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The return of winter has already claimed a life on the tallest mountain in the continental United States, with the death of a hiker on slippery Mt. Whitney, according to the Inyo County Sheriff’s Department.

Over the weekend, the hiker fell in the notorious “99 Switchbacks” section of the main trail, said Lindsey Stine, Community Outreach Coordinator for the Inyo County Sheriff’s Department. The switchbacks begin just above Trail Camp at almost 12,000 feet, where many hikers spend the night before making an early morning start for the 14,500-foot summit.

In the summer, when the trail is dry, the switchbacks section is a long slog, winding back and forth up two miles, and nearly 2,000 vertical feet.

When it gets a big snow, as it did earlier this month, the trail becomes buried and the whole slope becomes perilously steep.

Wes Ostgaard, who said he has climbed Mt. Whitney four times, posted on Facebook that conditions on Saturday were so treacherous he and his climbing partners decided to turn around.

“Winds were extremely intense, and with the recent snowfall, the wind was blasting snow in our faces,” Ostgaard wrote. The snow covered the trail and, in many places, rendered it “invisible,” he wrote.

When Ostgaard and his companions were descending the switchbacks they encountered the body of another hiker who had apparently fallen above a section of steel safety cables and then slid another 70 ft, or so.

“I believe it is highly unlikely he survived,” Ostgaard wrote of the hiker. “There was a fair amount of blood from [colliding with] the cables, and a lot of blood around a rock he made contact with.”

Ostgaard used Starlink to contact his father around 12:30 p.m., who then contacted emergency services. A helicopter arrived about four hours later, Ostgaard wrote.

Another hiker that day, Kirill Novitskiy, encountered the same conditions on the switchbacks on Saturday but made the “wrong decision” to keep climbing.

He made it up with just microspikes — little metal cleats that attach to the bottom of shoes and provide winter traction on flat ground — or on gentle slopes where falling would be no big deal.

But microspikes are notoriously inadequate for winter mountaineering, when a fall could be fatal.

As so often happens in the mountains, when Novitskiy returned to the steep switchbacks after a few hours traveling on relatively flat ground to and from the summit, he discovered conditions had deteriorated so much that he was in real danger and seriously under-equipped.

“I had a couple of dangerous places where the trail became a slope full of powdery snow, and it was very easy to slip off,” Novitskiy wrote on Facebook. “The worst part on the way back were the switchbacks. Almost all the trail was covered with powdery snow brought up with the wind, it was very hard to go with just microspikes.”

Near the cables he saw a pair of trekking poles with nobody around, and then encountered a group of five hikers at the bottom of the switchbacks who told him about the accident.

Anyone attempting to climb Mt. Whitney from this point on in the winter season should bring crampons — much larger spikes that attach firmly to mountaineering boots and dig deep into snow and ice to prevent falls – and an ice axe.

Experts also advise traveling in groups, and bringing a satellite communication device to contact help if anything goes wrong.

So far, the Inyo Sheriff’s Department has not released the identity of the hiker who died.

In January this year, a hiker from Texas died after attempting to climb Mt. Whitney in bad weather. His body was found at an elevation of 12,000 feet near North Fork Lone Pine Creek Trail.

In June, a 14-year-old hiker became delirious on Mt. Whitney and fell off of a 12,000-foot cliff. He survived.

WASHINGTON — President Trump is undergoing what he has described as a “semiannual physical” at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Friday.

The visit, which the White House announced earlier this week, comes as Trump is preparing to travel to the Middle East on the heels of a ceasefire deal in the Israel-Hamas war. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt described it as a “routine yearly checkup,” although Trump had his annual physical in April.

The White House declined to explain why Trump was getting a yearly checkup six months after his annual exam. But in an exchange with reporters Thursday, he said it was a “semiannual physical.”

“I’m meeting with the troops, and I’m also going to do a, sort of, semiannual physical, which I do,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. “I think I’m in great shape, but I’ll let you know.”

The president is scheduled to return to the White House after his visit to Walter Reed, which is located in Bethesda, Maryland.

Trump’s April physical found that he was “fully fit” to serve as commander in chief. The three-page summary of the exam done by his doctor, Navy Capt. Sean Barbabella, said he had lost 20 pounds (9 kilograms) since a medical exam in June 2020 and said he has an “active lifestyle” that “continues to contribute significantly” to the well-being of the president, who’s 79.

In July, the White House announced that Trump recently had had a medical checkup after noticing “mild swelling” in his lower legs and was found to have a condition common in older adults that causes blood to pool in his veins. Tests by the White House medical unit showed that Trump has chronic venous insufficiency, which occurs when little valves inside the veins that normally help move blood against gravity gradually lose the ability to work properly.

At the April physical, Trump also passed a short screening test to assess different brain functions.

Kim writes for the Associated Press.

Behind the facade of order and cunning that the terror group Boko Haram, and its splinter group ISWAP, flaunt to the outside world, lies a dysfunctional core corroded by greed, paranoia, extortion, tribalism, fear, and treachery. 

In their enclaves, in North East Nigeria and in the wider Lake Chad region, women often bear the heaviest scars, being subjected to systemic rape and violence, which leaders dismiss as spoils of war. 

Commanders fall not only in clashes with soldiers or vigilantes but also under the bullets of comrades, who once swore to fight the same cause. 

Feuds over leadership and resources, suspicion of working as spies, or simple ambition have sparked deadly purges that have claimed more fighters than external battles with their enemies have done. In the end, the insurgents are caught in a paradox of their own making –  they wage war against the state but are slowly devouring themselves from within.

Mamman Nur

At the height of his influence, Mamman Nur was revered as one of the most learned clerics in the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP). He was a charismatic leader whose voice once carried weight in the ideological debates that shaped the insurgency across the Lake Chad basin. But by the time of his death, Nur was not remembered for theology, nor for his role as a strategist. He was remembered for his bodily infirmity — broken, bleeding, and betrayed.

Nur suffered from severe haemorrhoids. The condition left him in constant agony, blood dripping from his anus. In the unforgiving world of insurgent camps, where strength and divine aura were as important as loyalty, Nur’s ailment became both a weakness and a curse. 

Fighters whispered that he had grown frail. Leaders suspected that his mind, like his body, was giving way. His decision to secretly accept ₦2 million from a negotiating team in the hope of finding treatment sealed his fate.

Nur’s health troubles coincided with shifting politics within ISWAP. The late Abu Musab al-Barnawi – favoured not for superior scholarship but for lineage as the son of slain Boko Haram founder Muhammad Yusuf – emerged as the face of the group. He was the conduit to the Islamic State core in Syria and Iraq. More importantly, he was also a Kanuri; Nur was not.

Nur, once seen as indispensable, was now considered expendable. Worse still, he was branded a tattler and a man too open to the prospect of peace. For many insurgents, this is a sign of weakness, not strength.

Prison of iron and cement

HumAngle gathered that ISWAP runs two categories of prisons in its Lake Chad strongholds, with the most notorious controlled by the group’s feared security arm, the Rijjalul Amni. Reserved for those convicted of major crimes—such as unauthorised possession or trading of firearms, contact with government institutions, adultery, or mutiny—the prison is a fortress of steel pillars and barbed wire, much of it stripped from telecom masts. The prison, open-roofed and welded into sections, is where ISWAP’s intelligence chiefs carry out torture, punishments, and executions. Lesser offences like marital disputes, loan default, or pornography cases are handled by the Maktabal Kazawul Mazalib, a community-level court, and do not lead to confinement.

Conditions inside the Rijjalul Amni prison are brutal, likened by one former member to a Hitler-era concentration camp. Prisoners are tortured, underfed, and often left with food that causes deadly illness. Lice infestations are routine, and survival rates are grim—about 70 per cent never make it out alive or healthy. The prison is designed not just to punish but to instil fear, ensuring strict obedience within ISWAP ranks and the communities under its control.

When Nur was accused of betrayal, he was locked inside one of those brutal prisons. His cell had no tarpaulin to shield him against the choking heat or torrential rains. The prisons serve not as holding spaces but as purgatories intended to dehumanise inmates.

