PAKET UMROH BULAN FEBRUARI MARET APRIL MEI 2018

BANJARNEGARA DITETAPAKAN SEBAGAI WILAYAH SIAGA DARURAT BENCANA

saco-indonesia.com, Bupati Banjarnegara Jawa Tengah, Sutedjo Slamet Utomo telah menetapkan wilayahnya dalam kondisi siaga darurat bencana. Penetapan tersebut telah dilakukan untuk dapat mengantisipasi bencana longsor yang hampir terjadi setiap tahun yang terjadi di Kabupaten Banjarnegara.

"Masa tanggap darurat longsor telah ditetapkan sejak 21 Desember 2013 hingga 3 Januari 2014 mendatang . Sedangkan masa siaga darurat longsor, banjir dan angin puting beliung akan ditetapkan mulai 1 Desember 2013 hingga 28 Februari 2014 mendatang ," kata Sutedjo.

Dalam rentang waktu sejak 19-24 Desember 2013, TELAH tercatat ada beberapa bencana alam yang terjadi di Kabupaten Banjarnegara. Bencana tersebut telah disebabkan oleh curah hujan yang deras, tingginya kerentanan dan batuan labil.

Dari catatan Pemkab, dalam seminggu terakhir, terdata 60 titik di 32 desa yang telah tersebar di 13 kecamatan terjadi bencana alam. Akibat dari bencana tersebut, telah menyebabkan 1 warga meninggal dunia. Sedangkan dalam bentuk kerugian material, sedikitnya 32 rumah rusak berat, 21 rusak sedang, 56 rusak ringan, 135 rumah terancam dan 46 kepala keluarga mengungsi di 5 desa.

Selain itu, kerusakan infrastruktur juga terjadi di 23 titik. Kerusakan infrastruktur telah meliputi jalan, jembatan, sekolah, dan irigasi. Total kerusakan diperkirakan telah mencapai Rp 1,4 miliar. "Saat ini upaya yang telah dilakukan oleh BPBD bersama TNI, Polri, relawan dan masyarakat dengan melakukan evakuasi, pendirian posko, pengiriman logistik, pembersihan material longsor," jelas Sutedjo.

Sementara itu, Kepala Badan Nasional Penanggulangan Bencana (BNPB), Syamsul Maarif, dalam kunjungan kerja ke lokasi longsor di Banjarnegara pada rabu (25/12) kemarin, telah mengapresiasi kinerja Pemkab Banjarnegara dalam penanganan bencana longsor. Selain itu, ia juga meminta adanya peraturan daerah dan pembangunan di Banjarnegara bisa menjauhkan warga dari risiko ketika hidup di daerah bencana alam.

"Bentuk Perda-nya bisa dengan aturan agar tempat hunian lama tidak dihuni kembali, setelah warga relokasi dan bisa dijadikan kawasan konservasi sehingga tidak timbul korban. Selain itu, penduduk juga harus dilibatkan dalam proses pembangunan," ujarnya.

Lebih jauh, ia juga menekankan program penghijauan yang dicanangkan Pemkab, tidak semata hanya berorientasi pada hijau daun, tetapi harus memberikan manfaat ekonomi. "Tanamannya harus mampu mengikat tanah dan ada nilai ekonominya, sehingga bio-engineering bisa dilakukan masyarakat," pesannya.

Dalam kesempatan tersebut, Syamsul juga menyerahkan bantuan dana siap pakai Rp 250 juta, serta logistik peralatan untuk penanganan darurat di Banjarnegara.

Editor : Dian sukmawati

MONCHARE GABUNG PERSEBAYA

saco-indonesia.com, Usai mengamankan tanda tangan Greg Nwokolo, Persebaya telah kembali mengikat satu pemain asal Kamerun, Daniel Monchare. Monchare akan dijadwalkan menandatangani kontrak di Kantor Kadin Jawa Timur (Jatim), Rabu (18/12) siang ini.

"Rencananya memang seperti itu. Dia akan teken hari ini," ujar sekretaris tim Persebaya, Rahmad Sumanjaya, Rabu pagi.

Dibanding tiga pemain asing lainnya, kedatangan Monchare juga terbilang terlambat. Ia seharusnya juga sudah mendarat di Indonesia sejak sepekan lalu. Namun Monchare harus tertahan di Nigeria karena urusan administrasi. "Sebab dia belum pernah main di Indonesia," jelas Rahmad.

