ALL IN ONE DAY

One dead, others rescued after 3 separate incidents on California mountain

incidents occurred amid poor climbing conditions on 

Mt. Shasta's Avalanche Gulch


Four survivors were airlifted Monday to local hospitals after being rescued from Mt. Shasta. Photo courtesy Siskiyou County Sheriff's Office/Facebook

June 7 (UPI) -- One climber died and four others were rescued in separate incidents that occurred amid poor climbing conditions on Mt. Shasta's Avalanche Gulch in Northern California, authorities said.

The Siskiyou County Sheriff's Office said in a statement that the first incident was reported at 8:39 a.m. Monday, and responders were dispatched to locate three climbers.

One was found in serious condition, another had a broken ankle and a third was confirmed dead before rescue efforts could begin, authorities said.

Courtney Kreider, a spokesperson for the sheriff's office, told the Redding Record Searchlight that witnesses said at least one of the climbers had fallen about 1,000 feet.

The identities of the climbers were not released.

"We're still notifying families," Kreider said.

The sheriff's office said the second incident was reported at about 12:31 p.m. and involved one climber who was reported in critical condition. A third incident then occurred at about 4 p.m. and required a helicopter crew to locate a woman climber who was found Monday night.

All four survivors were airlifted off the mountain to local hospitals, authorities said.

Wallace Casper, a climber from Bozeman, Mt., said in a video posted to the sheriff's office Facebook page that conditions on the mountain were "really bad" as there was a layer of ice on top of the snowpack that made it nearly impossible for skiers and climbers to traverse.

"A lot of people had issues with falling and sliding," he said, adding that the conditions on the mountain made it "pretty much impossible to self arrest."

According to the Mt. Shasta Avalanche Center, Avalanche Gulch is a steep and rigorous climb that follows a 7,000 vertical foot ascent "that exposes the climber to steep snow and ice, rock fall and weather extremes."

"Don't consider this route as a cake walk," it said.

Photographer captures unusual striped sunset in Midwest

By Zachary Rosenthal, Accuweather.com

The sky glowed orange, but in stripes, as the sun sets over Sabetha, Kansas, on May 30. 

Photo by Jazz Bishop via AccuWeather

June 7 -- An Oklahoma-based photographer captured a stunning phenomenon in nearby Kansas as the sun set over the Great Plains, and AccuWeather meteorologists are able to explain how this unusual sunset got set in motion.

Rather than seeing a sunset where the entire sky was illuminated in the typical orange glow one might expect as evening approaches, photographer Jazz Bishop caught a sunset that made it look like the sky was glitching.

Only certain parts of the sky glowed orange, rather than the whole sky being painted in the typical array of sunset colors.

What was even more peculiar were the glowing and non-glowing areas that were nearly perfectly straight, giving off the appearance of separate orange stripes in the sky.

The phenomenon, filmed from a few different angles in Sabetha, Kan., on May 30, can be explained by meteorologists, though it is not precisely clear what happened.

Crepuscular rays are seen at sunrise in Portugal on September 1, 2018. 

Photo by Kees Scherer/Flickr/AccuWeather

The stunning sunset could be attributed to either crepuscular or anticrepuscular rays, which are typically identified by the contrast between the orange rays and nearby darker skies at sunset or sunrise.

The major difference between the two is the direction they converge toward -- crepuscular rays point toward the sun, while anticrepuscular rays converge opposite the sun.

The dark regions between the rays are commonly known as cloud shadows, which help give the rays in the sky further definition. When the sunlight during sunrise and sunset is obstructed by clouds, the cloud itself can leave its shadow across the skies.

Cloud shadows operate essentially as the inverse of crepuscular and anticrepuscular rays, leaving streaks of darkness in the skies, while the latter phenomena are literally glowing columns of sunlight in the sky.

Philippines' Duterte calls for drug war to continue after he leaves office

By Thomas Maresca

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte urged police to continue with a bloody war on drugs after he leaves office at the end of the month. File Photo by Rolex Dela Pena/EPA-EFE

June 7 (UPI) -- As his single six-year term comes to an end, strongman Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte called for the continuation of his bloody war on drugs and urged the country to rally in support of his successor, Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

In a weekly briefing broadcast Monday night, Duterte called on the national police force to "maintain your momentum against the drug problem."

