Israel launched “extensive” new ground operations in Gaza. Hospitals reported that airstrikes Saturday into Sunday killed more than 100 people, including dozens of children. Northern Gaza’s main hospital was forced to close. Israel says it is pressuring Hamas to agree to a temporary ceasefire that would free Israeli hostages. Hamas wants a full withdrawal of Israeli forces as part of any deal. Israel said Sunday it will allow a limited amount of aid into Gaza after nearly three months of blockade. – The Associated Press

Republicans advanced their tax cut and border security package. The move came out of a rare Sunday night vote. Work remains. Deficit hawks who had blocked the measure two days earlier want more spending cuts. While the Budget Committee advanced the package, 17-16, four conservatives simply voted “present.” Speaker Mike Johnson aims to push the package forward in a House vote ahead of his Memorial Day deadline. – AP

Zelenskyy met with US and European officials. They met Sunday in Rome ahead of a planned call Monday between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin on ending the war in Ukraine. Mr. Trump said he would also speak with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The discussions came as Russia launched what Ukraine called its largest drone barrage since the start of its invasion in 2022. Direct talks between Moscow and Kyiv faltered Friday, though a prisoner exchange was announced. – AP

A hard-right candidate was rebuffed in Romania. Nicusor Dan, the pro-European Union candidate in the country’s critical presidential runoff won the closely watched race against George Simion, a nationalist, nearly complete electoral data showed Sunday. The tense election rerun was widely viewed as a geopolitical choice between East or West. – AP

The World Bank gave Syria a clean financial slate. It said Friday it had cleared the country’s $15.5 million in outstanding debt after receiving payments from Saudi Arabia and Qatar, making Syria eligible for millions of dollars in grants for reconstruction and budget support. This follows a surprise announcement by Mr. Trump that he would order the lifting of sanctions on Syria, which is struggling to rebuild after a prolonged civil war. – Reuters
Related Monitor story: Last month we looked at how small investments by struggling Syrian families signal hope for the country’s future.

Trump struck deals with Gulf nations. Mr. Trump said Friday that the United Arab Emirates and the United States had agreed for the UAE to buy advanced artificial intelligence semiconductors from U.S. companies. It’s a major win in Abu Dhabi’s push to become a global AI hub, as the country tries to balance its relations between longtime ally the U.S. and its largest trading partner, China. Abu Dhabi pledged to boost its energy investments in the U.S. to $440 billion by 2035. – Reuters
Related Monitor story: The president’s agenda suggested that business would take priority. The outlines of an emerging foreign policy could also be seen.

Find more from the weekend on our website. Get oriented with our curated briefs about the fertility clinic explosion in Palm Springs, California; Supreme Court action on deportations; a U.S. credit-rating downgrade; and more at CSMonitor.com/newsbriefs. 

Previous presidents have called the military to the southern border of the United States to support immigration agencies. The Trump administration’s novel expansion of the military’s role at the border raises a mixture of hope, distrust, and uncertainty for people who live in southern New Mexico and western Texas. While some here embrace more ways to deter unauthorized migration, others raise questions around the logistics, legality, and logic of new “national defense areas,” especially coming at a time when illegal border crossings are at their lowest levels in at least 25 years.

Above the Yarmouk Valley in Syria’s Daraa Province, 25,000 villagers – many of them farmers of wheat and barley, tenders of pomegranate and olive groves – find themselves squeezed between regional powers. Israeli drones hover overhead. Israeli soldiers stage nighttime raids on homes. Turkey’s security interests here raise alarm, too, and reflect Ankara’s increasingly adversarial stance toward Israel. Locally, a way of life is threatened. And while some here hunker down and await a peaceful resolution, others feel cornered. The growing question: What could emerge as frustration rises?

Just a couple of years after a major automaker closed its local plant, Belvidere, Illinois, is making a diversified economic comeback. Still, even here in this conservative city of 25,000, with new companies largely insulated from foreign trade, the prospect of tariffs casts a long shadow. The question is whether such worries will prove short-term, as industries adjust their supply chains, or long-term, as protectionism crimps long-term growth. Our writer found local wisdom divided.

Hindus make up around 8% of Bangladesh’s population. Most had supported Sheikh Hasina, the long-ruling autocrat deposed in a youth-led revolution last year. In the chaotic aftermath of her ouster, hundreds of people died in reprisal attacks across the country. Hindus were among the victims: Their homes, temples, and businesses were attacked by mobs; thousands of Hindus living near the Indian border crossed over to seek refuge. Protecting minority rights has become a key test in the South Asian country’s attempt to build a new democracy in a region beset by sectarian divides.

Malcolm X is one of the most misunderstood activists in world history. Our columnist is on a journey to get to know him better. That led him to a conversation with two people close to Malcolm X – his daughter and a close colleague – and into an exploration of a legacy of inspiration ahead of the icon’s 100th birthday commemoration.

For Asia’s democracies – the ones eager to work together to fend off the region’s autocratic bullies – a May 13 announcement in Tokyo was welcome news: For the first time, South Korean and Japanese troops would be operating shoulder to shoulder in a joint military exercise in early June.

The two neighboring nations, a ferryboat ride apart, would notch one more success in their slow reconciliation over painful memories, such as forced labor, from Japan’s 1910-1945 occupation of the Korean Peninsula.

Alas, South Korea quickly denied the news, even though its forces will be participating with those of the United States and the Philippines in the annual exercise – which includes Japan.

One possible reason for this conflicting information: South Korea holds a presidential election June 3, the day after the military drills. In Korean politics, relations with Japan have long been a hotly contested topic.

Nonetheless, the election itself is showing just how much the South Korean people are moving to work through dark periods of history, especially after an official apology and remorse by Japan for certain past atrocities.

The leading candidate for president, Lee Jae-myung of the liberal Democratic Party of Korea, has shed much of his past anti-Japan rhetoric. He now says the two countries should have a free trade agreement and that historical and territorial issues should not carry over to social, economic, and cultural ties.

One obvious reason for this shift is geopolitical. China and North Korea are becoming more aggressive toward their neighbors. Meanwhile, the U.S. under President Donald Trump appears to be less of a solid economic partner with his high tariffs. Japan and South Korea realize they now have much more in common than old frictions. Their economic wealth per capita, for example, is closely equal.

Yet perhaps a bigger driver of closer ties are young Japanese and Koreans. They revel in each other’s cultural exports – anime and K-pop, for instance. About half of 18-to-29-year-olds in South Korea see the Japanese as kind and hardworking, according to a 2023 poll. Each country provides the largest share of tourists to the other. Most young Koreans do not carry the memories of their grandparents from the Japanese occupation.

Perhaps the Korean troops in the coming military exercises may actually want to meet their Japanese counterparts. Politicians, take note. That would make history, rather than rehash it. Democracy in Asia would be the better for it.