Dutch anti-EU far-right populist Geert Wilders, who has vowed to halt all immigration to the Netherlands, was set for a major victory in parliamentary elections on Wednesday, an exit poll showed.

Beating all predictions, the exit poll put Wilders’ Freedom Party (PVV) at 35 out of 150 seats, 10 seats ahead of the closest rival, former EU Commissioner Frans Timmermans’ Labour/Green Left combination. That margin was far greater than expected and appeared to be too great for the outcome to change.

Exit polls are generally reliable with a margin of error of roughly two seats.

At a cafe in The Hague, Wilders fans erupted in cheers, hugged and threw their arms in the air.

In a victory speech, Wilders vowed to bring an end to a “tsunami of asylum and immigration.”

Wilders’ rode a wave of anti-immigration sentiment, blaming a housing shortage on flows of asylum seekers and drawing on widespread concerns about the cost of living and the overburdened healthcare system.

Wilders upset victory came two months after the return to power of the equally anti-EU populist Robert Fico in Slovakia, who pledged to halt military aid to Ukraine and cut immigration.

Last year, Italy formed its most right-wing government since World War Two after the election victory of Giorgia Meloni.

Wilders’ inflammatory views on Islam have prompted death threats and he has lived under heavy police protection for years.

Abroad, his outspoken comments about the prophet Mohammed led to sometimes violent protests in nations with large Muslim populations, including Pakistan, Indonesia and Egypt. In Pakistan, a religious leader issued a fatwa against him.

A self-proclaimed fan of Hungary’s Victor Orban, Wilders is also explicitly anti-EU, urging the Netherlands to control borders, to significantly reduce its payments to the union and to block the entrance of any new members.

He has also repeatedly said the Netherlands should stop providing arms to Ukraine, saying it needs the weapons to be able to defend itself. However, none of the parties he could potentially form a government with share these ideas.

The party of outgoing Prime Minister Mark Rutte, the conservative VVD, was in third place at 24 seats, the exit poll showed.

Immigration — the issue that triggered the collapse of Rutte’s last cabinet after 13 years in power — has been a key issue in the campaign.

Wilders is expected to try to form a right-wing government with the VVD and the upstart party ‘New Social Contract’, who together would hold a 79-seat majority.

Talks could be difficult as both parties have said they have serious doubts about working with Wilders, because of his outspoken anti-Islam stance, which includes aiming to ban all mosques and Korans from the Netherlands.

“I am confident we can reach an agreement,” Wilders said in his victory speech. “I understand perfectly well we should not take any measures that would be unconstitutional.”

His party had now become too large to ignore, he said, adding he was ready to lead the country.

Wilders is internationally known for his anti-Islam politics and was convicted by a Dutch judge for discrimination after he insulted Moroccans at a campaign rally in 2014.

Rutte will remain in a caretaker role until a new government is installed, likely in the first half of 2024.

Israel and Hamas reached an agreement early Wednesday for a pause in fighting, alongside the release of some of the hostages held by the militant group, in return for Palestinian prisoners jailed by Israel.

The breakthrough deal comes after weeks of painstaking discussions involving international negotiators and mediators – and marks the first major de-escalation in the conflict, which began on October 7 after Hamas’ brutal attacks on Israel killed around 1,200 people.

Since then, more than 12,000 people have died in Gaza since Israel began airstrikes on the enclave, according to Palestinian authorities.

Here’s what we know so far.

What’s in the deal?

The deal will see the release of 50 women and children held captive in Gaza by Hamas, according to Qatar, which mediated negotiations between Israel and the militant group.

In return, Israel will grant a “humanitarian pause” in its assault of the enclave and release some Palestinian prisoners.

Hamas released a statement saying 150 women and children held in Israeli prisons would be freed. The deal also allows hundreds of trucks carrying aid relief, medical supplies and fuel to enter Gaza, it said, echoing details in Qatar’s statement.

Israel’s own statement said the pause in fighting would last four days – but said the truce could potentially be longer, with an extra day added for each 10 additional hostages available for release.

Qatar said the start of the pause would be announced within 24 hours.

Which hostages are being freed?

The names of the hostages to be released haven’t been publicized. However, Israeli military spokesperson Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus said they are all Israelis, with some dual nationals.

US President Joe Biden said on Tuesday that the deal “should bring home additional American hostages.”

Two American hostages, Judith Tai Raanan and her 17-year-old daughter, Natalie Raanan, were among four hostages released earlier in the conflict.

Hamas is believed to be holding 239 hostages in Gaza, according to the Israeli military. More details of the release deal will be sent to families later today, said the Israeli government.

How did the agreement come together?

The deal hinged upon approval from Israel’s cabinet – which voted in favor of the agreement by a “significant majority” in the early hours of Wednesday morning, after what an Israeli official called a “tense and emotional” six-hour meeting.

The deal also followed mounting pressure on the Israeli government from the families of the hostages, who have demanded answers and action from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

What happens next in the war?

Several parties and hostage families expressed their hopes that this initial deal could pave the way for the return of all hostages, with Israel’s president calling it a “significant first step.”

