Marilyn Monroe, Mother Theresa, Muhammad Ali – for the first time ever images of these iconic figures are hanging in a Havana gallery. The Associated Press mounted the exhibit showcasing 100 of their most compelling moments in journalism as part of a workshop to help train Cuban photojournalists to cover their changing country.

VIDEO: Developing Cuban photojournalists

MIANYANG, China — More than two weeks into the rescue and relief efforts following the massive earthquake in China, most survivors seem eager and grateful to get into their assigned tent cities, where there is a at least a semblance of order and privacy. But at the Mianyang Sports Stadium, where thousands of people have taken refuge since the disaster, I encountered a knot of agitated people who believe the encampment established near their devastated village is a death trap and an insult.

"We'll never go back," said an enraged Zhao Qunfang, a 77-year-old woman who is one of many residents of the town of Leigu has been staying in the stadium rather than report to their assigned resettlement camp. "We died once already. If we go back, we may die again."

Kari Huus / msnbc.com

Zhao Qunfang, right, and Xie Chenghua, among the residents of Leigu in Beichuan County who were evacuated to Mianyang Sports Stadium after the earthquake destroyed their small town, denounce plans Sunday to return them to the devastated area.

As we talk, the crowd presses in and angry voices rise in a chorus. It is impossible to take it all in, but several themes emerge. The surviving residents from Leigu, in Beichuan County, are traumatized. Nearly everyone there lost a relative and they all witnessed their hometown awash in blood and bodies.

They are furious that their local officials didn't consult them before making a radio announcement assigning them to a tent city set up in Beichuan county. They say that not only is the camp in a dangerous place, it is too near the nightmare they have just been through.

"People cannot imagine. We couldn't get out of there without stepping on people's corpses," said Xie Chenghua.

On Sunday, they were gathered at Gate 17 of the stadium, awaiting a meeting with an official from Leigu to discuss their concerns. But they had been waiting a long time and were disgusted as it became clear that the official would not show up.

"(Premier) Wen Jiabao came here," shouted one man. "But our (local) hotshot hasn't showed his face! Maybe he thinks he's more important than Wen."

This small group among some 5 million left homeless by the May 12 earthquake is but one piece of a bigger picture -- a relief effort that has gone remarkably well so far. But their anger is a sobering reminder of the immensity and sensitivity of the task ahead. To get people back into housing will require thousands of consequential decisions — difficult in the best of times and now being made in an atmosphere of fear, anger and bottomless grief.

After some U.S. diplomats created an uproar last fall when told of potential forced assignments in Iraq for 2008, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is trying a more personal touch this year by circulating a taped video message to the foreign service appealing for volunteers in Iraq and Afghanistan for 2009.

The video was posted on the State Department's internal website yesterday for all employees to see, and now is available on the main State Department website under the headline "Service in Iraq and Afghanistan."

State Department officials acknowledge that Rice is trying to solicit volunteers personally and much earlier this year – in order to avoid the controversy that erupted last fall.

In her appeal, she describes the work done by diplomats in Iraq and Afghanistan as "inspiring" and asks diplomats to "consider joining this highly motivated team of professionals as we look for volunteers for positions opening in 2009."

According to a State Department official, the Human Resources bureau at the State Department has been reviewing a list of diplomats that are up for assignments in 2009 to find those who are "particularly well-qualified" to serve in Iraq and Afghanistan. In the coming months, those individuals will be contacted "to encourage them to volunteer," the official said.

There are an estimated 300 slots for Iraq that need to be filled for 2009. State Department officials say they are hopeful that enough volunteers will surface to avoid these so-called "directed assignments."

FULL TEXT OF RICE'S MESSAGE TO EMPLOYEES:
I want to thank the dedicated men and women of the Department of State, Foreign Service, Civil Service, Locally Employed Staff, and retirees alike, who have stepped forward to serve at our missions in Iraq and Afghanistan. I am proud of their achievements at the forefront of diplomacy and national security, in fulfillment of two of our country's highest foreign policy priorities. I am asking that you consider joining this highly motivated team of professionals as we look for volunteers for positions opening in 2009.

I visit Iraq and Afghanistan on a regular basis and have seen our efforts firsthand. Working closely with other civilian colleagues, our military, and Iraqi and Afghan counterparts from all levels of government and civil society, the Department of State is making a difference in the lives of ordinary people. We are helping to rebuild local and national governments, foster economic development, and promote reconciliation. The results are inspiring.

Our brave volunteers are doing a tough, but necessary, job far away from family and friends. Employees and families deserve the nation's gratitude.

I can assure you that they have mine, and I encourage you to join our teams in Baghdad and Kabul.

YINGXIU, China – When the Tibetan Plateau made its latest move, this small city about 50 miles to the west of Chengdu was ground zero. Yingxiu, sitting at the upper end of the Zipingpu reservoir was summarily crushed.

One witness remembers it as more of an explosion than a quake.

"I heard that in Chengdu buildings were swaying for a long time," said 60-year-old Yan Runqi, who was visiting his parents in a village above Yingxiu when the earthquake struck. "Here it felt like three seconds."

Ryan Pyle / MSNBC.com

Traffic passes along a dirt road next to a collapsed expressway near Yingxiu, China.

In those few moments on May 12, more than 75 percent of Yingxiu's population of about 10,000 was wiped out, according to local officials. Initially cut off from all road access, survivors were evacuated by boats launched from the far end of the reservoir and by helicopter.

Only a few days ago did it become possible to drive to Yingxiu to witness the impact at the quake's epicenter. (NBC News' Mark Mullen filed a story for the World Blog earlier in our coverage of the quake about an attempt to reach Yingxiu before the road was cleared).

Now a spine jarring dirt road lined with crushed cars and boulders is considered open; though, it has to be cleared almost daily of new debris sliding down the steep mountainside above. As this road heads into town, it passes under the ragged end of a collapsed highway bridge that once looped around the side of the mountain.

The destruction of Yingxui is complete – much like the devastation in Beichuan, a larger city that was accessible and widely covered by journalists shortly after the earthquake. The few buildings that remain standing are tipped precariously amid mountains of ruin. The smell of death still hangs in the air, which is thick with dust.

Only a handful of survivors are here now. A few people have come back to salvage bits of furniture. One man returned to try to find the remains of his wife. He was waiting for a cleanup team that had promised to help him dig so he can hold a solitary funeral and bury her again.

But Yingxiu is growing busy again, as a way station for ongoing relief efforts in the remote mountain region beyond. Slow processions of military convoys unload rice and other supplies here, and helicopters continuously land and take off on a broad flat area next to the ruins. Soldiers say these flights are moving supplies to the Wolong panda reserve just to the west, and to Wenchuan city, deep in the mountains.

Ryan Pyle / MSNBC.com

Zhen Soujun sits near her tent after becoming homeless from the earthquake near the city of Yingxiu, China.Â

Authorities are also stockpiling rice in Yingxiu, which will be sent into the more remote areas in larger quantities once the road to those areas is cleared, a process that could take another week. Until then, Wenchuan city, the seat of government in this county, is accessible only by a 10 hour drive from Chengdu over a 12,000 foot mountain pass, or by air. 

Yingxiu is also the base for repair and observation of the massive Zipingpu Dam, built in 2006, despite protest from environmental groups who said it was too close to the fault line.  Zipingpu's cracks have been repaired, but the dam remains under continuous observation, and some of the water has been released from the reservoir to lower stress on the structure. The Chinese government says that if the dam were breeched, it would deluge Dujiangyan, a large population center six miles downstream.

Whether Yingxiu should be rebuilt remains an open question for some survivors. Residents staying in tents along the road said that when Premier Wen Jiabao visited Yingxiu on Saturday he promised them it would be restored – and better than ever – within three years. Some of these residents said they are eager to get started.

But looking over a town so ruined that it was barely recognizable was enough to give pause to 80-year-old Zhen Soujun, whose family had been here for generations.

"We need some experts to come in here and look at the geology to decide how dangerous it is to live here," she said. "If the government tells us we should move, then we will move."

CHENGDU, China -- Last week, we reported on a couple who lost track of their 2-month-old daughter in the scramble to evacuate after the earthquake demolished their village. Now we can report one of the rare happy tales among the lost and missing in this disaster: Baby Anqi has been reunited with her parents.

