AP National News

By JACK JEFFERY RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — Palestinians are finally taking part in municipal elections across the occupied West Bank following months of simmering anger towards their government’s cancellation of parliamentary and presidential elections earlier this year. Some 400,000 Palestinians are eligible to vote in the election, where they will select representatives for 154

LONDON (AP) — British scientists are warning that the government may need to introduce tougher restrictions to slow the growth of the omicron coronavirus variant. U.K. health officials say omicron is spreading much more quickly than the delta strain and is likely to become the dominant variant in Britain within days. Concern about the new

By BRUCE SCHREINER and JIM SALTER Associated Press MAYFIELD, Ky. (AP) — Tornadoes and severe weather caused catastrophic damage across multiple states late Friday, killing at least seven people overnight. Kentucky’s governor feared dozens were dead after the storm struck a candle factory. Police in Illinois say at least one person died at an Amazon

By STEVE LeBLANC Associated Press BOSTON (AP) — Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker’s decision to forego a third term has sparked a scramble among potential successors in a suddenly wide-open race for the state’s top political office. Among Democrats, Harvard professor Danielle Allen, state Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz and former state Sen. Ben Downing jumped into the

By BASSEM MROUE Associated Press BEIRUT (AP) — The Palestinian Hamas group says that explosions that shook a refugee camp in southern Lebanon were caused by an electrical short-circuit in a storage area for oxygen bottles used to treat coronavirus patients. Later in the day however, a Lebanese security official said that the explosion in

ZAGREB, Croatia (AP) — Police in Croatia say they found the body of a 10-year-old Turkish girl who was swept away while her family tried to cross a swollen river on the border with Slovenia. The body was found about 1,300 feet downstream from where the girl’s mother said her child disappeared while they were

By MICHAEL KUNZELMAN Associated Press For many rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, self-incriminating messages, photos and videos that they broadcast on social media before, during and after the riot are influencing even the sentences in their criminal cases. Among the biggest takeaways from the Justice Department’s prosecution of the insurrection is

By STEVE KARNOWSKI and AMY FORLITI Associated Press MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — After prosecutors spent nearly a day reconstructing the moments after a suburban Minneapolis police officer shot and killed Daunte Wright, one of her attorneys had heard enough. Paul Engh asked for a mistrial, decrying the “sordid pictures” that he said were irrelevant and were

ROME (AP) — Italy’s La Scala has postponed its ballet season premiere after a coronavirus outbreak in its ranks. At least one of the four ballerinas who tested positive for COVID-19 also appeared in famed Milan theater’s Dec. 7 premiere of the opera “Macbeth.” The theater says 10 ther people linked to the outbreak tested

By JEFF ROBERSON, ROBERT JABLON and JIM SALTER Associated Press EDWARDSVILLE, Ill. (AP) — Tornadoes and severe weather caused catastrophic damage across multiple states late Friday, killing at least six people overnight. And, Kentucky’s governor feared dozens were dead after the storm struck a candle factory. Police in Illinois say at least one person died

ISTANBUL (AP) — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has described social media as one of the main threats to democracy. Erdogan discussed the topic in a video message to a government-organized communications conference on Saturday. His government is pursuing legislation to criminalize fake news and disinformation online. Critics say the proposed changes would tighten restrictions

By NICOLE WINFIELD Associated Press ROME (AP) — A consortium of Catholic women’s groups is calling on the Holy See to join the Council of Europe and sign the European Convention on Human Rights. In a petition marking the U.N. Day for Human Rights, the groups said the Holy See is recognized internationally as a

BEIRUT (AP) — The Palestinian Hamas group says that explosions that shook a refugee camp in southern Lebanon were caused by an electrical short-circuit in a storage area for oxygen bottles used to treat coronavirus patients. Lebanon’s state-run news agency had reported that arms stored for Hamas exploded Friday in the Burj Shamali camp killing

LONDON (AP) — Hundreds of people have lined up in the English city of Bristol to get the latest work by elusive street artist Banksy. It’s a T-shirt he created to help four people charged in the toppling of a local statue of a slave trader last year. The gray shirt features the word Bristol

SOFIA, Bulgaria (AP) — Bulgaria’s president has given a mandate to form a new government to the prime minister-designate of a centrist party that promised to fight corruption and carry out legal reforms. The leader of the newly formed We Continue the Change party, Kiril Petkov, accepted the task on Saturday. Petkov has signed a

By JEFF ROBERSON, ROBERT JABLON and JIM SALTER Associated Press EDWARDSVILLE, Ill. (AP) — Tornadoes and severe weather were blamed for several deaths and injuries across parts of the Midwest and the South late Friday and early Saturday as a storm system caused significant damage. Many people were feared dead in Kentucky where officials say

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — Health officials say Taiwan has recorded its first case of the omicron variant in a passenger who recently traveled to the southern African country of Eswatini. The Central Epidemic Command Center said Saturday that the passenger, a Taiwanese woman in her 30s, is now in quarantine in hospital. Taiwan reported a

By JILL LAWLESS and MATTHEW LEE Associated Press LIVERPOOL, England (AP) — Top diplomats from the Group of Seven nations were meeting in Liverpool for talks dominated by Russia’s military buildup near its border with Ukraine and what host country Britain called Moscow’s “malign behavior” around the world. The U.K. is seeking elusive consensus from