PHILADELPHIA — The Magic received a gut-wrenching injury update upon their return to Orlando early Saturday morning. Magic forward Franz Wagner has been diagnosed with a torn right oblique, the Orlando Sentinel learned. Wagner, who suffered the injury during the Magic’s 102-94 loss against the 76ers on Friday night, will be out indefinitely and his return to play will depend on how he responds to treatment. He will be re-evaluated in four weeks, president of basketball operations Jeff Weltman announced, confirming the Sentinel’s reporting. ESPN first shared word of the injury. It’s also the same torn right abdominal injury Wagner’s star counterpart Paolo Banchero suffered at Chicago on Oct. 30. Banchero has missed the last 20 games and Wagner had stepped up in his absence while playing at an All-Star level. On Friday, he recorded 30-plus points for the third straight and eighth contest of the season. Orlando had gone on two separate six-game win streaks in the time since Banchero suffered his injury. Now coach Jamahl Mosley will have to navigate a challenging stretch of the season without his two top players available. The Magic host Phoenix on Sunday. ©2024 Orlando Sentinel. Visit orlandosentinel.com . Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.Nantucket Teens Break Into $2M Mansion to Throw PartyBy BASSEM MROUE and ZEINA KARAM BEIRUT (AP) — The Syrian government appeared to have fallen early Sunday in a stunning end to the 50-year rule of the Assad family after a lightning rebel offensive. The head of a Syrian opposition war monitor said President Bashar Assad had left the country for an undisclosed location, fleeing ahead of insurgents who said they had entered Damascus after a remarkably swift advance across the country. Syrian Prime Minister Mohammed Ghazi Jalali said the government was ready to “extend its hand” to the opposition and hand over its functions to a transitional government. “I am in my house and I have not left, and this is because of my belonging to this country,” Jalili said in a video statement. He said he would go to his office to continue work in the morning and called on Syrian citizens not to deface public property. He did not address reports that Assad had left the country. Rami Abdurrahman of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights told The Associated Press that Assad took a flight Sunday from Damascus. State television in Iran, Assad’s main backer in the years of war in Syria, reported that Assad had left the capital. It cited Qatar’s Al Jazeera news network for the information and did not elaborate. There was no immediate statement from the Syrian government. An Associated Press journalist in Damascus reported seeing groups of armed residents along the road in the outskirts of the capital and hearing sounds of gunshots. The city’s main police headquarters appeared to be abandoned, its door left ajar with no officers outside. Another AP journalist shot footage of an abandoned army checkpoint where uniforms were discarded on the ground under a poster of Assad’s face. Residents of the capital reported hearing gunfire and explosions. Footage broadcast on opposition-linked media showed a tank in one of the capital’s central squares while a small group of people gathered in celebration. Calls of “God is great” rang out from mosques. It was the first time opposition forces had reached Damascus since 2018, when Syrian troops recaptured areas on the outskirts of the capital following a yearslong siege. The pro-government Sham FM radio reported that the Damascus airport had been evacuated and all flights halted. The insurgents also announced they had entered the notorious Saydnaya military prison north of the capital and “liberated” their prisoners there. The night before, opposition forces took the central city of Homs, Syria’s third largest, as government forces abandoned it. The city stands at an important intersection between Damascus, the capital, and Syria’s coastal provinces of Latakia and Tartus — the Syrian leader’s base of support and home to a Russian strategic naval base. The rebels had already seized the cities of Aleppo and Hama , as well as large parts of the south, in a lightning offensive that began Nov. 27. Analysts said rebel control of Homs would be a game-changer. The rebels’ moves into Damascus came after the Syrian army withdrew from much of southern part of the country, leaving more areas, including several provincial capitals, under the control of opposition fighters. The fall of Damascus would leave government forces in control of only two of 14 provincial capitals: Latakia and Tartus. The advances in the past week were by far the largest in recent years by opposition factions, led by a group that has its origins in al-Qaida and is considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. and the United Nations. In their push to overthrow Assad’s government, the insurgents, led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, or HTS, have met little resistance from the Syrian army. The rapid rebel gains, coupled with the lack of support from Assad’s erstwhile allies, posed the most serious threat to his rule since the start of the war. The U.N.’s special envoy for Syria, Geir Pedersen, called Saturday for urgent talks in Geneva to ensure an “orderly political transition.” Speaking to reporters at the annual Doha Forum in Qatar, he said the situation in Syria was changing by the minute. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, whose country is Assad’s chief international backer, said he feels “sorry for the Syrian people.” In Damascus, people rushed to stock up on supplies. Thousands went to Syria’s border with Lebanon, trying to leave the country. Lebanese border officials closed the main Masnaa border crossing late Saturday, leaving many stuck waiting. Many shops in the capital were shuttered, a resident told The Associated Press, and those still open ran out of staples such as sugar. Some were selling items at three times the normal price. The U.N. said it was moving noncritical staff outside the country as a precaution. Assad’s status Syria’s state media denied social media rumors that Assad left the country, saying he was performing his duties in Damascus. He has had little, if any, help from his allies. Russia is busy with its war in Ukraine . Lebanon’s Hezbollah, which at one point sent thousands of fighters to shore up Assad’s forces, has been weakened by a yearlong conflict with Israel. Iran has seen its proxies across the region degraded by regular Israeli airstrikes. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday posted on social media that the United States should avoid engaging militarily in Syria . Separately, President Joe Biden’s national security adviser said the Biden administration had no intention of intervening there. Pedersen said a date for talks in Geneva on the implementation of a U.N. resolution, adopted in 2015 and calling for a Syrian-led political process, would be announced later. The resolution calls for the establishment of a transitional governing body, followed by the drafting of a new constitution and ending with U.N.-supervised elections. Later Saturday, foreign ministers and senior diplomats from eight key countries, including Saudi Arabia, Russia, Egypt, Turkey and Iran, along with Pederson, gathered on the sidelines of the Doha Summit to discuss the situation in Syria. In a statement, the participants affirmed their support for a political solution to the Syrian crisis “that would lead to the end of military activity and protect civilians.” The insurgents’ march A commander with the insurgents, Hassan Abdul-Ghani, posted on the Telegram messaging app that opposition forces had begun the “final stage” of their offensive by encircling Damascus. HTS controls much of northwest Syria and in 2017 set up a “salvation government” to run day-to-day affairs in the region. In recent years, HTS leader Abu Mohammed al-Golani has sought to remake the group’s image, cutting ties with al-Qaida, ditching hard-line officials and vowing to embrace pluralism and religious tolerance. The shock offensive began Nov. 27, during which gunmen captured the northern city of Aleppo, Syria’s largest, and the central city of Hama , the country’s fourth-largest city. The Syrian government has referred to opposition gunmen as terrorists since conflict broke out in March 2011. Qatar’s top diplomat, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, criticized Assad for failing to take advantage of the lull in fighting in recent years to address the country’s underlying problems. “Assad didn’t seize this opportunity to start engaging and restoring his relationship with his people,” he said. ____ Karam reported from London. Associated Press writers Albert Aji in Damascus, Syria; Abby Sewell in Beirut; Qassim Abdul-Zahra in Baghdad; Josef Federman and Victoria Eastwood in Doha, Qatar; and Ellen Knickmeyer in Washington contributed to this report.