The family was split up during an airlift of quake survivors from a mountain top in Anxian county, northeast of Chengdu.

Ryan Pyle / Special to msnbc.com

Wei Anrong and baby Anqi

Anqi's mother, Wei Anrong, was airlifted to a hospital in Chengdu to be treated for injuries. Anqi's father, Ma Hong, handed the infant to a soldier on another helicopter, believing that the child would be wherever her mother had gone. Then he made the grueling trek out of the stricken area with those who were fit enough to walk.

When he finally arrived in Chengdu a week after the May 12 quake, he found his wife in the hospital. She was recovering, but in a state of panic he realized that Anqi had never arrived.

Ma frantically canvassed the many hospitals in Chengdu that were caring for survivors, but he found no trace of the infant. The wounded were being shipped to facilities not just in Chengdu, but also to cities hundreds of miles away, and other sites were caring for children orphaned by the disaster.

Meantime, at a hospital in Qionglai, about 60 miles west of Chengdu, hospital staff who received the wounded from Anqi's helicopter knew only that a baby had been evacuated from the Anxian area and believed she was orphaned as well.

"People there had no name, and no information," said Wei.

A series of cell phone calls between relatives and a savvy volunteer worker who stayed in Anxian finally led to Qionglai, and then to the hospital. There the searchers found Anqi, who was not only healthy but quite spoiled by hospital staff members who doted on their youngest ward.

Over the weekend, baby and parents were reunited in Chengdu. It was a separation of just over a week, but to Wei it was a lifetime.

"I was so worried for so long," says Wei. "But now I feel peaceful."

DUJIANGYAN, China – Releasing a tidal wave of emotion and anger, hundreds of grieving parents and sympathizers gathered at a pile of rubble that was once the Juyuan Middle School on Tuesday to memorialize the nearly 1,000 teenagers who died when the building collapsed in the May 12 earthquake.

The heart-rending ceremony also offered the victims' parents an opportunity to demand justice.

A woman clutching the portrait of her daughter, Dong Yan, cursed the people in charge of building the school, which collapsed even though all the buildings around it remained standing. Like most of the people in the crowd, she believes local corruption was the reason for the poor construction.

Ryan Pyle / msnbc.com

 Click for slide show: Parents mourn the loss of  the children who died at Juyuan Middle School  during the May 12 earthquake in China.

"We want the truth to come out and the corrupt officials to be punished," she said between sobs. "These corrupt players are the ones who have caused us so much misery."

Banners hung across the destroyed building for the occasion were more blunt: "Get even for the deaths of the Juyuan students," read one. Another demanded harsh punishment for the "murderers" responsible for the collapsed school. "Whoever is responsible for the building should pay with their life," said another, comparing the building materials used in the structure to tofu.

As the crowd grew, the sound of weeping became a chorus. Women sobbed, and men drew deeply on cigarettes as tears trickled down their cheeks. Mourners lit candles and incense in the wreckage. Some women were so distraught they were carried away by family and friends. A girl recovering from head injuries stood holding a picture of her dead brother, a faraway look on her face. A hastily set up sound system broadcast a dirge. The crack of fireworks cut through the din.

Notably missing from the memorial service were any representatives of the school or the local government, who in most crises would be expected to attempt to console the mourners.

Instead, two trucks arrived as the service got under way and began spraying down the ruins. One of them started to work at the far end of the building, and began moving toward the mourners. A driver, dressed in white, got out and tried unsuccessfully to shoo away the mourners. At one point, the two trucks took up positions on both sides of the crowd, with their powerful sprayers pointed at the center, as if they might start work in spite of the funeral. Eventually they backed out and drove away.

After 300 to 400 people had gathered, including several dozen Chinese journalists, the mood turned more businesslike. One parent took the microphone to organize mourners by class of students. He also announced that the group was gathering the names of the affected families so that they could speak with one voice in demanding justice and accountability from the government.  

The collapse of Juyuan school was not an isolated incident in Dujiangyan, a city about one hour's drive from Chengdu that suffered profound damage in the earthquake. Though it was farther from the epicenter than many other towns, the city's schools fared particularly badly.

At the Juyuan memorial, a man named Yan beseeched journalists to cover a similar event next week to commemorate students at the Xinjian Primary School, where he said his 10-year-old daughter died in a similar collapse along with more than 300 other children. He said local officials lied when they reported 20 deaths in the school.

Ryan Pyle / MSNBC.com

A father mourns for his daughter at what is left of the Juyuan Middle School.Â

Yan, too, wants someone held accountable for the collapse of the school that led to his daughter's death. He says that families of victims have been offered a total of 32,000 yuan (about $4,500) in "comfort money" from the central government, the provincial government and the local government.

"None of us has touched this money," he says. "What we want is justice."

DUJIANGYAN, China – In the heart of this disaster-stricken city, Luo Tingcai is almost giddy about his new digs. On Friday, his family of five was preparing to spend its first night in a single 10-by-12-foot room with three little beds, part of a temporary housing village that is rapidly rising from the rubble.

"We'll just line up side by side," he said.

Kari Huus / msnbc.com

Sitting on one of three beds in their new temporary housing unit in the Xinfu Resettlement area are, from left to right, Luo Min, Xu Xueyin, Chen Tonhua, Luo Tincai, and Xu Luoxing.

It's a humble shelter, but nonetheless a huge improvement. Luo's family – including his 83-year-old mother-in-law – spent the first few days in the streets after the May 12 earthquake flattened the five-story apartment building where they had been living. They were then fortunate enough to find a spot in a tent city set up by the military.

Their luck held this week. Amid millions of people left homeless and displaced from the quake, Luo and his family are among the first 30 families to be housed in what is being called the Xinfu Resettlement area. Within a few days, organizers here say, it will house 3,000 families, or about 10,000 people.

A village of these prefab units, donated by a local construction company, was rising up around Luo's family on Friday. Earnest volunteers from around China were delivering beds to row upon row of the new units, while workers drilled, painted, wired the units and installed loudspeakers and the military unloaded crates of water and food from trucks. A medical care unit with a staff of about 30 is already in place. The government will cover the ongoing expense of running the village.

Kari Huus / msnbc.com

People's Liberation Army soldiers carry supplies through Xinfu Resettlement area in Dujiangyan, which is slated to house 10,000 people made homeless by the earthquake.

All of this has come about in less than three days, according to a government foreign affairs staffer. Meantime, she said that construction of another resettlement center twice the size is getting under way just up the street.

Strangely, the whole city of Dujiangyan, a city of about 300,000 that was devastated by the quake 11 days ago, has the feel of a boomtown today. The stadium and a college sports field that served as refuge have been vacated and were being cleared of rubbish and sprayed with disinfectant. Damaged buildings are being demolished and removed throughout the area, and people are moving by truck, taxi and pedicab from their encampments in the rubble.

Of course, this is just a start. An estimated 5 million people were left homeless by the quake. And in months to come, people who are now happy with a glorified box will likely grow weary of the cramped conditions. The next stage — creating safe permanent homes for all those people — will be complicated and expensive.

Adrienne Mong, NBC News' Beijing Producer and frequent contributor to the World Blog, will be answering readers questions about China's earthquake on Newsvine from 10 a.m. ET to 12 p.m. ET on Friday. Click here to participate in the conversation.

CHENGDU -- Help finally arrived in the mountain village of Liuzu four days after the earthquake struck. The first to be airlifted out that morning were the injured.

Among those loaded on the Chinese Air Force helicopter was Wei Anrong, who had broken ribs when her house collapsed.  Wei's husband, Ma Hong, also handed a tiny bundle to a soldier, then stepped back as the chopper lifted and swept off toward Chengdu. That is the last he saw of their 2-month old daughter, Anqi.  

Ma was among those fit enough to make the 10-hour trek out of the devastated area. He made his way south to the provincial capital of Chengdu, and on Wednesday —with the help of his cell phone — found his wife recovering at the Sichuan Number One People's Hospital.  But to his dismay, there was no sign of Anqi, and no paper trail showing where she ended up.