Qatar’s lead negotiator has also urged the international community to “seize this brief window of opportunity to generate further momentum for the diplomatic track,” saying such a move was the only way to resolve the conflict and establish lasting peace.

However, Israel made clear in its statement it plans to resume its air and ground campaign on Gaza “to complete the eradication of Hamas” once this round of hostage releases concludes.

Netanyahu has repeatedly said there are two goals to the war: the return of all hostages, and the destruction of Hamas.

On Tuesday before the deal was approved, Netanyahu told his cabinet the agreement would “allow (the military) to prepare for the continuation of the fighting.” He said the war would continue until “Hamas, Gaza will no longer be a threat to Israel.”

In late September, Zimbabwe’s environment minister signed away control over a staggering amount of land — almost 20% of his country — to a little-known foreign company. Blue Carbon was a small, new outfit, not even a year old, but its chief was no fledgling entrepreneur: he was an Emirati royal whose family had ruled Dubai for 190 years, flush with oil money.

The Dubai-based Blue Carbon has secured forested land nearly equivalent to the size of the United Kingdom across five African nations to run projects to conserve forests that might otherwise be logged, preventing huge amounts of planet-heating carbon dioxide, or CO2, from entering the atmosphere.

Blue Carbon can then use that conservation to create carbon credits to sell to companies and governments to “offset” the climate pollution they generate while they continue to burn planet-warming fossil fuels.

At the same time, the UAE has said it plans to extract its very last barrel of oil 50 years from now, when its reserves are projected to dry up — decades beyond when scientists say society needs to be done with fossil fuel.

Climate advocates have criticized carbon removal — and scientists remain skeptical of its efficacy — as a ticket for companies to continue to produce and burn fossil fuels on a large scale, even expand, and profit handsomely.

The UAE has a lot to lose, financially. Oil and gas account for around 30% of its GDP and 13% of its exports as of last year, according to the US Department of Commerce. More than 80 countries support phasing out fossil fuels, and renewable energy, like wind and solar, are now so cost competitive in most parts of the world that market forces will eventually squeeze oil and gas out anyway.

Unless, that is, fossil fuel companies and lobbyists can convince the world at COP28 not to rely too much on wind and solar, and to keep pumping oil and gas.

The UAE has already been hit with a barrage of criticism since it put Sultan Al Jaber — who runs the nation’s mammoth oil and gas company, the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), and serves as the nation’s international climate envoy — in charge of the negotiations. More than 100 members of the US Congress and the European Parliament in May called for Al Jaber to be replaced as COP28 president.

Al Jaber has long argued that fossil fuel companies need to be at the table in climate negotiations to ensure the green transition actually happens.

There is a certain logic to the argument, but climate advocates aren’t buying it, pointing instead to all the time the fossil fuel industry has had to show leadership on the issue, but hasn’t. Some fossil fuel companies were among the first to understand their products were causing climate change. That was around four decades ago, yet they continued to profit from coal, oil and gas.

“I think that ADNOC has turned the UN climate negotiations into a giant greenwashing operation for one of the largest oil companies on the planet,” said Jamie Henn, founder and executive director of the non-profit Fossil Free Media, which supports the movement to end fossil fuels. “It’s been clear from the start when the UAE applied to host this COP that one of the main goals of the meeting was for them to try and situate themselves, and their oil and gas industry by extension, as somehow part of the climate solution.”

As of 2020, the UAE was responsible for around 0.53% of the world’s CO2 emissions, according to data from Climate Watch, but with a small population of nearly 10 million people, it’s the sixth-largest carbon polluter per capita. Despite its relatively small population, the UAE was the world’s seventh-biggest oil producer by volume in 2022.

Henn said it was “absurd” that the negotiations had been taken over by fossil fuel interests.

“It’s like the international tobacco control negotiations being run by Philip Morris. Luckily, the UN has rules in place for those negotiations, where they don’t let tobacco lobbyists at the table,” Henn said. “We need that at COP.”

Carbon offsets not a ‘get out of jail free’ card

Never has a COP, which is hosted by a different city each year, had so many apparent conflicts of interest. Not only is Al Jaber wearing leadership hats for climate and fossil fuels, but Blue Carbon is so intertwined with the nation’s royals and rulers, it’s difficult to separate its promotion of carbon offsets from the UAE’s interest in continuing fossil fuel production.

And it will be in Dubai, at COP28, where the rules of how to buy and sell these very carbon credits will be decided.

It’s not a big surprise that so many countries have signed up to work with Blue Carbon. Its parent company, Global Carbon Investments, has already agreed to transfer $1.5 billion to Zimbabwe in “pre-financing for carbon credits.” That’s more than the country spends on education and childcare, which combined are Zimbabwe’s biggest national expense.

With so little money trickling in from the developed to the developing world to adapt to the climate crisis, carbon credit schemes open a new channel of revenue for forest-rich countries.

Cutting down forests or letting them degrade accounts for at least 12% of global planet-warming emissions. It’s their ability to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere that makes them valuable as a climate solution.

