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Gaza Amputees Tackle Trauma with Football

Palestinian amputee football players train at the municipal stadium in Gaza's Deir El-Balah on July 9, 2018. (AFP)
Palestinian amputee football players train at the municipal stadium in Gaza's Deir El-Balah on July 9, 2018. (AFP)
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Gaza Amputees Tackle Trauma with Football

Palestinian amputee football players train at the municipal stadium in Gaza's Deir El-Balah on July 9, 2018. (AFP)
Palestinian amputee football players train at the municipal stadium in Gaza's Deir El-Balah on July 9, 2018. (AFP)

When 12-year-old Abdel Rahman Nofel was shot in the leg near the Gaza border, he thought he would never play football again.

But on an artificial pitch in the coastal enclave, the young amputee controlled the ball, leaned heavily on his crutches and took a shot, said an AFP report Saturday.

He is one of dozens of players who were preparing for kick-off Saturday in Gaza's first football tournament for amputees.

More than 6,500 people have been shot by Israeli forces during a year of weekly mass protests along the Gaza border, according to Palestinian figures.

More than 125 have had amputations and many others are permanently disabled.

Nofel, the youngest in his team, said he was shot during a kick-about near where protestors were clashing with Israeli forces.

He was transferred to the occupied West Bank for treatment and eventually given an artificial limb.

"I hadn't thought of playing again," he said.

But his father received a phone call from a member of the team.

"They told him there's a match for people with amputations," Nofel said.

Gaza's first football team for amputees pre-dates the protests, with most players either born disabled or losing limbs in the three wars between Israel and Gaza's Islamist rulers Hamas.

But interest has grown strongly since the start of the protests.

Protestors launched weekly rallies in March 2018 demanding Israel lift its crippling blockade of Gaza and allow refugees to return to homes their families fled in the late 1940s as the Jewish state was born.

Some have burned tires and thrown rocks and explosive devices at Israeli forces, who have responded with live ammunition.

At least 264 Palestinians have been killed, along with two Israeli soldiers.

Israel has been widely criticized for what rights groups say is a heavy-handed response.

Simon Baker, head of the European Amputee Football Federation who was visiting Gaza to train the six teams taking part in Saturday's tournament, said he aimed to keep politics out of his work.

"None of these players have talked about what happened to them and I haven't asked them, because we are here to play football," he said.

Baker, who himself lost a leg in a building site accident, said sport can help sufferers of trauma to recover.

"Any sport... is a great way to rehabilitate people and get people back into society," he told AFP.

"Just because you have lost your leg, it doesn't mean you are disabled, it doesn't mean you are useless."

He was sweating after hours of training in the spring sunshine ahead of the event, backed by the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Israel has maintained a crippling blockade of Gaza for more than a decade, arguing it is necessary to isolate Hamas.

Critics say it amounts to collective punishment of the strip's two million residents.

Coach Khaled al-Mabhooh, 32, said he was angered by the number of people injured in the protests.

Officials say the teams suffer from limited resources, including a shortage of high-quality crutches and a lack of sports fields in cramped Gaza.

But despite that, 27-year-old team captain Naji Naji, wounded during 2007 clashes, said participation had grown from a few players to six teams across Gaza.

"We are building a miracle," he said.

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'Breathtaking': Artemis Astronauts Blast towards Moon

This image taken from video provided by NASA shows the Earth, left, from NASA's Orion spacecraft as it fired its engines heading toward the moon Thursday, April 2, 2026. (NASA via AP)
This image taken from video provided by NASA shows the Earth, left, from NASA's Orion spacecraft as it fired its engines heading toward the moon Thursday, April 2, 2026. (NASA via AP)
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'Breathtaking': Artemis Astronauts Blast towards Moon

This image taken from video provided by NASA shows the Earth, left, from NASA's Orion spacecraft as it fired its engines heading toward the moon Thursday, April 2, 2026. (NASA via AP)
This image taken from video provided by NASA shows the Earth, left, from NASA's Orion spacecraft as it fired its engines heading toward the moon Thursday, April 2, 2026. (NASA via AP)

Four Artemis astronauts were zooming towards the Moon late Thursday after a major engine firing, a milestone that commits NASA to the first crewed lunar flyby in more than half a century.

With enough thrust to accelerate a stationary car to highway driving speed in less than three seconds, the Orion capsule engine blasted the astronauts on their trajectory towards the Moon, which they now will loop as part of the 10-day Artemis 2 mission, reported AFP.

In the moments that followed what the US space agency dubbed a "flawless" firing that lasted just under six minutes, astronaut Jeremy Hansen said that "humanity has once again shown what we are capable of."