"I would encourage the [police] to remember their country irrespective of who the leader is," he said. "Please don't let go of the fervor in your hearts, regardless of the leader."

Duterte swept to the presidency in 2016 with a violent, tough-on-crime message, vowing to end the country's drug problem within six months and publicly urging police and even citizens to kill drug dealers.

RELATED  For Philippines under new President Marcos, cold hard truths lie ahead

According to official government figures, more than 6,200 people have been killed in the brutal anti-drug operations since Duterte took office.

However, the International Criminal Court in The Hague has said the figure could be as high as 30,000, including widespread extrajudicial violence.

In September 2021, the court officially opened an investigation into alleged crimes against humanity in the Philippines under Duterte's war on drugs, dating to his time as mayor of the city of Davao.

Duterte withdrew the Philippines from the court in 2019 after its preliminary investigation began and his administration attempted to argue that the international body has no jurisdiction in the country.

The court temporarily suspended its probe in November after Manila requested a deferral, but said it would continue to analyze information in the case.

In his address Monday, which Duterte said would likely be his "parting message," the 77-year-old announced he was "ready and eager" for the transfer of power to the incoming Marcos Jr. administration, which will take office June 30.

RELATED Marcos clan returns to power in the Philippines with landslide presidential victory

"We must all be united in confronting the issues ahead of us," he said. "We have no room for politicking or going into a divisive exercise."

Marcos Jr., son and namesake of former dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr., won a landslide victory last month fueled in part by an extensive disinformation campaign that worked to rebrand his family's history as a golden age of the Philippines.

The Marcos camp also benefited by forging ties with the hugely popular current president through an alliance with his daughter, Sara Duterte, who was elected vice president in a separate race.

The president-elect has said that he will bar the international court from continuing its investigation against Duterte.

"We have a functioning judiciary, and that's why I don't see the need for a foreigner to come and do the job for us, do the job for our judicial system," Marcos said while campaigning earlier this year.

Duterte said in his address that he planned to stay out of politics once he leaves office.

"If there's a compelling need to talk, I will do it," he said. "But my drift is just really to retire quietly. No more politics for me."

Read More  Marcos victory opens old wounds for martial law victims in Philippines

Few studies have examined treating pain with medical marijuana, CBD

By Dennis Thompson, HealthDay News

Little research has been done to guide doctors in potential uses for medical marijuana, including for muscle pain, pinched nerves and other forms of chronic pain.

 Photo by Atomazul/Shutterstock

Use of medical marijuana has surged across the United States, but a new analysis finds that evidence supporting its use in treating chronic pain remains surprisingly thin.

There have been few well-performed clinical trials focused on pain relief from the sort of products you'd buy at a marijuana dispensary, including smoked cannabis, edibles, extracts and cannabidiol (CBD), researchers report.

The best medical evidence generated so far supports just two synthetic products approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that contain 100% THC, the chemical in pot that causes intoxication, researchers found.

The two drugs, dronabinol and nabilone, have a short-term benefit in treating neuropathic pain caused by damage to the peripheral nerves, researchers said.
RELATEDMore teens use pot when states legalize recreational marijuana

Another drug available in Canada but not in the United States -- a THC/CBD extract sprayed under the tongue -- also showed some evidence of clinical benefit for neuropathic pain.

That leaves unexplored many other potential uses for medical pot, including for muscle pain, pinched nerves and other forms of chronic pain, said lead researcher Marian McDonagh, a professor of medical informatics and clinical epidemiology with the Oregon Health & Science University School of Medicine.

"The narrowness of the research was a bit surprising," McDonagh said. "While there are a lot of people with neuropathic pain, this would not include people with, say, low back pain. There's a lot less evidence for those kinds of conditions."

The FDA-approved drugs also came with significant side effects, including dizziness and sedation, McDonagh said.

"The products that we have better evidence on are just not the products we're talking about in a typical dispensary in one of the U.S. states that allows medical marijuana," McDonagh said.