Dengan demikian, Monchare juga merupakan pemain asing ketiga yang telah bergabung dengan tim juara Divisi Utama 2013 ini. Sebelumnya, tim asuhan Rahmad Darmawan lebih dulu mengikat gelandang serang Patrice Nzekou dan striker Emmanuel "Pacho" Kenmogne.

Selain sama-sama berasal dari Kamerun, ketiga pemain ini juga berada dalam satu payung agen, yakni Francis Yonga. Kehadiran Monchare juga diharapkan mampu untuk memperkuat tembok pertahanan Persebaya. Sebelumnya, Persebaya juga sudah memiliki Ambrizal, Manahati Lestusen dan Vava Mario Yagalo.

Editor ; Dian Sukmawati

PENGERTIAN DAN FUNGSI BESI BETON

Besi Beton tentu bukan istilah yang asing lagi di telinga kita? Namun walaupun sering mendengarnya, seringkali kita tidak bisa menjelaskan dengan baik pengertian dari istilah besi beton tersebut.

Besi beton berbeda dengan besi – besi biasa. Besi beton adalah besi yang biasa digunakan untuk penulangan dalam konstruksi beton atau yang biasa dikenal dengan sebutan beton bertulang. Besi beton ini telah memiliki peran yang sangat penting dalam sebuah konstruksi. Beton pada prinsipnya telah mempunyai kekuatan yang terbatas untuk memikul beban. Oleh sebab itu, penulangan pada beton biasanya ditambah dengan beso beton agar konstruksinya menjadi lebih kuat dan akhirnya dapat memikul beban – beban atau gaya yang bekerja sehingga dikenal istilah beton bertulang.

Munculnya istilah beton bertulang karena terdiri dari dua material dalam instrumen pembuatannya yaitu beton dan besi tulangan. Fungsi tulangan dalam beton bertulang adalah untuk dapat menahan gaya atau tegangan tarik yang bekerja pada konstruksi.

Besi beton telah terdiri dari dua macam yaitu besi ulir dan besi dengan bentuk polos. Pada besi bentuk polos, bentuk penampangnya tidak bersirip, permukaannya lincin, dan berbentuk bundar. Sedangkan untuk jenis besi ulir identik dengan bentuk bersirip yang memanjang dengan pola tertentu. Pola tersebut bisa bermacam – macam, bisa sesuai dengan pilihan pola pada proses pembuatannya.

Besi beton sebenarnya bukan hal yang baru lagi dalam dunia konstruksi karena besi beton sudah digunakan sejak tahun 1950 sebagai elemen utama untuk pembangunan gedung – gedung tinggi. Pada awal abad ke-20, banyak gedung – gedung tinggi di Amerika yang menggunakan baja profil dalam struktur utamanya. Pada tahun 50an, konstruksi beton baru mulai ikut ambil bagian dalam konstruksi gedung tinggi.

Sementara itu, di Indonesia sendiri, besi beton biasa digunakan sebagai inti untuk pembangunan gedung karena besi beton lebih mudah didapat dan lebih ekonomis daripada konstruksi lainnya. Saat ini besi beton merupakan bahan yang paling penting dalam konstruksi karena digunakan dalam berbagai macam bentuk misalnya untuk jembatan, drainase, dinding penahan tanah, bendungan, bangunan, dll.

TEMPAT WISATA KAWAH PUTIH

Kawah Putih adalah sebuah danau kawah dari Gunung Patuha yang telah terletak di daerah selatan kota bandung, tidak jauh dari obyek wisata Situ patenggang (5km), yaitu berjarak sekitar 46 kilometer dengan waktu tempuh 2,5 jam perjalanan dari pusat kota atau 35 kilometer dari ibukota Kabupaten Bandung, Soreang. Bersuhu antara 8-22 derajat, terdapat dua kawah yaitu Kawah Saat ( Saat dalam bahasa sunda berarti Surut) berada di bagian barat dan Kawah Putih yang berada di bawahnya pada ketinggian 2.194 meter. Kedua kawah tersebut telah terbentuk akibat letusan yang terjadi sekitar abad X dan XII

Dahulu kala sebelum Kawah Putih di buka untuk umum, masyarakat setempat percaya bahwa Kawah Putih telah menyimpan misteri dan Angker karena banyaknya burung yang mati saat melintasi Kawah Putih, namun pada tahun 1837 seorang ilmuwan dari Jerman, Dr. Franz Wilhelm Junghun telah membantahnya. Ia pun kemudian melakukan penelitian dan menemukan fakta bahwa banyaknya burung mati saat melintasi kawasan tersebut tidak lain dikarenakan adanya semburan lava belerang. Karena kandungan belerang di Kawah Putih yang sangat tinggi maka pada zaman pemerintahan Belanda sempat dibangun pabrik belerang yang di beri nama Zwavel Ontgining Kawah Putih yang kemudian usaha tersebut di lanjutkan pada pemerintahan Jepang dengan mengganti namanya menjadi Kawah Putih Kenzanka Gokoya Ciwidey.

