Hamas responds to proposed Gaza ceasefire plan
Hamas says it has given its response to a framework proposal for a new ceasefire in Gaza.
The details of the deal – set out by Israel, the US, Qatar and Egypt – have not been released.
It was earlier reported to include a six-week truce, when more Israeli hostages would be exchanged for Palestinian prisoners.
Israel and the US have both said they are reviewing Hamas’s response.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who is currently in the Middle East, said he would discuss Hamas’s response with officials in Israel on Wednesday.
While Mr Blinken has given no indication of how the US views the response, President Joe Biden described it as “a little over the top” – suggesting the Israeli leadership will not easily agree to what the group is asking.
A senior Hamas official told the BBC the group had presented a “positive vision” in response to the framework but had asked for some amendments relating to the rebuilding of Gaza, the return of its residents to their homes and the provisions for those who had been displaced.
The official said Hamas had also asked for changes relating to the treatment of those injured, including their return home and transfer to hospitals abroad.
The proposal was sent to Hamas around a week ago but a representative told the Reuters news agency it had taken them until Tuesday to respond because parts of it were “unclear and ambiguous.”
Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed Bin Abdulrahman al Thani has described Hamas’s response as “positive” in general.
- Why are Israel and Hamas fighting in Gaza?
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The conflict in Gaza was triggered by an unprecedented cross-border attack by Hamas gunmen on southern Israel on 7 October, in which about 1,300 people were killed and about 250 others taken hostage.
More than 27,500 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the health ministry in the Gaza Strip, which has been governed by Hamas and blockaded by Israel and Egypt since 2007.
Hamas is proscribed as a terrorist organisation in several countries.
During a week-long ceasefire in late November, 105 Israeli and foreign hostages were freed in exchange for 240 Palestinians held in Israeli jails.
The timing of any new deal could be complicated by claims briefed earlier this week by Israeli defence officials that the military is “making progress” in its hunt for Hamas’s leader in Gaza Yahya Sinwar.
However, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is under intense domestic pressure to secure the release of the remaining hostages.
A growing sense of regional crisis also adds to the urgency Mr Blinken brings to the Israeli city of Tel Aviv, as he arrives seeking progress on the deal.
The US is increasingly trying to stem a widening regional escalation after last week’s drone strike that killed three American soldiers in Jordan.
Washington retaliated with air strikes against Iran-backed militias in Syria and Iraq and is warning more will come.
A ceasefire deal in Gaza is seen by the US as the most realistic way to reduce tensions further afield.
On Tuesday, Israel confirmed that 31 of the 136 remaining hostages in Gaza had been killed.
Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, a spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), said their families had been informed and that the authorities would continue to push for the return of the remaining captives.
“This is a moral obligation, national obligation and international obligation and this is our compass and this is how we will continue operating,” said Mr Hagari.
A TikTok grandpa with a bloody past is trying to win an election
There was a time when Prabowo Subianto’s name would have spooked most Indonesians.
But now young voters appear to be charmed by the defence minister’s slick makeover. The fiery ex-special forces commander dogged by allegations of human rights abuses and disappearances has become a cute grandfather made for memes.
“He is much older, but he is able to embrace my generation,” says a 25-year-old supporter of his, Albert Joshua.
Now 72, Mr Prabowo is running to succeed the popular Joko Widodo when the world’s third-largest democracy votes on 14 February. He is promising more of the stability and economic development Mr Widodo, or Jokowi as he is better known, pushed during his decade in power.
So far the polls put Mr Prabowo ahead of his younger rivals, Ganjar Pranowo and Anies Baswedan. Both men are in their 50s and have experience running key Indonesian provinces as governors. Job security, infrastructure and a bigger diplomatic role for Indonesia dominate their campaigns.
Mr Prabowo’s running mate is Mr Widodo’s eldest son, Gibran Rakabuming Raka. It’s a choice that many see as a tacit blessing by the president, who is yet to endorse anyone, including his own party’s candidate, Mr Pranowo.