One night, in 2018, Nur attempted to flee. Fighters had anticipated the move and ensured that all boats were removed from the shores before dawn. Desperate, he waded into the shallow waters of Lake Chad. By the time guards discovered his absence during morning prayers, he had barely made it 200 metres from the camp. 

A fighter later recalled spotting him, neck-deep in water, his head bobbing as he begged for rescue. He was dragged back, and his punishment was obvious.

In the law of the insurgency, attempting escape is treason. And Mamman Nur was executed some days after.

The same type of iron-barred cells held two former fighters who defected from the group and are now living in Maiduguri. They described the conditions as dehumanising. Swarms of mosquitoes and other dangerous creatures from the Lake Chad creeks made the nights unbearable, and once, a snake slithered into the enclosure and bit an inmate to death.

“When it rains, you’ll have to stand with your feet under muddy water,” said a former ISWAP prisoner. water,” the prisons remain flooded for weeks, leaving inmates inside.

“I witnessed a cellmate die from his injury,” one said. “We were then ordered to bury him without proper Islamic rites, simply because he was suspected of spying.”

A state built on fear

His fate was not unique. Since Nur’s death, thousands have attempted escape, and hundreds have been captured and executed. Punishments within the so-called caliphate rarely followed the dictates of Shariah law. They followed paranoia, envy, and impulse.

Unauthorised possession of a mobile phone or listening to a transistor radio could result in the death penalty. Fighters accused of theft were mutilated. 

HumAngle reviewed dozens of videos showing men’s hands chopped off. A man was executed for raping a woman who had travelled from Lagos to live and marry within the daulah (the territory controlled by Boko Haram/ISWAP in Lake Chad). Others were executed on allegations of homosexuality or even bestiality.

But executions were not always about morality. They were also tools of control.

A fighter told HumAngle how his shop was raided on orders of the leadership. Over ₦40 million in cash, earned from years of selling stolen and smuggled petrol in territories under insurgents’ control, was discovered. Half was seized instantly. He was accused of theft for possessing so much. Repeatedly extorted, he eventually fled and now lives in a Nigerian city, far from both insurgents and the government’s deradicalisation programme. 

A group of six fishermen loyal to Bakura, who led a Boko Haram sub-faction, lost over ₦10 million after venturing into a remote part of Lake Chad, where they caught a large haul of fish. 

They successfully transported the fish through Cameroon to Jimeta, Adamawa State. However, when the proceeds were delivered to them through a trusted courier, some fighters stormed their tent in the dead of night and seized both the money and their boat. They were accused of unauthorised fishing. Angered by the betrayal, the fishermen decided to defect.

Another defector currently living in Maiduguri said he left after ISWAP fighters confiscated his livestock. “I had cows and sheep, which I reared for over two years and was even willing to pay taxes on, but some fighters came and took everything from me,” he said.

Inequality behind the black flag

The insurgency drew young men from across Nigeria and the Sahel, lured by promises of equality under God and the dream of a just Islamic State. Instead, they encountered a microcosm of Nigeria’s worst ills – ethnic jingoism, class disparity, and systemic corruption.

Leadership remained tightly in the hands of the Kanuri elite. Non-Kanuri fighters – Buduma, Hausa, Margi, Babur, and Fulani – were relegated to cannon fodder. 

Buduma members, renowned for their expertise in Lake Chad waterways, expressed dissatisfaction over their exploitation and lack of leadership positions. Hausa and Margi fighters were routinely sent on suicide missions. Fulani recruits often defected, unable to endure the cultural and political hierarchies.

Even among the Kanuri, deep fractures existed. A caste-like system tied to dialect and ancestry meant that some Kanuris could not marry others, lead prayers, or rise in command. Fighters soon realised the hypocrisy – they had abandoned their homes, families, and futures for a caliphate that replicated the same inequalities they thought they had escaped.

Raising issues of Sharia application

In Maiduguri’s Shehu South Ward, Mustapha Abubakar, a man in his mid-fifties, reflected on how far the insurgents had strayed from the true path of Sharia. 

“Their interpretation of jihaad and the application of Sharia is quite contrary to those of general Islamic scholars,” he explained. “Islam requires three conditions before jihad can be carried out: a sovereign state, a unanimously accepted Imam, and an official flag. Boko Haram and ISWAP have none of these.”

Abubakar stressed that criminal justice in Sharia is the preserve of constituted authorities –  leaders such as a Khalifa, a Qadi, or an Alkali – not freelance militants. 

He cited the Prophet’s saying: “Whoever sees a bad thing, let him change it with his hand; if he cannot, then with his tongue; if he cannot, then let him hate it in his heart – and that is the weakest of faith.” To him, the saying makes it clear that only legitimate authorities may “change things with their hands,” not insurgent commanders.

He outlined the distinctions between civil (mu‘aamalaat) and criminal (hadd and tahziir) justice and the narrow grounds for capital punishment in Islam – deliberate murder, adultery by a married person, and voluntary renunciation of faith. 

Listening to the radio or making a phone call, he said, could never warrant death, but at most, a judge might order light tahziir punishments, such as caning if the content was indecent. Likewise, Sharia prescribes lashes for alcohol and drug consumption and severe penalties for trafficking in substances that spread crime and “mischief in the land.”

Even running away from a state that claims Sharia, Abubakar clarified, depended on legitimacy.

 “If it is an insurgent-controlled territory where Sharia is misinterpreted, fleeing is no crime. But in a true Islamic State, refusal to pay zakat or denial of its legitimacy, for instance, can be treated as disbelief and punished with confiscation of wealth, or worse,” Abubakar said.

He said the gulf between Sharia as understood by scholars and communities and its distortion under Boko Haram and ISWAP is stark. 

Where insurgents mete out execution for radios, phones, or suspected defections, Islamic jurisprudence stresses due process, legitimate authority, and a tightly limited scope of capital punishment, Abubakar stressed. 

The splintering and the question of survival

The Kanuri-first culture has fueled defections and splinters within the insurgency. Some non-Kanuri fighters have formed factions like Bughata. Others have drifted westward to terrorist bands in Nigeria’s North West, where profit, not ethnicity, dictates loyalty.

Defections are not just driven by hunger or military pressure. Former fighters confess that more than half who abandoned the insurgency did so because of betrayal, discrimination, or extortion within the group. Hunger ranks second, and military pressure is third.

Mamman Nur’s story is less about illness or treason and more about the fragility of the insurgency itself, which became an enterprise sustained by fear, suspicion, and a culture of unrelenting violence. His fate mirrors that of other former terror merchants, whose trust in one another has been severed.

Stargazers enjoyed a “blood moon” during a total lunar eclipse visible across Asia, as well as swaths of Europe and Africa.

When the sun, Earth, and the moon line up, the shadow cast by the planet on its satellite makes it appear an eerie, deep red colour — an effect that has astounded humans for millennia.

People in Asia, including India and China, were best placed to see Sunday’s total eclipse, which was also visible on the eastern edge of Africa as well as in western Australia.

The total lunar eclipse lasted from 17:30 GMT to 18:52 GMT.

Stargazers in Europe also had a brief chance to see a partial eclipse just as the moon rose during the early evening, but the Americas missed out.

The moon appears red during lunar eclipses because the only sunlight reaching it is “reflected and scattered through the Earth’s atmosphere”, said Ryan Milligan, an astrophysicist at Queen’s University Belfast, Northern Ireland.

Blue wavelengths of light are shorter than red ones, so they are more easily dispersed as they travel through Earth’s atmosphere, he told the AFP news agency.

“That’s what gives the moon its red, bloody colour.”

While special glasses or pinhole projectors are necessary to observe solar eclipses safely, all that is required to view a lunar eclipse is clear weather and a suitable spot.

The last total lunar eclipse was in March this year, while the previous one was in 2022.

A SUSPECTED murder victim found in a pool of blood at the infamous Burning Man festival has been identified as a 37-year-old Russian.

Vadim Kruglov was discovered on Saturday night inside the festival grounds in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert.

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On Wednesday, organisers confirmed his identity and said they were working with the Pershing County sheriff’s office, which is leading the investigation.

In a statement, Burning Man said: “Our hearts go out to Vadim’s family and friends, and we grieve the loss of a community member.