Kari Huus / msnbc.com

Ma Hong, right, and his wife, Wei Anrong, were reunited Wednesday at the Sichuan Number One People's Hospital in Chengdu, China.Â

Six days after the evacuation, Ma pulls out his cell phone, which has a tiny picture of Anqi as the screen saver, and shows it to a reporter. He says it never occurred to him that he might one day need to use it to find her.

He says he wishes he has asked the soldier the right questions, but adds that there wasn't much opportunity.

"The noise of the helicopter was so loud, I couldn't talk," he says. 

In the context of this catastrophe, which killed more than 50,000 people, many of them children, the good news is that Anqi is likely alive and healthy.  But the scope of the disaster is such that aid and recovery workers are still focused on more urgent problems than a little girl gone missing.

So Ma, a farmer with little education who rarely visits the city, is left to find her on his own.

Chengdu is a city of approximately 10.4 million people and dozens of hospitals in normal times. Now, hospitals are putting people wherever they have beds. Wei is recovering in the gynecology wing of her hospital, while others earthquake victims are in the cancer ward and the plastic surgery section. Staff, victims and visitors circulate through the hospital with few formalities. Meantime, there are dozens of makeshift sites caring for the displaced.

As of Thursday, Ma had searched three Chengdu hospitals, with no luck.

MIANYANG, China – I had an eerie feeling as I approached the Mianyang Stadium where thousands of survivors of the deadly earthquake in Sichuan province have taken refuge.

From a distance, it reminded me of the New Orleans Superdome following Hurricane Katrina, when city officials opened the sports arena as a shelter of last resort, but where storm victims and their needs were tragically ignored for days.

But as I got closer and started to look around, it appeared that China had studied its own past fumbles in emergency response and noted the mistakes of others.     

Mark Mullen/ NBC News

Chinese quake survivors share a meal in their makeshift tent.Â

At the Mianyang Stadium, there were water stations everywhere and nobody was waiting in line. There was free food in another corner of the parking lot and volunteers handing out snacks inside. I approached a group of people to ask if there was enough food available and they laughed saying "there is too much food."

In one part of the stadium complex there was a medical tent treating physical injuries and stress. One woman was being treated for exhaustion. Two other patients were having acupuncture. And there were psychiatrists roaming the grounds doing counseling.

Even a tent school was set up for the refugee children when volunteers weren't doing organized games and activities with them.

China hasn't always done this well. To be sure, the government here has upgraded emergency response after some hard lessons.

Mark Mullen/ NBC News

Men work on building a tent in Sichuan province.Â

A Chinese official candidly admitted that the country learned a lot from the SARS epidemic when it was accused of hiding the severity of the health problem. China also received bad press over not being quick and effective enough in its response to a crippling series of snowstorms that shut down large portions of China this past winter.

And as China prepares to host the summer Olympic Games, it also knows the world is watching to see how well it can handle a crisis and if it is worthy of its bid to be considered a modern and responsive government.

Whatever the motivation, the country has generally gotten high marks for its quick and effective response from the International Red Cross (and Red Crescent). And unlike the repressive regime governing Burma, China has opened its doors to international relief and expertise.

On Thursday, the government renewed an international appeal for help in housing some of the 5 million homeless survivors.

"We need more than 3.3 million tents," Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters, adding that 400,000 tents have already been delivered. "We hope and welcome international assistance in this regard. We hope the international community can give priority in providing tents," he said.

But, with an estimated 50,000 dead and 5 million homeless, the challenges are immense and despite the massive relief effort, there are complaints that the aid is not arriving fast enough. 

Mark Mullen/ NBC News

A temporary home inside a tent in Sichuan province.Â

In many ways, China's most difficult tests may still be ahead. It will have to undertake the most ambitious re-building campaign since 1976 when another earthquake leveled the northeastern coastal city of Tangshan and an estimated 250,000 were killed. 

But today, unlike 1976, China's economy is booming. Not to mention that this communist country so often accused of not valuing human life is trying to show the world that when it wants, it can take care of its own.

BEIJING – While most U.S. media have cut back coverage of China's earthquake, and the mainland Chinese press is trying to remain upbeat about the disaster, the largest Chinese-language paper distributed worldwide is bringing its readers the epic tragedy in epic proportions.

The Hong Kong-based Sing Tao Daily is covering the disaster from every level, with a 14 pages devoted to it in the Tuesday edition alone. But it is the individual tales, recounted in devastating detail and emotion that really sets the paper apart from the rest of the press at this stage, more than a week after the earthquake struck.

SLIDESHOW: China's loss

Double-page color photo montages bring to life the faces of parents twisted in pain, and articles spell out the horrifying details of destruction – the death of 8-year old twin sisters who died holding hands, in one instance, and that of a man who perished clutching a note he wrote to clear his conscience of an unpaid 3000 yuan (about $375) debt to someone he calls "Old Wang."  In that 800-word story, coming under a two-inch high headline, he is reported to have used the last of his strength to tell his daughter of the debt, and to urge her to live on and live well.

In a tribute to the grief of the children, the paper is running diary entries authored by a high school girl who was among the few who survived the collapse of her middle school in Beichuan. Liu Jian's first installment describes what she saw and feels in lengthy essay called "A Day Filled with Blood and Tears."

"That day at lunch, we were all laughing, talking, eating. Being high school students, we were talking about our dreams and the future… Everything was so wonderful…."  Then, she recalls, "there was the screaming, and wailing, and blood and tears running down faces all around me."

 "Is it that God was jealous? Why would he suddenly crush us so ruthlessly?"

The tone taken by the Hong Kong press, which is not subject to direct control by the Chinese government, is in stark contrast to that taken by the official press in China. Although this coverage is far more complete and objective than in perhaps any other crisis the country has experienced since the Communist leadership came to power in 1949 — publishing daily updates of the dead and missing — the reports fall squarely into a tradition of highlighting the positive, which at this stage means focusing on progress in the recovery and rescue.

The front page of Thursday's English language China Daily, for instance, focused on a new government decision to cut government spending by 5 percent to help funnel money toward a $10 billion fund for rebuilding in the quake zone. It was accompanied by a large photograph of children in the quake zone standing alongside the road holding signs expressing thanks to the People's Liberation Army and other rescuers.

Hong Kong's press has often been faulted for being unduly graphic and sensational, but in the case of a disaster of this enormity, it's certainly more understandable. It has likely also been one reason that overseas Chinese have dug deep into their pockets, reportedly pledging more than $6 billion to aid and recovery. Until today, this was more than Beijing itself had planned to spend.

MIANYANG, China – China's earthquake did not discriminate. It struck town and country, rich and poor, old and young. But it is China's children who may have suffered the most. 

Mark Mullen/ NBC News

Parents search lists of injured and missing at a refugee center in Sichuan province.

Schools were in session when the quake hit and many of the buildings were full of children when they collapsed. In seconds, students were killed, others were injured and even those rescued were traumatized. And many of those who did survive lost loved ones and their homes.

Other kids pulled from the rubble are now missing. When the quake hit – good Samaritans it is hoped – whisked some children away. But where are they?

As we perused the bulletin boards located at the Mianyang Stadium, which has become a refugee center for some 17,000 people, we saw hundreds of fliers posted by desperate parents with the faces of their little ones and contact information pleading for their return.

Sometimes children already in a parent's arms were traumatized. One father gingerly carried his 2-year-old daughter named Liu Xiangyi.

Her face was covered with abrasions from being covered with debris during the quake. Her father said she has not spoken since the earthquake.

Perhaps it is because she is from Beichuan. If you take a look at the videotape of that town NBC News obtained from the moments after the quake struck, it is easier to understand why she might not be talking.  

VIDEO: Quake's terrifying aftershocks caught on tape

There are also plenty of kids who suffered less or hide the pain more. They are harder to spot.

A psychiatrist from China's Ministry of Health is trying to reach those kids. He and his team are doing counseling at the refugee center on site as well as training teachers. Why teachers?

China is still a developing culture when it comes to mental health and the awareness of and services for mental health care are not as pervasive as in the West.  In enormous Sichuan province, which is both rural and urban, teachers may be the only psychological lifeguards in proximity to these kids almost daily.

Mark Mullen/ NBC News

Chinese children and their parents at the Mianyang sports stadium that has been converted into a refugee center for 17,000.

So teachers are learning how to help kids process their feelings and call in help for children who may need professional help quickly.