Yet the idea of creating tradable carbon credits in exchange for not cutting down forests has been widely criticized as problematic. And some of the world’s biggest companies certifying carbon credits have been shown to use accounting methods that exaggerate their project’s true contribution to mitigating climate change.

In early November, Swiss entrepreneur Renat Heuberger stepped down from his role as CEO of South Pole — one of the world’s first major carbon credit trading companies — after it was found to have overstated the climate value of carbon credits that lay in its Kariba forest project in Zimbabwe.

“Investment in efforts to conserve forests is always welcome. However, the challenge is that conserving forests isn’t a ‘get out of jail free’ card,” said Julia Jones, a conservation scientist at Bangor University in Wales.

“Globally, we need to both stop further loss of forests and drastically cut emissions,” she said. “Using one to offset the other, without very substantial investment in reducing emissions, is problematic.”

Land rights are another issue. In some cases, indigenous and customary landowners have been evicted to clear the way for such projects, as they witness their homes, once deemed nearly valueless, transformed into cash cows for polluting companies and countries.

The Forest Peoples Programme, a non-governmental organization, says that such evictions have become more common in Kenya since it began allocating land for carbon credits.

ADNOC to produce more oil than Shell, BP

Whatever the outcome at COP28, the UAE’s state-run oil and gas company, ADNOC, stands to emerge a big winner, especially if it can convince the world that its “Maximum Energy. Minimum Emissions” slogan is a viable climate solution, even as global temperatures soar and scientists press for rapid fossil fuel cuts.

ADNOC is expected to hike its oil production by 41% and its gas production by a third by 2030, compared to projections for this year, according to an analysis of industry data by Global Witness, a non-profit focused on environmental justice and human rights. That translates to a 40% rise in its greenhouse gas emissions, Global Witness said.

The production boost contrasts with plans among other oil majors: Shell’s production is projected to remain largely flat in that time, while BP envisions a 25-percent production cut by 2030. ADNOC, by 2030, plans to out-produce both companies.

To limit its carbon footprint amid the expansion, ADNOC said in October it plans to capture 10 million metric tons of CO2 a year from its operations by 2030 — a figure Global Witness found was wildly exaggerated in a recent analysis.

ADNOC currently has the capacity for 800,000 metric tons per year, though it hopes to capture another roughly 3 megatons per year through two facilities not yet completed. Even if those facilities do come online, Global Witness calculates it would take ADNOC more than 340 years to capture the amount of planet-heating carbon it is expected to emit between 2023 and 2030, if it captured both the emissions from its operations and those that occur from using its oil and gas.

“ADNOC plans not only to produce billions of barrels of oil for decades to come, but it is also positioning itself to be among the most aggressive expanders of oil and gas production out there.”

How much the UAE company expands beyond 2030 will depend on what role negotiators see for carbon capture at COP28, and whether it can find new markets abroad. Ironically, COP28 could be the arena that transforms ADNOC into a global oil major.

Susan Murabana’s life-changing moment happened at 22 years old, when she looked through a telescope for the very first time. Suddenly, Saturn and its yellow-gold rings were more than just an illustration in a textbook; they were real and the experience was powerful.

The opportunity came while she was a student volunteering with Cosmos Education, a non-profit dedicated to improving science learning in developing countries. By traveling with the organization to schools and villages in her home country of Kenya and helping teach young children, her love for astronomy was sparked.

“I thought I was going to inspire them [the children],” she said. “Instead, I was inspired too.”

In 2006, Murabana joined a teacher training program called Global Hands-On Universe, where she led a space education project. Four years later, she completed an online Master’s degree in astronomy from James Cook University in Australia, before being invited to the University of California as a short-term scholar. Here, she realized she wanted children in Africa to be as exposed to opportunities as children in the US were.

“Seeing the access to all these opportunities for kids — planetariums, science centers, festivals and everything else — I wanted to bring back that,” she said. “I wanted to have something sustainable and Kenyan that the Kenyan community would like.”

Travelling Telescope

In 2014, Murabana and her husband Daniel Chu Owen set up the social enterprise Travelling Telescope.

Combining Susan’s experience in education and public outreach with Owen’s passion for astrophotography and his knowledge of telescopes, the Travelling Telescope is an educational program designed for young children in underserved and remote communities. With just a telescope and a mobile inflatable planetarium, they aim to change lives by giving children a chance to see Saturn, the moon, and various constellations, whilst teaching them basic science and astrophysics.

“There’s a satisfaction you get from going to a school, talking to the children, and seeing their reaction and their anticipation,” said Murabana. “A 12-year-old boy in eastern Kenya even told us, ‘I used to think scientists lie, but now I believe in science.’”

Creating change

Murabana and Owen would love to inspire more Kenyans to be involved in the space industry, and dream of seeing the first Kenyan in space. Owen says most Kenyans aren’t aware that the country is involved in space research, but in 2018 the Kenya Space Agency deployed its first satellite into orbit from the International Space Station, and a satellite station in Malindi, on the coast of southeastern Kenya, is used by the European Space Agency for satellite tracking.