“Burning Man Project is doing everything we can to assist the sheriff’s investigation so the perpetrator can be caught and brought to justice.”

The festival added that it was donating to a programme allowing witnesses to share information anonymously and urged anyone with knowledge to come forward.

Friends said Kruglov had been missing for four days before his body was found.

His pal Sofiia Shcherbakova wrote on Instagram: “His tent and belongings were left at camp, but he never returned.”

She later confirmed his death, calling him a “true hero of Burning Man”.

“He poured his soul into our community: building the camp, creating an art installation, always ready to help others, and being kind and responsive to everyone,” she wrote.

“His energy and contribution will forever remain part of the Burn’s history.”

In a follow-up post, Shcherbakova said she was raising funds to bring his body back to his hometown of Omsk, Siberia.

“Now we want to honour his memory and support his family,” she said.

“We are raising funds to bring him home to Omsk, so that his parents can say their last goodbye and lay him to rest with his loved ones.”

As of Thursday, the GoFundMe had collected $4,063 of its $15,000 goal.

The sheriff’s office has condemned the killing, calling for information that could lead to the arrest of “any person who would commit such a heinous crime against another human being”.

They have so far declined to release further details about how Kruglov died.

Burning Man — famous for its giant effigies, art installations and eccentric camps — attracts tens of thousands of revellers every year, including tech billionaires and celebrities.

About 70,000 people from 102 countries attended this year’s gathering.

The festival was already rocked last week by intense dust storms that left some attendees injured.

It also saw the shock birth of a baby in an RV after a woman who did not know she was pregnant went into labour on site.

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Welcome to Screen Gab, the newsletter for everyone who likes to plan ahead.

Schools are (mostly) back in session, and the threat of pumpkin spice has already made the marketing rounds — it’s still summer, but the fall scaries have crept in. As some of us try to process how we’re basically a sneeze away from 2026, there’s at least comfort in knowing there’s a promising slate of new films and TV shows to keep us entertained as we hurtle through time. For our special Fall Preview issue, The Times staff gathered to share our picks for the most anticipated movies and TV shows to watch this fall: from a Bruce Springsteen biopic to the movie version of Stephen King’s “The Running Man” and the “Wicked” sequel, here’s our list of 21 films to be excited about; meanwhile, the Jude Law-Jason Bateman-led “Black Rabbit,” the docuseries “Mr. Scorsese” and broadcast comedy “DMV” are among the 16 intriguing shows in our TV roundup.

(Sian Roper / For The Times)

But, hey, we get it if you’d rather not think about the future just yet. In fact, the theme of this week’s Screen Gab is all about traveling back in time. Our streaming recommendations include a documentary exploring the quirky style and misunderstood message of art-rock band Devo, and a reminder of 2003 HBO drama “Carnivale,” which starred Amy Madigan long before she was creeping us out with her chilling performance in “Weapons.” Plus, Matthew B. Roberts, the showrunner behind Starz’s expanding “Outlander” universe, discusses the new prequel series and the art of making love letters swoon-worthy.

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Recommendations from the film and TV experts at The Times

The members of Devo in director Chris Smith’s documentary about the band.

(Barry Schultz)

“Devo” (Netflix)

They are Devo, and this is a film about them. A pseudoscientific theme — “de-evolution” — taken from an old book — led to a band that led to a career. (And looking around, it’s hard to argue that civilization isn’t racing rapidly backward.) Chris Smith’s breezy film neatly recaps the group’s career, from their earliest performances, when they had long hair and were still in college — Kent State, where in 1970 the National Guard opened fire on student protesters, killing four — to MTV fame, to their finally running out of gas. Founders Mark Mothersbaugh and Gerald Casale offer good-humored, incisive commentary on the rise and fall of their satirical art project whose social criticism paled in the glare of big pop success — “Whip It,” you remember” — and the usual major-label misadventures. Smith floats his narrative on a river of ephemeral films that echo the spirit of the group’s own aesthetic. Brian Eno, David Bowie, Mick Jagger and Neil Young, who put them in his movie “Human Highway,” make anecdotal appearances. (The band has since gotten off the couch — they’ll be at the Hollywood Bowl Oct. 18-19 with the B-52’s as part of a “Cosmic De-Evolution” tour.) — Robert Lloyd

Clancy Brown and Amy Madigan in “Carnivale.”

(Doug Hyun / HBO)

“Carnivale” (HBO Max)

The huge success of the horror film “Weapons” has put a fresh spotlight on star Amy Madigan. Her sinister portrayal of the eccentric Aunt Gladys, a witch whose spells wreak havoc on the children and adults of a small community, is already sparking early awards buzz and is the latest in a gallery of distinctive performances in films such as “Field of Dreams,” “Streets of Fire” and “Places in the Heart,” to name a few. Madigan also was featured in “Carnivale,” which premiered in 2003 and ran for two seasons on HBO. In the eerie drama about a struggling carnival of freaks and outcasts that traveled around the Dust Bowl during the Depression, Madigan played Iris Crowe, the soft-spoken sister of the demonic Brother Justin Crowe (Clancy Brown). — Greg Braxton

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A weekly chat with actors, writers, directors and more about what they’re working on — and what they’re watching

A still from “Outlander: Blood of my Blood,” the prequel to the popular period drama, that features Jamie Roy as Brian Fraser and Harriet Slater as Ellen MacKenzie, the future parents of Jamie Fraser.

(Sanne Gault / Starz)

“Outlander” meets “How I Met Your Mother”? Not quite. But “Outlander: Blood of My Blood” is a prequel to Starz’s romance epic that focuses on the parents of both protagonists from the original series, Jamie Fraser and Claire Beauchamp. The series alternates between WWI-era Scotland and the Scottish Highlands of the 18th century, often intertwining, as it chronicles the courtship and obstacles faced by Jamie’s parents — Brian Fraser (Jamie Roy) and Ellen MacKenzie (Harriet Slater) — and Claire’s — Julia (Hermione Corfield) and Henry Beauchamp (Jeremy Irvine). Here, showrunner Matthew B. Roberts discusses the inspiration for the show’s swoon-worthy love letters and reveals which TV drama he recently watched that echoes themes explored in “Outlander” through a modern lens. — Yvonne Villarreal

What do you find intriguing about each couple’s story and what it telegraphs about Claire and Jamie’s connection and their attitudes on love?

With Brian and Ellen, it’s the rush of first love — all passion, risk and discovery, which foreshadows Jamie’s all-in devotion to Claire. With Henry and Julia, it’s the strength of a tested love — the daily choice to stay together. Both show that true love requires surrender and courage, the same foundation that Claire and Jamie build their lives on.

The original series has delved into the complexities of PTSD. How did what you’ve explored there, particularly as it relates to Claire and her experiences as a combat nurse, inform how you shaped Henry Beauchamp’s journey? Are there connections you wanted to draw between father and daughter?

War scars everyone differently. Henry’s wounds are visible, Claire’s more contained — but both live with that same survival instinct. Even though Henry leaves when she’s young, Claire inherits his resilience. That ability to keep going when the world tries to break you is in her DNA.

Love letters are a hallmark of the “Outlander” universe. And the correspondence between Claire’s parents, Henry and Julia, are a key narrative element in their quest to be reunited — the declarations within have to be top tier. Any interesting references or sources of inspiration?

The inspiration came from my father, who fell in love with someone online before ever seeing her face. He said, “It doesn’t matter, I already love her.” He did meet her, they married, and they stayed together until his passing. That experience taught me how love can bloom through words alone. That’s what we aim for with Henry and Julia’s letters — each one has to feel like a real step deeper into their hearts. Everyone in the room weighs in, but the test for me is always the same: Does it feel authentic, does it honor the magic of falling in love?

What have you watched recently that you are recommending to everyone you know?

I really don’t recommend shows or movies. Everyone has their own tastes. But I did recently watch “The Better Sister” [Prime Video]. It’s a sharp look at family — love, betrayal, loyalty — all the same themes we explore, but in a modern world with cellphones and social media. The technology changes, but the struggles don’t. Families still compete, hide secrets and fight for trust. [It has] some great acting.

What’s your go-to “comfort watch,” the movie or TV show you go back to again and again?

