| | | | | | | Hello. My colleagues have been working to get a clearer picture of today’s incident in Gaza, where more than 110 Palestinians have been reported killed. They were trying to get aid in the north of the Strip. US President Joe Biden expressed concern that the dramatic episode, where Israeli troops shot at some people they thought were a threat, would complicate ongoing ceasefire negotiations. We’re also reporting on Iranian elections, Scottish crime, and the Costa Rican way of life. Finally, we’re meeting the editor of a French newspaper published every 29 February - quite the plum job, if you ask me. |
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| | | | Get up to speed | | • | US President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are both visiting the US-Mexico border as immigration emerges as one of the key issues in this year’s presidential election. Follow our live coverage here. | | • | Yaya Dillo, a leading critic of Chad's military leader Mahamat Déby, has been killed in a shootout with security forces, officials say. The country is expected to hold elections in May. | | • | Mounting social media speculation around Princess Catherine’s absence from the public eye is posing quite the dilemma to the British Royal Family, as it navigates appetite for information and privacy considerations around Kate’s health, our Royal correspondent Daniela Relph reports. |
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| AT THE SCENE |  Jerusalem | | More than 100 reported killed in crowd near Gaza aid convoy |  | | The Israeli military released aerial video showing hundreds of Palestinians crowding round aid lorries. Credit: IDF | | The Hamas-run health ministry says 112 Palestinians have been killed near an aid convoy in northern Gaza on Thursday morning. Footage analysis and conversations with the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and a Palestinian eyewitness help us understand what happened. |  | | Paul Adams, diplomatic correspondent |
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| Everyone agrees that the incident took place shortly after 04:00 local time (02:00 GMT) on the Gaza coast road. It occurred just past an Israeli military checkpoint, through which a convoy of aid trucks passed. The convoy was likely a few hundred metres long. Shortly after it passed through the checkpoint. Palestinians started surrounding the trucks. An IDF spokesman says some civilians approached the checkpoint and ignored warning shots fired by the soldiers there. Fearing that some of the civilians posed a threat, the soldiers then opened fire on those approaching in what the spokesman described as a "limited response".
Our Palestinian source has not confirmed that civilians approached the checkpoint, only that they were about 70 metres away. With crowds descending on all the trucks, and with machine gun fire coming from the checkpoint, panic seems to have ensued. The trucks (some of them now with many people clinging on) tried to move forward. Our eyewitness says that the bulk of the casualties were caused by the trucks running people over, not by the Israeli gunfire. |
| | | | • | Death toll: More than 30,000 Palestinians have now been killed in Gaza since 7 October - according to the Hamas-run health ministry, whose previous reporting was found credible by the World Health Organization. | | • | Verified: Israel says it has killed more than 10,000 fighters, but there are concerns about whether it is able to separate fighters from ordinary civilians. Here's a closer look at the data. |
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| Questions Answered | | Iranians head to polls for first time since protests |  | | The majority of the 15,200 approved parliamentary candidates are from conservative political parties. Credit: EPA |
| | The first elections in Iran since the nationwide anti-government protests of 2022 take place on Friday. These elections are seen as a crucial test for assessing the legitimacy of the Islamic Republic's regime. |  | | Farnoosh Amirshahi, BBC Persian |
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| | Do people really have a choice? | | Candidates must be approved by the Guardian Council, a body in which individuals appointed by Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, play a significant role. In the upcoming parliamentary election, a record 15,200 candidates have been allowed by the Guardian Council to stand for the 290 seats. However, only 30 candidates from the reformist camp who applied have been approved - a notably low number. | | Will it change anything? | | If social freedoms and economic conditions are important to voters, elections play a minimal role in affecting change. The principal decision-maker is the Supreme Leader. Iran's foreign policy, the primary factor affecting the economic situation, is decided by Ayatollah Khamenei, who has shown no willingness to compromise or retreat on social freedoms. Currently, all branches of government are in the hands of individuals approved by the Supreme Leader. | | How are voters feeling? | | Despite the abundance of electoral advertisements in the streets, the atmosphere in Iran these days lacks enthusiasm, indicating voter apathy. Hundreds of people were killed and thousands more injured in the 2022 protests, after which the political and social atmosphere became more repressive than before. Alongside this domestic crackdown, the economic situation continues to deteriorate daily, leaving people's tables emptier. | | | | | | |
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| | The big picture | | How police missed a murderer |  | | Emma Caldwell’s murder was one of Scotland's best-known unsolved cases. |
| | The killer of 27-year-old Emma Caldwell has finally been convicted, almost 19 years after the Scottish sex worker's body was found in a wood near Glasgow. My BBC Scotland colleagues, whose work had been crucial to catching murderer Iain Packer, now report that senior officers missed the chance to get him early on, while they were wrongly building a case against four Turkish men. | | | | |
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| | | For your downtime | | More than a motto | | To Costa Ricans, “pura vida” is a shared identity and a uniquely positive outlook. | | |
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| | And finally... in France | | A satirical newspaper that is only published on 29 February has released its 12th edition. La Bougie du Sapeur (The Sapper’s Candle) has a print run of 200,000 and is believed to be the world’s only periodical of this kind. |
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| | | | | | | | US Election Unspun newsletter | | Cut through the noise in the race for the White House, every Wednesday to your inbox. | | |
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– Jules |
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