Perched high above the southern edge of Kabul's old city, the imposing fortress of Bala Hissar has endured centuries of invasions, uprisings and conflict that scarred Afghanistan and left the citadel crumbling.

Now, an extensive, yearslong project by the Aga Khan Trust for Culture, or AKTC, is painstakingly conserving Bala Hissar. The aim is to turn the site into a public archaeological park, complete with landscaped gardens, restaurants and a museum.

Pope Leo XIV delivered a diplomatic but subtly strong critique of Argentine President Javier Milei's austerity measures and libertarian agenda as he arrived Sunday in Argentina, insisting that political leaders must put people, not the economy, first.

Leo used his first public speech in Argentina to lay out a vision of governance, democracy and society sharply at odds with Milei's, exposing differences over spending cuts, social justice and artificial intelligence that the government had sought to play down ahead of the visit.

Pope Leo XIV is kicking off a three-nation tour of Latin America on Friday with a visit to Uruguay, the region's least Catholic and most secular country, three weeks after undergoing lung cancer surgery that had put the entire trip into question.

Leo is due to arrive in Montevideo after a 13½-hour flight from Rome. He has a packed three-day itinerary in Uruguay including a visit to a neighborhood plagued by gang violence, a Mass in Paysandú, around 375 kilometers (230 miles) from the capital, and another Mass in the city of Florida, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) away from Montevideo.

From Michigan to the Middle East, Arabs are celebrating Abdul El-Sayed's election win and delighting in his introduction of Arabic terms like "habibi" and "inshallah" to the American political lexicon.

After being the target of Islamophobic rhetoric on the campaign trail, the rising political star who will be the first Muslim American U.S. senator has mocked his critics on the right while championing the Palestinian cause and leaning into his faith and Egyptian heritage.

Dozens of visitors have begun flocking to a new museum opened by Iraq's Jewish community, the first of its kind, amid ongoing efforts by the minority to preserve its heritage.

Collins Dictionary has named "mogging" — a slang word meaning to outshine someone or something — as its word of the year.

Dictionary experts said Tuesday that the word, most often used by young people "in a playful and ironic way when someone is upstaged," has entered mainstream language and saw a 210% increase in usage in 2026.

Russia's most renowned independent newspaper, Novaya Gazeta, on Friday announced its closure after more than three decades of operation, blaming relentless official pressure.

"They have killed us," it said in an editorial statement, announcing that it will shut its office on Nov. 9 after publishing its final issue. "The Russian authorities and the Russian security services have forced our editorial team to cease operations."

Pope Leo XIV has become the first pope to vote in a U.S. general election.

The Vatican confirmed Friday that the Chicago-born pontiff had submitted a mail-in ballot in Chicago ahead of the Nov. 3 midterm elections, citing his long-standing belief in civic participation.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s broad assertions about Arab contributions to humanity's scientific and literary discoveries at a Republican campaign event in Grand Rapids, Michigan, have drawn criticism just days before midterm elections.

"There's 500 million Arabs in the world and yet they don't produce science," Kennedy said on the campaign trail Monday. "They don't win the Nobel Prize. They don't win the Fields Prize. They don't win the Wolf Prize. They don't produce literature."

In southern Lebanon, visual artist Lina Jouni turns shrapnel from Israeli military munitions into sculptures, keychains and decorative objects.

Since 2024, she has collected fragments from the rubble of destroyed homes in Roumin.