Meanwhile, some kids are trying to work through their own feelings. At the stadium shelter, there were three girls drawing pictures. Another was putting her feelings down in a journal.

VIDEO: Counseling kids orphaned by China's quake

China's new orphans
The recovery will likely be much more complex for a new segment of China's population – those orphaned by the quake. In a safeguarded facility we were able to visit, there were 200 children whose parents were confirmed dead or missing. The group we saw looked to be of middle- and high-school age. Many were resting on the floor, some talking, others playing games.

Without knowing it, they are being sought after.

From the moment the first earthquake stories hit the news, there has been an enormous spike in requests from prospective parents both in China and around the world.

During the initial days following the quake, there was a wave of panic among some migrant worker parents, toiling in China's big cities, who raced back to Sichuan over fears their children, who had been staying with relatives, might be quickly adopted by an overseas family.

Mark Mullen/ NBC News

Missing children posters in Sichuan province, China.

That is not likely to happen. Even before the quake, China revised its adoption rules making it far stricter to bring home a child, a process that generally takes a year or more, so that everything can be checked out.

A government advisor from the group Care for Children told me the first plan for the kids would be to see if there are surviving relatives with whom they can live. If not, then they will be placed with Chinese foster families – though adoptions later are still a possibility.

There is something especially tragic about seeing bad things happening to children, but I was reminded of one thing by the psychiatrist now treating these kids at the refugee center: their youth may be their best ally. "Children," he said, "can have extraordinary resiliency. That's the best thing going for us."

KABUL, Afghanistan – When Mirwali, 25, finally got the chance to talk to his 65-year-old father, who is held in the U.S.-run military prison at Bagram Airbase, outside of Kabul, he was so overcome with emotion he couldn't speak. Mirwali covered his face with the long sash of grey silk hanging down from the wrap of his turban, held his head in his hands, and sobbed.

Their meeting wasn't face-to-face, but rather via a video conference connection provided by the U.S. military and set up at the offices of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Kabul. The video conference program is a compromise between the U.S. military authorities and the Red Cross.

Each family call is limited to 20 minutes – but after many months, sometimes years, of no communication, it is better than nothing.

 "We consider this as a positive intermediary step between nothing and face-to-face visits," said Graziella Leite Piccolo, the spokeswoman for the Red Cross in Kabul. "We continue to pressure, to insist on the relevance of face-to-face visits," she said.

VIDEO: Mirwali, seen here, is driven to tears while speaking to his father via video conference

Â

Red Cross connection
There have been more than 600 family video conference calls since the program started in January of this year – a lifeline for families who had lost all hope of ever seeing their loved ones again.   

Dozens of families turn up at the Red Cross offices in Kabul every Monday to wait their turn at the video booths provided by the U.S. military. 

The Red Cross does the legwork. The detainee writes the names of the family members he would like to come to Kabul to take part in the call. All names are then vetted by the Americans -- only family members; no friends. 

With the help of the Afghan Red Crescent Society, the family is then contacted – some live in the most remote and inaccessible parts of the country – travel expenses, food and lodging for the relatives are paid for by the Red Cross. Each family is assigned a specific date and time for their call and no more than five relatives are allowed in the booth.

Sometimes a detainee may not include a family member on their list of names because they fear the person may be too old, or too ill, to make the journey. But the family member may show up anyway, some so frail they can barely walk – refusing to miss the opportunity to talk to a loved one.

One old man – the deep furrows in his face framed by his white turban and long white beard – was barely able to stand, even with the help of his cane. He stood outside and watched through the glass window of the booth as his son's image appeared on the TV screen inside. He cried and banged his head on the closed door, but only his other children sitting inside were able to take part in the call – his son had not put his name on the list.

Carol Grisanti/ NBC News

Relatives watch a video conference call between family members and prisoners at Bagram Airbase in Kabul from outside the secure booth.

The U.S. military is holding between 600-650 detainees at the highly secretive Bagram detention center, which was opened in 2002. The authorities do not permit any information to leak out about who is incarcerated there – some have been high value targets in the war on terror. There are cases of detainees held without charges for as long as five years, according to human rights lawyers and the Red Cross.

Sometimes U.S. raids are triggered by bad intelligence or just bad tips that are based on local vendettas in this tribal society. The problem for U.S. and NATO forces is how can they tell what's real from what is someone's chance to finally settle an old score with a neighbor.

The U.S. military has recently established "enemy combatant review boards" that will examine every six months whether a detainee can be released. The prisoners cannot introduce outside testimony for their defense and have no access to independent lawyers.

Mirwali, who like most Afghans goes by only one name, said his father is an elder in their village and often acted as an intermediary between the people and the local government to resolve differences and negotiate on issues. He was taken one night after U.S. forces raided their home. The family doesn't know why.

"They came with their dogs and forced their way into our home firing their weapons," Mirwali said in an interview at the Red Cross office in Kabul. "Then they unleashed their dogs on two of my sisters." 

The U.S. military does not comment on the status of detainees. 

In the tribal culture of Afghanistan, there are strict rules – no one but immediate family members dare enter a home without first knocking and asking for permission.

Mirwali doesn't understand why the Americans didn't ask the local governor to bring his father in for questioning if they suspected him of some crime.   

"We are ordinary people," he said. "We are not linked to the Taliban. The Taliban come and destroy the roads and the schools that the government is trying to build. The government is trying to improve our life. The Taliban want to destroy all of that."

Mirwali explained that many people were not happy with the Taliban because they did not respect individuals and now they believe the Americans are doing the same thing.

Carol Grisanti/NBC News

A man speaks with his father, who is detained in the U.S. military prison at Bagram Airbase in Kabul, via a video conference call from the International Red Cross.

Reconnected, for a short time
When Mirwali finally got the chance to see his father, it took him a moment to regain his composure and then he asked, "How are you, father?"

He wanted to reassure him that no harm had come to the rest of the family as a result of his detention.

"Please believe me, father, we are all fine. If you are thinking something bad has happened to anyone of us, you are wrong, I swear to God. Father, father, please believe me," Mirwali pleaded with his father who was also crying.

Soon Mirwali's 20 minutes were up; his father's face abruptly disappeared from the screen and the line was cut. He put down the old-fashioned black telephone receiver and walked away –another family was waiting for their turn in the booth.

The school children of one Chinese village suffered dramatically different fates. NBC News' Adrienne Mong reports from the mountain village of Xiang'e.

VIDEO: A tale of two schools

By Adrienne Mong, NBC News Producer

XIANG'E, Sichuan Province –  It's common to witness outpourings of generosity during a natural disaster. Moved by tragic and horrific images in the aftermath of last Monday's quake, ordinary Chinese have rushed to donate whatever they can – money, rescue equipment, food, and clothing. 

But here, in Sichuan, we have seen generosity of a different order, coming from a most unexpected place – the quake's victims.

NBC News/Adrienne Mong

Millions of Chinese have rushed to volunteer to help quake survivors.Â

Take Han Dai Gui, whom we met overlooking the valley in Chenjiaba. The migrant worker had finally arrived back in his home village from Shanxi province the same morning we interviewed him – only to find that the quake had swept his wife and his home into the valley below.

As we, humbled and overwhelmed by the magnitude of his loss, took our leave, Han brushed the tears away from his red-rimmed eyes and thanked us for taking the time to listen to his story.

It was the same with Wu Xiu Ping, 39, who we met in Xiang'e. Wu lost his only child, a 13-year-old daughter, when her four-story school crumbled into a giant pile of stone and dust when the quake hit.  Three days passed before Wu was able to find his daughter's body.

Wu's sadness at his loss was only overmatched by his anger at local town authorities for having permitted the use of shoddy construction materials for his daughter's school. "It's important that this never happens again," he told us. "Thank you for reporting this story."

That's not all. 

Standing before a tiny makeshift tent that's become their temporary home after their house was damaged by the quake, Wu and his wife pressed into our hands several precious bottles of water.   

NBC News/Adrienne Mong

The central district of Xiang'e town six days after the quake.Â

"Please take it," they insisted despite our loud protestations.  And then to our embarrassed astonishment, they added, "You need it.  You journalists work hard.  Ni men hen xin ku."