Murabana believes astronomy, or even simply the act of looking up at the sky, establishes an awareness of the need to protect our planet, which can create “a generation of more informed leaders.”

“They say the first environmentalists were astronauts,” said Owen, “because they were the first ones to see the planet in its entirety. We are bringing that home in a way — looking out at space helps us look at our own planet much more objectively.”

But there is also a more personal motivation for Murabana’s work — combatting the perception that astronomy is a Western science.

When she was volunteering with Cosmos Education, the team had graduate students from the UK and US but no one else from Africa. Despite Murabana’s passion for astronomy, she felt she didn’t belong.

It wasn’t until a few years later, when she attended a solar eclipse viewing and a related conference in Ghana themed “African Cultural Astronomy,” that her perceptions changed. The history of astronomy in Africa can be traced back for millennia, and includes the ancient Egyptians and the Dogon people of Mali.

“Everything I was having access to in terms of astronomy was Western, like the moon landings, and we still don’t have astronomy textbooks that have come from the African culture,” she explained.

“So going to this conference and learning about how traditionally, different African cultures have looked up to the sky and tried to make sense of it was just empowering. I felt like I belonged, and that Africans could also be a part of this.”

Cosmic hill

Murabana and Owen fund Travelling Telescope by running astro-tourism services, which include camping trips, called Star Safaris, and astronomy nights for paying tourists.

They are in the process of buying a piece of land in Kenya, away from light pollution, on which they’re hoping to create what they call a “cosmic hill.”

“I would like to build an observatory there,” explained Owen, “and invite people to come and learn about space and watch special events like meteor showers. I want to have a little base, somewhere for us to sit and enjoy the sky with whoever wants to share it.”

So far, over 400,000 people have looked through the Travelling Telescope and the pair want to amplify their impact by reaching more schools. For Murabana, the dream is that “every child, at least once in their lifetime, gets the chance to have a lesson under the night sky.”

North Korea on Wednesday said it had put its first spy satellite into orbit and vowed further launches to defend against what it called its “enemies’ dangerous military maneuvers.”

Analysts said if the spacecraft works, it could provide significantly improve North Korea’s military capabilities, including enabling it to more accurately target opponents’ forces.

The satellite, named “Malligyong-1,” was launched late Tuesday on a new carrier rocket, “Chollima-1,” according to the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

“The launch of a reconnaissance satellite is the legal right of North Korea to strengthen its right to self-defense,” the KCNA report said.

Neither South Korea, the United States nor Japan, all of which are experiencing increasing military tensions with North Korea, could confirm the satellite had made it into orbit.

But South Korea called the launch a “clear violation” of a UN Security Council resolution that prohibits North Korea from using ballistic missile technology.

And Wednesday morning the South Korean government partially suspended an agreement it had with North Korea that limited the South’s reconnaissance and surveillance activities along the demilitarized zone (DMZ) that separates the two countries.

The rocket carrying the satellite was launched in a southerly direction and is believed to have passed over Japan’s Okinawa prefecture.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida condemned the launch, referring to it as “a serious situation” that “affects the safety” of people in Japan while reiterating his commitment to continue working with the US and South Korea to respond to Pyongyang’s launches.

In a statement Wednesday, Seoul’s military said that it had been tracking preparations for the launch in close cooperation with the US.

The statement said Aegis destroyers from South Korea, the US, and Japan were deployed to track the launch and information about the specifics of it were being comprehensively analyzed.

Japanese Defense Minister Hiroyuki Miyazawa said his country was still trying to determine whether North Korea’s satellite had reached orbit.

Third satellite launch attempt

Pyongyang first attempted to put a satellite into orbit in late May, but the second stage of the rocket carrying the satellite malfunctioned and it crashed into the sea.

KCNA said “the reliability and stability of the new engine system” was “low” and the fuel used “unstable,” leading to the mission’s failure.

A second attempt failed in August when there was “an error in the emergency blasting system during the third-stage flight,” a KCNA report said at the time.

That rocket broke into multiple parts before falling into the Yellow Sea, the East China Sea, and the Pacific Ocean, according to Japanese officials.

In a defiant speech to the UN Security Council after the second failed launch, North Korean Ambassador Kim Song insisted that pursuing the spy satellite program was within the country’s “legitimate right as a sovereign state.” He denied that North Korea had been seeking to acquire intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) technology through the satellite launch.

Tuesday night’s third attempt was widely expected and signaled by Pyongyang, which early Wednesday vowed to launch more.

North Korea’s National Aerospace Development Administration would submit a plan to “secure the capability to reconnoiter the south Korean region … by additionally launching several reconnaissance satellites in a short span of time,” KCNA said.

Pyongyang said having a satellite was a legitimate self-defense measure against what it claims are a series of provocations by the US, South Korea and Japan.

Earlier this week North Korea denounced the US for its potential sales of advanced missiles to Japan and military equipment to South Korea, calling it “a dangerous act” in a report from KCNA.

North Korea said it was “obvious” who the offensive military equipment would be aimed at and used against.

A military boost for Pyongyang

Analysts said even a single satellite in orbit helps North Korea’s military posture.

