BBC News Briefing

27 May, 2024

Sofia Lotto Persio

Hello. While the fighting between Hamas and Israel in Gaza continues, including in the Rafah area, Joel Gunter and Paul Adams report on instances of settler violence in the occupied West Bank. In Sudan, Mohamed Zakaria Omer Mohamed reports from besieged El Fasher, the last city in Darfur still under army control. We're also piecing together the clues that first indicated a thief was targeting the British Museum. As Monday is a bank holiday in the UK, we're only sending one newsletter edition. Regular programming will resume on Tuesday.

TOP OF THE AGENDA

Rafah refugee camp hit in Israeli strike

Fire rages at an area designated for displaced Palestinians in the Rafah area on Sunday.

The Israeli army has said it will review reports the fire from the air strike spread to shelters, harming civilians. Credit: Reuters

Air raid sirens sounded across central Israel on Sunday, as Hamas fired rockets for the first time in nearly four months. Three of the eight missiles were intercepted by air defences, and most of the others landed in open areas. Israeli media reported minor shrapnel damage to a home, and police said two people suffered light injuries. Hours after the rocket attack, the Israeli army launched an air strike in north-west Rafah, southern Gaza. The military said it targeted a Hamas compound and killed two senior commanders. At least 35 people were reported killed and dozens more injured in a fire at a refugee camp in the area, a designated humanitarian zone. The strikes, which follow Friday's ruling by the UN's top court that Israel must halt its offensive in Rafah, came with further ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas expected to resume this week.

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'Eliminate the beasts': Messages shared in settler WhatsApp groups following the disappearance of a young Israeli shepherd offer insights into one of the most intense and systematic rampages against Palestinians in the West Bank.

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Aid convoy attacks: A group of Jews and Arabs from across Israel have started vigils to protect lorries carrying supplies into Gaza from far-right violence.

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Post-war plans: There is an increasing focus on what could and should happen if and when the fighting in Gaza ends, writes diplomatic correspondent James Landale in the latest instalment of the Israel-Gaza briefings.

WORLD HEADLINES

Donald Trump: The presumptive Republican presidential nominee has been booed repeatedly while speaking at the Libertarian Party's national convention.

Extreme weather: At least 18 people were killed as tornadoes and storms tore across central areas of the US, destroying homes and cutting power to hundreds of thousands.

Delhi fire: Police have said a hospital where seven babies died on Saturday was operating without a valid licence and did not have fire extinguishers or emergency exits.

Papua New Guinea: Local media have reported one couple were rescued during operations to find survivors of Friday's landslide, as a government agency warned the death toll could stretch into the thousands.

Doha-Dublin: Twelve passengers aboard Qatar Airways flight QR017 have been injured as the plane experienced turbulence while airborne over Turkey.

AT THE SCENE

El Fasher, Sudan

The city besieged in Sudan's civil war

Abu Shouk camp is one of the areas that have recently been targeted. Credit: Abdulhafeez Al Ghali/BBC

Rival military factions have been fighting in Sudan since April 2023. The city of El Fasher is the army's last stronghold in Darfur, where the violence has recalled the ethnic cleansing unleashed by Arab militias on non-Arab communities two decades ago.

Mohamed Zakaria Omer Mohamed and Gladys Kigo

Satellite images analysed by Yale University's Humanitarian Research Lab show how the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces is targeting civilian dwellings in and around El Fasher. The army has also been accused of indiscriminate shelling and aerial bombing in densely populated areas. El Fasher resident Ibrahim al-Tayeb al-Faki said he had sent his three children to live with their grandfather but his house was hit in an air strike. The family is now sheltering in its ruins. “There is no safe place in El Fasher right now,” he said.

Read in full

Mounting death toll: More than 700 deaths have been reported in 10 days by a medical charity in El Fasher, with a UN official warning that a genocide could be unfolding, or has occurred.

South Hospital: Medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has said 134 people have died at the facility in just over two weeks, calling it a sign of the "intensity of the fighting".

BEYOND THE HEADLINES

eBay clues exposing British Museum thief

A drawer of artefacts from ancient Rome at the British Museum.

An estimated 2.4 million of the museum's eight million items are uncatalogued, or partially uncatalogued. Credit: BBC

The FBI is investigating the sale to US buyers of what are suspected to be hundreds of treasures from the British Museum. In the UK, police say the investigation is ongoing and nobody has been arrested or charged with any offence. But Danish antiquities dealer Dr Ittai Gradel began to suspect an eBay seller of being a thief who was stealing from the museum back in 2020.

What happened

A series of bridges connects 44 tropical islands from mainland Florida to Key West.

SOMETHING DIFFERENT

A 'floating' highway

The 113 mile engineering marvel that forever changed Florida.

Take a look

And finally...

Colombia has started exploring a sunk 18th Century Spanish galleon dubbed the “holy grail of shipwrecks”. The ship, whose ownership remains contested, was sunken by the British Royal Navy in 1708, off the Colombian city of Cartagena. It is estimated to be laden with as much as £16bn ($20bn) in treasure, one of the largest hauls of valuables ever lost at sea.

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– Sofia

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