But a Prabowo presidency is also alarming to many, who say he has never been held accountable for the alleged abduction and killing of pro-democracy student activists decades ago.
A young voter, who did not wish to be named, says she is “terrified” he will win: “If he could be an accomplice of silencing voices then he will be silencing those voices now if he gets elected.”
“Cuteness” hardly makes an eligible leader, she says. “If that’s how you think a leader should be, then you should elect kittens.”
Indonesia’s cat-loving ‘gemoy squad’
Cats are also a part of Mr Prabowo’s social media campaign. His brown and white stray, Bobby, has his own well-curated Instagram account that describes him as a “patriot”.
Then there are the TikTok videos of Mr Prabowo doing his signature move – an awkward shuffle across the stage – or shooting hearts at the audience. The gushing response has dubbed him “gemoy”, a moniker for all things cuddly and adorable. His young supporters call themselves the “gemoy squad”.
Social media has been the cornerstone of his outreach. Millennials and Gen Z make up more than half of Indonesia’s 205 million eligible voters – they also account for many of the 167 million Indonesians who use social media.
Mr Prabowo’s official Facebook and affiliated accounts spent $144,000 in advertising over the past three months, according to Meta’s data. That’s almost double Mr Pranowo’s spend, and triple that of Mr Baswedan.
“I rarely see Prabowo’s real picture anymore,” said Yoes C Kenawas, a research fellow at Atma Jaya University.
Instead the internet, drawing rooms and streets are filled with posters of Mr Prabowo as a chubby cartoon character. This new “avatar… is all over Indonesia”, Mr Kenawas says. “That’s how they’re softening his image. And so far, it’s pretty successful.”
A spokesperson for Mr Prabowo’s campaign said they were just trying to attract young people through a “fun” campaign: “Politics can be conveyed through different methods… that’s not a bad thing,” Dedek Prayudi told the BBC.
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Gen Z voter Rahayu Sartika Dewi says she is drawn to Mr Prabowo’s plans to develop the renewable energy and farming sectors. She calls the campaign “very cute, fun and approachable… not too heavy like in previous years”.
Mr Prabowo ran for president, and lost, in 2014 and 2019. But this campaign has been remarkably different.
“The logic is that Prabowo’s losses were, at least in part, because his strongman image and firebrand style alienated parts of the electorate,” says Dr Eve Warburton, director of the Australia National University’s Indonesia Institute.
Mr Prabowo is also targeting a generation that has no memory of the time when he rose to the peak of his power. That happened during the dictatorship of General Suharto, who was forced from office in 1998. His 32-year reign, which many Indonesians credit with modernising the country, was also a time of brutal repression and bloodshed.
Twenty-five years on, young voters say they would rather judge Mr Prabowo on how he tackles unemployment and cost of living. He has promised to create 19 million new jobs over the next five years.
“I know activists are still speaking out… but we have to move on,” Mr Joshua says.
Mr Prabowo’s campaign has denied the allegations, although he was dismissed from the military for his alleged role in the activists’ disappearance. In 2014 he told Al Jazeera that he had ordered their kidnapping but had only done so on the orders of superiors.
In recent months videos have been showing up of people in tears, expressing their sympathy for him, claiming he had been “victimised by his opponents”. They often feature young people, and some election watchers doubt if these are genuine supporters.
Ms Dewi says his presidential nomination is “proof” that he has shaken off the allegations.
An extraordinary comeback
Mr Prabowo was born into a wealthy political family, the son of a renowned economist who served in the Indonesian cabinet.
He followed his father who left the country in 1957 under a cloud of controversy, and spent a decade of his childhood in exile in Europe.
After returning home, he joined the army and quickly moved up the ranks to become the captain of Indonesia’s elite special forces, the Kopassus.
By then he had already been accused of human rights violations in restive East Timor, where he had served as a member of the unit. His exact role in the military operations in East Timor that claimed hundreds of lives has never been proven and he denies the allegations. But the murky blot on his career has stayed.