“If it works it will improve the North Korean military’s command, control, and communications or intelligence and surveillance capabilities. That would improve the North’s ability to command its forces” in any possible conflict, said Carl Schuster, a former director of operations at the US Pacific Command’s Joint Intelligence Center.

The “satellite will give them a capability that they previously used to lack that can assist them in military targeting, it can assist them in damage assessment,” said Ankit Panda, a nuclear policy at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

And lessons learned from Tuesday’s launch will be used in developing future satellites, Panda said.

“They’re going to take what they learn with this successful launch and apply it to additional launches. They will look to have a resilient, redundant constellation of Earth observation satellites and that will make a pretty big difference for (North Korea’s) overall strategic situational awareness capabilities,” he said.

But others cautioned that the real capabilities of what Pyongyang launched late Tuesday remain to be seen. Some suggested the North had more to lose from the South’s resumption of intelligence gathering along the border than it had to gain from the satellite launch.

“The surveillance drone operations Seoul may soon commence along the DMZ should produce more useful intelligence than North Korea’s rudimentary satellite program,” said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul.

Russian connection?

South Korea’s Defense Minister Shin Won-sik last Sunday said that the North was believed to have “almost resolved” its rocket engine issues “with Russia’s help.”

That came after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un had visited Russia in September, when he toured the Russian space rocket launch site alongside President Vladimir Putin.

In that meeting, Putin signaled a willingness to assist North Korea in developing its space and satellite program.

But Panda cautioned about making assumptions that aid and advice from Russia had made the difference for a successful third launch.

“It would seem unlikely to me given the timeline here that the North Koreans have already received and implemented technical assistance from Russia,” he said.

“Let’s also bear in mind that the North Koreans themselves are remarkably capable at this point.”

Rescuers in India drilled past the halfway mark on Wednesday in efforts to reach workers trapped in a partially collapsed tunnel in the Himalayas.

Forty-one labourers became trapped in India’s northern Uttarakhand state after part of the passageway to the tunnel’s entrance gave way on November 12, sparking a frantic rescue mission.

The operation has been able to use heavy machinery to successfully drill through two-thirds of the way through the rubble to reach the workers that have been trapped for more than a week, according to authorities on Wednesday.

A total of 39 meters’ drilling has been done with an Auger machine, according to a press release issued by state authorities, adding the drilling was “done at a fast pace.”

There is believed to be a total distance of 60 meters worth of debris between the rescuers and those trapped, authorities said earlier.

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, senior government official Dr. Neeraj Khairlanji said, “If there are no further hurdles, then maybe by later tonight or early morning we may have some good news.”

The incident earlier this month left workers confined behind a pile of rubble with little oxygen and water.

Authorities established contact with the men soon after the collapse and embarked on a mission to bring them out safely, aided by local police, India’s Disaster Management Authority and State Disaster Response Fund.

In what was described as the operation’s “first success,” rescuers managed to insert a 53-meter (174 ft) pipe through the rubble late Monday, allowing them to deliver their first hot meal of lentils, water, medicines and oxygen to the trapped laborers.

A second pipeline was put in place on Tuesday to deliver more food to the workers.

The tunnel is part of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Char Dham Highway project, a multimillion-dollar infrastructure plan to improve connectivity in the state of Uttarakhand and provide better access to important pilgrimage locations.

Uttarakhand, a mountainous and picturesque state on India’s border with China, is often referred to as “Devbhumi” or “Land of the Gods” owing to its rich cultural heritage and the abundance of Hindu religious sites.

Israel and Hamas have reached a deal for a four-day pause in fighting and the release of at least 50 women and children held hostage in Gaza, marking a major diplomatic breakthrough nearly seven weeks after the start of a conflict that has spiraled into a grave humanitarian crisis in the enclave.

The deal, as laid out by key negotiator Qatar in a statement, would see hostages held captive by Hamas released in exchange for a number of Palestinian women and children in Israeli jails. The truce, meanwhile, would also allow the entry of “a larger number of humanitarian convoys and relief aid,” the statement said.

The starting time of the pause in fighting would be announced within the next 24 hours, the statement added.

Qatar’s lead negotiator Minister of State Mohammed Al-Khulaifi said the agreement should prompt the international community to “seize this brief window of opportunity to generate further momentum for the diplomatic track.”

The announcement has been greeted with relief and heightened anticipation from the families of those taken hostage, who now await further news about their loved ones.

It has also been met with positive reaction on the international stage. Egyptian President Abdelfattah El-Sisi reiterated Egypt’s commitment to finding a “sustainable” solution for the Palestinian people, while Qatar’s prime minister said his country hopes the development will establish “a comprehensive and sustainable agreement that will put an end to the war and the bloodshed.”

Jordan’s foreign ministry said it hopes the foreign-mediated deal will be a “step” that leads to a “complete cessation of the war” in Gaza. In Russia, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov welcomed the deal, saying that Moscow views it “positively” and describing it as “the first good news from Gaza in a very long time.”