Medical cannabis is now legal in 38 states, according to World Population Review. Of those, 19 states have outright legalized the recreational use of pot, along with the District of Columbia.

RELATED Medical marijuana reduces pain, opioid use among cancer patients

As medical pot has become more widely accepted, so has the notion that THC or CBD products can help treat chronic pain. This new analysis, sponsored by the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, was intended to shed light on the subject.

McDonagh and her colleagues searched through more than 3,000 studies, and they came up with 25 that had scientifically valid evidence regarding the use of pot products to treat chronic pain. These included 18 clinical trials involving 1,740 people and seven observational studies that included more than 13,000 participants.

The researchers then sorted the studies by the type of product being tested -- containing high, low or comparable ratios of THC to CBD.

Six randomized controlled studies showed that the high-THC drugs dronabinol and nabilone demonstrated statistically valid benefits for easing neuropathic pain, researchers concluded.

But the evidence for pot, CBD and other chemicals derived from marijuana were limited by flaws in the studies they reviewed.

McDonagh suggested that people interested in trying medical marijuana talk to their doctor, although there's not a lot for a physician to go on.

"What we found that has evidence is a prescription product," McDonagh said of the two drugs. "So really, you'd have to go to your doctor anyway. But there isn't enough evidence in there to guide a physician on how to advise a patient about what to buy at a dispensary or how to use it."

Her team's findings were published Tuesday in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

People interested in medical pot should start with pure CBD products, since they don't contain anything that would intoxicate and have a remarkable safety profile, said Dr. Daniel Clauw, a professor of anesthesiology with the University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor. Clauw is co-author of an editorial accompanying the analysis.

"It's totally fine for most people that have chronic pain to try some CBD because it seems to be quite safe," Clauw said. "On the other hand, when you do add THC, you have to be a lot more careful.

"It does appear as though a low amount of THC might be a lot more effective to treat pain, but if people take recreational, really high THC products in the hope of getting good pain relief, it's probably more likely they'll get harmed by the product than helped because they'll be using too much THC," Clauw continued.

Some studies have suggested that CBD has anti-inflammatory properties that could help treat arthritis pain, Clauw noted.

"Given the slow pace of clinical trials, we believe it likely that McDonagh and colleagues' findings will be the best available evidence for some time," Clauw's editorial concluded.

"While we await better evidence, we believe that clinicians should meet patients with chronic pain 'where they are,'" the editorial said. "Conventional analgesic medications are effective only in a subset of persons, so it is no wonder that many patients are drawn to widely available cannabis products. Clinicians can compassionately witness, record and offer guidance to help patients with chronic pain use cannabis wisely."

More information

The U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse has more about marijuana.

Copyright © 2022 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

Cowboys lasso loose cow on Oklahoma City highway

June 7 (UPI) -- A cowboy rode his horse onto a busy Oklahoma highway and was able to lasso a cow running loose in traffic -- and the moment was caught on camera.

Blake Igert, a contractor for Oklahoma National Stockyards pinback crew, said he received a call Monday morning that loose cows had been spotted on Interstate 40 in Oklahoma City.

Igert and colleague Jimmy Dishman saddled up their horses and rode onto the highway.

"It was a little more intense this time. We were right in the middle of traffic. The cows were heading right into the interstate," Igert told KOCO-TV.

An Oklahoma City Fire Department crew that happened to be in the area blocked traffic while Igert and Dishman chased the bovine.

A KOCO news helicopter recorded the moment Dishman threw a lasso around the neck of the cow.

"You got to be patient and wait for a good opportunity," Igert said.

Barcelona to tax cruise passengers for pollution from 'monster ships'


Barcelona announces it will tax cruise passengers to help clear up toxic emissions from massive ships. File Photo by Terry Schmitt/UPI | License Photo

June 7 (UPI) -- Cruise passengers in Barcelona will have to pay more tourist taxes to fight pollution caused by massive ships docking in the Spanish port city.

The Catalan government that oversees Barcelona has not yet announced how much the new tax will cost.

"We expect to be able to present, in the coming weeks, the government's proposal to regulate emissions in the port areas of Catalonia, and we will be delighted to be able to share with Barcelona town hall the work carried out and the formula for this tax," said Teresa Jordan, the Catalonian minister for climate action.