When “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” [VOD] or “Fargo” [Tubi, MGM+] come on, I’m in — they just never get old. “Butch Cassidy” has that perfect mix of charm and tragedy; and “Fargo” is dark, funny and somehow still feels authentically real. For TV, my go-tos are “The Sopranos” [HBO Max] and “Seinfeld” [Netflix] — totally different, but both perfect at what they do. And true-crime shows are always in the mix. They are research. It’s the human condition on full display.

LONDON — President Clinton and Republican presidential nominee Bob Dole have more in common than wanting to be president. They are distant cousins.

But Clinton has a snootier pedigree, according to genealogists who say that gives him an election edge.

Both Clinton and Dole can trace their ancestry to King Henry III and Presidents William Henry Harrison and Benjamin Harrison, according to Burke’s Peerage.

But Clinton has far more royal blood than Dole because he is directly descended from King Robert I of France and is also related to every Scottish monarch and to the current British royal family.

Harold Brooks-Baker, publishing director of Burke’s Peerage, says Clinton’s bluer blood gives him an edge on Nov. 5.

“The presidential candidate with the greatest number of royal genes has always been the victor, without exception, since George Washington,” Brooks-Baker said.

Gaza’s already battered healthcare system is in a state of collapse as blood banks run dry and Israeli forces continue targeting clinics and facilities housing patients and displaced families while maintaining an aid blockade.

Healthcare officials in the besieged enclave reported on Wednesday that there is a severe shortage of blood as many would-be donors are too malnourished due to a severe Israeli-induced hunger crisis that has so far claimed the lives of 193 Palestinians, including five in the past 24 hours.

Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from Gaza City, said blood donations are desperately needed across the remaining operational medical facilities in Gaza – al-Shifa Hospital, Al-Aqsa Hospital, and Nasser Hospital.

“We’ve seen at the blood banks many people who were begging doctors to allow them to give blood donations to save their loved ones, but they had to be turned away because they were not fit to donate blood due to the enforced dehydration and starvation,” Mahmoud said.

Amani Abu Ouda, head of the blood bank at al-Shifa Hospital, said most would-be donors who arrive are malnourished, which affects the safety and quality of blood donations.

As a result, she said, “when they donate blood they could lose consciousness within seconds, which not only endangers their health but also leads to the loss of a precious blood unit.”

More than 14,800 patients in Gaza are still in urgent need of specialised medical treatment, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned, calling on the international community to act swiftly.

“We urge more countries to step forward to accept patients and for medical evacuations to be expedited through all possible routes,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in a statement posted on X on Wednesday.

Israeli attacks have continued to pound Gaza, killing at least 44 people on Wednesday.

An overnight attack in Gaza City’s Sheikh Radwan neighbourhood injured dozens of people. The attack targeted the Sheikh Radwan Health Centre, previously run by the UN refugee agency for Palestinians.

“Last night, while we were having dinner, we suddenly heard people shouting, calling for evacuation. There was no time to take anything no food, no clothes, no bedding. We just ran,” Ghaleb Tafesh, a displaced Palestinian resident, told Al Jazeera.

Among those killed Wednesday were 18 hungry aid seekers, who were shot dead as they approached UN aid trucks and aid distribution sites operated by the United States and Israeli-backed GHF.

So far, more than 1,560 Palestinians seeking aid have been killed by Israeli forces while trying to receive food since GHF began operating in late May.

This week, a group of UN special rapporteurs and independent human rights experts called for the GHF to be disbanded, saying it is “an utterly disturbing example of how humanitarian relief can be exploited for covert military and geopolitical agendas in serious breach of international law”.

Israel’s air and ground assault has also destroyed nearly all of Gaza’s food production capabilities, leaving its people reliant on aid.

A new report by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization and the UN satellite centre found that just 8.6 percent of Gaza’s cropland is still accessible following sweeping Israeli forced evacuation orders in recent months. Just 1.5 percent is accessible and undamaged, it said.

Israel blockade extends to medical supplies and fuel

Hamas, meanwhile, called for protests across the world against the starvation in Gaza.

“We call for continuing and escalating the popular pressure in the cities, capitals and squares on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and all the upcoming days with marches, protests and demonstrations in front of the Zionist and US embassies,” Hamas said in a statement.

Israel’s blockade extends to medical supplies and much-needed fuel – shortages that have forced several medical facilities to shut down in recent months.

Farhan Haq, deputy spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, warned that Israel’s continued blockade on the entry of fuel into Gaza is affecting “lifesaving” operations.

“In the past two days, the UN collected some 300,000 litres from the Karem Abu Salem [Kerem Shalom] crossing,” Haq told reporters.

“This is far less than what is needed to sustain operations,” he said. “For example, our partners working in health warned today that the lives of more than 100 premature babies are in imminent danger due to the lack of fuel.”

Haq also said that, since March, more than 100 health workers, including surgeons and specialised staff, had been denied entry into the Strip.

Fears mount over possible plans for expanded military offensive in Gaza

The latest deaths came as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was expected to announce further military action – and possibly plans for Israel to fully reoccupy Gaza. Experts say Israel’s ongoing offensive and blockade are already pushing the territory of some 2 million Palestinians into famine.

The UN has called reports about a possible expansion of Israel’s military operations in Gaza “deeply alarming” if true.

Despite international pressure for a ceasefire, efforts to mediate a truce between Israel and Hamas have collapsed.

An expansion of the military offensive in heavily populated areas would likely be devastating.

“Where will we go?” said Tamer al-Burai, a displaced Palestinian living at the edge of Deir el-Balah in central Gaza.

“Should people jump into the sea if the tanks rolled in, or wait to die under the rubble of their houses? We want an end to this war; it is enough, enough.”

More than 61,158 Palestinians, including at least 18,430 children, have been killed in Gaza since the war began in October 2023, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

Forty-nine captives, including 27 who are believed to be dead, are still being held by Hamas, according to Israeli authorities.

Gaza’s health system is in a state of collapse as Israel continues its attacks on medical facilities. A strike on Tuesday hit a UN clinic in Gaza City. The nearby Al Shifa Hospital reported a severe shortage of blood as many people in Gaza are too malnourished to make donations.

Bulawayo, Zimbabwe – When Lloyd Muzamba was critically injured in a car accident on the Harare–Bulawayo highway in 2023, he needed an urgent blood transfusion to save his life. Despite being admitted at Mpilo Central Hospital, the biggest public health facility in Zimbabwe’s Matabeleland region, a shortage of supplies meant the doctors didn’t have enough for him.

In desperation, Muzamba’s family turned to their only other option – a nearby private hospital that sold them the three pints of blood. But at a cost of $250 per pint, Muzamba – who earned a $270 monthly salary and had no savings – could not afford it.

With time running out, the family had to make a plan. Eventually, Muzamba’s uncle sold a cow for $300 and asked other relatives to contribute the balance.

Two years on, the now recovered Muzamba says the incident has left him psychologically wounded, as he worries about other emergencies when people may need lifesaving blood.

“Three pints can be a small number; others might need more than that. But due to the costs involved, it becomes life-threatening,” said the 35-year-old, who works in a hardware store in Bulawayo.

“I could not get the blood without paying or making a payment plan. It was a painful experience for an ordinary Zimbabwean like me.”

Muzamba’s is not an isolated case.

With ongoing currency woes, rising costs of living and high levels of poverty, desperate Zimbabweans in need of care face life-threatening delays due to financial barriers. This includes blood shortages – despite supplies being free in public health facilities.

Tanaka Moyo, a mother of two in the capital Harare, also experienced the stress of needing to pay for emergency blood supplies during the delivery of her second child.

After excessive postpartum haemorrhaging, the 38-year-old street vendor needed four pints of blood.

Together with her husband, a security guard, she had struggled to raise money for the birth of their child. The sudden need for a blood transfusion was a shocking unplanned cost.

“My husband ran around and borrowed money from a microfinance institution. The interests are steep and conditions stringent, but he had to act quickly,” said Moyo.

“At the hospital, they insisted the blood was free – but it was not available.”

