Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon meets Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas for the first time in four months. The two leaders will discuss, among other things, the Israeli pullout from Gaza in August.
Linda Gradstein has been the Israel correspondent for NPR since 1990. She is a member of the team that received the Overseas Press Club award for her coverage of the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and the team that received Alfred I. DuPont-Columbia University Award for Excellence in Broadcast Journalism for her coverage of the Gulf War. Linda spent 1998-9 as a Knight Journalist Fellow at Stanford University.
Dommaraju unseated China's Ding Liren to become the new world chess champion. "Every chess player wants to experience this moment, and very few get the chance," Dommaraju said after the match.
If successful, Trump's move would install a loyalist at the helm of the network. A U.S. judge found Trump appointees illegally violated Voice of America's journalistic independence in his first term.
The 29-year-old said he was detained earlier this year after crossing into Syria on foot from Lebanon and held in prison until the fall of Assad. Timmerman's family called it a "Christmas miracle."