The new tax will be added to the Catalonia government's existing tourist tax for Barcelona's cruise passengers, which is 3 euros for a stay of more than 12 hours, 1 euro for less than 12 hours and a daily surcharge of 1.75 euros.

Barcelona is Europe's busiest cruise port with more than 10,000 passengers disembarking daily during the high season of 2019. While those numbers dropped during the pandemic, they are expected to surge again.

A 2019 Transport & Environment report detailed the impact of massive cruise ships and the effects they are having on ports bordering the Mediterranean. The report found toxic sulphur emissions from the ships that run on heavy crude oil is far worse than emissions from road vehicles.

The report also found Barcelona suffered more air pollution from cruise ships than any other port in Europe with 32.8 metric tons, or 72,311 pounds, of sulphur oxide emitted in 2017.

"The enormity of the problem caused by monster ships is finally starting to be realized," said Fair Abbasov, director at Transport & Environment.

"Luxury cruise ships are floating cities powered by some of the dirtiest fuel possible. Cities are rightly banning dirty diesel cars but they're giving a free pass to cruise companies that spew out toxic fumes that do immeasurable harm to those both on board and on nearby shores."

Barcelona is not the only city fighting the impact of large cruise ships. Italy banned cruise ships from docking in Venice last year to prevent the city from sinking.

RELATED Princess Cruise Lines fined $40M for intentionally polluting ocean

Container depot fire spotlights Bangladesh industrial safety

By JULHAS ALAM and Al-EMRUN GARJON

June 6, 2022

1 of 13

People light candles to pay tribute to victims of a massive fire at the BM Inland Container Depot, at Chittagong as they gather at Shahid Minar in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Monday, June 6, 2022. Authorities in Bangladesh were still struggling Monday to determine the cause of the devastating fire that killed at least 49 people, including nine firefighters, and injured more than 100 others.

 (AP Photo/Mahmud Hossain Opu)


CHITTAGONG, Bangladesh (AP) — Authorities in Bangladesh struggled Monday to determine the cause of a devastating fire that killed at least 41 people, including nine firefighters, and injured more than 100 others at a shipping container storage depot, as experts raised concerns over the country’s industrial safety standards.

Efforts to fully extinguish the fire at the BM Inland Container Depot, a Dutch-Bangladesh joint venture near the country’s main Chittagong Seaport, continued Monday after it broke out around midnight Saturday following explosions in a container full of chemicals. The explosions were felt as far as 4 kilometers (2 1/2 miles) away, officials and local media said.

Authorities said there were more than 4,000 containers at the depot, of which about 1,000 were filled with materials including chemicals.

Nearly 40 hours after the initial explosion, smoke was still coming out of some containers. Explosives experts from the military were called in to assist the firefighters.

Officials said the number of casualties rose dramatically over the weekend because many workers and firefighters were unaware of the chemicals stored at the depot and went too close to the containers. A total of 21 firefighters were either killed or injured.

On Monday, authorities began collecting DNA samples from relatives of victims because severe burns made many of the bodies unrecognizable.

Elias Chowdhury, the area’s civil surgeon, said the death toll was revised down from 49 on Monday, citing errors in earlier counting.

Mominur Rahman, a senior official in Chittagong, about 210 kilometers (130 miles) southeast of Dhaka, the capital, said some bodies were taken to a hospital where they were counted, and were later taken to a second hospital where they were counted again, resulting in the error.

The fire raised concern over whether such storage facilities in Bangladesh observe proper safety standards.

Khairul Alam Sujan, vice president of the Bangladesh Freight Forwarders Association, said Sunday that containers with hazardous chemicals are often kept near those with garment products ready for export.



Firefighters said more than a dozen containers stored hydrogen peroxide, which helped spread the fire, but it was still unclear what caused the initial powerful blast.