Plaxedes Charuma, a gynaecologist in Bulawayo, says “postpartum haemorrhage is the leading cause of maternal mortality”. The prevalence of the condition means that hospitals should always have supplies on hand to deal with maternal blood loss emergencies that arise, health experts say.

According to the Community Working Group on Health (CWGH), a network of civic health organisations in Zimbabwe, the country faces a high demand for blood transfusions, and those most affected are pregnant women.

“About half a million pregnancies are expected in Zimbabwe, and in some of these, there is excessive blood loss, requiring transfusion of at least three pints of blood,” said Itai Rusike, CWGH’s executive director.

“Maternal mortality in Zimbabwe remains unacceptably high,” Rusike told Al Jazeera. “Timely blood transfusion prevents maternal deaths, which in Zimbabwe stands at 212 women dying per every 100,000 live births.”

‘Free blood for all’

Generally, there are two major types of blood transfusions: allogeneic and autologous. Autologous transfusion refers to self-same blood donation by an individual for their own use later. Allogeneic transfusion, which is the most common in Zimbabwe, involves administering blood donated by one person to another who matches their blood type.

The National Blood Service Zimbabwe (NBSZ) is the body that oversees blood donation and distribution in the country. It operates as an independent not-for-profit entity, but it is mandated by law to collect, process and distribute blood throughout Zimbabwe.

While the Ministry of Health and Child Care is permanently represented on its board of directors, NBSZ functions independently of hospitals and government health institutions. It is not present in every facility, but maintains decentralised distribution from five regional centres: Harare, Bulawayo, Gweru, Masvingo and Mutare.

Historically, patients in Zimbabwe paid for blood, but over the years the government worked on lowering costs – from $150 a pint in 2016 and prior to $50 by 2018.

The government then went a step further in July that year, deciding that blood would be made free at all public health institutions.

“The free blood for all move is going ahead as planned and mechanisms have already been put in place to finance the move, and come July 1 [2018], blood will be available for free,” said then-Minister of Health and Child Care Dr David Parirenyatwa during the June 2018 World Blood Donor Day celebrations.

However, despite the policy, hospitals continue to face shortages.

This May, there was a critical lack of blood in public hospitals, a situation that threatened the lives of thousands of people, the Ministry of Health and Child Care said in a statement. Al Jazeera contacted ministry spokesperson Donald Mujiri to ask about the shortage and the implementation of the free blood policy, but he did not respond to our requests for comment.

NBSZ, meanwhile, said that May’s shortage was due to operational and systemic challenges that disrupted its ability to carry out routine blood collection activities.

“Without timely financial support, we faced constraints in mobilising outreach teams, securing fuel, and procuring essential supplies,” Vickie Maponga, NBSZ communications officer, told Al Jazeera.

“Additionally, the crisis was exacerbated by a seasonal dip in donations, particularly from youth, who make up over 70 percent of our donor base.”

These shortages regularly result in patients on the front line needing to buy blood at private clinics. In most cases, the patient is physically transferred to the private facility for the transfusion, where they pay the costs. In some cases, the patient pays and the private hospital sends the blood to them in the public hospital.

Crucial blood donations

The World Health Organization (WHO) aims to ensure that all countries practicing blood transfusions obtain their blood supplies from voluntary blood donors.

The NBSZ told Al Jazeera that a sustainable blood supply in Zimbabwe depends on cultivating a culture of regular, voluntary donations, particularly among the youth and underserved communities.

The service has a mobile outreach model, through which it brings blood donation drives directly to schools and communities. To further engage the youth, Maponga said they also started a club that “encourages young people to commit to donating blood at least 25 times in their lifetime”.

“We also integrate blood donation awareness into school programmes and partner with tertiary institutions to maintain continuity post-high school,” she said.

Ivy Khumalo, 32, is one of those who has been donating blood since she was in high school. But she says the lack of blood donation centres around her now limits her ability to give as an adult.

“As a school child, it was [first started] as a result of peer pressure, but I found it fascinating,” Khumalo said. “It was only when I was an adult that I made a personal decision to continue donating out of love to save life and help those in need.”

But since moving from Bulawayo to Hwange, she said, donating blood has become expensive as the nearest centre is in Victoria Falls, over 100km (62 miles) away.

NBSZ says it routinely deploys mobile blood drives around the country. It also says it offers donors incentives.

“Regular donors who meet specific criteria such as having made at least 10 donations, with the most recent within the past 12 months, qualify for free blood and blood products for themselves and their immediate family members … in times of medical need,” explained Maponga.

However, for keen donors like Khumalo, the effort to reach a far-off donation site is a barrier to entry.

“In such circumstances, it is no longer a free donation as I spent money going there. In the end, most of us decide to stay home despite the passion for blood donation,” she said.

CWGH’s Rusike says the NBSZ and Ministry of Health and Child Care must urgently devise innovative and sustainable ways to increase the number of eligible blood donors.

“The government should utilise the Health Levy Fund of 5 percent tax on airtime and mobile data as it was set up to specifically subsidise the cost of blood and assist public health institutions to replace obsolete equipment and address the perennial drug shortages in our public health institutions,” he said. “That money should be ring-fenced and used for its intended purpose in a more accountable and transparent manner.”

Promises and shortages

Authorities say that as of mid-2025, Zimbabwe’s national blood supply is showing good progress, and NBSZ has already collected over 73 percent of its half-year target (the 2025 annual target is 97,500 units).

The blood service also says the Ministry of Health and Child Care plays a central role in both subsidising and overseeing the cost of blood within the public health sector.

“Since 2018, this [free blood policy] is made possible through a government-funded coupon system, which absorbs the full cost of $250 per unit, resulting in zero cost to the recipient [in public hospitals],” said Maponga.

The NBSZ maintains that it operates on a cost recovery basis. It says the entire chain of collecting, processing and distributing a pint of blood costs $245. The agency charges $250, making a $5 profit per pint.

However, prices at some private facilities can reach as much as $500 per pint, Zimbabweans say. This has sparked heated debate on social media, as the high cost remains far out of reach for many people.

“NBSZ does not have regulatory authority over how those institutions price their services to patients,” said Maponga, explaining that while blood itself is donated freely, the journey from “vein to vein” involves a complex and resource-intensive process.

Observers, however, say more can be done to lower the costs of blood transfusions.

“At closer look, the whole chain of blood transfusion can cost less than $150 by strategically deploying available resources, use of financial donor stakeholders like corporates, and also holding the government accountable to fund the whole process,” said Carlton Ntini, a socioeconomic justice activist in Bulawayo.

The issue of free blood in the public hospitals is noble, Ntini said, but without full implementation, it remains a false hope and only benefits the “lucky” few, as shortages are the order of the day.

“In reality, any amount above $50 per pint of blood will still be high to Zimbabweans, and it’s a death sentence,” he said.

Meanwhile, for patients, the cost of essentials only adds to an already stressful situation.

Muzamba was fortunate in that his family did not claim back the money they gave him for his blood transfusion. But Moyo and her husband struggled to settle their $1,000 loan debt, which escalated to $1,400 after interest.

“It psychologically drained me more than the physical pain as I wondered, ‘Where would I get such money in this economy?’” said Moyo. “The government must own up to its promises – it’s not only about being free, but must be accessible.”

What is it about brothers? So competitive, so determined to outshine the other, so very male. In popular music, there are numerous examples of passionate sibling partnerships that have burned bright only to flame out, leaving recriminatory anger and the occasional lawsuit in their wake.

The Everly brothers were no exception. Foundational pillars of 20th century popular music, they formed the first great harmony vocal duo to bridge country music and pop. Over a five year period from 1957 to 1962, the brothers recorded a series of singles — “Wake Up Little Susie,” “Bye Bye Love” and “All I Have to Do Is Dream,” among them — that imprinted themselves into the pop-music canon, their soaring, wistful, close-interval harmonies gliding straight into our souls.

You don’t have to look too hard to find Phil and Don Everly’s traces. The Beatles regarded them as the harmony group they longed to emulate; you can hear them sing a snatch of “Bye Bye Love” in Peter Jackson’s “Get Back” documentary, and Paul McCartney name-checked them in his 1976 song “Let ‘Em In.” Simon & Garfunkel wanted to be the Everlys and included “Bye Bye Love” on the “Bridge Over Troubled Water” album. In 2013, Billie Joe Armstrong and Norah Jones recorded “Foreverly,” an album of Everly Brothers songs.

