Middle East

Gathering accurate statistics detailing the ever-mounting toll of civilian deaths in Gaza has been an immense challenge. Now, a new study by the independent British research group Airwars has examined the statistics Gaza’s Health Ministry provided in the war’s first 17 days. Airwars’ head of investigations, Joe Dyke, tells The World’s Marco Werman why he thinks the Health Ministry’s estimates are reliable.

Samir Ousman al-Sheikh, an ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, was arrested at the airport on his way out of the US this week. The World’s host Carolyn Beeler discussed the significance of the move with Mouaz Mustafa, who played a key role in his detention.

National Geographic Explorer Paul Salopek is on a 24,000-mile, transcontinental journey, and he’s traveling the slow way: on foot. In this installment, we learn a bit more about the local foods he’s eaten along the way. He tells host Marco Werman about some of the dishes he’s tasted — from a meat dumpling stew in the Palestinian West Bank, to fresh fruits and vegetables gathered on a Turkish farm, to pizza in rural India.

The feudal principalities of far northern Pakistan, home to walled villages, yak herders, glacial rivers, golden poplar forests, and snow leopards, held off—or played off—would-be conquerors ranging from Alexander the Great to imperial Great Britain. Host Carolyn Beeler speaks with National Geographic Explorer Paul Salopek, whose globe-spanning journey on foot brought him through this remote region on the cusp of change.

There’s been a 100% increase in the number of Palestinians detained since Oct. 7. And watchdog groups are sounding the alarm on what they claim are ‘brutal’ conditions inside Israeli prisons. The grounds for the arrests are often murky, and many are put into administrative detentions that can last for weeks or months. At least 27 Palestinians have died while in Israeli prisons in the last eight months. Rebecca Rosman reports from Israel.