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Every spring, roses bloom in the western Saudi city of Taif, turning pockets of the Kingdom’s vast desert landscape a vivid and fragrant pink.
In April, they are harvested for the essential oil used to cleanse the outer walls of the sacred Kaaba in Makkah.
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NEW YORK: Michael Malone, who coached the Denver Nuggets to the NBA title in 2023 and has led the team to eight consecutive winning seasons, was fired Tuesday in a stunning move that comes with less than a week in the regular season.
Also out: general manager Calvin Booth, whose contract will not be renewed. The Nuggets said David Adelman will become the coach for the remainder of the season.
Josh Kroenke, the vice chairman of Kroenke Sports and Entertainment, said “it is with no pleasure” that the Nuggets made the change at coach.
“This decision was not made lightly and was evaluated very carefully, and we do it only with the intention of giving our group the best chance at competing for the 2025 NBA Championship and delivering another title to Denver and our fans everywhere,” Kroenke said.
The Nuggets are 47-32 this season with three games left but have dropped four consecutive games and are in a logjam of teams fighting for home-court advantage in Round 1 of the playoffs. Denver won the title in 2023 and lost a Game 7 at home in the Western Conference semifinals a year ago to Minnesota.
Malone had the fourth-longest tenure of any active NBA coach, behind San Antonio’s Gregg Popovich, Miami’s Erik Spoelstra and Golden State’s Steve Kerr.
Malone won 471 regular-season games in Denver, 39 more than Doug Moe for the franchise’s all-time coaching lead.
“While the timing of this decision is unfortunate, as Coach Malone helped build the foundation of our now championship level program, it is a necessary step to allow us to compete at the highest level right now. Championship level standards and expectations remain in place for the current season, and as we look to the future, we look forward to building on the foundations laid by Coach Malone over his record-breaking 10-year career in Denver,” Kroenke said.
Malone had consistent success in Denver. The Nuggets finished with losing records in his first two seasons and posted winning records in his next eight years with the club.
This season’s postseason appearance will be the team’s seventh in a row; it has not clinched a playoff berth yet this season but is assured of finishing no worse than in the play-in tournament.
Starting with the first playoff appearance under Malone in 2019, the Nuggets got out of the first round six times in seven chances. They made the Western Conference finals in the Walt Disney World bubble in 2020 and then rolled to the championship by winning 16 of 20 playoff games in 2023.
WASHINGTON: The Trump administration has frozen over $1 billion in funding for Cornell University and $790 million for Northwestern University while it investigates both schools over civil rights violations, a US official said on Tuesday.
The funding being paused includes mostly grants and contracts with the federal departments of health, education, agriculture and defense, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The administration of US President Donald Trump has threatened to block federal funding for schools over pro-Palestinian campus protests as well as other issues such as diversity, equity and inclusion programs and transgender policies.
• Trump has threatened to freeze funding over pro-Palestinian protests, DEI, transgender policies
• Cornell and Northwestern among 60 schools being probed by US over alleged antisemitism
• Rights advocates raise free speech and academic freedom concerns
Last month, it sent a letter to 60 universities, including Cornell and Northwestern, that it could bring enforcement actions if a review determined the schools had failed to stop what it called antisemitism.
Northwestern said it was aware of media reports about the funding freeze but had not received any official notification from the government and that it has cooperated in the investigation.
“Federal funds that Northwestern receives drive innovative and life-saving research, like the recent development by Northwestern researchers of the world’s smallest pacemaker, and research fueling the fight against Alzheimer’s disease. This type of research is now in jeopardy,” a Northwestern spokesperson said.
Cornell did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In an opinion piece in the New York Times last week, Cornell President Michael Kotlikoff said his university was not afraid to let people argue, including over issues like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Trump has attempted to crack down on pro-Palestinian campus protests against US ally Israel’s devastating military assault on Gaza, which has caused a humanitarian crisis in the enclave and followed a deadly October 2023 attack by Islamist group Hamas.
The US president has called the protesters antisemitic, and has labeled them as sympathetic to Hamas militants and as foreign policy threats.
Protesters, including some Jewish groups, say the Trump administration wrongly conflates their criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza and advocacy for Palestinian rights with antisemitism and support for Hamas.
TRUMP CRACKDOWN ON SCHOOLS
Human rights advocates have raised free speech and academic freedom concerns over the crackdown by the Trump administration.
Last week, the US government announced a review of $9 billion in federal grants and contracts to Harvard University and has since listed conditions it must meet to receive federal money. Princeton University also said last week the government froze dozens of research grants.
Last month, the Trump administration canceled $400 million in funding for Columbia University, the epicenter of last year’s pro-Palestinian campus protests.
Columbia agreed to some significant changes that Trump’s administration demanded for talks about restoring the funding.