And yet, biographies of them are scant. Barry Mazor’s “Blood Harmony” is long overdue, a rigorously researched narrative of the duo’s fascinatingly zig-zaggy 50-plus-year career, as well as a loving valentine to the pair’s enduring musical power.

In his book, Mazor is quick to refute many of the myths that have accreted around the pair, starting with the backstory that the brothers were reared in Kentucky, a cradle of bluegrass, and that their dad, an accomplished guitarist and singer, nurtured them up from rural poverty into spotlight stardom. In fact, Mazor’s book points out that the brothers, who were born two years apart, moved around a lot as kids — Iowa and Chicago, mostly — soaking in the musical folkways of those regions and absorbing it all into their musical bloodstream. Though they were apprenticed by their father to perform as adolescents, they were their own men, with a sophisticated grasp of various musical genres as teenagers.

“They were as much products of the Midwest as they were of Kentucky,” says Mazor from his Nashville home. “The music they learned and the culture they absorbed was in Chicago, where they lived with their parents for a time, and they picked up on the R&B there. All of this eventually adds up to what we now call Americana, which is music that has a sense of place.” The Everlys brought that country-meets-the-city vibe to pop music.

Another misconception that Mazor clears up in “Blood Harmony” is the notion that the Beatles were the first musical group to write and play its own songs. In fact, Phil and Don wrote a clutch of the Everlys’ greatest records, including Phil’s 1960 composition “When Will I Be Loved,” which became a mammoth hit when Linda Ronstadt covered it in 1975. It’s also true that Don is rock’s first great rhythm guitarist, his strident acoustic strum powering ”Wake Up Little Susie” and others. George Harrison was listening, as was Pete Townsend.

The Everlys produced hits, many of them written by one or both of the husband-and-wife team of Felice and Boudleaux Bryant: “Bird Dog,” “Love Hurts,” “Poor Jenny” and others. But the Beatles’ global success became a barricade that many of the first-generation rock stars couldn’t breach, including the Everlys. “Even though they were only a couple of years older than the Beatles, they were treated as old hat,” says Mazor.

Complicating matters further: A lawsuit brought by their publishing company Acuff-Rose in 1961 meant that the brothers could no longer tap the Bryants to write songs for them. The same year, they enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserve and found, just as Elvis had discovered a few years prior, that military service did little to help sell records. By the time the lawsuit was settled in 1964, both brothers had descended into amphetamine abuse.

The Everlys had to go back to move forward. Warner Bros. Records, their label since 1960, had become the greatest label for a new era of singer-songwriters taking country-rock to a more introspective place. Future label president Lenny Waronker, an Everlys fan, wanted to make an album that would place the brothers in their proper context, as pioneers who bridged musical worlds to create something entirely new.

Author Barry Mazor is quick to refute many of the myths surrounding the Everlys.

(Courtesy of the author)

The resulting project, called “Roots,” drew from the Everlys’ musical heritage but also featured covers of songs by contemporary writers Randy Newman and Ron Elliott. Released in 1968, the same year as the Byrds’ “Sweetheart of the Rodeo” and the Band’s “Music from Big Pink,” “Roots” sold meekly, but it remains a touchstone of the Everlys’ career, a key progenitor of the Americana genre. “‘The ‘Roots’ album was one last chance to show they mattered,” says Mazor. “And there was suddenly room for them again. It wasn’t a massive seller, but it opened the door.”

If anything, it was their own fraught relationship that tended to snag the Everlys’ progress. Their identities were as intertwined as their harmonies, and it grated on them. Mazor points out that they were in fact vastly different in temperament, Phil’s pragmatic careerism running counter to Don’s more free-spirited approach. This push and pull created tensions that weighed heavily on their friendship and their musical output.

“Phil was more conservative in some ways. He was content to play the supper club circuit well into ‘70s, while Don wanted to explore and was less willing to sell out, as it were,” says Mazor. “And this created a wedge between them.” Perhaps inevitably, from 1973 to roughly 1983, they branched out as solo artists, making records that left little imprint on the public consciousness. They had families and eventually both moved from their L.A. home base to different cities.

But there was time for one final triumph. Having briefly set their differences aside, the brothers played a reunion show at London’s Royal Albert Hall in September 1983, which led to a collaboration on an album with British guitarist Dave Edmunds producing. Edmunds, in turn, asked Paul McCartney whether he would be willing to write something for the “EB 84” album, and the result was “On the Wings of a Nightingale,” their last U.S. hit, albeit a modest one.

“The harmony singing that the Everlys pioneered is still with us,” says Mazor. “If you look back, the Kinks, the Beach Boys, all of these brother acts all loved the Everlys. But there’s also a contemporary act called Larkin Poe, who called one of their albums ‘Blood Harmony.’ They set an example for how two singers can maximize their voices to create something larger than themselves. This kind of harmony still lingers.”

WASHINGTON — President Trump recently had a medical checkup after noticing “mild swelling” in his lower legs and was found to have a condition common in older adults that causes blood to pool in his veins, the White House said Thursday.

Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said tests by the White House medical unit showed that Trump has chronic venous insufficiency, which occurs when little valves inside the veins that normally help move blood against gravity gradually lose the ability to work properly.

Leavitt also addressed bruising on the back of Trump’s hand, seen in recent photos covered by makeup that was not an exact match to his skin tone. She said the bruising was “consistent” with irritation from his “frequent handshaking and the use of aspirin.” Trump takes aspirin to reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke.

She said during her briefing that her disclosure of Trump’s medical checkup was meant to dispel recent speculation about the 79-year-old president’s health. Nonetheless, the announcement was notable given that the Republican president has routinely kept secret basic facts about his health.

Trump in April had a comprehensive physical exam with more than a dozen medical specialists. The three-page report released then by the White House did not include a finding of chronic venous insufficiency. At the time, Trump’s doctor, Sean Barbabella, determined that the president’s joints and muscles had a full range of motion, with normal blood flow and no swelling.

Leavitt did not say when Trump first noticed the swelling in his lower legs. As part of the president’s routine medical care and out of an “abundance of caution,” she said he had a “comprehensive exam” that included vascular, lower extremity and ultrasound testing.

She noted that chronic venous insufficiency is a benign condition that is common in people older than 70.

She said the tests revealed no evidence of deep vein thrombosis, a more serious medical condition in which a blood clot forms in one or more of the deep veins in the body, usually in the legs. Nor was there any evidence of arterial disease, she said, reading a letter from Barbabella.

People often are advised to lose weight, walk for exercise and elevate their legs periodically, and some may be advised to wear compression stockings. Severe cases over time can lead to complications including lower leg sores called ulcers. Blood clots are one cause, but was ruled out, Leavitt said.

Leavitt said the condition wasn’t causing the president discomfort. She wouldn’t discuss how he was treating the condition and suggested those details would be in the doctor’s letter, which was released to the public. But the letter was the same as what she read, and it did not include additional details.

Dr. Anahita Dua, a vascular surgeon at Mass General Brigham who has never treated Trump, said there is no cure for chronic venous insufficiency.

“The vast majority of people, probably including our president, have a mild to moderate form of it,” Dua said.

People with the condition can reduce the swelling by wearing medical-grade compression socks or stockings, to help the blood circulate back to the heart, or by walking, she said.

The exam the White House disclosed Thursday included other testing that found no signs of heart failure, renal impairment or systemic illness in Trump, Leavitt said.

“The president remains in excellent health, which I think all of you witness on a daily basis here,” she told reporters.

Superville and Neergaard write for the Associated Press.

I live near Nasser Hospital in the west of Khan Younis city. Almost every day, I hear desperate calls for blood donations made on loudspeakers out of the hospital. It has been like that for more than a year.

The hospital, like other barely functioning health facilities in Gaza, has been regularly overwhelmed with victims of continuing Israeli air attacks. Since the end of May, it has also received many victims shot by Israeli soldiers at aid distribution sites.

I had donated blood before, and I felt it was my duty to do it again. So one morning last month, I headed to Nasser Hospital.