The characters "ni men" translate to the plural form of "you," while the characters, "xin ku," mean literally "hard and bitter." As a common Chinese phrase, "xin ku" means to suffer hardship. 

And we have heard it from every grieving family we have met here, "Your work is hard, you are suffering to come here to see us."

VIDEO: China begins day of mourning

"How can you say that to us?" we say to them.  "After what you have just suffered, what we are doing is nothing."

Arguably, the victims of Sichuan have lost everything 

But not their dignity or their generous capacity for humanity.

Click here to see a list of agencies accepting China quake donations 

 SICHUAN PROVINCE, China – I moved to China from California, so earthquakes are unfortunately familiar. But even in California, the most populous state in the U.S., the epicenter of any quake is often located in a place where it doesn't seem to do much harm: in the woods or off the coast. Here in Sichuan province, I thought it was tragic that an epicenter located so far from a city center could be blamed for so many deaths – including 70 percent of the 10,000 residents in a town called Yingxiu. Why did this happen? And how were the town's survivors coping days later?

I'm curious to find out, so we set out for the town, located in the scenic mountains of Sichuan province that are the habitat of the giant panda. We know there will be challenges getting there. The town itself is in a fairly remote area to begin with; access has been blocked further by damaged roads and falling debris. With my GPS in hand and a knowledgeable local guide behind the wheel, we set out for Yingxiu, dodging road closures, convoys and landslides. As we move closer to our destination, it's remarkable to see the impact of this quake: not just damaged structures but also the countless people living street side in makeshift tents. They are everywhere.

msnbc.com

We move through the city of Dujiangyan and see a gathering of residents standing outside a partially collapsed apartment building. A yellow heavy hydraulic shovel is there with its arm extended onto an exposed section of apartment floor. Both lurching and delicate at once, the shovel paws at a section of debris, moving it off the floor and away, we soon learn, from another fatality of this earthquake. Notification of next of kin is instant, with the sound of a wail from a relative watching from the crowd. She soon learns that three other relatives also died in that apartment. With casualties this high and widespread, death is not always dignified for the victims or their families. We leave.

As we head into the mountains it's apparent we are getting closer to Yingxiu. Its proximity can be measured by the increase in emergency vehicles and rigidity of the guards limiting access to the hardest-hit areas – though we have permission to be here. If our van is not allowed through the access point, then the question is how to get up the mountain. We spot some local motorcyclists and immediately begin negotiations. We are told they can take us to a point at the river where we can try to hire a private boat and move us closer to the town. As it turns out, none of this is necessary. Our driver gets the van through, and as we make our way up the hill, we learn from a soldier that Yingxiu has been hastily abandoned by the surviving residents. We find them on a roadside turnout waiting for buses, tractors, anything to take them down the mountain. Their stories are horrific. One man tells us the ground shook so hard, that everyone was knocked off their feet. A woman says she had no food for four days and bad weather and conditions prevented her from escaping. Her only nourishment was rainwater that she scooped from the ground. The most disturbing story comes from a resident who said most of the town's children died because they weren't fast enough to escape the heavier debris when it started to fall.

Ng Han Guan/AP

Damage in Yingxiu, China.

It is the number of fatalities, both young and old, that is why these residents are here. There are so many bodies in Yingxiu, says one man, that they fear disease is going to break out. "We ran for our lives as fast as we could."

Unlike so many rural Chinese who are determined to rebuild their homes and lives, the survivors of Yingxiu don't appear to be looking back. A bus approaches and they jam the door, competing for a seat. Our journey concludes as theirs begins – though theirs is a race to nowhere. Many have no idea where they will go next. They are positive only that they don't want to be here.

(For a Newsweek interactive map of the stricken area, including aerial images of the devastation in Yingxiu, click here.)  

By Adrienne Mong, NBC News Producer

CHENJIABA, Sichuan Province – It all started out friendly enough.

Our team ran into a pair of young volunteer rescue workers in the ghostly mountain village of Chenjiaba.

They were drawn to NBC News cameraman Dmitry Solovyov and his TV camera, offering to carry his tripod, even his backpack, while chatting amiably with researcher Sarah Jiang and me about the work they'd done in the quake-devastated area.

It was the same when we met Gao, who was overseeing a brigade of firemen from Ningxia province who had just arrived. He was fresh-faced and ready for the daunting clean-up challenges that lie ahead.

VIDEO: Chinese media unusually open up after quake

"You media are very hard-working," said the jovial-looking Gao. "Coming to report this story is not easy."

"Oh, we think your job is much tougher," we chorused back. "What you're doing is so admirable."

It wasn't long before our little lovefest came to an end.

Change of tune
As Dmitry filmed the firemen sifting through the debris of a collapsed town market, Gao and his sidekick began to get uneasy and started to ask questions.

"Who do you work for?" demanded Gao's sidekick, who refused to give his name. "Do you have permission to be here?"

Adrienne Mong / NBC News

A flattened building in Chenjiaba

As Sarah tried to mollify him, Gao saw me clipping on a microphone for a stand-up I was preparing to file. Immediately he demanded that we stop filming.

"I don't want you press reporting about my men. I don't want you using them as a background and saying negative things like CNN did with their Tibet reporting," he said.

CNN and a handful of other western media outlets had been accused in China's blogosphere of deliberate bias against the Chinese in its coverage of the Tibet unrest in March. 

Adrienne Mong / NBC News

Firemen from Ningxia Province on the move in Chenjiaba.

We went ahead with our stand-up, but an attempt to film a second one was blocked by a fireman.

"I can't let you film here. You are interfering with our work," said Gao.

"But we have permission to be here, given by your superiors, and you are interfering with our work," I responded.

Gao walked away. We walked away.

The two young rescue volunteers watched this exchange with interest. One of them whispered to me, "Are you German media?"

He was referring to the Berliner Morgenpost, a German newspaper vilified on Chinese websites for publishing a photograph of Nepalese troops beating up Tibetan protesters and running a caption that mistakenly identified the Nepalese as Chinese soldiers.

We sighed. No, we were not German media. He smiled apologetically and hoisted Dmitry's knapsack back on his shoulders and picked up the tripod, offering to continue showing us around Chenjiaba.

By Adrienne Mong, NBC News producer

CHENGDU, China – From the air, as we approached Chengdu, it looked much like it did when we were last here in March to cover the Tibet unrest.

Residential high-rises and skyscrapers stood tall. Roads looked intact. And traffic seemed as congested as usual. Maybe, I thought, the Chinese authorities had really been able to enforce tough building codes after the last quake in 1976 in Tangshan killed a quarter of a million people. 

But as we piled into the car ready to drive off from the airport, the vehicle began to shake.  I looked up accusingly at the driver, who shouted, "It's the earthquake!"

VIDEO: Adrienne Mong reports on the Chinese rescue effort from the sceneÂ

The aftershock subsided, and we drove on in search of supplies of bottled water before trying to link up with correspondent Ian Williams and his team up in Dujiangyan, one of the worst-hit areas outside of Chengdu.

But there were no bottles of water to be found. "People are afraid the water is polluted," explained our driver. "They heard the quake may have damaged some chemical factories, leaking into the water supply."

The highway out of Chengdu was closed off by the time we made it to the turn-off so we travelled on a local road.  Along the way more signs of the quake appeared. There were half-crumbled walls, collapsed roofs, clusters of local residents sheltering from the setting sun under sheets of tarpaulin.

In Juyuan, about 30 minutes outside of Chengdu, we finally stopped to look around.  The signs of devastation here were much clearer. Entire buildings were razed to the ground. Debris lay everywhere.  Families with piles of belongings sat around under plastic sheeting on makeshift furniture. Some looked listless.  Others chatted amongst themselves as though it were any other summer's night.

At the far end of one road, we saw a group of men sitting around smoking.  Behind them was a gate to a middle school, where up to 100 or so teenage students were still buried.  We were not allowed any closer, but we could see two large cranes worked steadily in the distance.

There were no families wailing. Just an eerie silence.

"We're fumigating here now," said a young man. As he spoke, the sound of firecrackers punctuated the air. Ordinarily firecrackers are used in China to ward off evil spirits, especially at weddings but also at funerals.

Here in Juyuan, it was the sound of mourners wishing safe passage for the souls of the deceased journeying to their next life.

