Elections

Israel says Hamas routinely operates within — and beneath — places like Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, using them as shields, and has held Israeli hostages there. The group denies the charges.The Israeli military on Thursday raided the largest hospital still functioning in the Gaza Strip, in what it called a search for Hamas fighters and the bodies of hostages. Many people who had sought shelter there were forced to flee from combat once again. Explosions and gunfire rocked the hospital in the city of Khan Younis, the Nasser Medical Complex, before the predawn raid, killing and wounding several people including at least one doctor and a patient, according to a doctor there, as well as the charity Doctors Without Borders, which had staff members at the hospital, and Gaza health authorities. The specific casualty claims, like many assertions in the conflict, could not be immediately confirmed.Videos posted on social media on Thursday and voice messages sent by doctors during the night, both before and after Israeli forces smashed through the perimeter wall and entered the compound, depicted scenes of chaos and fear inside the damaged, smoke-filled hospital, punctuated by automatic gunfire, explosions and shouting.Health care workers shared videos of a chaotic scene at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, as Israeli troops raided the hospital and ordered people to evacuate.Obtained by ReutersOne video, verified by The New York Times, showed damage to the hospital and injured people being rushed through a smoke-filled corridor among debris amid sounds of gunfire. Witnesses said people by the hundreds — possibly thousands — later stood in long lines as Israeli troops screened them, a few at a time, for evacuation.The Israeli military said it had detained dozens of people, but did not say who or why.“We have credible intelligence from a number of sources, including from released hostages, indicating that Hamas held hostages at the Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, and that there may be bodies of our hostages in the Nasser hospital facility,” Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, the chief spokesman for the Israeli military, said in a video statement.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Ms. Willis, the district attorney overseeing the Georgia prosecution of Donald J. Trump, searingly refuted allegations that she had a disqualifying conflict of interest.Fani T. Willis walked unaccompanied through the front door of a Fulton County courtroom on Thursday afternoon in a bright magenta dress and announced she was ready to testify. She was interrupting her lawyer, who at that very moment was trying to convince a judge that she should not have to testify at all.“I’m going to go,” Ms. Willis said.And so she did.For roughly three hours on Thursday, Ms. Willis, the district attorney in Fulton County, Ga., engaged in the fight of her life from the witness stand to try to salvage the case of her life, the prosecution of former President Donald J. Trump. In a raw performance, Ms. Willis, 52, presented herself as a woman in full — by turns combative and serene, focused and discursive (at one point she declared her preference for Grey Goose vodka over wine). Her language toggled between casual (a thousand dollars was “a G”) and precise: On numerous occasions, she prefaced her statements with variations on the phrase, “I want to be very clear.”She upbraided Ashleigh Merchant, one of the defense lawyers questioning her, alleging that Ms. Merchant’s court filings — which accused Ms. Willis of having a disqualifying conflict of interest stemming from a romantic relationship with Nathan J. Wade, the special prosecutor on the case — were full of lies. At one point her voice approached a yell, prompting Scott McAfee, the mild-mannered judge, to call a five-minute recess in an apparent effort to cool things down.Elsewhere, Ms. Willis chided Mr. Trump’s lawyer, Steven Sadow, when he asked if she had been in contact with Mr. Wade in 2020. Noting that Mr. Wade had cancer at the time, she said, “I am not going to emasculate a Black man.” She spoke of giving Mr. Wade a trip to Belize for his 50th birthday — earlier in the day, Ms. Merchant had asked Mr. Wade about the couple visiting a tattoo parlor there. She also admitted, in a digression that the lawyers’ questions did not seem to prompt, that she thought Mr. Wade had a sexist view of the world, and said it was the reason they broke up last summer.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Elizabeth Galvan, 43, who was fatally shot near Union Station in Kansas City, Mo., on Wednesday, was a mother of two and co-hosted a radio program that featured Tejano music.Wednesday was a day that Elizabeth Galvan and thousands of Kansas City Chiefs fans had long awaited.But a chance to revel in the team’s Super Bowl victory was abruptly cut short when gunfire rang out in the afternoon near Union Station, where a rally was being held for the Chiefs, sending scores of fans fleeing for safety.Caught in the gunfire was Ms. Galvan, 43, who the police said on Thursday had died in the shooting. At least 22 others were injured, the authorities.“She was beloved by many,” Chief Stacey Graves of the Kansas City Police Department said at a news conference on Thursday.Elizabeth Galvan was killed in the shooting in Kansas City, Mo., on Wednesday.KKFIMs. Galvan, who was also known as Lisa Lopez-Galvan, was well-known in the Kansas City area. She was a host of the radio show “Taste of Tejano,” broadcast on KKFI, a local radio station. She had a daughter and a son. And she was an avid fan of the Chiefs.Her son, Marc, was also at the rally, and was shot in the leg, KKFI said Thursday. He was treated at a hospital and later released.Ms. Lopez-Galvan had been a disc-jockey for more than 15 years, and she performed for all sorts of crowds with music in English and Spanish, according to KKFI. In March 2022, she was asked to join Tommy Andrade and Monica Frias in co-hosting “Taste of Tejano,” a program she had listened to for years, according to the radio station. The program features Tejano music and news.Lisa Lopez, a friend of Ms. Lopez-Galvan, said in an interview that Ms. Lopez-Galvan was known for inviting her close friends to her garage to watch football games. Ms. Lopez said that she and Ms. Lopez-Galvan, who were not related, would often call each other “tocaya,” Spanish for “namesake,” because of their similar names.Ms. Lopez-Galvan’s passion for the Chiefs was so strong that she was superstitious about watching the team’s games each week with the same people, hoping that it was good luck for the team, Ms. Lopez said. In fact, she said, Ms. Lopez-Galvan would not let anyone new join the group.Ms. Lopez described Ms. Lopez-Galvan as the life of the party, and said she had recently joined a group that helped to organize Fiesta Hispana, an annual festival in downtown Kansas City.“She was loved by everybody in our community,” said Ms. Lopez, who is an executive administrative assistant at The Kansas City Star newspaper. “Our Hispanic community lost a beautiful, wonderful person.”Jacey Fortin More