While the blood was being drawn from my arm, I felt severe dizziness, and I thought I was going to faint. My friend, Nurse Hanan, who was one of the workers in the blood donation campaign, rushed to me and raised my legs to increase the blood flow to my brain until I felt better. She went to test my blood, and after 10 minutes returned to tell me that I was suffering from severe anaemia and malnutrition. My blood did not contain the minimum nutrients necessary for donation.

Hanan told me that my case was not an exception. She explained that most of the people who visited the hospital to donate blood suffer from anaemia and malnutrition as a result of the ongoing Israeli blockade and the absence of nutritious food, such as meat, milk, eggs and fruits. Two-thirds of the blood units donated at the hospital have extremely low haemoglobin and iron levels, which makes them unusable for blood transfusions.

In early June, Dr Sofia Za’arab, director of the Laboratory and Blood Bank, told the media that the severe shortage of donated blood units has reached “critical” levels, threatening the lives of patients, many of whom require urgent blood transfusions. The whole of Gaza needs 400 units daily.

“Despite contacting the Ministry of Health in the West Bank to transfer blood units, the occupation authorities prevented their entry [into Gaza],” Dr Za’arab said.

After the failed blood donation, I returned home crushed.

I knew the famine was affecting me. I have lost a lot of weight. I suffer from constant fatigue, chronic joint pain, headaches, and dizziness. Even when I write my journalistic articles or study, I need to take short breaks.

But the revelation of how bad my health condition is really struck me.

For months now, my family and I have been eating only pasta and rice, due to the astronomical cost of flour. We eat one meal a day, and sometimes even half a meal to give more food to my younger siblings. I worry about them being malnourished. They have also lost a lot of weight and are constantly asking for food.

We have not seen meat, eggs, or dairy products since Israel imposed the full blockade on March 2, and, even before that, we rarely did.

The Gaza health authorities have said at least 66 children have died from starvation since the start of the Israeli genocidal war. According to UNICEF, more than 5,000 children were admitted to health facilities across the Strip for treatment of acute malnutrition in May, alone.

Even if some of these children are miraculously saved, they will not have the opportunity to grow up healthy, to develop their full potential, and enjoy stable, secure lives.

But beyond the anxiety I felt about the toll starvation has taken on my body and on bodies of my family members, I also felt pain because I had failed to help the wounded.

I wanted to help those who are suffering from war injuries and fighting for their lives in the hospital because I am a human being.

After all, the urge to help another person is one of the most human instincts we have. Solidarity is what defines our humanity.

When you want to save a life but are prevented from doing it, it means a whole new horizon of despair has opened. When you want to help with whatever little you have – in this case, part of yourself – but are denied, this leaves a deep scar on the soul.

For 21 months now, we have been denied all our human rights inscribed in international law: The right to water and food, the right to healthcare and housing, the right to education, the right to free movement and asylum, the right to life.

Now, we have reached a point where even the urge to save others’ lives, the right to show human solidarity, is being denied to us.

All this is not by chance, but by design. The genocide is not only killing people; it is also targeting people’s humanity and solidarity. From charities and food kitchens being bombed, to people being encouraged to carry knives and form gangs to rob and steal food, the strong solidarity that has kept the Palestinian people going through this genocide – through 75 years of suffering and dispossession – is directly under attack.

Cracks may be appearing in our communal bonds, but we shall repair them. We are one big family in Gaza, and we know how to heal and support each other. The humanity of the Palestinian people has always stood victorious.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

On the stunning “What’s It All For” on her new album, “I Want My Loved Ones to Go With Me,” Noah Cyrus sings: “Why have a family/If that ain’t what you want?/Why have a child/You don’t know how to love?

I’ve asked all of these questions/And I got one more/If that’s all there is/Then what’s it all for?/What’s it all for?”

Cyrus, often writing with Australian singer-songwriter PJ Harding, has a way of storytelling that captures the grit and highs and lows of real life the way Kris Kristofferson does on the classic “Sunday Morning Comin’ Down,” or John Mellencamp and Lucinda Williams do.

Her song, “July,” released when she was 19, was praised by the likes of John Mayer and Leon Bridges and has more than a billion streams. So the potential for something special has always been there. But now that she has put it all together on “I Want My Loved Ones to Go With Me” the result transcends special. The 11 songs on the album bridge storytelling with classic country and folk sounds that hark back to the ‘70s, a la songs like the Eagles’ “Wasted Time.”

“I hope that this record, when I hear it, I hear something that’s very classic and reminds me of music that’s been around for a very long time,” she says.

Cyrus has that “classic” music in her blood and bones. Old soul is often a trite, overused expression, but when you grow up in a famous family in the public eye, as Noah Cyrus has, it is an accurate one — her father is country music veteran Billy Ray Cyrus and her sister is pop star Miley Cyrus.

Cyrus said she grew up faster than most people her age. “I’ve been touring since I was 16, I’ve been making music since I was 16,” she tells The Times. “ I grew up in a family that was in the public eye. I think with that there were certain things that we could and couldn’t do, that felt restricted because of the public eye or the way we’d be judged or the way we were judged whenever we made mistakes just as kids.”

She turned 25 in January, which brought a new maturity. Like another all-time great songwriter, Jackson Browne, who famously wrote “These Days” when he was 16, Cyrus has shown a wisdom beyond her years.

“I found out a lot about my senses on a song and learning to trust that as a songwriter,” Cyrus said. “I learned a lot how to lead for myself as a musician.”

(Jason Renaud)

She addresses growing up throughout the album. “I turned 25 this January and I talk about this on the record It’s one of the themes of the album … growing up and new countries about walking on your own two feet and going into unknown land and no matter where you go, there you are. And just learning how to deal with that and cope with that as a young adult,” she says. “That was something that was going on at the time of creating this record. That’s why I just fell into the themes because as a person I was like, ‘How do I not second-guess myself with every single move? How do I learn to trust myself? How do I learn how to become an adult that’s going to be a mother one day? How do I grow up so one day I can take care of another actual person?’”

Having confronted fame and the insecurity that comes with youth, she was ready to take control of her artistic vision with this album.

“I found out a lot about my senses on a song and learning to trust that as a songwriter. I learned a lot how to lead for myself as a musician. This is the first record that I have actual producer credits on and I actually produce some of these songs with Mike [Crossey],” she says. “It was a really beautiful experience and a great learning experience. I really was surprised by those intuitions. And when I listened to the final product, I think it’s the first time in my career where I’m actually really proud of myself.”

Cyrus made sure her personal touch was felt on every aspect of the record, including the eclectic quartet of guests: Robin Pecknold of Fleet Foxes, Bill Callahan, Ella Langley and Blake Shelton.

She made sure the invite to Shelton on “New Country” came directly from her. “I really wanted to personally talk to Blake and wrote him a letter and did all the things to really make this a personal connection,” she says. “Blake and I have a mutual friend on the song — Amy Wadge, she’s one of my favorite songwriters and I love her so much. It was like a God thing telling me you have to reach out to Blake. When I heard that song, it was Blake’s from the beginning. And Blake made it happen. It felt like this spiritual thing that was bound to happen and something that was just written up there in the stars was having Blake on this record.”

For all the notable guests, the centerpiece of the album fittingly features Cyrus’ grandfather. The mesmerizing spiritual hymn “Apple Tree,” which is like the love child of a Nick Cave song and Dolly Parton track, is built around her grandfather’s voice.

“I do feel like ‘Apple Tree’ is a song from God because of the prayer that is said at the end and spoken by my grandfather Ron Cyrus,” she says.

It’s fitting that the song features her grandfather because “I Want My Loved Ones to Go With Me” is very much Cyrus returning to her Nashville roots and the music she grew up around. Though she says it’s just a happy accident, her embracing the music that is her birthright coincides with the surge in popularity of country music.

“When I was making this album, country was really getting its mainstream momentum again and taking over the world again as it was when I was a baby, when CMA fans used to have Fanfare and stuff. I remember my dad doing Fanfare. For me it’s really awesome because I think country music has so much more of a wider audience and so many people are starting to connect with country,” she says. “I think that was just God’s timing with the album and everything and it all lining up.”