The astronauts said they were "glued to the window" taking pictures, and later passed a floating microphone back and forth as they took questions from US television networks.

They said the spacecraft was a little chilly and they were still making it a home, but the crew was all smiles.

"There's nothing that prepares you for the breathtaking aspect of seeing your home planet both lit up bright as day, and also the Moon glow on it at night with the beautiful beam of the sunset," said Christina Koch.

Thursday's nudge came one day after the enormous orange-and-white Space Launch System (SLS) rocket carrying the Orion capsule launched from Kennedy Space Center in Florida for the long-anticipated journey around the Moon.

The astronauts are now on a "free-return" trajectory, which uses the Moon's gravity to slingshot around it before heading back towards Earth without propulsion.

"From this point forward, the laws of orbital mechanics are going to carry our crew to the Moon, around the far side and back to Earth," NASA official Lori Glaze said.

The astronauts are wearing suits that also serve as "survival systems" -- in the unlikely case of a cabin depressurization or leak, they'll maintain oxygen, temperature controls and the correct pressure for up to six days.

The astronauts -- Americans Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Koch along with Canadian Hansen -- spent their first hours in space performing checks and troubleshooting minor problems on the spacecraft that has never carried humans before, including a communications issue and a malfunctioning toilet.

Queried on the toilet situation, Koch said she was "proud to call myself the space plumber.

"I like to say that it is probably the most important piece of equipment on board," she said. "So we were all breathing a sigh of relief when it turned out to be just fine."

- 'Herculean' -

Crewmembers also had their first workouts of the mission on the spacecraft's "flywheel exercise device" -- each astronaut will carve out 30 minutes a day for fitness, a bid to minimize the muscle and bone loss that happens without gravity.

The 10-day mission is aimed at paving the way for a Moon landing in 2028.

Artemis 2 marks a series of historic accomplishments: sending the first person of color, the first woman and the first non-American on a lunar mission.

If all proceeds smoothly, the astronauts could also set a record by venturing farther from Earth than any human before.

"There is nothing normal about this," said Wiseman. "Sending four humans 250,000 miles away is a Herculean effort, and we are now just realizing the gravity of that."

The Artemis 2 mission is part of a longer-term plan to repeatedly return to the Moon, with the goal of establishing a permanent base that will offer a platform for further exploration.

The current era of American lunar investment has frequently been portrayed as an effort to compete with China, which aims to land humans on the Moon by 2030.

Asked about division closer to home and what message they had for Americans, Glover said from his vantage point, "You look amazing. You look beautiful."

"From up here, you also look like one thing," he added. "We're all one people."

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Trump Ballroom Approved by Panel, Remains Stalled by Judge

Donald Trump has cited the need for the ballroom to host state dinners for visiting dignitaries. Mandel NGAN / AFP/File
Donald Trump has cited the need for the ballroom to host state dinners for visiting dignitaries. Mandel NGAN / AFP/File
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Trump Ballroom Approved by Panel, Remains Stalled by Judge

Donald Trump has cited the need for the ballroom to host state dinners for visiting dignitaries. Mandel NGAN / AFP/File
Donald Trump has cited the need for the ballroom to host state dinners for visiting dignitaries. Mandel NGAN / AFP/File

US President Donald Trump's White House ballroom won final planning approval on Thursday, but construction remains in limbo following a court order that he needs congressional approval.

The National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC), which has several Trump appointees on its board, greenlit the plans in an 8-1 vote, said AFP.

The project aims to construct a massive ballroom on the site of the White House's East Wing -- previously best known for housing the First Lady's offices. It was demolished in September.

Trump expressed his thanks in a post on his Truth social media platform, saying, "when completed, it will be the greatest and most beautiful ballroom of its kind anywhere in the world."

Planning approval does not, however, mean construction can go ahead unchecked.

On Tuesday, a federal judge ordered a halt to construction, saying Trump needed congressional approval. The president is "steward" of the White House, Judge Richard Leon wrote. "He is not, however, the owner!"

Will Scharf, the commission's chairman and a political ally of Trump, addressed the lawsuit before the vote, saying, "That order really does not impact our action here today.

"From my perspective, we have a project before us. We've been asked to review it, and that's really our job here today."

He noted that Judge Leon had placed a two-week delay on his stop-work order to allow the Trump administration to appeal.

The ballroom has become a passion project for Trump during his second term: the president often discusses the plan in public appearances, press conferences and meetings.

Trump has repeatedly said that a large ballroom is needed to host, among other key events, state dinners for visiting dignitaries.

