| | | | | | | Hello. Fighting continues in northern Gaza, as Israel's army is reportedly circling the biggest hospital in the strip. We have the updates. Our cyber correspondent Joe Tidy checks in on the NFT market and, in India, Divya Arya reports on sexual violence in an ethnic conflict. A word of warning: this piece includes descriptions of sexual assault. Finally, scroll down to see the formation of a volcanic island off the coast of Japan. |
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| | | | Top of the agenda | | Reports of heavy fighting near Gaza City hospitals | | | | Heavy bombardment in northern Gaza, seen from Sderot in southern Israel. Credit: EPA |
| | Israeli forces are carrying on their deep push into Gaza City amid their war against Hamas. Multiple reports indicate heavy fighting is taking place near hospitals in northern Gaza. People in the city tell our correspondent Rushdi Abualouf that the biggest hospital of the Strip, Al-Shifa, is currently surrounded. He has also been told that tanks are advancing on the city centre. There have been no immediate reports of a lull in fighting in northern Gaza, despite the US saying on Thursday that Israel had agreed to begin four-hour daily military pauses to allow civilians to flee. "There is more that can and should be done to minimise harm to Palestinian civilians," insisted the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken today. Follow our live page as we're getting updates and verifying footage. | | • | Divided communities: International correspondent Joe Inwood has visited the town of Bethlehem and the Israeli settlement of Efrat, which face each other in the West Bank. He reports on the worsening relations between Jewish settlers and their Arab neighbours. | | • | In Israel: Ohad Hatzofe, of Israel's Nature and Parks Authority, is tracking birds of prey to help Israel's army recover bodies at the sites where Hamas attacked on 7 October. Read about his efforts that helped recover four corpses. | | • | Media front: Reuters, AP, CNN and the New York Times have denied any prior knowledge of the 7 October attacks, after an Israeli minister accused Gaza-based freelancers for these outlets of "participating" in the attack. The NYT rejected "unsupported accusations" in a statement. |
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| | | | | | World headlines | | • | Prince Harry: The Duke of Sussex can go ahead with privacy claims against the UK publisher of The Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday, a judge has ruled. Our royal correspondent Sean Coughlan explains the story. For weekly analysis from Sean, subscribe to Royal Watch - his weekly newsletter. | | • | Surgical breakthrough: Surgeons in New York say they have performed the world's first complete eye transplant on a man. It's not certain he will regain vision. Our report shows the impressive result of the surgery. | | • | Fumes in Lahore: Toxic smog in eastern Pakistan has made thousands of people sick, forcing authorities to shut some cities for the rest of the week. | | • | Robert De Niro: The actor's company, Canal Productions, has been ordered to pay a former assistant $1.2m (£982,000) in damages over claims of gender discrimination and retaliation. Jurors did not find the actor personally liable. | | • | 'Living fossil': Scientists say a species of egg-laying mammal, long thought extinct, lives on. The Attenborough long-beaked echidna was filmed on the final day of an expedition in Indonesia, which is said to have identified dozens of species new to science. See the footage. |
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| | AT THE SCENE | Manipur, India | | Women in naked assault video ‘will not give up’ | | Six months ago, two women were filmed being stripped, paraded naked and allegedly gang raped by a mob of men from the majority Meitei community in the state of Manipur, in north-east India. They belong to the Kuki-Zomi minority. The women, whose ordeal was made public in a viral video, speak about living in hiding, their fight for justice and their call for a separate administration for their community. | | | Before they were attacked, Glory was a student and Mercy filled her days taking care of her two young children. But after the attack both women had to flee to a different town where they are now living in hiding. They stay indoors now. Restricted to the walls of her temporary home, Mercy no longer goes to church or takes her children to school herself. "I don't think I will ever be able to live like I lived before," she says. "I find it hard to step out of the house, I feel scared and ashamed of meeting people." Since the violence erupted, there is no crossover between the Meitei and Kuki-Zomi communities in Manipur. People are divided by a de facto border, lined with checkpoints manned by the police, army and volunteers from the two communities.
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| | | | Beyond the headlines | | What happened to NFTs? | | | | Paris Hilton has not tweeted about NFTs since October 2022, in spite of almost daily posts in January and February 2022 to promote her collections. Credit: Getty Images |
| | Gaudy monkeys and pixelated characters were all the rage in 2022, but NFTs - digital tokens of ownership usually bought with cryptocurrency - have hit something of a slump. Sales figures have dropped and celebrities have mostly stopped touting the collectible market. But some still believe there is hope despite declining prices, writes Joe Tidy. | | | | |
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| | | | Something different | | Check mate | | This bitter, caffeinated tea is increasing in popularity beyond South America. | | |
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| | | | | | | | | | Future Earth Newsletter | | Essential climate news and hopeful developments, in your inbox every Tuesday. | | |
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