Roberto Abraham Scaruffi

New on nybooks.com: Ahmed Rashid on how the growth of ISIS distracted the West from al-Qaeda’s continued threat, Francine Prose on what your e-book knows about you, Jeremy Bernstein on declassified photos from Los Alamos, April Bernard on the subversive charms of Beatrix Potter, Jenny Uglow on the life of a great museum, and George Soros’s plan to help Ukraine.

Waking Up to the New al-Qaeda Ahmed Rashid While ISIS represents a threat of its own, the Paris attacks have demonstrated that the greatest danger to the West is al-Qaeda’s Yemen branch.   ADVERTISEMENT   They’re Watching You Read Francine Prose In an age in which our email messages can be perused by the NSA and our Facebook posts are scanned for clues to our habits and our desires, what joy and a relief it is, to escape into a book and know that no one is watching. But now it turns out that I haven’t been quite as alone as I’d imagined.   Los Alamos Declassified Jeremy Bernstein I entered Harvard in the fall of 1947. By the time I left Cambridge ten years later I knew all the members of the physics department. A number of them had been at Los Alamos during the war and had essential parts in building the bomb. But none of them ever said anything about it, at least not to me.   Introducing Calligrams, a new NYRB series of writings from and on China   ADVERTISEMENT   Mice: Naughty and Nice April Bernard As with many classics, if Beatrix Potter’s tales have become invisibly “charming,” it is time to return to them and see them anew.   A Grande Dame in Close-Up Jenny Uglow In Frederick Wiseman’s brilliant new documentary on the National Gallery in London, we may learn about Caravaggio, Rembrandt, or Vermeer, about Holbein and Henry VIII. But we learn almost more about the varied ways that art can be brought to life today.   A New Policy to Rescue Ukraine George Soros There is an urgent need to reorient the current policies of the European Union toward Russia and Ukraine. I have been arguing for a two-pronged approach that balances the sanctions against Russia with assistance for Ukraine on a much larger scale.