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A tiny wooden relic that some Christians believe to be part of Jesus’ manger arrived Saturday in its permanent home in the biblical city of Bethlehem 1,400 years after it was sent to Rome as a gift to the pope. Cheerful crowds greeted the ornately encased relic with much fanfare before it entered the Franciscan Church of St. Catherine next...

Charles Schwab is buying rival TD Ameritrade in a $26 billion stock swap, a blockbuster agreement brought about by massive disruption in the online brokerage industry. Bowing to competitive pressure, brokerages have made it free for customers to trade U.S. stocks online. A combination of two of the biggest players in the industry would allow Schwab to save billions of...

A prominent bodyguard to Saudi Arabia’s King Salman was shot and killed in what authorities described as a personal dispute, state TV reported Sunday, offering few details on an incident that shocked the kingdom. Tributes poured in across social media for Maj. Gen. Abdulaziz al-Fagham, with many including images of the bodyguard at work. One included him bending down to...

Heather Waldron and John Hawley are losing their four-bedroom house in the hills above Blacksburg, Va. A teenage daughter, one of their five children, sold her clothes for spending money. They worried about paying the electric bill. Financial disaster, they say, contributed to their divorce, finalized in April. Their money problems began when the University of Virginia Health System pursued...

Police say a 12-year-old boy has been arrested and charged with scrawling swastikas and other hateful graffiti all over a playground in Queens.

Police are investigating after hateful graffiti was scrawled in chalk all over a playground in Queens, officials said.

One by one, U.S. Magistrate Judge William Gallo called the names of 14 defendants who were charged with entering the country illegally. Defense attorneys told him the government had already deported them to Mexico, making it impossible for them to appear. In a rebuke to the government, the judge immediately dismissed all charges and ordered that their bond money be...

An unlikely bond between a Stafford County, Virginia, school janitor and a student has gone viral.

More than 2 million Muslims began the annual hajj pilgrimage at first light on Sunday in Saudi Arabia, circling the cube-shaped Kaaba in Mecca that Islam’s faithful face five times each day during their prayers. The five-day hajj pilgrimage represents one of the world’s biggest gatherings every year, and is required of all able-bodied Muslims once in their life. The...

People feel happier and less depressed when vacant lots in their neighborhood are cleared of trash or “greened up,” according to what might be a first-of-a-kind study of public space’s effects on mental health. NBC News reported that Philadelphia residents who lived near vacant lots that were filled in with trees and grass or simply cleaned up reported to University...

North Korea’s Kim Jong Un held a secretive summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping on March 28, signaling strong ties between the two ahead of Kim’s meetings with South Korea’s Moon Jae-in and the United States’ Donald Trump.

After six years of seclusion, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un seems to want to get out and see the world. Kim’s surprise summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping this week was the first time he’d traveled outside of his country since he assumed power in 2011, according to his own state media. But Beijing is just the start of...

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s surprise visit to Beijing makes clear what has been easily forgotten amid the whirlwind of diplomatic developments in past months: China still plays a major role in efforts to end North Korea’s nuclear program. Just how much is still open to debate, but the visit shows Kim Jong Un hasn’t forgotten his only major...

A woman in Utah has taken to the streets to try and raise money to have a baby.

Jordan’s king appealed Sunday to U.S. Vice President Mike Pence to “rebuild trust and confidence” in the possibility of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, following fallout from the Trump administration’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. Pence, in turn, tried to reassure the monarch that the Trump administration remains committed to restarting Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts and views...

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence’s upcoming visit to the Middle East comes at a time of intensely publicized friction between his administration and the Palestinian leadership, posing a dilemma for his Arab hosts — Egypt’s president and Jordan’s king — on how to safeguard their vital ties with Washington without appearing to ignore Palestinian misgivings. Both countries are heavily dependent...

A Massachusetts man who has been in immigration custody since July and who faces deportation to his native El Salvador has been released as he awaits his asylum appeal to be determined.

Officials said they’re still not entirely sure what caused students, staff and a firefighter to get sick over the course of two days last week at one New Jersey elementary school.

One day after a New Jersey school was evacuated because two students fainted, the building was again cleared out as six staff members were sent home sick in the second hazmat scare in as many days.

A New Jersey elementary school was evacuated Wednesday afternoon after a chemical leak caused two students to faint.