Containers of chemicals lie scattered after explosion at the BM Inland Container Depot, where a fire broke out around midnight Saturday in Chittagong, about 210 kilometers (130 miles) southeast of, Dhaka, Bangladesh, Monday, June 6, 2022. Dozens of people were killed and more than 100 others were injured after the inferno broke out following explosions in a container full of chemicals. (AP Photo)

Containers of hydrogen peroxide, lie scattered after explosion at the BM Inland Container Depot, where a fire broke out around midnight Saturday in Chittagong, about 210 kilometers (130 miles) southeast of, Dhaka, Bangladesh, Monday, June 6, 2022. Dozens of people were killed and more than 100 others were injured after the inferno broke out following explosions in a container full of chemicals. (AP Photo)

The head of the country’s fire service department regretted that firefighters did not have information from the depot’s management about materials stored there while they were fighting the fire.

Bangladeshi media blamed the high death toll on poor industrial safety standards.

“The fire … is the latest in an ever-growing list of tragedies that put Bangladesh’s appalling industrial safety record once again under the spotlight,” the Daily Star newspaper said in an editorial Monday.

“The poor infrastructure and institutional preparedness for industrial safety … makes such fire incidents almost inevitable,” it said.

The International Labor Organization said in a 2020 report that Bangladesh needs a “credible and accountable industrial safety governance structure.”

Bangladesh has a history of industrial disasters, including factories catching fire with workers trapped inside. Monitoring groups have blamed corruption and lax enforcement.

In the country’s garment industry, which employs about 4 million people, safety conditions have improved significantly after massive reforms, but experts say other sectors need to make similar changes.

In 2012, about 117 workers died when they were trapped behind locked exits in a garment factory in Dhaka.

The country’s worst industrial disaster occurred the following year, when the Rana Plaza garment factory outside Dhaka collapsed, killing more than 1,100 people.

In 2019, a blaze ripped through a 400-year-old area cramped with apartments, shops and warehouses in the oldest part of Dhaka and killed at least 67 people. Another fire in Old Dhaka in a house illegally storing chemicals killed at least 123 people in 2010.

In 2021, a fire at a food and beverage factory outside Dhaka killed at least 52 people, many of whom were trapped inside by an illegally locked door.

___

Alam reported from Dhaka, Bangladesh.

US Farmers at high risk for tick-borne illnesses do little to prevent exposure

By HealthDay News


Only 2% of farmers surveyed said they use tick repellent, and only 10% wear permethrin-treated clothing. Nearly one-quarter said they take no precautions. Photo by Judy Gallagher/Wikimedia Commons

American farmers are at increased risk for tick bites, but new research shows they are doing little to defend themselves against the insects and the illnesses they cause.

Tick-borne diseases include Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain Spotted fever, Powassan virus, anaplasmosis, tularemia, ehrlichiosis, heartland virus and Alpha-gal syndrome, and these diseases cost the U.S. health care system up to $1.3 billion a year, the investigators said.

Farm workers have a high risk of exposure to ticks due to the large amount of time they spend outdoors, so scientists from the University of Illinois created an online survey to learn more about their knowledge about ticks and how to prevent tick bites.

To date, 36% of farm workers who have participated in the survey said they have a low level of knowledge about ticks. Fifty-six percent said they rely on friends and family for information about ticks and the diseases they carry; 48% rely on medical professionals, and 40% rely on university extension education programs.

RELATED Tick-borne Heartland virus is spreading across U.S.

Only 38% of respondents say they are concerned about tick-borne diseases, but 90% do self-checks for ticks.

"This is one of the simplest things one can do if going out of doors," said project researcher Sulagna Chakraborty, an ecology, evolution and conservation biology doctorate candidate.

Other recommended precautions include: wearing a hat, long-sleeve shirt and long pants; tucking pants inside boots, and wearing light-colored shirts.

RELATED Gene editing on ticks promises insights into disease prevention

Only 2% of survey respondents said they use tick repellent, and only 10% wear permethrin-treated clothing. Nearly one-quarter said they take no precautions. Only 28% of respondents use tick repellent on their animals.

When they find a tick attached to them, 76% of respondents say they would use the recommended practice of removing the tick with tweezers; 42% remove with their hands; 8% would consult a physician.

"By knowing the knowledge gap, we can provide specific training to fill the gap," Chakraborty said in a university news release.