Kemudian pada tahun 1987 PT. Perhutani unit III Jawa Barat, Banten telah mulai mengembangkan kawasan Kawah Putih sebagai obyek wisata, Keindahan danau Kawah Putih memang sangat mempesona. Danau Kawah Putih telah memiliki ciri khas dan keunikan yaitu air di danau kawahnya bisa berubah warna, seperti hijau apel, kebiru-biruan bila cuaca terang terkena pantulan matahari, coklat susu, namun paling sering terlihat airnya berwarna putih disertai kabut tebal di atasnya. Kawasan ini tidak jarang sebagai obyek untuk foto pre wedding karena pemandangannya yang eksotis.

Obyek wisata danau Kawah Putih di buka pada pukul 07.00 sampai pukul 17.00, setiap harinya. Fasilitas yang tersedia pun juga sudah memadai dengan adanya area parkir, mushola, transportasi transit, pusat informasi serta adanya warung-warung makanan. Untuk tarif masuk Kawah Putih terbilang mahal yaitu Rp.150.000 untuk mobil sampai di atas kawasan Kawah Putih, Rp.35.000 untuk motor dan Rp. 15.000 per orang.

Akses ke Kawah Putih transport

Dari jakarta melewati tol Cipularang menuju pintu keluar tol Kopo, lalu menuju Soreang ke arah selatan kota Ciwidey. Lamanya perjalanan dari Ciwidey sekitar 20 sampai 30 menit menuju gerbang masuk obyek wisata Kawah Putih, dan pengunjung disarankan menggunakan kendaraan untuk menuju Kawah Putih dari pintu masuk dikarenakan jaraknya yang sangat cukup jauh dan menanjak sekitar 5,6 Kilometer atau sekitar 10-15 menit dengan berkendara.

Jika Anda menggunakan kendaraan pribadi maka Anda bisa langsung menuju area parkir yang tidak jauh dari Kawah Putih, sementara pengunjung dengan rombongan besar hanya bisa menuju Kawah Putih dengan menggunakan Kendaraan Khusus yang tersedia di area parkir, karena kondisi jalan yang sempit dan menanjak tidak memungkinkan untuk dilewati bus atau kendaraan besar lainnya.

Anda bisa juga dari Terminal Kebun Kelapa maupun Leuwi Panjang, Bandung dengan menggunakan transportasi umum menuju Ciwidey. Kemudian perjalanan dilanjutkan dengan menggunakan angkutan pedesaan dengan tujuan Situ Patenggan.

400 ANGGOTA TNI POLRI BERSIHKAN GUNDUKAN LUMPUR

saco-indonesia.com, 400 Anggota gabungan TNI, Polri, dan Pemda DKI telah membersihkan gundukan lumpur yang terdapat di bagian samping gedung SMAN 8, Bukit Duri, Tebet, Jakarta Selatan. Gundukan lumpur setinggi sekitar 25 sentimeter tersebut telah dimasukkan ke dalam ribuan karung yang telah disiapkan.

Dandim Jakarta Selatan Letkol Infantri Ali Aminudin telah menuturkan lokasi tersebut juga merupakan salah satu daerah yang terparah terendam banjir di wilayah Tebet, Jakarta Selatan.

"Sudah 1.500 karung yang telah diangkut. Karya bakti bersama ini telah dilakukan di Jakarta Selatan terutama di sektor 1 yakni wilayah Tebet dan nanti di sektor 2 wilayah Pancoran," ujar Ali saat ditemui di lokasi, Senin (27/1).

Ali juga menambahkan, sejumlah alat berat pun juga dikerahkan guna untuk mengeruk lumpur yang menumpuk di kawasan itu. Lima unit mobil pemadam kebakaran digunakan untuk dapat membersihkan sisa lumpur.

"Setiap anggota menggunakan sekop untuk dapat memasukkan lumpur ke dalam karung, kemudian lumpur juga dikeruk dengan 2 unit loader dan diangkut oleh 3 unit truk. Dari pemadam kebakaran ada 5 unit," jelasnya.

Saat ini, masih ada ratusan karung yang menunggu untuk diangkut. Setelah mengangkut tumpukan lumpur, sisa lumpur dibersihkan dengan cara disiram dengan menggunakan mobil pemadam kebakaran.