While artists have been increasingly embracing country, for Cyrus this wasn’t about a trend — she was following the natural order of things. Many musicians will say that as they get older, they return to their roots.

So this was Cyrus coming home. “The more freedom I got I just kept putting more and more of myself into the record, which is metaphorically and literally back to my roots. I think I’ve been longing to feel closer to where I come from. I put that into my music and that’s such a beautiful outlet for me. And I think there’s so many people, not just kids, as an adult, as your parent, you feel things, they’re just like you and the child inside you, it’s all still broken, no matter how old you get, you still have that inner child inside of you. I think a lot of that inner child goes into my music and you hear a lot of my inner child.”

Though Cyrus loves the storytelling aspect of classic country records, it is just as much about the sound of those albums and artists as it is the lyrics. She reveled in that raw, organic sound in making this album.

“The more freedom I got I just kept putting more and more of myself into the record, which is metaphorically and literally back to my roots,” Cyrus said.

(Hannah DeVries)

“That was a fun thing for me again to learn is when you take all the bells and whistles away on a vocal and you just have that person’s originality and that person’s personality and let that shine through on a vocal. That’s the best thing you can do, just have the most amazing and natural raw vocals for people to hear and that’s what I love about the genre of country music and especially older records where you’re singing full takes and that’s what the record is. That’s a lot of the time what Mike and I like to do with our songs, is our songs are full takes of everything. We like everything to feel live, and I think that’s an important part of the record.”

The goal was an album that defies categorization and time. She wanted a record that if you had found it in 1975 and put it on right next to Bob Dylan’s “Blood on the Tracks” or you played it in 2025 it would have sounded of that time. In her pursuit of that lofty goal, she transcends the genre tag. This isn’t what most people think of as country today. The closest contemporary artist would be Chris Stapleton, who, when seen live, embodies a Neil Young solo acoustic; it could be country, folk, rock.

That’s what Cyrus set out to do. “When I hear it, I hear a record that will hopefully give the listener a chance to heal as it was a really healing experience for myself,” she says. “And I hope that this record, for me, is something that in 20 years … people are still mentioning and it’s a monumental album in the timeline of my career.”

Noah Cyrus performs Friday at The Ford at 8 p.m.

A NEW blood test to pick up early signs of a cancer which kills more than half of people within three months of diagnosis is being trialled by UK doctors.

The genomic test uses blood samples to look for markers of the deadly disease, which often has vague symptoms.

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Currently, the UK doesn’t have a national screening programme for pancreatic cancer like it does for breast or bowel cancer. 

A huge issue is the disease is often diagnosed at a late stage because it frequently lacks noticeable symptoms in the early stages. 

But a new pancreatic cancer test is being trialled in patients with a recent diagnosis of type 2 diabetes – a known risk factor for the disease.

People over 50 with a new case of type 2 diabetes have a higher chance of also being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer within three years.

Early data suggests the Avantect test is 68 per cent accurate in picking up people with early stages of the disease, which kills almost 10,000 people every year in the UK.

It’s also 97 per cent accurate in ruling out people without pancreatic cancer.

The new clinical trial has been launched at the Cancer Research UK Southampton Clinical Trials Unit.

Zaed Hamady, consultant surgeon and pancreatic researcher at the University of Southampton, who’s leading the trial, said: “There is currently no targeted early detection or surveillance test for the disease meaning patients are often diagnosed late when they become really unwell.

“If we can develop approaches to detect the cancer sooner, then there are more options we may consider to treat the disease, and patients will have a much better chance of long-term survival.

“Although most people with diabetes will not go on to develop the disease, new onset diabetes is associated with a six to eight-fold increased risk.

“This patient group gives us a way to test how accurate the new diagnostic blood test is, and that could potentially help thousands of people in the future.”

According to researchers, newly-diagnosed type 2 diabetes patients often have similar symptoms as a person with early-stage pancreatic cancer.

This is because the cancer destroys the same insulin-producing cells that are also destroyed in diabetes.

‘Earlier diagnosis would have meant time to make more memories with our children’

Sean Cleghorn’s wife, Allison, discovered she had pancreatic cancer at Christmas 2020 but died four weeks later aged 54.

Mr Cleghorn, a father of three from Kingsclere in Hampshire, said: “The only symptom Allison displayed was some slight indigestion and then she was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes in the autumn of 2020.

“Allison had always eaten healthily, was active and avoided processed food, so this diagnosis was puzzling for us.

“When we learned that new-onset type 2 diabetes was a potential risk factor for pancreatic cancer, we asked for further testing and a scan confirmed she had terminal cancer.

“We hoped she could have chemotherapy to prolong her life, but she became too weak and died four weeks later.

“Perhaps if she had been diagnosed sooner with a test like the one that’s currently being trialled, we may have had time to make more memories with our three children.”

Angelica Cazaly, senior trial manager for the trial, said: “We are asking people with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes who are attending GP surgeries or diabetic clinics whether they would like to take part in the study.

“Initially, we will collect blood samples from 800 people for testing.

“The results from the test, together with medical information collected from each patient, will help provide researchers with important information on how best to proceed with the rest of the study that will evaluate how accurate the test is at predicting pancreatic cancer.”

‘Exciting time for early detection research’

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Around 10,500 people in the UK are diagnosed with pancreatic cancer every year and just one in 20 survive the disease for 10 years or more.

Samuel Levy, chief scientific officer of ClearNote Health, said: “Our early data demonstrate that our Avantect test can identify pancreatic cancer in stages I and II.

“We are excited to collaborate with the Cancer Research UK Southampton Clinical Trials Unit and the University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust on this transformative study that could redefine how pancreatic cancer is detected and managed for patients at high risk.”

Dr Chris Macdonald, head of research at Pancreatic Cancer UK, said over 80 per cent of people with pancreatic cancer are currently diagnosed too late for treatment.

He added: “This is an exciting time for early detection research, with tests using blood, breath and urine in development which, if shown to be successful in clinical trials, could save thousands of lives every year.

“Early findings from these tests are very promising, but more research is needed to ensure that they are as accurate as possible before they will be available in the GP surgery.”

The NHS has warned that it continues to face a “challenging” blood shortage, as it calls for 200,000 new donors to come forward.

Concern over blood stocks prompted the health service to issue an “amber alert” last year, meaning supplies were running low enough to have an impact on patient treatment.

Supplies have remained low ever since, with officials warning there is a “critical” need for more donors who have O negative blood, which can be given to the majority of patients.

NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT), the body that oversees England’s blood donation system, said the number of regular donors needs to rise from around 800,000 to more than one million to maintain a safe and reliable supply.

NHSBT chief executive Dr Jo Farrar said: “Our stocks over the past 12 months have been challenging. If we had a million regular donors, this would help keep our stocks healthy – you’d truly be one in a million.”

There is a pressing need to avoid a “red alert”, which would mean demand far exceeds capacity, threatening public safety, NHSBT added.

The body’s chief medical officer said such an alert could see patients waiting longer for treatment.

Dr Gail Miflin told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “It can mean, if you’re not urgently needing blood, that you may be delayed or have an operation delayed.

“But if you really need blood you’ll still get it.”

Health Minister Baroness Merron said the NHS was in “urgent need” of more blood donors from all backgrounds.

“We are working alongside NHS Blood and Transplant to make donating blood easier than ever before, opening up new donor centres and making appointments available closer to home,” she added.

NHSBT stressed the need for more black donors in particular, as they are more likely to have specific blood types which can help treat people with sickle cell disease.

Just 2% of the population keep the nation’s blood stocks afloat by donating regularly, the body said. Donors are defined as regular if they have donated in the last 12 months.

The number of people registering as donors rose in 2024, but only 24% of them went on to donate.

The appeal comes almost a year after the NHS issued an amber alert for only the second time in its history, last July.

It was caused by what the NHS called a “perfect storm” of unfilled appointments at donor centres and increased demand following a cyber-attack, which affected services in London.

At that time, stocks of O negative stood at just 1.6 days, and 4.3 days for all types of blood.

Two thirds of the blood collected by NHSBT is used to treat people who rely on regular blood transfusions, including people with cancer and blood conditions.