JERUSALEM – Women screaming and children trying to escape a village on fire.

These are just two of the images that two Palestinian sisters, Fatima and Zeinab Jaber, 65 and 71, live with from an event they witnessed 60 years ago.

They are haunted, too, by the memory of their mother, Nuzah, who they recall crying as she rushed members of their family to safety.

And they are their last recollections of their home, the village of Deir Yassin, as it was being overrun and destroyed by armed Jewish militant groups.

VIDEO: Palestinians mark 'the catastrophe'

The attack on Deir Yassin in April 1948 is one of the most well-documented in a series of expulsions the former British Mandate of Palestine that led up to the foundation of Israel – an episode that Palestinian recall bitterly as "Nakba" ("the Catastrophe").

So while Israelis are celebrating 60 years of independence on May 14, many Palestinians will be commemorating what they call "Catastrophe Day" on May 15 – an annual day of remembrance for the hundreds of thousands of Arabs who were displaced as Israel was being born.

'I still hear my brother's voice screaming'
As a result of fighting leading up to Israel's declaration of independence and the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, approximately 700,000 Palestinians were forced off their land. They were either expelled by the Haganah, a military force which later became the core of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), and other paramilitary groups, or they fled under the threat of more violence.

Up to 418 Arab villages in Palestine were taken over by Israelis during the period, and the massacre at Deir Yassin is remembered as one of the most brutal episodes of the time. 

"I still hear my brother's voice screaming before they killed him, my grandmother was begging them to leave him alone," said Fatima Jaber, while her sister nodded in silent agreement during a recent interview. (Fatima married, but kept her family name). They now live in a tiny house in Beit Hanina, a predominantly Arab neighborhood in East Jerusalem.

"We lost all our family. The Jews killed my father, grandmother and my brother before we ran away with my mother that day. After a while we knew that 47 relatives were killed," said Zeinab, as she started crying like a child. "My brother was about to get married the same week.  He was 22 years old. [Now] we are living alone without any family."

The Deir Yassin village was located in the hills next to the Jewish neighborhood of Givat Shaul, on the outskirts of what is now West Jerusalem. There are various accounts of what happened in Deir Yassin, but there is agreement on the essentials – that two underground Jewish paramilitary groups, the Lehi and the Irgun – the latter by headed by Menachem Begin, a future Israeli prime minister – attacked the village on April 9, 1948. 

According to most reliable reports, a force of 132 men from these units killed between 107-120 villagers – including men, women and children. (For years the death toll was cited as 254, but Bir Zeit University, a prominent Arab university on the West Bank, published a comprehensive study in 1987 and found that the death toll did not exceed 120).  

Palestinian relatives of residents of the Arab village of Deir Yassin stand over plaques listing the names of more than 100 people killed by pre-state Israeli paramilitary groups as they mark the 60th anniversary of the attack on April 10, 2008.

Campaign of terror
The massacre is considered by many historians to be part of a strategy to terrify the Palestinian populations enough so that they would leave their homes and land, thus enabling them to be occupied by Jews.

Benny Morris, an Israeli historian who has written extensively about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in his books "The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947-49," first published in 1988, and this year's "1948: A History of the First Arab-Israeli War," has documented  at least 24 massacres, including Deir Hassin, committed by Israeli forces against Palestinians between 1947-49. 

Fatima and Zeinab say that Deir Yassin left their mother a broken woman. "She kept crying until she died. She was only 45 years old," said Fatima. "I will never forget it. She was missing my father and brother all the time. The memories killed her."

David Ben-Gurion, Israel's founding father, noted that the Deir Yassin massacre was a trigger for other evacuations of Palestinians, without which the Israeli state could not have been born. "I support compulsory transfer," he insisted at the time. "I don't see in it anything immoral," Ben-Gurion is quoted as saying in Morris' book "Righteous Victims: A History of the Zionist-Arab Conflict, 1881-2001." In the Arab world, though, the perception hardened that the birth of Israel came at the expense of the Palestinian refugee problem.

Refugee problem persists
Today, according to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), at least 5 million Palestinians and their descendants are registered as refugees. The figure includes hundreds of thousands who became refugees as a result of the Six-Day War in 1967, when Israel occupied the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem. As refugees, those living in other countries such as Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria, are not recognized as citizens and have few rights, despite living there for decades. In effect they are stateless unless and until a Palestinian state is created.

The fate of the Jaber family is typical of many Palestinians. They lived in Jordan for two years, then moved to Jericho and after five years moved to Jerusalem, when the sisters' mother wanted to be close to what was once their home.

Many have given up hope of returning to the homes they lost in 1948; instead, they watch with bitterness and sadness the celebrations for Israel's 60 years of statehood, which they feel came at their expense.

"I feel ashamed to be a refugee," said Zeinab. "Three months ago we went to Deir Yassin; our house is used as a storage place for hospital workers. I want my family house back," she said.

And as the U.S. struggles to keep Israel and the Palestinian Authority committed to making an arrangement that will lead to the creation of a two-nation state, it is the plight of the refugees – most particularly, whether they should be allowed to return to their original homes or what is sufficient compensation – that still proves to be one of the biggest obstacles for a lasting peace.

"How can Israel celebrate when we still have this refugee problem?" said Fatima, who is the mother of 11 children.

"They created it, and now it's worse. This is the question my children are now asking."

Lawahez Jabiri is an NBC News Producer based in the Tel Aviv bureau.  

Click here for more on Israel's at 60:
Bush visits Israel for 60th celebrations amid new attacks in Gaza
NBC News Tel Aviv Bureau Chief Martin Fletcher: Israel at 60 - a land of contradictions
Rice: Mideast peace improbably, not impossible
Slideshow: As Israel turns 60, a look at the Jewish state's turbulent past 
NBC News Cairo Producer Charlene Gubash: Arabs not celebrating Israel's 60th birthday

BANGKOK, Thailand – Let's hear it for freedom of speech! Tibet, Zimbabwe and now Myanmar are all refusing access to journalists who want to report on the hardships of their people.

In Tibet, the Chinese are clamping down in fear that unrest will spoil the summer Olympics in Beijing; Tibetans complain of beatings and killings. In Zimbabwe, President Robert Mugabe is hanging on grimly, trying to overthrow an apparent election loss by subterfuge and violence, after running his country into the ground for twenty years. And in Myanmar, after 46 years of iron rule by a military junta, the generals wants to stop outsiders from witnessing the devastation of Cyclone Nargis. They're afraid of a threat to their power.

As a journalist who has tried to enter each of these places in the last three months and failed – my heart goes out to the citizens under stress, whose stories I would dearly like to tell, in the hope some good would come of it.

But my predominant emotion is thanks to the world into which I was fortunate enough to be born. My world has enough food and my vote is a force that cannot be changed, unlike Zimbabwe; I can say what I like, unlike in Tibet; and I know I can count on my government in case of a natural disaster, unlike in Myanmar.

Aid not reaching those who need it
As I write, more natural disasters are unfolding: in China, a severe earthquake has buried hundreds of schoolchildren and killed thousands of people – with fears that the death toll could climb sharply. The United States is just recovering from a tornado and deaths in Missouri, Oklahoma and Georgia. How basic it seems for citizens to expect help, and indeed American and Chinese authorities have rushed to the aid of their victims.

And how hard it is to imagine a place like Myanmar where the government prefers to hold a referendum on a constitution rather than delay it in order to help the victims of the cyclone. Girls danced and balloons were released into the air to celebrate the vote. 

One British television correspondent working undercover in Myanmar reported that local citizens he spoke to thought that about 1,000 of their countrymen had died in the cyclone; that's what they were being told by their own media. Foreign aid officials believe the toll of dead or missing may be as high as 100,000, and many more could die from disease due to lack of clean water, food and medical supplies. The British aid organization Oxfam warned that 1.5 million survivors face death from disease and starvation.

Aid is beginning to reach the hungry, thirsty, sick survivors, but at this point, it has been over a week since the cyclone hit.

Imagine huddling under a tree with dozens of others, your back flayed open by the whipping leaves and branches in the water, and there's no medication; the wind is severe and it's raining hard, you're hungry and there's no food, and the only water to drink is the floodwater that surrounds you, which is polluted by the corpses of humans and animals bobbing around you. Your children are crying and the old people are sick. And you look into the sky for planes or across the water for rescue boats, and they both stretch to the horizon and are empty.