- Why Indonesia’s leader went from scorn to selfies
He married one of Suharto’s daughters and remained in the dictator’s inner circle. As Suharto’s reign crumbled in the late 1990s, the Kopassus was accused of kidnapping more than 20 student activists who opposed the regime. At least a dozen of them are still missing and feared dead. Those who survived have alleged torture.
Mr Prabowo was discharged from the military, went into self-imposed exile in Jordan, made it onto a blacklist in Australia and was banned from travelling to the United States.
But he made a comeback in 2019, when Mr Widodo appointed him as his defence minister, turning the rivals into allies. The surprise move followed a bitter election win – Mr Prabowo blamed his loss on cheating – and violent protests that left eight people dead.
“How can we expect justice if the perpetrator becomes the president?” asks Suciwati, the widow of a prominent human rights lawyer. Munir Said Thalib spent much of his life investigating the 1998 disappearances. He was assassinated in 2004 on a flight. The pilot was found guilty, but Suciwati does not believe that is the full story.
Prabowo’s presidency “would be an extraordinary defeat for us, the families of victims, and human rights activists”, she says.
Mr Widodo’s support has helped restore Mr Prabowo’s image, some say. Social media is “not enough”, Mr Kenawas adds, and “how the state machineries have supported his campaign… should not be underestimated”.
Many point to his running mate and Mr Widodo’s son, Mr Gibran. A constitutional court, where Mr Widodo’s brother-in-law serves as chief justice, controversially cleared the way for the 36-year-old to run for vice-president – Indonesian law requires him to be older.
What also worries many is a return of the “old Prabowo”, known for his hot temper and volatile personality.
Dr Warburton says some of his recent public appearances had hints of that.
“No-one knows how Prabowo will govern,” she says. “He may be a very hands-off president most interested in the prestige and pomp of office; but most who know him well emphasise his unpredictable personality. And that’s never good for governance.”
Additional reporting by Nicky Widadio and Amahl Azwar
Bolts missing from door, says Boeing blowout probe
A door that blew away from a Boeing 737 Max shortly after take-off may not have been properly secured, a new report says.
The US National Transportation Safety Board has released initial findings from its probe into the incident on an Alaska Airlines plane in January.
It says four key bolts that were meant to lock the unused door to the fuselage appeared to be missing.
Replying to the report, Boeing said it was accountable for what happened.
In a statement, Boeing’s president Dave Calhoun said: “An event like this must not happen on an airplane that leaves our factory. We simply must do better for our customers and their passengers.”
“We are implementing a comprehensive plan to strengthen quality and the confidence of our stakeholders,” he added.
The incident happened minutes after Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 took off, and involved a panel covering an unused emergency exit – known as a door plug. This suddenly blew out, leaving a gaping hole in the side of the main body of the aircraft, the fuselage.
The missing bolts appeared to have allowed the door panel to move out of position and break away from the aircraft, the report says.
It happened just moments after the flight took off from Portland International Airport.
The plane then suffered a rapid loss of cabin pressure, as air rushed out and the atmosphere within the plane equalised with the thinner air outside.
The door plug was manufactured by Boeing’s supplier Spirit AeroSystems, and originally installed in the fuselage before being delivered to the aerospace giant.
According to the preliminary report, this door plug was later removed in the factory due to damage that had occurred during the production process.
Photographic evidence suggests that when the plug was reinstalled, at least three of the four locking bolts were not put back in place.
Damage to the door plug and its hinges, as well as a lack of damage to the areas where the bolts should have been, suggests that the bolts were missing before the door moved out of its normal position, the report said.
Spirit AeroSystems said it remain focused on working closely with Boeing and regulators “on continuous improvement in our processes and meeting the highest standards of safety, quality and reliability”.
The findings are likely to make uncomfortable reading for Boeing, which has already faced harsh criticism over its corporate culture and quality control processes.
Inspections have already revealed loose bolts and fixings on other planes of the same specification, raising questions about the way they were built.