Federal agents have also detained some foreign student protesters in recent weeks from different campuses and are working to deport them. And the government has revoked visas of many foreign students.
Rights advocates have also raised concerns about Islamophobia and anti-Arab bias during the Israel-Gaza war. The Trump administration has not announced steps in response.
In March, the Trump administration suspended $175 million in funding to the University of Pennsylvania over its transgender sports policies.
MONTE CARLO, Principality of Monaco: Top seed Alexander Zverev crashed out in his opening match of the Monte Carlo Masters on Tuesday falling to Italy’s Matteo Berrettini as defending champion Stefanos Tsitsipas and Britain’s Jack Draper both advanced.
World No. 2 Zverev has struggled for any kind of form since his defeat by Jannik Sinner in the Australian Open final at the end of January, winning just six of 12 matches.
But with a first-round bye in the absence of world No. 1 Sinner, who is suspended for a doping violation until May 4, Zverev was among the favorites.
After a controlled start to the game, the German slumped to a 2-6, 6-3, 7-5 defeat to 34th-ranked Berrettini, at the end of a high-flying match, which had included an impressive 48-stroke rally won by the Italian.
“It’s been the worst period since my injury (the) last few months,” said Zverev who has suffered a string of early exits of late, including at Indian Wells.
“I played a great first set, and once I got broken in the second set I play ten levels down. My ball is much slower. I stop hitting the ball.
“The same story the last few months. Nothing changes. So it’s me who lost the match, once again.
“I thought my level was terrible, but that’s just my opinion.”
Defending champion and three-time Monte Carlo winner Tsitsipas advanced past 38th-ranked Australian Jordan Thompson. After a lacklustre US tour, the Dubai winner won through 4-6, 6-4, 6-2 in his second round tie.
Indian Wells champion Draper, seeded fifth, eased past 45th-ranked American Marcos Giron 6-1, 6-1.
Novak Djokovic — the winner in 2013 and 2015 — and Carlos Alcaraz start their campaigns on Wednesday.
Zverev won the first set against former Wimbledon runner-up Berrettini but a break of serve in the sixth game of the second set allowed the Italian to level the match.
Berrettini broke at 3-all in the final set before blowing a chance to close out victory on his own serve, but he broke again for a 6-5 lead after an astonishing 48-shot rally.
The 34th-ranked Berrettini made no mistake with his second opportunity though, advancing to a last-16 meeting with Lorenzo Musetti or Jiri Lehecka.
“The game plan was the same but I changed my attitude and the way I was believing in my strokes,” Berrettini said.
“I told myself to be more aggressive and if I am going to lose this match, I am going to do the right things and luckily it worked.”
Berrettini has won 17 of his past 18 matches on clay. Last season, he captured clay-court titles in Marrakech, Gstaad and Kitzbuehel. However, he hasn’t played at the French Open since 2021 due to injuries.
“I have missed the biggest tournament on clay for the past three years and that was tough and now I want to enjoy it. I feel really comfortable on clay,” said the former world number six.
For Zverev, last year’s Roland Garros runner-up, it was another disappointing outcome on clay after quarter-final exits in Buenos Aires and Rio de Janeiro. His next tournament will be on home soil in Munich.
Meanwhile Tsitsipas let a 5-2 lead slip in the second set, before getting past Thompson to set up a third round meeting with either Portugal’s Nuno Borges or Spaniard Pedro Martinez.
“I really didn’t know what to expect, you don’t know what your opponent is capable of,” said Tsitsipas.
“He showed a good first set, he seemed to be playing quite reserved and wasn’t giving me much to work with. I was just trying to find something to reignite that consistency within my game.”
Dane Holger Rune, the 10th seed, retired due to illness against Portugal’s Nuno Borges.
Rune, the Monte Carlo runner-up in 2023, called for the doctor after losing the opening set before shaking hands with his opponent while trailing 6-2, 3-0.
Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov, a two-time Monte Carlo semifinalist, defeated Chilean Nicolas Jarry 6-3, 6-4, on his seventh match point.
JENA, Louisiana: A month after Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil was picked up by immigration agents in New York and transferred 1,200 miles to a detention center in rural Louisiana, an immigration judge on Tuesday gave the government a day to provide evidence he should be deported and said she would rule on that question on Friday.
“If he’s not removable I’m going to be terminating this case on Friday,” Assistant Chief Immigration Judge Jamee Comans said during a hearing at the LaSalle Immigration Court in Jena, Louisiana. Khalil was in the courtroom at a table where he could see his attorney Marc Van Der Hout, appearing remotely from California, on a nearby screen.
Department of Homeland Security lawyers told Comans they would provide the evidence by her 5 p.m. Wednesday deadline.