"Sekarang tinggal finishing yaitu pembersihan dengan air. Tapi itu masih ada lumpur yang masih diangkut," ujar Ali seraya menunjuk tumpukan lumpur yang ada di dalam selokan air.

Editor : Dian Sukmawati

Suzanne Crough, Actress in ‘The Partridge Family,’ Dies at 52

Ms. Crough played the youngest daughter on the hit ’70s sitcom starring David Cassidy and Shirley Jones.

Bruce Alger, 96, Dies; Led ‘Mink Coat’ Protest Against Lyndon Johnson

Mr. Alger, who served five terms from Texas, led Republican women in a confrontation with Lyndon B. Johnson that may have cost Richard M. Nixon the 1960 presidential election.

Verne Gagne, Wrestler Who Grappled Through Two Eras, Dies at 89

Gagne wrestled professionally from the late 1940s until the 1980s and was a transitional figure between the early 20th century barnstormers and the steroidal sideshows of today

Review: ‘Frontline’ Looks at Missteps During the Ebola Outbreak

y NEIL GENZLINGER

Frontline

Frontline An installment of this PBS program looks at the effects of Ebola on Liberia and other countries, as well as the origins of the outbreak.

The program traces the outbreak to its origin, thought to be a tree full of bats in Guinea.

François Michelin, Head of Tire Company, Dies at 88

Under Mr. Michelin’s leadership, which ended when he left the company in 2002, the Michelin Group became the world’s biggest tire maker, establishing a big presence in the United States and other major markets overseas.

How Some Men Fake an 80-Hour Workweek, and Why It Matters

Imagine an elite professional services firm with a high-performing, workaholic culture. Everyone is expected to turn on a dime to serve a client, travel at a moment’s notice, and be available pretty much every evening and weekend. It can make for a grueling work life, but at the highest levels of accounting, law, investment banking and consulting firms, it is just the way things are.

Except for one dirty little secret: Some of the people ostensibly turning in those 80- or 90-hour workweeks, particularly men, may just be faking it.

Many of them were, at least, at one elite consulting firm studied by Erin Reid, a professor at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. It’s impossible to know if what she learned at that unidentified consulting firm applies across the world of work more broadly. But her research, published in the academic journal Organization Science, offers a way to understand how the professional world differs between men and women, and some of the ways a hard-charging culture that emphasizes long hours above all can make some companies worse off.

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Ms. Reid interviewed more than 100 people in the American offices of a global consulting firm and had access to performance reviews and internal human resources documents. At the firm there was a strong culture around long hours and responding to clients promptly.

“When the client needs me to be somewhere, I just have to be there,” said one of the consultants Ms. Reid interviewed. “And if you can’t be there, it’s probably because you’ve got another client meeting at the same time. You know it’s tough to say I can’t be there because my son had a Cub Scout meeting.”

Some people fully embraced this culture and put in the long hours, and they tended to be top performers. Others openly pushed back against it, insisting upon lighter and more flexible work hours, or less travel; they were punished in their performance reviews.

The third group is most interesting. Some 31 percent of the men and 11 percent of the women whose records Ms. Reid examined managed to achieve the benefits of a more moderate work schedule without explicitly asking for it.

They made an effort to line up clients who were local, reducing the need for travel. When they skipped work to spend time with their children or spouse, they didn’t call attention to it. One team on which several members had small children agreed among themselves to cover for one another so that everyone could have more flexible hours.

A male junior manager described working to have repeat consulting engagements with a company near enough to his home that he could take care of it with day trips. “I try to head out by 5, get home at 5:30, have dinner, play with my daughter,” he said, adding that he generally kept weekend work down to two hours of catching up on email.

Despite the limited hours, he said: “I know what clients are expecting. So I deliver above that.” He received a high performance review and a promotion.

What is fascinating about the firm Ms. Reid studied is that these people, who in her terminology were “passing” as workaholics, received performance reviews that were as strong as their hyper-ambitious colleagues. For people who were good at faking it, there was no real damage done by their lighter workloads.

It calls to mind the episode of “Seinfeld” in which George Costanza leaves his car in the parking lot at Yankee Stadium, where he works, and gets a promotion because his boss sees the car and thinks he is getting to work earlier and staying later than anyone else. (The strategy goes awry for him, and is not recommended for any aspiring partners in a consulting firm.)

A second finding is that women, particularly those with young children, were much more likely to request greater flexibility through more formal means, such as returning from maternity leave with an explicitly reduced schedule. Men who requested a paternity leave seemed to be punished come review time, and so may have felt more need to take time to spend with their families through those unofficial methods.