In his response, Boeing’s president and chief executive said its improvement plan would “take significant, demonstrated action and transparency at every turn”.
Mr Calhoun said the airline manufacturer would implement new inspections of door plug assembly and fully document when the plug is removed.
Additional inspections into the supply chain and an independent assessment would also be included in the plans.
“This added scrutiny – from ourselves, from our regulator and from our customers – will make us better. It’s that simple,” Mr Calhoun said.
A history of problems
Prior to the Alaska Airlines incident, there had been other serious problems on the 737 Max production line, including the discovery of manufacturing defects affecting key parts of the planes, as well as a part protecting the central fuel tank against lightning strikes.
The scrutiny is all the more intense because of the history of the 737 Max itself.
The plane – a new version of Boeing’s decades old workhorse – was involved in two major accidents in late 2018 and early 2019, in which 346 people were killed.
- Boeing 737 Max: What went wrong?
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Those crashes were attributed to badly-designed flight control software, which forced both aircraft into catastrophic dives that the pilots were powerless to prevent.
In the aftermath, Boeing faced accusations from lawmakers and safety campaigners that it had put profits above the safety of passengers.
Testifying before US lawmakers today, the head of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Mike Whitaker said inspections of 737 Max aircraft had shown that “the quality system issues at Boeing were unacceptable and require further scrutiny”.
He promised to put more “boots on the ground” in Boeing’s factories in order to increase scrutiny of the manufacturer.
Boeing would be held accountable for any future failure or refusal to comply with the FAA, he added.
Last month, Boeing’s chief executive Dave Calhoun told staff at the company it would co-operate with investigators and regulators “to ensure all the procedures are put into place, inspections, all the readiness actions that are required to ensure every next airplane that moves into the sky is in fact safe and that this event can never happen again”.
Offices struggle with Lunar New Year celebration
For Lunar New Year, Aivee’s office was decorated with Chinese lanterns. The Sydney location of the global tech-consulting firm, where she worked as a lawyer, also hosted a traditional lion dance, and convened a panel discussion about Lunar New Year traditions that lacked diverse representation other than one Chinese colleague.
Yet 32-year-old Aivee, who is Malaysian, felt dissatisfied. The entire effort felt lacklustre, if not generic. Little about the organisation of the festivities, she says, felt inclusive or genuine. “I came in with the expectations of hearing more about Lunar New Year traditions of different Asian countries across the office.”
As workforces grow more diverse, many companies have rolled in a wider swath of multicultural celebrations, recognising heritage months and culturally specific holidays. Research from McKinsey & Company shows companies leading in diversity are 35% more likely to outperform their peers financially; for workers, Deloitte data shows workers who have a strong sense of belonging often become often productive, leave companies less often and take fewer sick days.
“It leads to higher employee engagement,” explains Pin-ya Tseng, a senior consultant at Paradigm, a San Francisco-based diversity and inclusion consultancy. She says workplace multiculturalism, as opposed to ignoring or minimising group differences, leads employees to perceive their colleagues to be less biased.
Yet it can be hard to handle cultural celebrations with nuance – getting details right, hitting the correct touchpoints and doing so with sensitivity. Experts point to Lunar New Year as an example where businesses can make missteps that leave workers like Aivee feeling like their companies have simply paid them lip service – or left them unacknowledged.
“Organisations need to recognise that many of their employees observe Lunar New Year,” says Tseng. “It is estimated that around two billion people worldwide celebrate the holiday.”
For many of those people, workplace recognition of Lunar New Year is not just the desire for a party. Instead, it’s an opportunity foster cultural understanding among leaders and colleagues. When companies don’t emphasise the significance of the Spring Festival for the many cultures that celebrate it – and do so properly – some workers can feel misunderstood.