"For more than 150 years, every president has dreamt about having a ballroom at the White House to accommodate people for grand parties, state visits, and even, in the modern day, inaugurations," Trump wrote on Truth. "I am honored to be the first president to finally get this much-needed project, which is on time and under budget, underway."

He has promised to meet the costs -- estimated to be upwards of $400 million -- with private donations, not tax payer money.

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Waste Water to Clean Energy: Japanese Engineers Harness the Power of Osmosis

Engineers in the city of Fukuoka and their private partners have opened what is only the world's second osmotic power plant. Philip FONG / AFP
Engineers in the city of Fukuoka and their private partners have opened what is only the world's second osmotic power plant. Philip FONG / AFP
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Waste Water to Clean Energy: Japanese Engineers Harness the Power of Osmosis

Engineers in the city of Fukuoka and their private partners have opened what is only the world's second osmotic power plant. Philip FONG / AFP
Engineers in the city of Fukuoka and their private partners have opened what is only the world's second osmotic power plant. Philip FONG / AFP

A Japanese water plant is harnessing the natural process of osmosis to generate renewable energy that could one day become a common power source.

The possibility of generating power from osmosis -- when water molecules pass from a less salty solution to a more salty one -- has long been known.

But actually, generating energy from that has proved more complicated, in part due the difficulty of designing the membrane through which the molecules pass, said AFP.

Engineers in the city of Fukuoka and their private partners think they might have cracked it, and have opened what is only the world's second osmotic power plant.

It generates power from the transfer of molecules between treated sewage water and concentrated seawater, a waste product from a desalination plant in the city.

"If osmotic power generation technology advances to the point where it can be practically used with ordinary seawater... this, in turn, would represent a major contribution to efforts against global warming," said Kenji Hirokawa, manager at Sea Water Desalination Plant.

Osmosis is familiar to most people. It is the process that, for example, causes water to seep out of a cucumber or eggplant when sprinkled with salt.

Water molecules move across membranes from an area of low solution concentration to an area of higher concentrated solution.

At scale, that movement can be significant enough to turn a turbine and thereby generate electricity.

Desalination solution

Fukuoka is particularly well-placed to benefit from the technology because it has a readily available source of extremely salty water -- the brine leftover from desalination.

With no major rivers to sufficiently source its water, the city and wider Fukuoka region of 2.6 million people have relied on a major desalination plant to produce drinking water since 2005.

That left the city with large quantities of concentrated saline wastewater to deal with.

Ordinarily it is diluted and released back to the sea. Previous attempts to find alternatives, including salt making, failed to gain traction.

Then engineering firm Kyowakiden Industry approached the city about harnessing the salty wastewater for osmotic power.

"When our company rolls this out as a business, we aim to build plants roughly five to 10 times the scale of this current facility," said Tetsuro Ueyama, research and development manager at the Nagasaki-based company.

In Fukuoka's system, a generator is attached to a local desalination plant located near a sewage treatment facility.

It draws in highly saline wastewater from the desalination plant and receives treated sewage.

The two separate streams of liquid go through a number of chambers separated by semi-permeable membranes through which water molecules travel from the treated sewage toward the salty water.

That process increases the volume, pressure and speed of the saline water flow, spinning a turbine that generates electricity before the now-diluted mixture is discharged to sea.

The 700-million-yen ($4.4 million) power generation system came online last August, and once running at full capacity, it should generate up to 880,000 kilowatts annually, equivalent to the electricity consumption of 300 households.

However, it will remain devoted to supplying the power-thirsty facility, although it covers just a tiny fraction of its energy needs.

Not 'a pipe dream'

The engineers involved, however, are dreaming big.

The system will go through a five-year test to monitor its performance, including costs and maintenance, particularly for the membrane and other parts exposed to salt.

Financial details of the project have not been disclosed, but engineers admitted that for now the system's power costs "a lot more" than either fossil fuel or renewable energy.

Pumping the water into the system also uses energy itself, and scaling up osmotic power for grid-level energy production has not yet been done anywhere in the world.

Still, officials and experts believe the power source has a future, noting that unlike solar and wind, it is not dependent on weather or light.

And the current high costs are partly because the company had to build a one-of-a-kind power plant, Ueyama said.

Osmotic power has often been seen as primarily useful for estuary areas, where freshwater river flows meet the salty ocean.

But Ueyama said the technique being used in Japan could be useful for countries with large desalination facilities like Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern nations.

Kyowakiden is also working on technology that could generate similar power levels from less salty regular seawater.

"First we want to popularize this technology from Fukuoka to the rest of Japan. In order for us to do that, we want to further upgrade our technology to create osmotic power generation that can use ordinary ocean water to generate electricity," he said.

"We don't think this is a pipe dream."