RELATED 500K in U.S. diagnosed with Lyme disease annually, but some may not have it

Climate change has increased the range of ticks seen in the United States: The nation has seen a 10-fold increase in the number of tick-borne diseases since 2006, according to Rebecca Smith, an associate professor of epidemiology in the university's College of Veterinary Medicine.

More information

For more on avoiding ticks, see the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Copyright © 2022 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

Vatican’s Pius XII archives begin to shed light on WWII pope


President Truman's envoy to the Vatican, Myron C. Taylor, left, has an audience with Pope Pius XII at Castelgandolfo near Rome, on Aug. 26, 1947. The Vatican has long defended its World War II-era pope, Pius XII, against criticism that he remained silent as the Holocaust unfolded, insisting that he worked quietly behind the scenes to save lives. 

Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Kertzer’s “The Pope at War,” which comes out Tuesday, June 7, 2022 in the United States, citing recently opened Vatican archives, suggests the lives the Vatican worked hardest to save were Jews who had converted to Catholicism or were children of Catholic-Jewish “mixed marriages.” 

(AP Photo/Luigi Felici, File)

VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican has long defended its World War II-era pope, Pius XII, against criticism that he remained silent as the Holocaust unfolded, insisting that he worked quietly behind the scenes to save lives. A new book, citing recently opened Vatican archives, suggests the lives the Vatican worked hardest to save were Jews who had converted to Catholicism or were children of Catholic-Jewish “mixed marriages.”

Documents attesting to frantic searches for baptismal certificates, lists of names of converts handed over by the Vatican to the German ambassador and heartfelt pleas from Catholics for the pope to find relatives of Jewish descent are contained in David Kertzer’s “The Pope at War,” being published Tuesday in the United States.

The book follows on the heels of Kertzer’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “The Pope and Mussolini,” about Pius’ predecessor, Pius XI. It uses the millions of recently released documents from the Vatican archives as well as the state archives of Italy, France, Germany, the U.S., and Britain to craft a history of World War II through the prism of the Pius XII papacy and its extensive diplomatic network with both Axis and Allied nations.

“The amount of material in these archives about searching for baptismal records for Jews that could save them is really pretty stunning,” Kertzer said in a telephone interview ahead of the release.

The 484-page book, and its nearly 100 pages of endnotes, portrays a timid pontiff who wasn’t driven by antisemitism, but rather a conviction that Vatican neutrality was the best and only way to protect the interests of the Catholic Church as the war raged on.

Kertzer, a professor of anthropology and Italian studies at Brown University, suggests Pius’ primary motivation was fear: fear for the church and Catholics in German-occupied territories if, as he believed until the very end, the Axis won; and fear of atheist Communism spreading across Christian Europe if the Axis lost.

To assuage that fear, Kertzer writes, Pius charted a paralyzingly cautious course to avoid conflict at all costs with the Nazis. Direct orders went to the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano not to write about German atrocities — and to ensure seamless cooperation with the Fascist dictatorship of Benito Mussolini in the Vatican’s backyard.

That meant never saying a word in public to explicitly denounce SS massacres, even when Jews were being rounded up right outside the Vatican walls, as they were on Oct. 16, 1943, and put on trains bound for Auschwitz.

Kertzer concludes that Pius was no “Hitler’s Pope” — the provocative title of the last Pius-era blockbuster by John Cornwell. But neither was he the champion of Jews that Pius’ supporters contend.

Marla Stone, professor of humanities at the American Academy of Rome, said the book “takes a position between the previous poles of historical interpretation.”

“Previously, the choices were either Pius XII was ‘Hitler’s Pope,’ deeply sympathetic to the Nazis, eager for a Nazi-Fascist victory, obsessed with the defeat of the Soviets at all costs, and a dedicated antisemite,” she told a panel at the academy last month. “The other historiographic position held that Pius XII did everything within his power to help those suffering under Nazi and Fascist oppression and that he was merely constrained by circumstances.”

“The Pope at War” is one of several books starting to roll out two years after Pope Francis opened the Pius XII archives ahead of schedule. That gave scholars access to the full set of documentation to resolve the outstanding questions about Pius and what he did or didn’t do as the Holocaust unfolded.