The case, brought by the New York attorney general, Letitia James, accused leaders of the National Rifle Association of corruption and misspending.Lawyers for New York State concluded their case against the National Rifle Association on Thursday, bringing an end to a closely watched civil showdown that accused leaders of the nation’s most prominent gun rights group of financial misconduct and corruption.Over the last six weeks, lawyers for New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, have outlined a case that paints the N.R.A. as a mismanaged organization with little fealty to its mission of defending the Second Amendment or to the gun owners who prize that right. Monica Connell, representing the attorney general’s office, began her closing arguments on Thursday by comparing the defendants to children who grabbed cookies from a jar and were “caught with crumbs on their face and on their shirt.”Central to the case has been the state’s depiction of the group’s former longtime leader, Wayne LaPierre, as a lavish spender who used N.R.A. funds to pay for private jets, luxury vacations, and the occasional spin on a superyacht. “This case is about corruption: Misuse of funds spent on jets, black cars, five-star hotels, hundreds of thousands of dollars of suits, million-dollar deals to insiders, payments to loyal board members and pervasive violations of internal controls,” Ms. Connell said to the nearly full courtroom in Manhattan.The jury is expected to begin deliberations on Friday.Mr. LaPierre, 74, stepped down just before the New York trial commenced, ending more than three decades as the head of the organization. He had nonetheless testified in the case, conceding to pricey trips and other perks. He also spent many days in the front row the courtroom, as government lawyers — and even his own — described his sometimes troubled leadership of the group.Along with Mr. LaPierre, the defendants included John Frazer, the N.R.A.’s general counsel; Woody Phillips, a former finance chief; and the N.R.A. itself.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

As Russian forces breach a supply line and seek to encircle opposing soldiers, Ukraine’s commanders maneuver to “more advantageous positions.”Ukrainian soldiers are withdrawing even further from positions around the shattered town of Avdiivka after advancing Russian forces breached a critical supply line and threatened to encircle scores of Ukrainian soldiers, Ukrainian military officials and soldiers said on Thursday.Dmytro Lykhovii, a spokesman for Ukrainian forces fighting in the area, said the Ukrainians were “maneuvering” and “sometimes withdrawing to more advantageous positions and sometimes repelling enemy advances.”He also said military commanders had set up a backup logistical route to the town to transport much needed supplies to Ukraine’s beleaguered troops.The battle, Mr. Lykhovii said, was dynamic and changing by the hour as the two sides engaged in fierce urban combat. But his comments suggested the fighting had taken another ominous turn for Kyiv’s forces, potentially presaging their withdrawal from a town reduced to ruins by months of horrendous bombardment.Signs of Ukraine’s deteriorating hold on Avdiivka have been evident for several weeks. Ukraine recently rotated out soldiers from the 110th Brigade, which had played a vital role in the defense of the city for two years but were exhausted and severely depleted after months of brutal combat. Soldiers from the elite Third Assault Brigade were sent in to shore up Ukraine’s forces but noted that they were being sent into a situation that was already “extremely critical.”“ “Avdiivka is hell,” the brigade’s commander, Andrii Biletskyi, said in a statement. The situation in the city was “ precarious and unstable,” he said, with the Russians able to rotate troops and deploy more resources the fight.“We are forced to fight 360 degrees against new brigades that the enemy is deploying,” he said.Laundry dried outside amid heavy destruction in Avdiivka, Ukraine, in October.Nicole Tung for The New York TimesAvdiivka, which is less than ten miles from the Russian occupied city of Donetsk, has withstood months of relentless Russian assaults aimed at encircling the stronghold.However, as U.S. military assistance stopped flowing and commanders were forced to start rationing ammunition, the Russians managed to gain two footholds within the town itself.As Russian warplanes pounded Avdiivka with powerful guided bombs, its small assault units stormed through the ruins. The Ukrainians have turned to drones to help thwart Russian advances. But a recent stretch of foggy and rainy weather has limited the use of drones by both sides.With the Ukrainians forced to conserve ammunition, small bands of Russian assault units were able to amass within the city itself.The Russian units are now advancing from the south, threatening to cut off Ukrainian forces in the southern part of city, and the north, where they have now crossed a key supply line in several places.“The supply and evacuation of Avdiivka has become challenging, but an alternative logistics route, prepared in advance, has been activated,” Mr. Lykhovii said.The Russians’ ultimate goal, he said, is to encircle the hulking Avdiivka Coke and Chemical Plant, which could be used by Ukrainian forces to mount a last stand in the city should they be forced to pull out of the residential areas entirely.Tyler Hicks More