The result of this is easy to see: Those specifically requesting a lighter workload, who were disproportionately women, suffered in their performance reviews; those who took a lighter workload more discreetly didn’t suffer. The maxim of “ask forgiveness, not permission” seemed to apply.

It would be dangerous to extrapolate too much from a study at one firm, but Ms. Reid said in an interview that since publishing a summary of her research in Harvard Business Review she has heard from people in a variety of industries describing the same dynamic.

High-octane professional service firms are that way for a reason, and no one would doubt that insane hours and lots of travel can be necessary if you’re a lawyer on the verge of a big trial, an accountant right before tax day or an investment banker advising on a huge merger.

But the fact that the consultants who quietly lightened their workload did just as well in their performance reviews as those who were truly working 80 or more hours a week suggests that in normal times, heavy workloads may be more about signaling devotion to a firm than really being more productive. The person working 80 hours isn’t necessarily serving clients any better than the person working 50.

In other words, maybe the real problem isn’t men faking greater devotion to their jobs. Maybe it’s that too many companies reward the wrong things, favoring the illusion of extraordinary effort over actual productivity.

Jim Fanning, 87, Dies; Lifted Baseball in Canada With Expos

Hired in 1968, a year before their first season, Mr. Fanning spent 25 years with the team, managing them to their only playoff appearance in Canada.

Negative View of U.S. Race Relations Grows, Poll Finds

Public perceptions of race relations in America have grown substantially more negative in the aftermath of the death of a young black man who was injured while in police custody in Baltimore and the subsequent unrest, far eclipsing the sentiment recorded in the wake of turmoil in Ferguson, Mo., last summer.

Americans are also increasingly likely to say that the police are more apt to use deadly force against a black person, the latest New York Times/CBS News poll finds.

The poll findings highlight the challenges for local leaders and police officials in trying to maintain order while sustaining faith in the criminal justice system in a racially polarized nation.

Sixty-one percent of Americans now say race relations in this country are generally bad. That figure is up sharply from 44 percent after the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown and the unrest that followed in Ferguson in August, and 43 percent in December. In a CBS News poll just two months ago, 38 percent said race relations were generally bad. Current views are by far the worst of Barack Obama’s presidency.

The negative sentiment is echoed by broad majorities of blacks and whites alike, a stark change from earlier this year, when 58 percent of blacks thought race relations were bad, but just 35 percent of whites agreed. In August, 48 percent of blacks and 41 percent of whites said they felt that way.

Looking ahead, 44 percent of Americans think race relations are worsening, up from 36 percent in December. Forty-one percent of blacks and 46 percent of whites think so. Pessimism among whites has increased 10 points since December.

Continue reading the main story

Do you think race relations in the United States are generally good or generally bad?

60

40

20

0

White

Black

May '14

May '15

Generally bad

 

 

Continue reading the main story

Do you think race relations in the United States are getting better, getting worse or staying about the same?

Getting worse

Staying the same

Getting better

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

44%

37

17

46

36

16

41

42

15

 

 

The poll finds that profound racial divisions in views of how the police use deadly force remain. Blacks are more than twice as likely to say police in most communities are more apt to use deadly force against a black person — 79 percent of blacks say so compared with 37 percent of whites. A slim majority of whites say race is not a factor in a police officer’s decision to use deadly force.

Overall, 44 percent of Americans say deadly force is more likely to be used against a black person, up from 37 percent in August and 40 percent in December.

Blacks also remain far more likely than whites to say they feel mostly anxious about the police in their community. Forty-two percent say so, while 51 percent feel mostly safe. Among whites, 8 in 10 feel mostly safe.

One proposal to address the matter — having on-duty police officers wear body cameras — receives overwhelming support. More than 9 in 10 whites and blacks alike favor it.

Continue reading the main story

How would you describe your feelings about the police in your community? Would you say they make you feel mostly safe or mostly anxious?

Mostly safe

Mostly anxious

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

75%

21

3

81

16

3

51

42

7

 

 

Continue reading the main story

In general, do you think the police in most communities are more likely to use deadly force against a black person, or more likely to use it against a white person, or don’t you think race affects police use of deadly force?

Police more likely to use deadly force against a black person

Police more likely to use deadly force against a white person

Race DOES NOT affect police use of deadly force

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

44%

37%

79%

2%

2%

1%

46%

53%

16%

9%

8%

4%

 

 

Continue reading the main story

Do you favor or oppose on-duty police officers wearing video cameras that would record events and actions as they occur?