 Brown University professor David I. Kertzer holds his book "The Pope and Mussolini: The Secret History of Pius XI and the Rise of Fascism in Europe" in his office, Monday, April 20, 2015, in Providence, R.I. The Vatican has long defended its World War II-era pope, Pius XII, against criticism that he remained silent as the Holocaust unfolded, insisting that he worked quietly behind the scenes to save lives. Pulitzer Prize-winning author Kertzer’s new book “The Pope at War,” which comes out Tuesday, June 7, 2022 in the United States, citing recently opened Vatican archives, suggests the lives the Vatican worked hardest to save were Jews who had converted to Catholicism or were children of Catholic-Jewish “mixed marriages.” (AP Photo/Steven Senne, File)

One of the first out of the gate was written in-house, by the archivist of the Vatican’s secretariat of state, Johan Ickx. Perhaps understandably, it praised Pius and the humanitarian efforts of the Vatican to care for Jews and people fleeing the war, recounting the hundreds of files of Jews who turned to him, begging for help.

“For the Jews it was obvious and clear that Pius XII was on their side and both he and his staff would have done everything in their possibility to save them,” Ickx told Vatican News.

The Rev. Peter Gumpel, the German investigator who promoted Pius’ now-stalled cause for sainthood, has argued that Pius couldn’t speak out more publicly because he knew it would enrage Adolf Hitler and result in more Jews being killed. He cites the case of a Catholic bishops in the Netherlands who spoke out against the deportation of Jews and the Gestapo’s response: deporting Jews who had converted to Catholicism.

The Vatican had already taken the extraordinary step, between 1965 and 1981, of publishing an 11-volume set of documentation, curated by a team of Jesuits, to try to rebut criticism of Pius’ silence that erupted following the 1963 play “The Deputy,” which alleged he turned a blind eye to Nazi atrocities.

But even the Vatican’s own prefect of the archives, Monsignor Sergio Pagano, said recently that the initiative, while “worthy” at the time, now needs to be revised.

During a panel discussion hosted by a Spanish research institute in Rome, Pagano acknowledged that the Jesuits “sometimes looked at half of one document, and the other half no,” and that he had learned of some “strange omissions” that are now becoming evident. But he insisted there was no attempt at the time to hide inconvenient truths, just a lack of full access to all the files and the chaos of working quickly with a disorganized archive.

Kertzer identifies two major omissions in his book: The first was the transcripts of a series of secret meetings between Pius and a personal envoy of Hitler, Prince Philipp von Hessen, that began shortly after Pius was elected and continued for two years. The secret channel gave Pius a direct line to Hitler that was previously unknown, even to high-ranking Vatican officials at the time.

The second was the full contents of the note from Pius’ top diplomatic adviser on Jewish issues, Monsignor Angelo Dell’Acqua, responding to pleas for Pius to finally say something about the roundup of Italy’s Jews that accelerated in the autumn and winter of 1943. While Dell’Acqua’s opinion — that Pius should not say anything — was previously known, Kertzer says the antisemitic slurs he used to describe Jews had been excised from the Jesuits’ 11-volume text.

FILE - Pope Pius XII, wearing the ring of St. Peter, raises his right hand in a papal blessing at the Vatican, in Sept. 1945. (AP Photo, File)

L’Osservatore Romano has already come out swinging against Kertzer’s scholarship, blasting a 2020 essay he published in The Atlantic on some preliminary findings from the archives as “strong affirmations, but unproven.”

A key example of the Vatican’s priorities, Kertzer says, came during the Oct. 16, 1943, roundup of Rome’s Jews. That cold morning, 1,259 Jews were arrested and brought to a military barracks near the Vatican, bound for deportation to Auschwitz.

The day after their capture, the Vatican’s secretariat of state received permission from German authorities to send an envoy to the barracks, who ascertained that those inside “included people who had already been baptized, confirmed and celebrated a church wedding,” according to the envoy’s notes.

Over the following days, the secretariat of state drew up lists of people the church deemed Catholic and gave the names to the German ambassador asking for his intervention. In all, of the 1,259 people originally arrested, some 250 were spared deportation.

