, eagerly jumped on the phone from Scotland to share that her life was changed, for the better.She showed up with the kind of bubbly, giddy energy that only a teenager could radiate. It's the same energy that drew millions of viewers to her TikTok account, where she emerged as a key participant in a Willy Wonka-themed event that went so badly that her memes briefly took over much of the internet and international news coverage. she went on for days.That event, which took place in Glasgow at the end of February, failed to create the dazzling experience it promised. The fallout, in true Internet style, was swift and brutal. Organizers quickly s...

Listen and follow 'Hard Fork'Apple | Spotify | Amazon | YoutubeThis week we'll look at how artificial intelligence is impacting jobs. As companies begin to announce AI-related job cuts and experiment with customer service bots, economists are betting that AI will lead to big gains for companies and workers. Some even predict that this will help rebuild the middle class.Then, multidisciplinary artist and filmmaker Paul Trillo joins to talk to us about his experience as part of a select group of testers who were granted early access to Sora, OpenAI's video generation tool. Finally, Kevin explains what happened when a Microsoft developer encountered a massive cybersecurity breach.Today's guests:Paul Trillo, multidisciplinary artist, writer and directorAdditional read...

Israel has agreed to open another crossing and increase the flow of aid entering Gaza, a move apparently aimed at assuaging the US president's growing frustration over the dire humanitarian crisis in the enclave.The Israeli government confirmed the new measures in an overnight statement, after the Biden administration announced them Thursday evening following a tense phone call between President Biden and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. During the call, Biden threatened to make future support for Israel conditional on how it addresses its concerns about civilian casualties and the humanitarian situation in Gaza.In a statement, a National Security Council spokesperson said Israel had agreed to open the Erez crossing to allow aid into northern Gaza, to use the port of Ashdod to direc...

If you're 50 or older and reading this article, chances are you wear a pair of inexpensive reading glasses to correct presbyopia, or hyperopia, the age-related decline in vision that makes it progressively harder to read small and tiny print . objects.Eventually, everyone gets the condition.But for nearly a billion people in developing countries, reading glasses are a luxury that many cannot afford. According to the World Health Organization, lack of access to corrective glasses inhibits learning among young students, increases the likelihood of road accidents and forces millions of middle-aged workers and farmers to leave the workforce too early.Not surprisingly, uncorrected presbyopia makes it more difficult for breadwinners to support their families. That's the conclusion of ...