The grill‑strategy is starting to work. With every degree the heat rises, the situation in Cuba — both on the streets and in the regime’s top offices — becomes more and more unbearable. The fall earlier this year of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro, Havana’s key ally, and the subsequent energy embargo on the island marked the beginning of a decline that now seems unstoppable.

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From the creators of renaming Washington’s historic Kennedy Center to add Donald Trump’s name, building a gigantic ballroom at the White House called the Donald Trump Ballroom, and of many other initiatives to glorify the current U.S. president, comes now the idea of issuing $250 bills bearing the face of — yes, indeed — Donald J. Trump.

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On stage, the performers are playing Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera. He is about to die. She has returned to the world of the living, but only briefly, to be reunited with her beloved/loathed husband. “Life is brief, but the light will remain,” sings the chorus surrounding them, framed by a luminous staging and the baton of music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin. The music has not even finished when a near-capacity Lincoln Center erupts in applause, with ecstatic shouts of “viva,” in Spanish.

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When Mangue Banzima arrived in New York at 17 from an African country — he prefers not to say which — the only thing that made him feel at home was the Knicks. He remembers wearing sneakers as a child like those of his idol Patrick Ewing. And when he arrived in the United States, he found a city where his basketball team was everywhere. Banzima’s arrival in New York coincided with something no Knicks fan will ever forget: they had just reached the NBA Finals, where they lost to the San Antonio Spurs. That was in 1999. It has not happened since in 27 years — until now, when the New Yorkers have finally qualified to compete for the famed ring, for which they will face the Spurs again. After so many disappointments, the success of a team used to failure has infected the whole city with euphoria.

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A window for peace between the United States and Iran has opened. Nearly three months after the attack that killed the supreme leader of the Islamic Republic, Ali Khamenei, and set off a campaign that has produced uncertain results, Washington is confident it will be able to announce soon an agreement with Tehran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Since the start of the war, this has been one of the thorniest issues. The waterway has become a choke point threatening to suffocate the global economy. Iran, fully aware of the leverage it holds, has used it to its advantage.

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The battle for control of the United States Senate begins in Maine. If Democrats want to take the upper house from Republicans in the upcoming November 3 midterm election, they cannot lose in this northeastern state, famous for its lobster industry and for producing the writer Stephen King. Republican Senator Susan Collins, who has sometimes been critical of President Donald Trump, is running for re-election and polls place her in a weak position. Graham Platner, a political newcomer, seemed like the right man for the job—until criticism from at least three women he had relationships with, as well as new details about a tattoo resembling a Nazi symbol that he got years ago, began to cast doubt on his suitability. Despite these shadows, Platner won the Democratic primary this Tuesday, making him the official Senate candidate for the midterms.

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In another move in the campaign of retaliation that the Donald Trump administration has launched against its enemies, the Department of Justice has reportedly opened a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll, the journalist who first accused Trump of sexual abusing her in a department store dressing room and who later won a case ordering the president to also pay her $83 million for defamation (he had called her, among other things, “mentally ill”).

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The elephant in the room was Donald Trump. The aim: not to name the person who succeeded in getting rid of Stephen Colbert, one of the most popular comedians in the United States. In the last episode of The Late Show, broadcast on Thursday by the CBS network, Colbert insisted he did not want to do anything special, just another show like the 1,800 he has under his belt. But reality had other plans.

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New Yorkers didn’t hesitate to make their displeasure heard during Donald Trump’s attendance at one of the city’s most important sporting nights in decades. In a packed Madison Square Garden, as the national anthem played before the start of the first NBA Finals game to be staged in New York in 27 years, fans erupted in boos when the president of the United States — the first sitting president to attend an NBA Finals game — appeared in his box, protected by bulletproof glass, and appeared on the arena’s giant screen. The Republican offered a mocking smile as the game between the Knicks and the San Antonio Spurs got under way in a series the New Yorkers now lead 2-1 after the visitors’ 115-111 victory.

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Six people were stabbed at Penn Station, New York’s main intercity rail hub and its busiest station. The attack occurred on Sunday after 7.00 p.m. local time (1.00 a.m. CEST) between 33rd Street and Seventh Avenue, the New York Fire Department told local media. The incident comes as the city is on a high security alert ahead of a planned presidential visit on Monday by U.S. President Donald Trump, Game 3 of the NBA Finals, and the start of the FIFA World Cup.

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Nicolás Maduro, the former president of Venezuela who was seized by U.S. forces in January and taken to a New York prison, faces a new legal challenge. The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Miami is examining a new criminal inquiry into Maduro, U.S. outlets such as CBS and Reuters have reported in recent days. It is unclear whether that probe will lead to additional charges.

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