Favor

Oppose

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

92%

93%

93%

6%

5%

5%

2%

2%

2%

 

 

Asked specifically about the situation in Baltimore, most Americans expressed at least some confidence that the investigation by local authorities would be conducted fairly. But while nearly two-thirds of whites think so, fewer than half of blacks agree. Still, more blacks are confident now than were in August regarding the investigation in Ferguson. On Friday, six members of the police force involved in the arrest of Mr. Gray were charged with serious offenses, including manslaughter. The poll was conducted Thursday through Sunday; results from before charges were announced are similar to those from after.

Reaction to the recent turmoil in Baltimore, however, is similar among blacks and whites. Most Americans, 61 percent, say the unrest after Mr. Gray’s death was not justified. That includes 64 percent of whites and 57 percent of blacks.

Continue reading the main story

As you may know, a Baltimore man, Freddie Gray, recently died after being in the custody of the Baltimore police. How much confidence do you have that the investigation by local authorities into this matter will be conducted fairly?

A lot

Some

Not much

None at all

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

29%

31

22

14

5

31

33

20

11

5

20

26

30

22

 

 

In general, do you think the unrest in Baltimore after the death of Freddie Gray was justified, or do you think the unrest was not justified?

Justified

Not justified

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

28%

61

11

26

64

11

37

57

6

 

 

With Iran Talks, a Tangled Path to Ending Syria’s War

UNITED NATIONS — Wearing pinstripes and a pince-nez, Staffan de Mistura, the United Nations envoy for Syria, arrived at the Security Council one Tuesday afternoon in February and announced that President Bashar al-Assad had agreed to halt airstrikes over Aleppo. Would the rebels, Mr. de Mistura suggested, agree to halt their shelling?

What he did not announce, but everyone knew by then, was that the Assad government had begun a military offensive to encircle opposition-held enclaves in Aleppo and that fierce fighting was underway. It would take only a few days for rebel leaders, having pushed back Syrian government forces, to outright reject Mr. de Mistura’s proposed freeze in the fighting, dooming the latest diplomatic overture on Syria.

Diplomacy is often about appearing to be doing something until the time is ripe for a deal to be done.

Now, with Mr. Assad’s forces having suffered a string of losses on the battlefield and the United States reaching at least a partial rapprochement with Mr. Assad’s main backer, Iran, Mr. de Mistura is changing course. Starting Monday, he is set to hold a series of closed talks in Geneva with the warring sides and their main supporters. Iran will be among them.

In an interview at United Nations headquarters last week, Mr. de Mistura hinted that the changing circumstances, both military and diplomatic, may have prompted various backers of the war to question how much longer the bloodshed could go on.

“Will that have an impact in accelerating the willingness for a political solution? We need to test it,” he said. “The Geneva consultations may be a good umbrella for testing that. It’s an occasion for asking everyone, including the government, if there is any new way that they are looking at a political solution, as they too claim they want.”

He said he would have a better assessment at the end of June, when he expects to wrap up his consultations. That coincides with the deadline for a final agreement in the Iran nuclear talks.

Whether a nuclear deal with Iran will pave the way for a new opening on peace talks in Syria remains to be seen. Increasingly, though, world leaders are explicitly linking the two, with the European Union’s top diplomat, Federica Mogherini, suggesting last week that a nuclear agreement could spur Tehran to play “a major but positive role in Syria.”

It could hardly come soon enough. Now in its fifth year, the Syrian war has claimed 220,000 lives, prompted an exodus of more than three million refugees and unleashed jihadist groups across the region. “This conflict is producing a question mark in many — where is it leading and whether this can be sustained,” Mr. de Mistura said.

Part Italian, part Swedish, Mr. de Mistura has worked with the United Nations for more than 40 years, but he is more widely known for his dapper style than for any diplomatic coups. Syria is by far the toughest assignment of his career — indeed, two of the organization’s most seasoned diplomats, Lakhdar Brahimi and Kofi Annan, tried to do the job and gave up — and critics have wondered aloud whether Mr. de Mistura is up to the task.

He served as a United Nations envoy in Afghanistan and Iraq, and before that in Lebanon, where a former minister recalled, with some scorn, that he spent many hours sunbathing at a private club in the hills above Beirut. Those who know him say he has a taste for fine suits and can sometimes speak too soon and too much, just as they point to his diplomatic missteps and hyperbole.