“For me, what this means, and I think this is also a novelty in the book, is that the Vatican participates in the selection of Jews,” Kertzer said in the interview. “Who is going to live and who is going to die.”

Proud Marvel super fan, Iman Vellani, stars in ‘Ms. Marvel’

By ALICIA RANCILIO

1 of 19

Iman Vellani, star of the Disney+ series "Ms. Marvel," poses for a portrait, Thursday, June 2, 2022, at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

NEW YORK (AP) — Iman Vellani, who stars as Kamala Khan in the new Disney+ series “Ms. Marvel,” has a conundrum. Now that she’s a part of the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe), does she remove the Marvel posters from the walls of her childhood bedroom or leave them up?

“Brie (Larson) is on my wall and she’s in my phone book. So, like, that’s weird,” said Vellani in a recent interview.

“Ms. Marvel,” debuting Wednesday, is 19-year-old Vellani’s first professional acting job. Already an avid reader of the comics, Vellani learned of the open audition from her aunt. She went to the audition. Lo and behold, Vellani got the job.

The first month on set was spent in prep, rehearsing and stunt training. She had to give up her high school diet of McDonald’s and Oreos and build stamina, but Vellani wasn’t interested in changing her shape too much. “I was 17. Kamala was 16. I wanted her to look like a normal high school kid,” she said.

“My first proper day of filming — that was intense,” said Vellani. “It was all of the stunts that I had to do in the real Captain Marvel suit. The one that Brie gets to wear. It was an extremely uncomfortable day. That suit is not made to move in. You’re just supposed to stand and walk like a mannequin, and that’s what it’s made for. There’s so many pieces and it’s just really uncomfortable, and the scenes were pretty intense. So I came home with all these bruises and everything. My mom was like, ‘Oh my God, what happened?’ And I’m like, ‘I’m a superhero. That’s what happened.’”

Vellani just may be the first Marvel actor who is also a massive fan. She especially loves Robert Downey, Jr. and has proudly re-watched “Iron Man” “more than the average person.”

“They really are just a projection of real life and make you feel like you’re a part of something. Isn’t that what we all kind of want, to feel like we belong? And I know it sounds super cheesy, but for the Marvel fandom, it’s comfortable. It’s what we know. We can recite everything under the sun about the MCU.”

Sana Amanat, the co-creator of “Ms. Marvel,” jokes that having an actor who is a stan (or, really big fan) as they say, has its challenges.

“Sometimes she would just pull up in the producer’s chair next to me and just give lots of thoughts and opinions on, you know, either the show or the rest of the MCU. And I’d be like, ’That’s cool, but I need you to just act right now,” she laughed, adding, “Iman brought so much life and love to the character and it just made the entire process so much easier.”

Vellani was browsing a local comic book store when she discovered the “Ms. Marvel” comics and immediately felt represented in a way that is not common in mainstream media.

“I saw a girl who looked like me. She was Muslim and Pakistani and a superhero fanatic and I was Muslim, Pakistani and a superhero fanatic, so it worked out quite well. And I think my favorite part about the comic books was that it wasn’t about her religion or her culture or her ethnicity, it was about a fanfic-writing nerd, who just so happened to be Pakistani and just so happened to be Muslim. Those parts of her life motivated her and drove her as a character. she used her religion as a moral code. .. She never neglected her culture. It was something that kind of uplifted her journey.”

One of the things about South Asian culture that Vellani says “Ms. Marvel” gets right, is the importance of family. Kamala’s parents and brother feature prominently in the series.

“Showing those close, tight-knit family relationships, showing parents that are alive in the MCU, how rare is that,” said Vellani. “We wanted to hopefully get the ball rolling on Muslim representation in the media because there’s 2 billion Muslims and South Asians in the world, and we cannot represent every single one of them. But I do hope that people find some sort of comfort in Kamala’s character or through her brother or her parents or anyone in her community.”

Vellani is not only thrilled to represent in the MCU but also to be entrusted with its secrets.

“It’s an honor to keep these secrets. For some people, power is money. For Marvel fans, it’s knowledge and secrets and all the inside scoop on all the movies that haven’t been released yet. I have it. I have that power and I love it.”