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Lead President Donald Trump convened the inaugural Board of Peace in Washington on Thursday and announced that nine member states pledged a combined $7 billion toward Gaza reconstruction while five countries committed troops to an international stabilization force. He also said the United States would pledge $10 billion, though he offered no timeline or funding … Read more

Lead A deadly avalanche struck backcountry terrain near Donner Pass on Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026, killing at least eight people and leaving one person missing and presumed dead. The slide hit a party of 15 skiers at about 11:30 a.m. as a severe winter storm swept the Sierra Nevada. Local officials and rescue teams evacuated … Read more

Lead: A seven-member federal arts panel composed largely of President Donald Trump’s January appointees voted Thursday to approve his plan for a new 90,000-square-foot ballroom on the footprint of the former East Wing in Washington, D.C. The vote, 6-0 with one commissioner absent from deliberations, clears one of two required federal reviews; the National Capital … Read more

Lead A 29-researcher international team has drilled deeper beneath the West Antarctic Ice Sheet than ever before at Crary Ice Rise, retrieving 523 metres of ice and 228 metres of underlying sediment. The cores contain shell fragments and other marine material that indicate the site was open ocean, at least intermittently, as far back as … Read more

David Ellison’s campaign to steer Warner Bros. Discovery to Paramount Skydance rather than Netflix has moved squarely into Brussels, where EU competition officials are preparing pre-notification talks and are expected to open a formal antitrust review once a U.S. deal is sealed. Warner Bros. Discovery this week said it would give Paramount a seven-day window … Read more

The Illinois governor’s office said it was blindsided after the Chicago Bears and Indiana officials released statements this morning suggesting progress toward a stadium deal in Hammond, Indiana. Illinois spokesman Matt Hill said the Bears had told state officials as recently as yesterday that negotiations were headed toward a bill in the Illinois General Assembly … Read more

Lead: Samsung has begun rolling out a new One UI 8.5 beta build (Android 16 QPR2) to the Galaxy S25, S25+ and S25 Ultra in India. The OTA carries firmware ID ZZAN and is a 553.08MB package that the changelog lists as a Bixby version update. In India this is the fourth beta build; if … Read more

Lead: Hilary Duff, 38, is returning to pop with her first full-length record in over a decade, Luck … or Something, due Feb. 20 via Atlantic. Speaking by Zoom in late January, the former child star described the album as an honest update on motherhood, marriage and the passing of time and said its release … Read more

Lead The Chicago Bears and Indiana officials said on Thursday that they have taken a meaningful procedural step toward a potential new stadium near Wolf Lake in Hammond, Indiana. Indiana’s proposed amendment to Senate Bill 27 would establish a state-owned framework the team could play in, and both the Bears and Governor Mike Braun described … Read more

Lead Rapper Lil Poppa, born Janarious Wheeler, died on Feb. 18, 2026, at age 25, the Fulton County Medical Examiner confirmed. The office reported the time of death at about 11:20 a.m. local time and said the cause is under investigation. Wheeler, who signed with Collective Music Group in 2022, had released a new single, … Read more

Feb. 19, 2026 — New federal trade data show that the United States ran its largest-ever deficit in physical goods in 2025 even as the overall trade gap with the world narrowed thanks to stronger services exports. The U.S. imported a wider range of products, including chips for new AI data centers and overseas weight-loss … Read more

Lead New York — In 2025 Amazon reported $717 billion in sales, surpassing Walmart’s $713 billion and ending Walmart’s 13-year streak as the world’s largest company by revenue, company statements showed Thursday. The shift reflects Amazon’s faster growth outside traditional retail — notably in cloud computing, advertising and subscriptions — which helped offset lower retail … Read more

After a three-year health ordeal that began after a 2023 trip to Morocco, reality star Brandi Glanville says a sonogram has identified ruptured breast implants leaking silicone into her lymph nodes, a discovery she describes as life-threatening and that prompted emergency removal in early 2026. The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills alum had suspected a … Read more

Lead: Reports on Feb. 18–19, 2026 indicate Christine Lagarde is weighing an early departure from the European Central Bank, a term set to run through October 2027. Financial outlets say the move could let European leaders name a successor before France’s 2027 presidential vote, creating a rare window for national politics to influence a top … Read more

Lead According to a Financial Times report, Amazon has overtaken Walmart as the largest retailer by sales even though Walmart posted record revenues in its most recent reporting period. The shift marks a notable milestone in the global retail hierarchy and highlights accelerating changes in online and omnichannel commerce. Executives, analysts and suppliers are reassessing … Read more