They cite, for instance, a news conference in October, when he raised the specter of Srebrenica, where thousands of Muslims were massacred in 1995 during the Balkans war, in warning that the Syrian border town of Kobani could fall to the Islamic State. In February, he was photographed at a party in Damascus, the Syrian capital, celebrating the anniversary of the Iranian revolution just as Syrian forces, aided by Iran, were pummeling rebel-held suburbs of Damascus; critics seized on that as evidence of his coziness with the government.

Mouin Rabbani, who served briefly as the head of Mr. de Mistura’s political affairs unit and has since emerged as one of his most outspoken critics, said Mr. de Mistura did not have the background necessary for the job. “This isn’t someone well known for his political vision or political imagination, and his closest confidants lack the requisite knowledge and experience,” Mr. Rabbani said.

As a deputy foreign minister in the Italian government, Mr. de Mistura was tasked in 2012 with freeing two Italian marines detained in India for shooting at Indian fishermen. He made 19 trips to India, to little effect. One marine was allowed to return to Italy for medical reasons; the other remains in India.

He said he initially turned down the Syria job when the United Nations secretary general approached him last August, only to change his mind the next day, after a sleepless, guilt-ridden night.

Mr. de Mistura compared his role in Syria to that of a doctor faced with a terminally ill patient. His goal in brokering a freeze in the fighting, he said, was to alleviate suffering. He settled on Aleppo as the location for its “fame,” he said, a decision that some questioned, considering that Aleppo was far trickier than the many other lesser-known towns where activists had negotiated temporary local cease-fires.

“Everybody, at least in Europe, are very familiar with the value of Aleppo,” Mr. de Mistura said. “So I was using that as an icebreaker.”

The cease-fire negotiations, to which he had devoted six months, fell apart quickly because of the government’s military offensive in Aleppo the very day of his announcement at the Security Council. Privately, United Nations diplomats said Mr. de Mistura had been manipulated. To this, Mr. de Mistura said only that he was “disappointed and concerned.”

Tarek Fares, a former rebel fighter, said after a recent visit to Aleppo that no Syrian would admit publicly to supporting Mr. de Mistura’s cease-fire proposal. “If anyone said they went to a de Mistura meeting in Gaziantep, they would be arrested,” is how he put it, referring to the Turkish city where negotiations between the two sides were held.

Secretary General Ban Ki-moon remains staunchly behind Mr. de Mistura’s efforts. His defenders point out that he is at the center of one of the world’s toughest diplomatic problems, charged with mediating a conflict in which two of the world’s most powerful nations — Russia, which supports Mr. Assad, and the United States, which has called for his ouster — remain deadlocked.

R. Nicholas Burns, a former State Department official who now teaches at Harvard, credited Mr. de Mistura for trying to negotiate a cease-fire even when the chances of success were exceedingly small — and the chances of a political deal even smaller. For his efforts to work, Professor Burns argued, the world powers will first have to come to an agreement of their own.

“He needs the help of outside powers,” he said. “It starts with backers of Assad. That’s Russia and Iran. De Mistura is there, waiting.”

Gene Fullmer, a Brawling Middleweight Champion, Dies at 83

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William Price Fox, Admired Southern Novelist and Humorist, Dies at 89

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Dave Goldberg Was Lifelong Women’s Advocate

Even as a high school student, Dave Goldberg was urging female classmates to speak up. As a young dot-com executive, he had one girlfriend after another, but fell hard for a driven friend named Sheryl Sandberg, pining after her for years. After they wed, Mr. Goldberg pushed her to negotiate hard for high compensation and arranged his schedule so that he could be home with their children when she was traveling for work.

Mr. Goldberg, who died unexpectedly on Friday, was a genial, 47-year-old Silicon Valley entrepreneur who built his latest company, SurveyMonkey, from a modest enterprise to one recently valued by investors at $2 billion. But he was also perhaps the signature male feminist of his era: the first major chief executive in memory to spur his wife to become as successful in business as he was, and an essential figure in “Lean In,” Ms. Sandberg’s blockbuster guide to female achievement.

Over the weekend, even strangers were shocked at his death, both because of his relatively young age and because they knew of him as the living, breathing, car-pooling center of a new philosophy of two-career marriage.

“They were very much the role models for what this next generation wants to grapple with,” said Debora L. Spar, the president of Barnard College. In a 2011 commencement speech there, Ms. Sandberg told the graduates that whom they married would be their most important career decision.

In the play “The Heidi Chronicles,” revived on Broadway this spring, a male character who is the founder of a media company says that “I don’t want to come home to an A-plus,” explaining that his ambitions require him to marry an unthreatening helpmeet. Mr. Goldberg grew up to hold the opposite view, starting with his upbringing in progressive Minneapolis circles where “there was woman power in every aspect of our lives,” Jeffrey Dachis, a childhood friend, said in an interview.

