• Passenger jet crash: A jet with 60 passengers and four crew members aboard collided with an Army helicopter while landing at Ronald Reagan National Airport near Washington. There was no immediate word on casualties or the cause of the Wednesday collision.
• Migrants to Guantánamo: President Donald Trump said Jan. 29 he’s directing the opening of a detention center to hold up to 30,000 migrants who are living illegally in the United States.
• RFK’s confirmation hearing: In a contentious hearing to be America’s top health official Jan. 29, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. struggled to answer questions about how he would reform Medicaid or Medicare. He also denied that he is anti-vaccine.
  • Related Monitor story: The pandemic turned many conservatives against public health experts – creating the opening for the nomination of RFK Jr.
• Buyouts for federal workers: The Trump administration said Jan. 28 it is offering financial incentives to 2 million civilian full-time federal workers to quit as part of plans to drastically shrink the size of the U.S. government. 
• Transgender care: President Donald Trump has signed an executive order aimed at cutting federal support for gender transitions for people under age 19.
  • Related Monitor story: Who should decide the best way to protect vulnerable children – their parents, or the state? That question lies at the heart of the biggest transgender rights case in U.S. Supreme Court history.
• Serbian leader resigns: The populist prime minister, Miloš Vučević, stepped down Jan. 28 to calm tensions stoked by weeks of massive anti-corruption protests.

America’s birthright citizenship is getting a more robust airing than it likely ever has in its 150-year history. Many people, including the 23 attorneys general who have challenged President Donald Trump’s executive order ending its universal application, see it as unassailable, enshrined in the 14th Amendment. But there may be more afoot than legal jousting. No matter the outcome, the debate could spur Congress to act – or drive support for a constitutional amendment.

Is blowing things up the first step toward remaking Washington? That’s one interpretation of actions taken by President Donald Trump, who has put a stamp on government in ways not seen during his first term – or, for that matter, by other newly inaugurated American presidents. One observer sees a rhetorical goal: for Mr. Trump to present himself as “extremely powerful and active.”

In President Donald Trump’s early flurry of actions, his goal of shrinking the federal government may overlap with efforts at retribution against perceived enemies. The moves are part of a tumultuous, systemwide push to remake the federal government – even areas that have traditionally remained independent from the presidency or are staffed with nonpartisan career civil servants. 

Americans’ rush to the popular Chinese social media app RedNote has opened a window between two starkly different worlds, allowing for unexpected discoveries. For one thing, despite the tense geopolitical atmosphere, the conversations between the some 300 million Chinese users and their new American guests have quickly deepened, challenging biases on both sides.

Our reporter’s trip to the world’s largest holy festival was interrupted by a deadly stampede. His account reveals both the risks and the spiritual importance of the Kumbh Mela, and how India’s relationship with Hinduism is changing. Yet even as a polarized version of Hinduism has been revived, ordinary pilgrims said that the spiritual significance of Kumbh Mela, at least for a moment, eclipsed politics. 

We take a global look at progress each week, and today’s roundup highlights national policymaking that recognizes the needs and rights of children. Among the initiatives: giving fathers more paternity leave, and ensuring that girls in particular aren’t forced into marriage at unsuitably young ages. It’s all about caring for the youngest among us.

The rules of war set up 75 years ago to protect lives in a conflict really do work – when they are honored. Under the terms of a Jan. 15 truce agreement, Hamas has released the first Israeli hostages in Gaza while Israel let free Palestinian detainees. More exchanges are expected in coming days.

These safe transfers, complex in their logistics, were possible because of the trust that Hamas and Israel have put in the International Committee of the Red Cross, the guardian of the fourth Geneva Convention of 1949.

That trust has been well earned over decades each time the ICRC has forcibly worked as a neutral intermediary for the safety and dignity of civilians, wounded soldiers, prisoners of war, and other individuals affected by conflict. Yet the Red Cross now says that this principle-driven approach is becoming more difficult in today’s wars when one or both sides ignore or “misinterpret” the rules of war, resulting in massive losses of innocent life.

“We are already seeing wars without limits, without regard for human dignity. We are seeing deepening divisions, rendering the struggle for peace harder than it should be,” Mirjana Spoljaric, president of the ICRC, told the United Nations Tuesday.

Last year, the ICRC joined with six nations – Brazil, China, France, Jordan, Kazakhstan, and South Africa – not only to reinvigorate the world’s commitment to international humanitarian law but also to adjust the terms of engagement in conflicts. “We need to think about how the rules of war apply to new technologies, and consider the challenges that large-scale conflicts might bring,” said Ms. Spoljaric, a Swiss Croatian diplomat.

She hopes this rethink of the Geneva Conventions will result in changes at a global meeting set for late 2026. The tragic trend to disregard innocent life in war can be reversed, the Red Cross believes. Otherwise, its workers would not be putting themselves in harm’s way in conflicts, such as facilitating the transfer of people between Hamas and Israel. Preserving the innocent in war is a strong inducement for peace.