| Jared Kushner’s role in the Gaza deal A rare earths deal between the U.S. and Australia Vietnam War movies |
In plain sight
It took less than 10 minutes.
Thieves broke into the Louvre in broad daylight on Sunday and made off with jewelry said to be of “incalculable” worth, all while visitors and staff members were going about their business in one of the world’s most famous museums.
“The French people,” the country’s justice minister said, “feel as though they have been robbed.”
My colleagues have been reporting on the heist — how the thieves pulled it off, why they did it and what precedents there are for this kind of high-stakes burglary.
How they did it:
With a removal truck, a ladder and a disc cutter.
At 9:30 a.m. on Sunday, four men parked a truck behind the Louvre underneath the first-floor balcony windows of the Apollo Gallery. At 9:34 a.m., they climbed up an electric ladder from the back of the truck. (This truck-mounted ladder — a monte-meubles — is a pretty common sight on the streets of Paris, where it’s used to lift bulky furniture through apartment windows.)
To break into the gallery, they cut the glass with the disc cutter, setting off the security alarm. When confronted by guards, the thieves threatened them with the same tool. Louvre staff members then evacuated the museum.
With the clock ticking, the thieves smashed two display cases.
They grabbed several precious objects, including a sapphire necklace, an emerald necklace and a diadem worn by Empress Eugénie, the wife of Napoleon III, France’s 19th-century ruler.
At 9:38 a.m. — eight minutes after their arrival — the thieves jumped on two high-powered scooters waiting for them outside and rode away.
Why they did it:
The thieves weren’t after art. They only stole jewelry — tiaras, earrings and necklaces — which experts say suggests they were really after diamonds, jewels and precious metals that can be offloaded individually.
A tiara that once belonged to Queen Hortense, for example, contained 24 Ceylon sapphires and 1,083 diamonds. These stones could be sold and reset in new items, undetected. The gold could be melted down and sold, too.
In that sense, the Louvre heist wasn’t really an art crime. It was, as a former leader of the London police force’s art squad told one of our reporters, “commodity theft.”
Commodity thieves generally don’t worry about leaving some valuable pieces behind. The Louvre robbers tried to steal a crown that had belonged to Empress Eugénie, featuring eight gold eagles, 1,354 diamonds, 1,136 rose-cut diamonds and 56 emeralds. But they abandoned it in their haste to leave.
They also didn’t bother with high-profile and easily identifiable pieces, like the Regent and Sancy diamonds, which would have been tricky to sell, even broken up.
| Stephane De Sakutin/AFP — Getty Images, top left and bottom right; Vincent Isore/IP3, via Zuma Press, top right; Eugen Wais/Alamy |
How often do big museums get robbed?
It happens — and more often than you may think.
| Louvre, 1911: On a summer day, Vincenzo Peruggia, a former worker at the Louvre, tucked the Mona Lisa beneath his coat and walked out with it. By the time the painting reappeared, after Peruggia tried to unload it in Italy, the Mona Lisa was no longer merely a portrait, but a legend.National Museum, Oslo, 1994: Like the robbers at the Louvre, two men climbed a ladder and broke a window to steal Norway’s best-known painting, “The Scream” by Edvard Munch. It took them less than a minute, and they left behind a note: “A thousand thanks for your poor security.”Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 2000: As fireworks lit up the night skies to welcome the new millennium, a thief — or perhaps multiple thieves — dropped through a skylight, filled the gallery with smoke, and left minutes later with Cézanne’s “View of Auvers-sur-Oise.” It has not surfaced since.Bode Museum, Berlin, 2017: Thieves stole a giant gold coin worth several million euros, rolling it out in a wheelbarrow. |
| MORE TOP NEWS |
A U.S. push to advance the Gaza plan
Jared Kushner, one of President Trump’s sons-in-law, and Steve Witkoff, the president’s envoy to the Middle East, arrived in Israel yesterday to try to shore up the peace plan for Gaza. Vice President JD Vance was expected to land in Israel today.
The visits come as the cease-fire between Israel and Hamas is showing signs of strain, with each side accusing the other of violating the agreement. And there is growing concern within the Trump administration that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel may vacate the deal, Trump officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
Kushner, who is not a government official and runs an investment firm in Miami, has been a crucial player in negotiations between Hamas and Israel. My colleague Tyler Pager, a White House correspondent, explains Kushner’s role in the video above.
Related: The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a much-criticized aid group run by U.S. security contractors and backed by Israel, has suspended its aid operations because of the cease-fire.
| OTHER NEWS |
| Trump signed an agreement with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of Australia that would give the U.S. access to Australia’s rare earth minerals.A global outage involving Amazon’s cloud service forced hundreds of websites and apps offline, including WhatsApp and Snapchat.A report on a deadly funicular crash in Lisbon last month said that the cable that snapped in the accident had not been cleared for use in public transport.A top Iranian official drew widespread criticism after a video of his daughter’s wedding, which eschewed traditional notions of Islamic morality, spread online. |
| A senior German general told The New York Times that unless Russia was stopped in Ukraine, democracy in the rest of Europe would be at severe risk. |
| Australian officials said that a Chinese fighter jet released flares dangerously close to an Australian Air Force aircraft during patrols over the South China Sea. |
| SPORTS |
Football: Here’s a look back at Manchester United’s shocking win over Liverpool.
Tennis: The race between Mirra Andreeva and Elena Rybakina at the W.T.A. Tour Finals went down to the wire.
Formula 1: Max Verstappen won the U.S. Grand Prix to force himself into the championship race.
| QUOTE OF THE DAY |
“And if you and your policies are at odds with the facts, then you may find it very uncomfortable for people to simply explain the facts.”
Jimmy Wales, one of the founders of Wikipedia, in an interview addressing criticism from the U.S. right that the website’s content is biased.
| MORNING READ |
For centuries, explorers searching for the fabled Northwest Passage through the Arctic Ocean met with disaster. But today, melting sea ice is making the region and its resources more accessible.
That’s fueling an international rivalry. Canada claims sovereignty over the passage, but the U.S. and several other countries say it’s an international waterway. To back up its claim, Canada is relying on the Inuit people. Read more.
| AROUND THE WORLD |
What they’re watching in … Vietnam
Vietnam War movies are well known in the West, but in Vietnam, big-budget films about the conflict are relatively new. Now, they’re breaking local box-office records.
Two recent films — “Dia Dao: Mat Troi Trong Bong Toi” (“Tunnels: Sun in the Dark”) and “Mua do” (“Red Rain”) — have stunned audiences with their Hollywood-style special effects and emotional tales of heroism.
To some, their popularity points to the country’s growing confidence and surging nationalism. To others, the films, made with government financial support, represent a new kind of propaganda: heavily marketed and pop-culture savvy. — Damien Cave, Vietnam bureau chief
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| RECIPE |
Khorak-e loobia sabz, a green bean and chicken stew, is perfect for entertaining without much effort. Fill the dish out with potatoes and carrots. Add saffron, the flag-bearer of many Iranian dishes, for a distinct perfume, earthy and floral notes, and a pop of color. Serve with rice and salad-e Shirazi, a cucumber, tomato and onion salad.
