A gap persisted last year between consumers’ dour mood and more upbeat data. But such gaps can close. Economists look at the role trust and optimism play in an economy’s health.
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Explore values journalism About usWelcome to midweek.
So much of world news focuses on the top-down imposition of will. Two stories in today’s Daily show how earnest community-builders, in very different settings, are applying aggregated power to make change.
In El Salvador, a nation traumatized by violence, community leaders work to build trust by revitalizing a pair of fútbol pitches in what once were no-go zones. In a wealthy Boston neighborhood, local associations add permanent housing, with social services, that supports people not normally welcome in tony ZIP codes.
Different deep-seated “realities,” confronted in different ways. Both acts of agency, and of transcendence.
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And why we wrote them
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A gap persisted last year between consumers’ dour mood and more upbeat data. But such gaps can close. Economists look at the role trust and optimism play in an economy’s health.
• Shooting near Super Bowl parade: One person is killed and up to 15 wounded in a shooting at the end of a parade in Kansas City, Missouri, to celebrate the Super Bowl win by the NFL’s Kansas City Chiefs, the city’s police chief said. Two people were taken into custody.
• Santos seat filled: New York Democrat Tom Suozzi wins a closely watched special election for the House seat formerly held by George Santos, who was expelled. The win narrows an already thin margin held by Republicans in the House.
• Mayorkas impeached: The GOP-controlled House narrowly votes to impeach Alejandro Mayorkas, approving two articles of impeachment accusing the homeland security secretary of not enforcing U.S. immigration laws. Meanwhile, authorities say arrests for illegal crossings on the U.S.-Mexico border fell by half in January from December’s record highs.
• Indonesia votes: Indonesian Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto declares victory in the presidential election after unofficial vote counts show him with a huge lead, and on course for a single-round win in his third attempt at the presidency.
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Since ancient times, sport has brought nations together. One community in El Salvador is turning to soccer to help overcome divisions sown by years of brutal gang violence and impunity.
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This one, too, is a community story. In the Philippines, drivers of jeepneys struggle to adapt to a modernization program that, while addressing a need for safe and sustainable transportation, also threatens their livelihoods – and a beloved piece of Filipino culture.
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NIMBY can be a powerful force in wealthy areas. Here is what happens when neighbors say yes.
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Literary love appears in many guises – not all of it romantic. For a Valentine’s Day treat, we asked our reviewers to share books that include unexpected love stories.
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Asma Mustafa, a Palestinian English teacher in Gaza, has been dislocated three times by war during the four months since a brutal Hamas attack on Israeli civilians. She and her family now live in a tent in Rafah, the enclave’s southernmost city, amid other displaced families. Her circumstances have only strengthened her resolve to practice her profession.
“I look at the children around me and think of them as a treasure,” she told Middle East Eye, explaining why she gathers eager young learners each day despite the makeshift conditions. “They should never stop learning.” When classes end, the children often linger and play.
Rafah is now the latest focus of intense diplomacy to end the war in Gaza to prevent greater humanitarian harm and end the threat of Hamas to Israel. Those efforts hinge on finding a balance between Israel’s right to defend itself and the imperatives of international law to protect innocent life. But the quiet, often unseen work of people like Ms. Mustafa reflects something different: the healing impact of preserving innocence during war.
That is about something more than sheltering childhood from the emotional or physical trauma of conflict. Innocence, writes anthropologist Miriam Ticktin, “helps to create a pure space for humanity” rooted in sincerity and dignity. It “intimately shapes why and how we should care” about one another. Its resilience is evident even in the world’s most difficult wars.
In Sudan, for example, where a civil war has displaced more than 5.5 million people in less than a year, youth groups have set up networks to distribute humanitarian supplies, challenge disinformation, and care for their society’s most vulnerable people. Their work is grounded in sacrifice and an adherence to the principle of nonviolence, Ahmed Osman, a youth leader, told the United States Institute of Peace.
Last week, the exiled Iranian singer Dara released a rendition of a beloved Israeli song entitled “The Eucalyptus Grove.” It spread rapidly across social media in Iran and rattled the regime in Tehran. Moved by the song’s beauty, Dara recorded it to express the “love and respect” the Iranian people have for Israelis. “It’s incorrect to say that the Iranians hate Israel,” he told Haaretz. “The serious distress can be felt in my voice.” But he added that the song “was pure and clean.”
In a Stanford University webinar last week, Mohammad Darawshe, an Israeli Arab scholar, shared accounts of Arab citizens of Israel who, during the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas, “remembered their humanity and not their ethnicity.” That reflects a shared sentiment revealed in a recent poll he conducted. While nearly a third of Arab and Jewish Israelis have lost trust in the other since the start of the war in Gaza, 83% of Arabs and 71% of Jews remain willing to work or study together.
During war, “happiness hides in minutiae,” wrote Pavlo Matyusha, a Ukrainian writer who joined the armed forces when Russia invaded his country two years ago, in the Los Angeles Review of Books. Such glimmers of innocence may more often go unrecorded. But to the extent that they counter hatred, aggression, and fear, they prepare the way for peace.
Each weekday, the Monitor includes one clearly labeled religious article offering spiritual insight on contemporary issues, including the news. The publication – in its various forms – is produced for anyone who cares about the progress of the human endeavor around the world and seeks news reported with compassion, intelligence, and an essentially constructive lens. For many, that caring has religious roots. For many, it does not. The Monitor has always embraced both audiences. The Monitor is owned by a church – The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston – whose founder was concerned with both the state of the world and the quality of available news.
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We’re all capable of glimpsing the spiritual reality that God governs us all in ceaseless harmony, evidenced in safety and protection.
Thanks again for dropping by. In his Patterns column tomorrow, Ned Temko will preview Friday’s opening of the Munich Security Conference with a look at how NATO, central pillar of the post-World War II global power balance, now confronts big questions about its future.