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Bryn Lennon / Getty Images
Cyclists make their way through the Qatar desert on stage four of the Tour of Qatar from Camel Race Track to Al Khor Corniche on Feb. 6, 2013.
Top cyclists compete in Qatar desert
Qatar mall fire kills 19, including 13 children
Brian Candy / flickr / Getty Images Contributor
A fireman carries a child from the roof as emergency services seek to rescue people trapped in a fire at the Villaggio mall on May 28, 2012 in Doha, Qatar.
Reuters
Smoke is seen from a fire at the Villagio Mall, in Doha's west end on May 28.
Reuters
Firefighters work to put out a fire at the Villagio Mall.
Qatar's Interior Ministry said 13 children were among 19 people killed in a fire that broke out at Villagio Mall in Doha's west end late Monday morning. The Villaggio mall is a popular shopping and recreational complex with facilities including a cinema, hotel and theme park.
--The Associated Press contributed to this blog post
Osama Faisal / AP
The father of a child killed after a fire took hold of the Villaggio Mall, in Doha's west end is comforted in the Qatari capital of Doha on May 28.
Reuters
Firefighters attempt to extinguish a fire at the Villagio Mall, in Doha's west end on May 28.
French Spiderman climbs to the top in Doha
Faisal Al-Tamimi / AFP - Getty Images
Alain Robert climbs up The Torch hotel in Doha, Qatar on April 12.
Fadi Al-Assaad / Reuters
French climber Alain Robert scales The Torch hotel, the tallest tower in Doha, on April 12.
Alain Robert, who calls himself the “French Spiderman”, climbed 300 meters (about 985 feet) up The Torch hotel in Doha, Qatar on April 12. Robert, who has been scaling tall buildings since the age of seven took 75 minutes to complete the climb. The Torch hotel was built in the shape of the Olympic torch for the 2006 Asian games and is the tallest tower in Doha.
Fadi Al-Assaad / Reuters
A crowd gathers to watch Alain Robert climb 985 feet up The Torch hotel in Doha, Qatar on April 12.
Daredevil Alain Robert scales a hotel in Doha, Qatar on Thursday without a harness or safety ropes. Msnbc.com's Al Stirrett reports.
Motorcycle racer Nicky Hayden turns fast laps in Doha, Qatar
Mirco Lazzari / Getty Images
Nicky Hayden of USA and Ducati Marlboro Team rounds the bend during the first day of practice of Doha GP at Losail Circuit on April 5, 2012 in Doha, Qatar.
GeoEye
The blue water and patterns of sediment in Khor al-Adaid, or Inland Sea, create a lovely effect when viewed from space by the GeoEye 1 satellite.
Holiday calendar: Beauty of the Inland Sea
Khor al-Adaid, also known as the Inland Sea, rates as one of the Arabian Peninsula's natural treasures, and it's easy to understand why when you take a look at GeoEye's satellite picture of the scene.
The blue-green water and white sediments combine to create a blossoming flower (or is that a leafy tree?), surrounded by the Arabian desert's swirling sand dunes. Qatar has placed the 9-mile-wide (15-kilometer-wide) tidal lake on the tentative list for consideration as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
"There is no comparable lagoonal system of this type known elsewhere in the world," according to the site description submitted to UNESCO. "The diverse water quality and bottom substrates create an exceptional variety of aquatic and semi-aquatic habitats of considerable importance for some endangered marine species, particularly turtles and dugongs."
This picture was captured by the GeoEye 1 satellite from a height of 425 miles (684 kilometers) on Feb. 7, 2011, and it's one of the year's featured images from GeoEye, a commercial Earth-imaging company. It also serves as today's offering from the Cosmic Log Space Advent Calendar, which turns a spotlight on views of Earth from space every day from now until Christmas.
Check back on Monday for the next treat from the calendar, and click through the previous pictures in the daily series:
- The full Cosmic Log Space Advent Calendar
- Dec. 1: An ornament in outer space
- Dec. 2: The masses in Mecca
- Dec. 3: Santa's shrinking domain
- Dec. 4: The monster of Madagascar
- Dec. 5: Antarctica stripped naked
- Dec. 6: Streaking for home
- Dec. 7: Pearl Harbor from above, 1941-2011
- Dec. 8: The rise and fall of the Dead Sea
- Dec. 9: How an eclipse dims Earth
- Dec. 10: Psychedelic storm
- Hubble calendar, from The Atlantic's In Focus
- 2011 Zooniverse Advent calendar
Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.
Marwan Naamani / AFP - Getty Images
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (C) meets with Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) foregin ministers in Doha, on Jan. 12.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton meets with foreign ministers in Qatar
At times like this, it would be hard to be in Hillary Clinton's place and not feel a bit outnumbered.
Read more about her Mideast trip here.