The Goldberg parents read “The Feminine Mystique” together — in fact, Mr. Goldberg’s father introduced it to his wife, according to Ms. Sandberg’s book. In 1976, Paula Goldberg helped found a nonprofit to aid children with disabilities. Her husband, Mel, a law professor who taught at night, made the family breakfast at home.

Later, when Dave Goldberg was in high school and his prom date, Jill Chessen, stayed silent in a politics class, he chastised her afterward. He said, “You need to speak up,” Ms. Chessen recalled in an interview. “They need to hear your voice.”

Years later, when Karin Gilford, an early employee at Launch Media, Mr. Goldberg’s digital music company, became a mother, he knew exactly what to do. He kept giving her challenging assignments, she recalled, but also let her work from home one day a week. After Yahoo acquired Launch, Mr. Goldberg became known for distributing roses to all the women in the office on Valentine’s Day.

Ms. Sandberg, who often describes herself as bossy-in-a-good-way, enchanted him when they became friendly in the mid-1990s. He “was smitten with her,” Ms. Chessen remembered. Ms. Sandberg was dating someone else, but Mr. Goldberg still hung around, even helping her and her then-boyfriend move, recalled Bob Roback, a friend and co-founder of Launch. When they finally married in 2004, friends remember thinking how similar the two were, and that the qualities that might have made Ms. Sandberg intimidating to some men drew Mr. Goldberg to her even more.

Over the next decade, Mr. Goldberg and Ms. Sandberg pioneered new ways of capturing information online, had a son and then a daughter, became immensely wealthy, and hashed out their who-does-what-in-this-marriage issues. Mr. Goldberg’s commute from the Bay Area to Los Angeles became a strain, so he relocated, later joking that he “lost the coin flip” of where they would live. He paid the bills, she planned the birthday parties, and both often left their offices at 5:30 so they could eat dinner with their children before resuming work afterward.

Friends in Silicon Valley say they were careful to conduct their careers separately, politely refusing when outsiders would ask one about the other’s work: Ms. Sandberg’s role building Facebook into an information and advertising powerhouse, and Mr. Goldberg at SurveyMonkey, which made polling faster and cheaper. But privately, their work was intertwined. He often began statements to his team with the phrase “Well, Sheryl said” sharing her business advice. He counseled her, too, starting with her salary negotiations with Mark Zuckerberg.

“I wanted Mark to really feel he stretched to get Sheryl, because she was worth it,” Mr. Goldberg explained in a 2013 “60 Minutes” interview, his Minnesota accent and his smile intact as he offered a rare peek of the intersection of marriage and money at the top of corporate life.

While his wife grew increasingly outspoken about women’s advancement, Mr. Goldberg quietly advised the men in the office on family and partnership matters, an associate said. Six out of 16 members of SurveyMonkey’s management team are female, an almost unheard-of ratio among Silicon Valley “unicorns,” or companies valued at over $1 billion.

When Mellody Hobson, a friend and finance executive, wrote a chapter of “Lean In” about women of color for the college edition of the book, Mr. Goldberg gave her feedback on the draft, a clue to his deep involvement. He joked with Ms. Hobson that she was too long-winded, like Ms. Sandberg, but aside from that, he said he loved the chapter, she said in an interview.

By then, Mr. Goldberg was a figure of fascination who inspired a “where can I get one of those?” reaction among many of the women who had read the best seller “Lean In.” Some lamented that Ms. Sandberg’s advice hinged too much on marrying a Dave Goldberg, who was humble enough to plan around his wife, attentive enough to worry about which shoes his young daughter would wear, and rich enough to help pay for the help that made the family’s balancing act manageable.

Now that he is gone, and Ms. Sandberg goes from being half of a celebrated partnership to perhaps the business world’s most prominent single mother, the pages of “Lean In” carry a new sting of loss.

“We are never at 50-50 at any given moment — perfect equality is hard to define or sustain — but we allow the pendulum to swing back and forth between us,” she wrote in 2013, adding that they were looking forward to raising teenagers together.

“Fortunately, I have Dave to figure it out with me,” she wrote.

Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, 93, Dies; Polish Auschwitz Survivor Aided Jews

Mr. Bartoszewski was given honorary Israeli citizenship for his work to save Jews during World War II and later surprised even himself by being instrumental in reconciling Poland and Germany.

Jean Nidetch, 91, Dies; Pounds Came Off, and Weight Watchers Was Born

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Fatal Police Shootings: Accounts Since Ferguson

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