The awards, which celebrate the best of American literature, are expanding the definition of who qualifies.Since their inauguration in 1950, the National Book Awards have set a lofty goal: to celebrate the best writing in America. And for most of the awards’ history, American literature was defined as books written by United States citizens.On Thursday, the National Book Foundation, which administers the prizes, announced that it was dropping the citizenship requirement, opening up the prize to immigrants and other longtime residents who have made their home in the United States.Ruth Dickey, the executive director of the National Book Foundation, said she hoped the change would help broaden the way the book world defines great American writing.“We are all deeply thinking about, how do we most expansively think about the literature of a place, and how writers contribute to that place?” she said. “How do we think about who are the writers who are part of a literary community, and who are we excluding when we draw certain boundaries?”In adopting the change, the National Book Awards are following other major literary prizes and organizations.Last fall, the board that administers the Pulitzer Prizes said that beginning with their 2025 prizes, permanent and longtime residents of the United States would be eligible for its awards for literature, drama and music. Previously, those categories were only open to American citizens, whereas the journalism awards were open to noncitizens whose work was published by U.S. media. The Academy of American Poets and the Poetry Foundation have also expanded their prizes to include poetry by immigrants with temporary legal status.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

Many sponsors were inadequately vetted and safety checks went unfulfilled, an independent watchdog found. Children ended up in dangerous jobs across the country.An independent government watchdog found serious lapses at the Department of Health and Human Services in its protection of children who migrate to the United States on their own, according to a report released Thursday.H.H.S., the federal agency responsible for sheltering migrant children when they arrive by themselves, repeatedly handed them over to adult sponsors in the United States without thorough vetting and sometimes failed to conduct timely safety checks on children once they were released, said the report by the department’s inspector general.“I would define these gaps as very serious,” said Haley Lubeck, the project leader for the review. “We know that these children are especially vulnerable to exploitation.”The findings echoed New York Times reporting that the screening of sponsors and other safeguards for migrant children broke down during the first years of the Biden administration as hundreds of thousands of children crossed the border amid a pandemic-era economic collapse in parts of Central America. Migrant children have ended up working dangerous industrial jobs in violation of child labor laws across the country — in slaughterhouses, factories, construction sites and elsewhere, The Times found. Some have been gravely injured or killed.The report follows a June audit that H.H.S. conducted in response to Times reporting that found that many children were living with strangers who expected or even forced them to work. That audit revealed that government case workers had released more than 340 migrant children to adults who were sponsoring three or more children who were not family members.In early 2021, record numbers of children started crossing the border faster than H.H.S. could process them. With no room left in shelters, many children stayed on cots in crowded tents, sparking public outrage. The Biden administration pressured staff members to move the children out of shelters more quickly, and government workers said they saw children being sent to adults who clearly intended to put them to work.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

“Blind Injustice,” which is being staged at Montclair State University, tells the stories of people freed with the help of the Ohio Innocence Project.Near the end of “Blind Injustice,” an opera about six people who were wrongfully convicted of crimes and later freed, the exonerees reflect on the time they have spent behind bars.“What makes a person strong enough to endure injustice?” they sing. “What makes a person free?”Questions of prejudice, guilt and resilience run throughout “Blind Injustice,” composed by Scott Davenport Richards to a libretto by David Cote, which has its East Coast premiere on Friday at Peak Performances at Montclair State University.The work, which was commissioned by Cincinnati Opera and premiered there in 2019, explores the effects of wrongful convictions on the prisoners and their families, and the help to overturn their convictions that they received from the Ohio Innocence Project, a nonprofit organization at the University of Cincinnati College of Law.One man who was sent to death row describes spending 39 years in prison after being wrongfully convicted of murder. A bus driver falsely accused of sexual abuse describes the pain of being separated from her four children. “Oh Lord, protect them!” she sings. “Oh, God! Deliver me!”And a mother of a young man accused of murder pleads for his release. “Smash bricks into dust!” she sings. “Bust it! Bust it! Bust it! Bust this goddamned prison down!”The creators of “Blind Injustice,” from left: Scott Davenport Richards, Robin Guarino and David Cote.Jeenah Moon for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More