MARTIN KEOWN TALKS TACTICS: Tottenham's flying full back Pedro Porro will be a handful for shaky Man City as Pep Guardiola's men bid to end four-game losing streakNegotiations for the EU-Mercosur agreement have concluded after 25 years. The two sides will now have to ratify the deal, but it could still be blocked as it has many opponents — particularly in Europe. "Today marks a truly historic milestone," said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Friday in Montevideo, when the EU and the Mercosur trade bloc finalized their deal . She said that a "powerful message to the world" had been sent. "In an increasingly confrontational world, we demonstrate that democracies can rely on each other." Von der Leyen added that the agreement, which has been almost 25 years in the making, was "one of the largest trade and investment partnerships the world has ever seen." Connecting Europe with South America The EU-Mercosur agreement connects more than 700 million people on the European and South American continents. Some 450 million citizens in 27 EU states, and about 270 million in Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay. It does not yet apply to the Mercosur trade bloc's newest member, Bolivia, nor to Venezuela whose membership of the bloc has been suspended until further notice due to democratic backsliding. Most of the key points had already been agreed in 2019. The agreement will remove over 90% of tariffs on goods exchanged between the two blocs, which the European Commission estimates will save EU exporters more than €4 billion ($4.2 billion) per year. Rare earth elements needed for cars, machinery From the EU perspective, the main focus is likely to be on the import of raw materials and the export of cars and machinery. The bloc's interest in finalizing the agreement became more acute in the wake of the reelection of US President-elect Donald Trump, who threatened the EU with tariffs during his campaign . In view of the global geopolitical situation, von der Leyen said the agreement was "a political necessity." The EU hopes to become less dependent on China for its access to rare earth elements , for example. Mercosur states will be able to supply the EU with these raw materials that are crucial for modern technological products, like mobile phones and electric vehicles . In 2023, according to the EU, the Mercosur states exported mainly mineral products, food, beverages and tobacco to the EU, which in turn exported machinery, equipment, chemicals and pharmaceutical products. The trade volume between the two blocs that year amounted to around €110 billion. In the EU, particularly in Germany , car manufacturers will be likely hoping that the 35% import duty on cars will be reduced, while South American producers will be looking forward to being able to more easily sell meat, sugar and other such products to the EU. Environmental protection at risk, say critics Over the past five years, it has proven difficult to conclude the agreement largely because the EU has demanded stricter environmental regulations. These will be set out in an additional protocol. In its press release, the European Commission stressed that the current agreement had "strong, specific and measurable commitments to stop deforestation." Criticism of the agreement has also been voiced in South America in recent years. During his 2023 election campaign, the president of Argentina, Javier Milei, expressed his opposition to the deal, and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio da Silva has also criticized the additional protocol. European farmers oppose deal In recent weeks, the agreement has also sparked vehement protests from farmers in the EU, particularly in France and Belgium. They fear unfair competition from cheap South American products, arguing that producers there benefit from lower environmental standards. The German Farmers' Association has also spoken out against the agreement, calling for negotiations to be restarted. Environmental organizations such as Greenpeace have rejected the agreement outright, arguing that continued rainforest deforestation to produce beef and grow soy to feed cattle will be catastrophic. Supporters of the agreement, meanwhile, argue that it will protect EU standards as well as quotas in certain areas, such as beef, poultry and sugar. The European Commission said on Friday that the interests of all Europeans, including farmers, would be protected by the agreement. EU member states in disagreement Opinions on the agreement also differ within the EU. France has been a staunch opponent of the deal , and on Thursday the office of President Emmanuel Macron said it had told von der Leyen that it considered it "unacceptable" in its current form. It said France would continue to tirelessly defend its "agricultural sovereignty." Poland and Italy have also expressed their doubts, while Germany and Spain both support the agreement. Recently, Germany had pushed increasingly hard for a swift conclusion. Though the agreement has been finalized, it's likely to be some time before it actually takes effect. Both blocs will have to ratify the deal, and it could still be blocked. The European Commission said that the end of the negotiations was a "first step." EU-Mercosur trade deal: A tale of two cattle breeders To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video This article was originally written in German.2025 S&P 500 Prediction: Let Reflexivity Reign
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