From the New York Times, it's the

headlines. I'm Tracy Mumford. Today's

Tuesday, March 24th. Here's what we're

covering

in the Middle East.

Now, the missile attacks here reportedly

caused extensive damage at oil

facilities throughout the region.

A recent wave of attacks on energy

infrastructure has marked a new phase in

the war. After Israel struck the South

Pass gas field,

Iran vowing to retaliate unleash

and economists are raising the alarm

that the damage to the global economy

could be long-term. Until now, much of

the attention has been on the straight

of Hormuz, whether oil tankers and other

ships can get in or out. The idea is if

that's resolved, things will get flowing

again. Fuel prices will come back down.

But with targets like refineries and gas

fields coming under fire, the effects

could be felt for years.

Let me explain you how challenging the

situation is.

Yesterday, the head of the International

Energy Agency said the war is the

biggest threat to global energy security

in history.

There are at least 40

energy assets in the region are severely

or very severely damaged. One site

that's been hit, for example, is a vast

Qatari complex that produces roughly a

fifth of the world's liqufied natural

gas that's used to heat homes, cook

food, and power factories across Asia

and Europe. An official said it could

take up to 5 years to repair. All the

disruptions like that could continue to

drive up global energy prices, and high

energy prices tend to slow economic

growth, increase unemployment, and speed

up inflation.

One energy consulting firm is now

warning that oil, which was about $73 a

barrel before the war and has now

crossed 100, could climb to as high as

$200 a barrel by the end of the year. If

that happens, one expert told the Times,

quote, I couldn't fathom we would not

start seeing economies fall into a

recession.

Meanwhile, there's been a slew of

conflicting signals on how long the war

could last and whether any more energy

infrastructure could come under fire.

President Trump declared yesterday that

the US and Iran had had what he called

productive conversations. An Iranian

parliamentary leader dismissed that as

fake news. The Times has learned that

while some messages have been going back

and forth, US officials say the

negotiations have not been substantive

despite Trump's claims.

And last update on the administration,

the White House has struck an unusual

deal with a French energy company. The

US is going to pay nearly $1 billion to

Total Energies to abandon its plans to

build wind farms off the East Coast. The

company paid for leases under the Biden

administration to build off New York and

North Carolina. The US will now

reimburse it for that. In exchange,

Total Energies is supposed to invest

that money in oil and gas projects in

the US. The deal is a remarkable

transfer of taxpayer dollars to a

foreign company for the purposes of

boosting the production of fossil fuels

while throttling a renewable energy

source. Trump has railed against wind

power for years, calling the projects

ugly and claiming without evidence that

they are quote driving whales crazy.

Now, a few more quick updates on the

Trump administration. From the Homeland

Security shutdown to an extraordinary

transfer of taxpayer dollars. First,

it would have worked. We could have had

TSA paid by the end of the week, but uh

the president said no deals. So, my

plan,

there was almost a bipartisan agreement

in the Senate over the DHS shutdown, but

President Trump has nixed it. GOP

Senator John Kennedy told Fox News that

he and other Republicans were prepared

to accept a deal from Democrats that

would have funded all of DHS except ICE

for now. But when the president was

looped in, he quashed it.

And I'm suggesting strongly to the

Republican party, don't make any deal on

anything. The most important thing we

can have is what's called the Save

America Act. Don't make any deal on

anything unless you include voter ID.

Yesterday, Trump made clear he wants to

leverage the funding standoff as a way

to push his voter ID bill. Without a

deal on DHS, TSA agents will continue to

go unpaid, which has already caused

widespread disruption to air travel in

the US as some passengers wait in hours

long security lines. on this vote.

Also in the Senate,

the eyes are 54, the nays are

The

nomination of Mark Wayne Mullen of

Oklahoma to be Secretary of Homeland

Security is confirmed.

Mark Wayne Mullen was confirmed as the

next leader of DHS, taking over from

Christy Gnome, who Trump fired after a

string of controversies and national

outrage over the killings of two US

citizens by federal immigration agents.

All of that combined with the ongoing

shutdown make it a tenuous time for

Mullen to step into the role. In his

confirmation hearing, he struck a less

combative and more cooperative tone than

his predecessor, but he's made clear

he's committed to fulfilling Trump's

promise to crack down on illegal

immigration.

In New York, a person briefed on the

federal investigation into the deadly

crash at LaGuardia on Sunday tells the

Times that officials are looking into

whether an air traffic controller there

was distracted moments before the

accident.

Warning company tower requesting to

cross at Delta. One company cross delta.

Recordings from the control tower show

that just before the crash, one of the

controllers on duty was directing a fire

truck to help with an issue on a

separate flight. The controller gave the

fire truck the go-ahad to cross the

runway just as an Air Canada flight was

landing.

Truck one, stop.

One, stop.

One passenger on the flight told the

Times she heard a loud grinding sound,

which she thought was the pilot trying

to break before the crash. Then she was

thrown forward and people started

screaming. The force of the collision

ejected one flight attendant who was

tossed from the plane and landed on the

runway, still strapped to her seat. She

was one of dozens of people who were

injured. The two pilots on the plane

both died in the crash. While the

airport partially reopened yesterday,

officials with the National

Transportation Safety Board say it will

still take time to finish sorting

through the wreckage and fully clear it.

The head of the NTSB says its

investigation got off to a bit of a slow

start yesterday, in part because some of

its specialists who were trying to fly

in from around the country were among

those caught in long security lines.

And finally,

in Argentina, the Times has been

reporting on how the country's national

dance, tango, is being put to use as

therapy,

specifically for patients with

Parkinson's, the incurable disease that

affects the central nervous system.

Tango is known for its passion, its

heart, and its precise movements. It's

those specific steps that doctors at one

hospital in Buenoseras have found are

extremely helpful for their patients,

dealing with balance and coordination

issues. Tango involves a lot of going

backwards, shifting weight from one foot

to another. As one researcher who helped

start the hospital's program put it,

quote, "Tango uses the same kind of

movements that people with Parkinson's

disease tend to lose." The class

encourages patients to use the tango

moves they've learned to then help with

everyday activities. For instance,

opening the fridge is basically doing a

side step. There's also a lot of torso

rotation in tango, a key movement for

something like washing the dishes. Dance

therapy is used to treat other

conditions as well. in Argentina and

beyond like Alzheimer's or multiple

sclerosis. In Buenoseres, the program

has been so transformative for some

patients sense of confidence that some

people who walked in with canes ended up

walking out of tango class without them.