That's the situation described by aid officials who are frustrated beyond comprehension at the obstructive response of the Myanmar government.

By Irina Prentice

BEIRUT – By Friday afternoon, the street battles which have flared across Beirut over the last three days seemed to have abated somewhat, though sporadic gunfire could still be heard in different areas of the city.

During these tense 72 hours, mostly Shiite Hezbollah and Amal gunmen managed to seize nearly all of the Lebanese capital's Sunni Muslim sector from foes loyal to the U.S.-backed government. At least 11 people have been killed and more than 20 wounded in the armed conflict between the Iranian and Syrian backed Hezbollah fighters and gunmen loyal to the government.

SLIDESHOW: Fighting roils Beirut

Beirut, perched between the sparkling Mediterranean and a green mountain range, has been badly shaken by the violence – the worst sectarian clashes the country has seen since the 15-year civil war from 1975-1990. The skirmishes echo off the mountains, amplifying the sound of explosions as they occur.

Throughout Thursday night, heavy fighting took place, with machine gun fire, rocket-propelled grenades and pistol shots making sleep almost impossible for most residents. Compounding the magnitude of the sound was a thunderstorm, which unexpectedly erupted in the same way the armed conflict had a few hours earlier.

"The thunderstorm… eerie timing" said Hanna Defuria, visiting her sister who just moved to Beirut two weeks ago. "It was hard to tell what was thunder and what were gunshots, but when the storm passed there were no gunshots."

Added Laura Defuria, Hanna's sister: "Amazingly, I don't feel unsafe. Maybe it is because I am new to the situation, but I feel like it is far away although it is very close."

The sisters are indeed close to the action – they are staying in an apartment on the same street where Saad Hariri, one of Lebanon's top Sunni lawmakers, lives. Head of the Future Movement and deputy in the parliament, Hariri's residence suffered damage from a rocket-propelled grenade, and the television station and newspaper affiliated with his political party were attacked and ransacked.

The Beirut residents who actually managed to sleep during the night woke up to television images displaying empty streets patrolled by armed militiamen. Damage displayed on the news varied from pockmarked storefronts to shot-up cars parked in the street. 

A U.S. citizen studying at the American University of Beirut said "that bullets whizzed by my place in the night." A little shook up, he commented on the relaxing atmosphere in mostly Christian East Beirut, which had remained mostly free of violence.

Meantime, Joe, a supporter of the Hezbollah opposition, expressed his pleasure at the turn of events. (Like most people I spoke to, he asked that his last name not be used because of the volatility of the situation.)

"Look, it is time that there is a change in the government," he said. "They have been robbing the country blind, and this is simply unacceptable." According to him, Hezbollah is only doing what is best for Lebanon, and will pull back once a change in the government takes place.

But supporters of the current government are fearful that a forceful change of guard of the government will lead to a Shiite takeover, and lead to an invitation for Syria's return. "The situation is not good," said Anthony, a supporter of the current government led by Prime Minister Fuad Saniora. "Stay home today if you can."

Not knowing what to expect, Beirutis in the Christian neighborhood of Achrafiye piled into a nearby supermarket to stock up on provisions for the next few days. Fresh produce shelves were emptied by mid-day and there were long lines at the checkout counter.

Gas stations also experienced increased activity. "Things are calm, but if they get bad again … I will take my family to the mountains," said one driver.

Although the atmosphere seemed to have calmed by Friday afternoon, most people seemed to be staying indoors and watching the situation carefully – walking in the quiet streets you can hear the sound of television reports drifting out of open windows.

"We are all on standby," said a man named Mustafa who, like many others, had been following the news all day.

For more information click here: Q & A: What's happening in Lebanon? NBC News' Richard Engel explains the issues behind the battles in Beirut

NBC News Mushtaq Yusufzai is the first recipient of the Agence France Press Kate Webb Award which was set up to honor one of the news agency's top foreign correspondents who died in 2007.

Yusufzai, 32, won the prize for his in-depth reporting and analysis on the complex situation in Pakistan's tribal areas.

His daily reports for "The News," one of Pakistan's leading English language daily newspapers and his blogs for msnbc.com were cited as exceptional work in dangerous and difficult circumstances.

NBC News

Faqir Mohammed, left, speaks with NBC News Mushtaq Yusufzai, center, at his remote mountain top stronghold near the Pakistan/ Afghanistan border while Faqir's bodyguards stand by in rear.

In pursuit of the story, Yusufzai has been wounded by the Taliban, caught in cross-fire between Taliban militants and Pakistan's security forces, dodged U.S. predator drone attacks, and was arrested and harassed by Pakistan's intelligence agents – all while on assignment for NBC News.

In addition to the honor of the prize, Yusufzai was awarded $8,000 so he can pursue an opportunity to work on a story that he otherwise may not be able to afford to.

A native Pashtun, from the Northwest Frontier Province, he intends to use the funds to trace the movement of people from Western countries into the tribal areas who then go on to fight U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan.  "I want to find out who finances these people," he said.

Read some of Yusufzai' award-winning reports from the field for NBC News' World Blog: Face to face with a Taliban commander
Taliban Mullah talks
How two teens were recruited for jihad
In tribal Pakistan, a shave may cost your life
One-way ticket Pakistan to Afghanistan, $4 please
Pakistan and U.S. - still best of friends?

 
CAIRO, Egypt - Israel's celebration of 60 years of independence is clearly more bitter than sweet for Arabs, who refer to the 1948 war marking their defeat as "Al Nakba," or "The Catastrophe."

While the anniversary of the birth of the Israel represents the fulfillment of a dream for Jewish people, for many Arabs it is a day of remembrance for the estimated 700,000 Palestinians who were forced to flee their homeland as a result of the Arab loss.

Several wars and peace agreements later, Arabs want peace, but view Israel with mistrust, as a belligerent nation that talks peace but actively works to deny the Palestinians a viable state.

Israel's plan for A-list independence anniversary celebrations has rankled many Arab observers. President Bush is expected to attend anniversary celebrations in Jerusalem next week, along with Tony Blair, the former British prime minister and current envoy for the International Quartet, former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, and a host of other leaders of countries from Burkina Faso to Ukraine.

"While Israel will be showered with words of admiration and congratulations, principally by those countries that helped create it, the Palestinians will be huddled together in exile or under military occupation," wrote one editorialist in the Saudi daily Arab News.

That anger extends to the man who is often seen as Israel's staunchest ally - Bush - who is expected to visit Saudi Arabia and Egypt after the festivities in Israel.

"Syrians feel offended that President Bush will be received warmly in Arab countries at a time when Gazans are killed, surrounded, jailed and tortured," said Thabet Salem, a Syrian journalist.

Israel's anniversary comes at a time of increasing frustration with the Middle East peace process. Even Egypt and Jordan, Israel's two main Arab partners, are hugely disappointed that successive peace agreements have not led to wider regional stability.

"People were thrilled when they signed a peace treaty," Ica Wahbeh, managing editor of the Jordan Times daily newspaper, said of the 1994 deal signed by Israeli Prime Minister Yitzak Rabin and King Hussein of Jordan. "They [thought we] would have peace and economic prosperity."

Instead, Wahbeh said, many Jordanians have grown tired of the lack of progress. "So many years on, nothing has happened and nothing appears to be happening. They are frustrated."

Salama Ahmed Salama, an Egyptian editorialist, echoed Wahbe's comments, "Peace with Israel has not met expectations to establish a more peaceful environment," said Salama. As a result, he said, many in the Arab world "look at Israel's strategic or national motives with suspicion."

Salama believes Egyptians are also frustrated with decades of failed peace negotiations with Israel. While people don't want war, they would like to see a strong Egyptian government that was capable of delivering concrete results in the peace process, while not caving in to U.S. pressure.

While many are frustrated by the lack of political progress, peace partners and enemies alike also fear Israel's nuclear and conventional military advantage and readiness to attack. "Israel is not a threat to Jordan. But look what it is doing by proxy: The U.S. is threatening Iran and Syria - and everybody is blaming Israel," said Wahbeh. She added that Israel's military capability has led to a "vicious circle that doesn't help anyone."