Hamas is holding 239 hostages captive in Gaza, including foreign nationals from 26 countries, according to figures from the Israeli military. The mass abductions at gunpoint took place during October 7, when Hamas militants struck across the border in a coordinated and bloody surprise attack killing around 1,200 people – the largest such attack on Israel since the country’s founding in 1948.

Prior to the deal, only a handful of hostages had been released.

Israel responded to the attack by declaring war against Hamas and imposing a blockade on Gaza that cut off supplies of food, water, medicines and fuel, while launching a relentless air and ground assault. Some 12,700 people have been killed in Gaza since October 7, according to data from the Palestinian health ministry in the West Bank, which draws on information from Hamas-run health authorities.

The newly announced deal followed weeks of negotiations that included the United States and Egypt, and was approved by Israel’s cabinet in the early hours of Wednesday morning following a six-hour meeting an Israeli official described as “tense and emotional.”

Israel held out the potential for the truce to extend beyond the original four-day period, saying in a statement that an extra day would be added for each 10 additional hostages available for release. Some 150 Palestinian prisoners would be released over four days during the initial hostage release if terms are met, the government said.

The Israeli Cabinet Secretariat said that in the first phase, 150 security prisoners would be released in four stages over four days, with Palestinians being released subject to at least 10 Israeli abductees being handed over to Israeli security forces each day. Israel said there would be a lull in the fighting during those four days.

But it also made clear that Israel plans to resume its air and ground campaign “to complete the eradication of Hamas” once this round of hostage releases concludes.

“Until we are told to do so by the Israeli government, we will continue fighting Hamas and when such a deal will come into effect, we will respect that. But we will be very vigilant on the ground,” Conricus said.

The deal followed mounting pressure on the Israeli government from the families of the hostages, who have demanded answers and action from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It also comes amid growing international pressure for more humanitarian support for the people of Gaza.

Hostages’ families anxiously await the release

Even as the details of the release remained unclear, some family members of the hostages held by Hamas expressed relief – and anticipation as they waited to learn whether their loved ones would be included in the negotiated release.

Anat Moshe Shoshany, whose grandmother was kidnapped from kibbutz Nir Oz on the back of a moped, said hearing of the hostage deal gave her “so much hope.”

“I really do hope to see someone walking out of there alive,” Shoshany said. “We want a chance to see our loved ones back. This is all we want and I really hope this is just the first step in this mess.”

“We have spent the last seven weeks, seven weeks, worrying, wondering, praying, hoping,” she said.

The family hopes Abigail, who is the youngest American hostage held by Hamas, can come home by Friday, her fourth birthday.

“We need to see Abigail come out and then we will be able to believe it,” Naftali added.

US President Joe Biden welcomed the deal in a statement Tuesday night in Washington, saying it “should bring home additional American hostages.” He pledge he “will not stop until they are all released.”

Three Americans could be among the 50 women and children freed as part of the deal, senior US officials said. Ten Americans remain unaccounted for, including two women and a 3-year-old girl, according to a senior administration official. The official didn’t name the girl.

A US official also said there are “various locations where the hostages will be brought out,” but declined to provide further detail.

The IDF spokesperson Conricus said the list of hostages to be released in the deal are all Israelis – some with dual nationalities. He added that the Palestinian prisoners set to be released are “not serious offenders.”

Israel on Wednesday released a list of 300 prisoners that could be released, leaving open the possibility of a second phase of exchanges of prisoners for hostages after the initial four-day period.

The publication of the list starts a 24-hour period during which legal petitions against the release of Palestinian prisoners can be filed to Israel’s Supreme Court, after which point the process is expected to begin.

The total number of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails is approximately 8,300, according to Qadura Fares, the head of the Palestinian Prisoners Club, a non-governmental organization.

Of those 8,300, more than 3,000 are being held in what Israel calls “administrative detention,” which Amnesty International says can be extended indefinitely.

‘Potential’ for longer pause

The arrangement for a second phase of exchange built into the deal has the potential to create a longer humanitarian pause than just the four days originally stipulated, officials and statements from the US, Israel and Qatar have suggested.

“The hostages deal, as it is structured, includes a pause, a humanitarian pause over a number of days, four to five days at least. And there’s the potential with additional releases for that to be for that to be extended, but that will also be dependent upon Hamas releasing additional hostages,” according to a senior US official, who added this “incentivizes the release” of all hostages.

The pause will also allow for additional, much-needed humanitarian convoys and relief aid to enter the enclave.

Those would include fuel “designated for humanitarian needs,” according to Qatar, which did not provide further details on the volume of aid expected.

In its statement Wednesday, Hamas said the deal “involves the entry of hundreds of trucks carrying aid relief, medical supplies and fuel to all parts of Gaza.”

Israel has been highly reluctant to allow fuel into Gaza since October 7, citing concerns Hamas will use it to power its operations, and only last week agreed to allow minimal deliveries to power sewage facilities and water supply systems.

Humanitarian groups have for weeks called for fuel to be allowed into Gaza, arguing it is critical for cooking food and maintaining operations at hospitals, which have struggled to keep patients, including neonatal babies alive, amid power outages, supply shortages and bombardment.

