In Israel, the Shadow of a New Gaza War

Israeli officials say it so often they’ve taken to apologizing for using the example, acknowledging it’s become a clich: Israel and Hamas can lob shells into and out of the Gaza Strip indefinitely without risking actual war, the explanation begins. Each side wants to appear tough, and over four years the call and response has grown as delicately calibrated as a minuet.

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Two Journalists Arrested in Britain’s New Phone-Hacking Probe

When a reporter from Rupert Murdoch’s British Sunday paper the News of the World was jailed, along with a private detective, in 2007 for hacking into the cellphone voicemails of aides to the royal family, the paper insisted it was a one-off — a “rogue reporter” operating without the knowledge or approval of his bosses. That assertion prompted two reactions from those in the U.K

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Air France bodies had broken bones, official says

At least some of the bodies recovered from the Air France crash this month had broken bones, Brazilian authorities have told French investigators, evidence that suggests the flight broke apart before hitting the ocean. Paul-Louis Arslanian, director of the Bureau d’Enquetes et d’Analyses, the French accident investigation board, said Thursday that Brazilian medical examiners had given that information to his agency

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Boyle backlash — but Susan set to cash in

She may have finished second but Susan Boyle continued to make newspaper headlines in the UK Sunday following her shock defeat in the final of "Britain’s Got Talent." “Boyle Backlash” said the headline in the tabloid News of the World, suggesting that the Scottish 48-year-old’s alleged “four-letter tantrum” earlier this week had influenced millions of viewers to switch their votes to dance act Diversity. The build-up to Saturday night’s live final had been dominated by reports that Boyle lost her temper in a London hotel and had even considered pulling out of the talent show finale. The Mail on Sunday said she had been been “comforted by psychiatrists” ahead of Saturday’s final.

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Paper: 20,000 killed in Sri Lanka conflict

More than 20,000 civilians were killed in the final months of Sri Lanka’s civil war — nearly three times previous estimates, The Times newspaper in Britain reported Friday. The Times said it had acquired confidential U.N. documents that record nearly 7,000 civilian deaths in the no-fire zone up to the end of April.

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New Clues to Autism’s Cause

Correction appended: July 15, 2008 What exactly is going awry in the brains of people who have autism The answer is very slowly coming into focus. A paper published in the current issue of Science by researchers at Children’s Hospital Boston and members of the Boston-based Autism Consortium identifies five new autism-related gene defects. Already, more than a dozen genetic defects have been found to be associated with autism spectrum disorders, which affect about 1 in 150 children, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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