Likewise, Salama believes people must question Israel's intent when it conducts raids in Syria or invades Lebanon, and he finds it hard to see the Jewish nation as a "peaceful entity." He believes that U.S. mediation attempts have failed because Israel isn't interested in negotiation, but only "tries to achieve goals by military force and power."

That threat of military force is acutely felt in Lebanon, where Hannah Anbar, associate publisher of the Daily Star newspaper in Beirut, says fear of Israel is "ever present in daily life."

"It is a country that has attacked Lebanon in one way or another five or six times, in addition to daily reconnaissance flights over Lebanon," said Anbar. "So it's not like it is something that is in our imagination."

In addition to the fears created by Israel's military strength, the regional arms race has taken an indirect toll on neighboring countries, which have invested heavily in defense rather than much needed development. For example, Syria once spent up to 75 percent of its budget on defense and now spends 40 percent, according to Salem.

In Egypt, successive wars have also sapped the nation's resources. Dr. Abdel Moneim Said, Director of the Al Ahram Center for Strategic and Political Studies in Cairo, believes that the border tension with Israel has taken its toll on society - making it "much more militarized than necessary."

Some feel the perceived threat from Israel has given leaders a convenient excuse to exert control with an iron fist and resist democratic reform.

"This tragedy has been the crux of the problems in the whole Middle East. All the revolutions, coup d'etats, lack of democracy is because we have an enemy called Israel - so everything is being put on hold," said Anbar of the Daily Star.

Others believe that anger at Israel has inspired Islamic militancy and made it harder to contain.

"Young men can be easily recruited," said Wahbeh. "They find an enemy and fixate on it, and Israel doesn't help. The U.S. and Israel are interchangeable."

But despite hard-bitten cynicism toward Israel, even its most outspoken adversaries recognize the need for peace. "Syrians are known to be relentless," said Salem. "But over the years the mood has changed. They prefer peace to war. Not to mean they accept Israel as a state, but they prefer peace definitely. They have changed their views drastically."

More on Israel's 60th anniversary:
World Blog: Israel at 60 - a land of contradictions
SLIDESHOW: As Israel turns 60, a look at the country's turbulent past
CNBC Special Report: Israeli industry at 60

 

MOSCOW –  Russia inaugurated a new president today. And while there was never really any doubt or drama in the March presidential elections here – Dmitry Medvedev was assured of victory the moment Vladimir Putin announced him as his chosen successor – it is still a mystery what exactly this inauguration will mean for Russia.

Since the elections, Russian media and chat rooms have been trying to guess what the power balance will look like after Medvedev takes over the presidency and Putin becomes prime minister – which is expected as early as Thursday.

VIDEO: Who is Medvedev?

The question is: who will really be in charge? Can a "tandem-ocracy," with two leaders at the head, actually work – or will there be power struggles between the two? Media reports say Putin may have as many as 11 deputy prime ministers. The president is the stronger post on paper, but can Medvedev compete with the political capital that Putin enjoys?

For some Russians, it doesn't really matter. Many people I spoke to had no idea when the inauguration is – which may be just the way the Kremlin wants it.

Masha Lipman, a Russia affairs expert at the Carnegie Moscow Center, said that Putin has established a "non-participation pact" with the Russian public. "People accepted it…as long as you deliver, we will not meddle in politics."

While Western media and governments may criticize what it perceives to be a rollback of democracy in Russia, many here simply want the stability, economic growth and newfound feeling of patriotic pride that Putin's era brought to continue.

Enjoying a sunny day on Red Square this past weekend, retired teacher Irina Ivanova, 73, said she "hopes that the new president will be like Putin. The respect that he commands in the world…he's beginning to lift this country up."

Part of Putin's popularity here is due to the fact that he had such an easy act to follow – almost everyone I spoke to compared Putin's era favorably to the chaos of Yeltsin's.

"Putin is better than any president we've ever had," said Lina Fasulakis, a Moscow businesswoman. "Medvedev will be more of the same. He's Putin's chosen successor."

But it looks like a simple comparison to the past may no longer be enough. While acknowledging Putin's accomplishments, many feel the new president has to start delivering more concrete results. Sasha Zhukov, a 25 year-old engineer, said that the biggest problem is corruption.

"Putin hasn't really done anything about it. We need more active reform," he said, waiting on line at McDonald's outside the Kremlin walls.

These reforms include translating the petrorubles that Russia enjoys from high oil prices into actual improvements on the ground – better infrastructure, overhauling the healthcare system and figuring out a way to check inflation.

"All this money goes to the bureaucrats!" complained Yulya Ivanova, an industrial manager. "I love Russia, but I don't love the Russian government. And Putin is …"

"Quiet!" Her mother, Larisa, cut her off. "If you say that about Putin, he'll print it and then it'll come back to hurt you!"

"We still have freedom of speech here, don't we?" Yulya shot back.

Israel's logo for its 60th anniversary harks back to the good old days – an innocent boy in shorts romping with a variation of the Israeli flag unfurling behind him.

But you can't please everyone. One orthodox Jewish member of parliament trashed the symbol, saying the child looks "frumpy and should get a haircut." 

That could sum up the reservations of many Israelis about their country as its leaders prepare to celebrate its 60th anniversary.

SLIDESHOW: As Israel turn's 60, a look at the country's turbulent past

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Festivities being met with a yawn
President Bush will be coming later in the month for part of the festivities, reportedly with about 800 of his closest friends and bodyguards. And a dozen other leaders from countries as diverse as Rwanda, Burkina Faso and Latvia, will attend too, along with the world's A-list of party stars Tony Blair, Henry Kissinger and Mikhail Gorbachev. Paris Hilton will be absent, to the chagrin of ordinary Israelis, who appear to be treating the party with a yawn.

For most people Independence Day on Thursday will proceed as usual – children spraying each other with string foam and hitting each other on the head with squeaky plastic hammers, a violent custom that apparently goes back to the days of pre-plastic Persia; barbeques on every square foot of public space; and car drivers flying the Israeli flag. It's a raucous annual celebration of what Israelis see as one of the great achievements of the twentieth century: After 2,000 years, the return of the Jews to the land of Zion.

The ensuing conflict with the Palestinians over the right to the land, the tarnishing of the Jewish dream in the face of brute reality, the wake-up call of the need to survive, none of these harsh facts detract from the central achievement, that a persecuted people never gave up on their dream and 2,000 years after their expulsion, and dispersal around the globe, gathered together again, revived their dead language, and created one of the world's most exciting countries.

I've reported from Israel for almost half its lifetime. What always strikes me is the contradiction between the glory of its existence and the mundane reality of what it takes to exist. One friend, an archaeologist and former Mossad agent, summed up his varied interests saying that his two worlds complement each other perfectly. In one he collects and analyses data to understand the past, in the other he collects and analyses data to understand the future. 

For me, that sums up the central dilemma of Israel, where the past determines the future: how to exist as a light unto nations, according to its own high standard, in a region where, just to survive, it has adopted the harsh methods of its neighborhood, so successfully that it is known as the neighborhood bully.

Israel is a land of contradictions: a desert that reaches the sea; snow-capped mountains with ski resorts two hours away from sun-drenched beaches; Jerusalem, the heart of three great religions, where the prayers never end, less than an hour from the fleshpots of Tel Aviv, the city that never sleeps. Centers of hi-tech and innovation alongside the greatest biblical scholars in the world, a powerful military force pitted daily against home-made rockets, a vibrant economy with one of the world's strongest currencies and one of the greatest gaps between rich and poor in the developed world.

It's a head-spinning place, and all the more vibrant for it. Few first-time visitors leave without saying something like: "I had no idea what a great place Israel is."

But few visit the 20 foot high wall and fence that is supposed to keep out suicide bombers, or visit a Jewish settlement on the West Bank, or see the fence around Gaza.

For Israel is a bipolar place. One reality exists alongside another: war and peace, love and hate, pain and joy.

Israel at 60 is a fascinating and challenging country, unlike any other.

More on Israel's 60th anniversary:
SLIDESHOW: As Israel turns 60, a look at the country's turbulent past
CNBC Special Report: Israeli industry at 60
World Blog: Arabs not celebrating Israel's 60th birthday