• Khalil's case tests Trump's efforts to deport student activists
• Trump administration revokes Khalil's residency under 1952 law
• Khalil's lawyers argue arrest violates First Amendment rights
President Donald Trump’s administration says it has revoked Khalil’s status as a lawful permanent resident under a 1952 law allowing the deportation of any immigrant whose presence in the country the secretary of state deems harmful to US foreign policy.
The US government also has said the pro-Palestinian demonstrator should be forced from the country because he withheld that he worked for a United Nations Palestinian relief agency in his visa application, and also left off the application that he worked for the Syria office in the British embassy in Beirut and that he was a member of the group Columbia University Apartheid Divest.
During Tuesday’s hearing, Comans read the government’s allegations, and Van Der Hout responded with “deny” to each.
The immigration case is separate from a challenge to the legality of his March arrest, known as a habeas corpus petition. A different judge hearing Khalil’s habeas petition has ruled that he must remain in the United States for now.
Since Khalil’s arrest Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said he has revoked the visas of hundreds of foreign students. The Trump administration says college protests against US military support for Israel have included harassment of Jewish students.
Student protest organizers, including some Jewish groups, say criticism of Israel is being wrongly conflated with antisemitism.
Khalil, a Palestinian born in a refugee camp in Syria, has called himself a political prisoner. His lawyers have argued the Trump administration improperly targeted him for his political views in violation of his right to free speech guaranteed by the US Constitution’s First Amendment.
Khalil’s wife, US citizen Noor Abdalla, is due to give birth to their first child “imminently,” Khalil’s lawyers said in a court filing on Friday. She has not been able to travel to Louisiana to visit him due to her pregnancy. She watched on Tuesday via a court video link.
WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump’s administration on Tuesday moved to reinstate at least six recently canceled US foreign aid programs for emergency food assistance, six sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.
The quick reversal of decisions made just days ago underscored the rapid-fire nature of Trump’s cuts to foreign aid. That has led to programs being cut, restored then cut again, disrupting international humanitarian operations.
USAID Acting Deputy Administrator Jeremy Lewin, who has previously been identified as a member of billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, asked staff in an internal email to reverse the terminations.
• Lewin asked staff to reverse terminations
• WFP awards in Lebanon, Syria, Somalia among those to be restored
He asked to restore awards to the World Food Programme in Lebanon, Syria, Somalia, Jordan, Iraq and Ecuador, five sources familiar with the matter said.
The administration has also resumed four awards to the International Organization for Migration in the Pacific region, two sources familiar with the matter said.
“Sorry for all the back and forth on awards,” Lewin said on Tuesday in the internal email seen by Reuters. “There are a lot of stakeholders and we need to do better about balancing these competing interests — that’s my fault and I take responsibility,” he added.
Reuters reported on Monday that the Trump administration had ended life-saving aid programs for more than a dozen countries including Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia and Syria, totaling over $1.3 billion.
According to Stand Up For Aid, an advocacy group of current and former US officials, WFP contracts canceled on Lewin’s orders last weekend for Lebanon, Syria, Somalia and Jordan totaled more than $463 million.
Many of the terminated programs had been granted waivers by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio following an initial round of cuts to foreign aid programs. The State Department said those did not reflect a final decision.
The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment about restoring the awards.
A ‘DEATH SENTENCE’
The decision to restore some aid followed pressure from inside the administration and from Congress, two sources said.
The World Food Programme said on Monday that the US notified the organization it was eliminating emergency food assistance funding in 14 countries, warning: “If implemented, this could amount to a death sentence for millions of people facing extreme hunger and starvation.”
The US did not restore aid to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan and to Yemen, most of which is controlled by Islamist militants of the Iran-backed Houthi movement. Washington has been the largest aid donor to both countries, which have suffered years of devastating war.
State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce on Tuesday told reporters that the United States had concerns that WFP funding for Yemen and Afghanistan was benefiting the Houthis and the Taliban.
“There were a few programs that were cut in other countries that were not meant to be cut that have been rolled back and put into place,” Bruce said, adding that the administration remains committed to foreign aid.
Among the cuts over the weekend were $169.8 million for the WFP in Somalia, covering food assistance, nutrition for malnourished babies and children and humanitarian air support. In Syria, $111 million was cut from WFP food assistance.
The cuts have been the latest piece of the Trump administration’s drive to dismantle USAID, the main US humanitarian aid agency.
The administration has canceled billions of dollars in foreign aid since the Republican president began his second term on January 20 in an overhaul that officials described as marked by chaos and confusion.
Senate Foreign Relations Committee Democrats on Tuesday wrote a letter to Rubio regarding plans to restructure the State Department, including by folding in USAID, which they said was “unconstitutional, illegal, unjustified, damaging, and inefficient.”