Governments across the world and international organizations have also been ramping up pressure for increased aid deliveries to the struggling enclave.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

Twenty-eight premature babies arrived in Egypt from Gaza on Monday and are receiving care in two hospitals, an Egyptian government source said after the infants were evacuated from Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza.

Four of the mothers traveled with their children to Egypt, but the status and whereabouts of the other parents are not known, the source said.

The babies are receiving treatment in El-Arish General Hospital in the Sinai Peninsula and in the New Administrative Capital Hospital in Cairo.

Two of the babies stayed at the Emirati’s ICU unit – with one infant said to be in good health – and a third baby did not transfer to Egypt as his parents are currently in northern Gaza. The other 28 were transferred to Egypt.

“We have been waiting for them during the past few days. We have made all the preparations to receive the newborn babies with all the medical equipment needed for that,” a doctor at Al-Arish, named Ahmad, told Egyptian state broadcaster Al Qahera Monday, adding some of the babies are in need of “more advanced medical measures.”

A mother of one of the premature babies transferred to a hospital in Egypt said it was the “best place on earth” for her daughter to be. She told Egyptian state run pool that after a “difficult birth” on September 28, her daughter had been placed in an incubator in Al-Shifa.

“On the seventh of October, I was supposed to go and see my daughter. She was reliant on artificial respiration. Then they asked us to leave our house, then they bombed our house. So I went to Al Shifa Hospital. It never occurred to us that the hospital would be targeted and that those children would have to go through what they went through,” Lubna El-Seik said Monday.

After Israel announced a “precise and targeted” operation in Al-Shifa and fighting began in the hospital complex, Al Seik said her daughter’s condition deteriorated. “She relied solely on artificial oxygen,” she said.

Citing doctors at the Rafah hospital, the World Health Organization said earlier the babies were fighting serious infections and 11 were in “critical condition,” due to a lack of medical supplies at Al-Shifa.

UNICEF, which worked with UN agencies and PCRS to carry out the evacuation, warned Sunday that the babies’ condition was “rapidly deteriorating.” It said the evacuation took place in “extremely dangerous conditions” and followed the “tragic death of several other babies, and total collapse of all medical services at Al-Shifa.”

Al-Shifa, the largest hospital in Gaza, has become a flashpoint in Israel’s war in the besieged enclave. The Israeli military alleges the facility is being used by Hamas as a shield for its operations and raided the hospital last Wednesday. Hamas and hospital officials have denied Israel’s claims.

For days, relentless bombardment near the hospital trapped thousands of staff, patients and civilians sheltering inside, prompting public outcry, fueled by the details of the plight of newborn babies fighting for their lives.

The WHO described Al-Shifa as a “death zone” with corridors “filled with medical and solid waste,” after a United Nations team visited the hospital for an hour on Saturday to assess the deteriorating humanitarian situation.

Palestinian authorities said several newborns have died due to power outages and a shortage of medical supplies; hospital staff described having to move babies by hand from incubators after running out of fuel and wrapping them in foil to keep them warm.

Under growing pressure to provide evidence for its claim that Hamas is using Al-Shifa for military purposes, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on Sunday released CCTV videos and still images it says show Hamas fighters bringing hostages into Al-Shifa on October 7, when Hamas launched its attack on southern Israel, killing more than 1,200 people and taking some 240 people into Gaza as hostages.

Dr. Ahmed Mokhallalati, the head of the hospital’s burns unit, accused Israeli forces of pushing around staff, questioning them about Hamas and restricting staff movements after the raid last week.

“The common question (staff keep being asked): Do you know anything about the Hamas groups? Do you know anything about the tunnels within the hospital?” the doctor said.

Egyptian health workers were photographed on Monday standing beside ambulances and incubators, waiting for the babies to arrive at the Rafah border, which has been used to bring in limited aid and evacuate foreign nationals.

It was hoped that the parents of the newborns would be able to travel to safety with their children, but the WHO said very few of the infants were accompanied by family members.

Gazan officials had “limited information” and were not able to find close family members, the WHO said.

One father, Ali Sbeiti, was reunited with his young son Anas, who was born three days before the war began.

The intense fighting between Israel and Hamas, and a communications blackout across the enclave due to a lack of fuel, has complicated aid delivery efforts and made it more difficult for Palestinians to reach relief services.

WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Sunday further missions were being planned to evacuate the remaining patients and staff from Al-Shifa, “pending guarantees of safe passage by parties to the conflict.”

This is a developing story and will be updated.

Palestinian poet and writer Mosab Abu Toha, who had been contributing to The New Yorker and other publications with reflections on his life inside Gaza during the war, has been released from detention after questioning, according to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).

In a statement Tuesday, the IDF said that Abu Toha was among a group of civilians who was taken into questioning during operations, when “there was intelligence indicating of a number of interactions between several civilians and terror organizations inside the Gaza Strip.”

The poet’s brother, Hamza Abu Toha, recounted the story of his detention in a Facebook post Monday.

