April 27, 1996

The effects of the more than 24,000 Israeli shells and nearly 600 air raids that pounded Lebanon over the last 16 days will be felt long after the guns fall silent early today.

Anthropologists at the Nevada State Museum said today that they had unearthed the oldest known mummy in North America -- and they found it right on their own shelves. The mummy, known as the Spirit Cave man, was found in a Nevada cave in 1940, but advances in radiocarbon dating made only recently allowed scientists to determine, to their amazement, that the remains they had thought dated back about 2,000 years were in fact more than 9,400 years old.

With Europe in the throes of a widespread debate over its economic future, Chancellor Helmut Kohl announced a plan today for long-heralded cuts in Germany's vaunted and well-padded welfare state that threaten social benefits that his compatriots have come to regard as virtually sacrosanct. The proposals, intended to reduce Germany's budget deficit by some $33 billion, reflected a broader sense in Europe that leaner times lie ahead for nations, led by Germany, that are working to fulfill the economic conditions for a single European currency.

Prime Minister Shimon Peres, evidently relieved at being extracted by the American-brokered deal from a military operation that had gone awry, declared today that "Israel comes out of this with more quiet and more strength." The announcement that attacks and counterattacks on civilians in Israel and Lebanon would cease early Saturday cleared the way for Mr. Peres to leave later that day on an official visit to Washington, a trip that was in question as long as the fighting continued.

Responding to the crash of an Air Force passenger plane that killed Commerce Secretary Ronald H. Brown and 34 other people, the Pentagon announced today that it would immediately begin adding better navigation equipment to all 2,800 passenger planes in its fleet. Mr. Brown's plane was more than a mile off course when it hit a mountain on approach to the airport in Dubrovnik, Croatia, on April 3, and many experts believe that more precise navigation instruments would have helped to prevent the accident.