Abu Toha was taken into custody by the IDF “when he reached the checkpoint while leaving from the north to the south” of Gaza, reads the post.

“His wife and children entered the south, and the army arrested my brother Mosab,” continues the post. “We have no information about him. It is worth mentioning that the American embassy sent him and his family to travel through the Rafah crossing.”

An American Book Award winner and finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for his debut poetry book, “Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear,” Mosab Abu Toha, 30, had written searingly about the Israeli airstrikes that have decimated Gaza since war broke out last month between Israel and Hamas.

In a New Yorker essay published on October 20, he described returning to his home in Beit Lahia, in northern Gaza, days after evacuating to Jabalia refugee camp, where he had stayed with relatives.

“On the main street leading to my house, I find the first of many shocking scenes. A shop where I used to take my children, to buy juice and biscuits, is in shambles. The freezer, which used to hold ice cream, is now filled with rubble. I smell explosives, and maybe flesh,” he wrote.

In a Facebook post five days ago – his most recent post on the website – Abu Toha wrote that he was “alive” and begged for an end to the bloodshed.

“Thanks for your prayers. We don’t have any access to food or clean water. Winter is coming and we don’t have enough clothes. Kids are suffering. We are suffering,” he wrote, adding, “the army is now at Al-Shifa Hospital. More death, more destruction. Who can stop this? Please stop it now.”

PEN International, the global association of writers, said Monday that it is “deeply concerned” about Abu Toha.

“We join calls demanding to know his whereabouts and the reasons for his detention,” PEN said in a statement posted to X, the social media site formerly known as Twitter.

The New York Review of Books also posted about his reported detention on X, noting that “in May we published his poem “What a Gazan Should Do During an Israeli Air Strike.”

This is a developing news story and will be updated.

The recovery of the ozone layer — which sits miles above the Earth and protects the planet from ultraviolet radiation — has been celebrated as one of the world’s greatest environmental achievements. But in a new study published Tuesday, some scientists claim it may not be recovering at all, and that the hole may even be expanding.

The findings are in disagreement with widely accepted assessments of the ozone layer’s status, including a recent UN-backed study that showed it would return to 1980s levels as soon as 2040.

In 1987, several countries agreed to ban or phase down the use of more than 100 ozone-depleting chemicals that had caused a “hole” in the layer above Antarctica. The depletion is mainly attributed to the use of chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs, which were common in aerosol sprays, solvents and refrigerants.

That ban, agreed under the Montreal Protocol, is widely considered to have been effective in aiding the ozone layer’s recovery.

But the hole, which grows over the Antarctic during spring before shrinking again in the summer, reached record sizes in 2020 to 2022, prompting scientists in New Zealand to investigate why.

In a paper, published by Nature Communications, they found that ozone levels have reduced by 26% since 2004 at the core of the hole in the Antarctic springtime.

“This means that the hole has not only remained large in area, but it has also become deeper [i.e. has less ozone] throughout most of Antarctic spring,” said Hannah Kessenich, a PhD Student at the University of Otago and lead author of the study.

“The especially long-lived ozone holes during 2020-2022 fit squarely into this picture, as the size/depth of the hole during October was particularly notable in all three years.”

To reach that conclusion, the scientists analyzed the ozone layer’s behavior from September to November using a satellite instrument. They used historical data to compare that behavior and changing ozone levels, and to measure signs of ozone recovery. They then sought to identify what was driving these changes.

They found that the depletion of ozone and deepening of the hole were a result of changes in the Antarctic polar vortex, a vast swirl of low pressure and very cold air, high above the South Pole.

The study’s authors didn’t go further to explore what was causing those changes, but they acknowledged that many factors could also contribute to ozone depletion, including planet-warming pollution; tiny, airborne particles that are emitted from wildfires and volcanoes; and changes in the solar cycle.

“Altogether, our findings reveal the recent, large ozone holes may not be caused just by CFCs,” Kessenich said. “So, while the Montreal Protocol has been indisputably successful in reducing CFCs over time and preventing environmental catastrophe, the recent persistent Antarctic ozone holes appear to be closely tied to changes in atmospheric dynamics.”

Some scientists are skeptical of the study’s findings, which rely heavily on the holes observed in 2020 to 2022 and use a short period — 19 years — to make conclusions about the long-term health of the ozone layer.

“Existing literature has already found reasons for these large ozone holes: Smoke from the 2019 bushfires and a volcanic eruption (La Soufriere), as well as a general relationship between the polar stratosphere and El Niño Southern Oscillation,” Martin Jucker, a scientist at the Climate Change Research Centre at the University of New South Wales in Australia, told the Science Media Center.

“We know that during La Niña years, the polar vortex in the stratosphere tends to be stronger and colder than usual, which means that ozone concentrations will also be lower during those years. The years 2020-22 have seen a rare triple La Niña, but this relationship is never mentioned in the study.”

He noted the study’s authors said they removed two years in the record — 2002 and 2019 — to ensure that “exceptional events” did not skew their findings.

“Those events have been shown to have strongly decreased the ozone hole size,” he said, “so including those events would probably have nullified any long-term negative trend.”