Several cultures celebrate Lunar New Year in different ways, and workplaces need to take into account global traditions (Credit: Alamy)
Kelly, 22, who is originally from Hong Kong, says she was left “feeling different” at work, as she found it challenging to explain the importance of the Lunar New Year in her London workplace. To her it is “the best time of the year”. Yet her colleagues, who overwhelmingly celebrated Western holidays, didn’t grasp its significance and customs after the office’s tepid, drop-by celebration.
“It’s much harder for them to relate when I say I’m going home for the Lunar New Year. I’m taking two weeks off and it’s affecting my work,” she says. It’s a contrast to the common approach of taking end-of-year holidays off, and many of her colleagues didn’t understand why she was taking the time in February. The burden can fall on employees to explain their cultural customs – work that is both unpaid and emotionally taxing.
Even when business leaders do introduce programming, workers say they often get it wrong.
“We’ve seen organisations make the mistake of neglecting to acknowledge the range of countries and communities that celebrate the Lunar New Year,” explains Tseng. Some companies refer to “Lunar New Year” as “Chinese New Year”, or conversely, assume certain Asian cultures celebrate Lunar New Year when they don’t.
Khoi, a 23-year-old Vietnamese graduate at a global financial firm in London, celebrates Tết. His employer did recognise Lunar New Year, but called it “Lunar Chinese New Year”.
“Well, at least it’s better than just ‘Chinese New Year’,” says Khoi, a sentiment that stems from his previous employer’s complete lack of recognition for the season. Yet this “good enough” attitude can leave workers like him resigned to the fact that companies simply will not be able to get it right – and lower the bar for what they should expect of their employers.
Leaders have a major role to play in making employees who celebrate Lunar New Year feel supported and prioritised (Credit: Getty Images)
Yet companies can do it, say experts. Much of the success of these programmes fall on senior leaders to actively promote them. “If leaders aren’t visibly prioritising these events or programs, others within the organisation won’t see them as important either,” says Tseng. “This means it will be hard to get engagement from those who may be helping create and run activities as well as those who would be participating.”
One of the underlying issues with executive support, however, is a common lack of Asian representation in leadership positions: often called the “bamboo ceiling”. Research in 2023 from the MIT Sloan School of Management in Massachusetts, US, showed East Asian workers – Chinese, Japanese and Koreans – were viewed as less creative, creating a barrier to top roles. Organically boosting Lunar New Year celebrations from the top is challenging when few Asians hold senior jobs.
However, senior managers of all backgrounds can still to use their roles to push forward diversity efforts and make positive changes step by step, carefully working in tandem with Asian colleagues at all levels of an organisation. And leaders from Asian backgrounds say the importance of Lunar New Year inclusivity pays dividends.
“As I’ve grown professionally, I have seen first-hand how important it can be for myself and other Asian colleagues to have a strong support network, from a community to celebrate our culture with many people without strong family connections in-country, to advice and career support as people progress and build their careers,” says Cassandra Yong, a Chinese-Malaysian partner at Boston Consulting Group in London, who founded and leads its Asian Diversity Network at the firm across the UK, Netherlands and Belgium. “Our Asian community has grown significantly over the years, and it was important for me to ensure everyone is able to access a network like this.”
The latest in Italy’s battle against overtourism
According to the United Nations World Tourism Organization, in 2022, nearly 50 million people visited Italy, a nearly one-for-one match on the nation’s total population of locals. As a result, Italy has strengthened its stance against overtourism, with new entry fees and group size restrictions in Venice for 2024 being the latest in a slew of new regulations. Additionally, a few recent events have led the European nation to propose policies to combat transgressions by ill-behaved visitors.
Take, for example, in 2023 when a tourist took a swim in the centuries-old Trevi Fountain, one of Rome’s most iconic sites. The occurrence was so dramatic that local officials contemplated limiting access to the historic monument. However, like previous calls to erect a glass barrier around the fountain to protect it from unruly travellers, this notion was shut down after experts said it would impede the view of the fountain, with one expert telling La Repubblica the idea was “really silly”. (Just around the corner at the Spanish Steps, though, officials enacted a rule back in 2019 stating that neither locals nor tourists can sit on the steps, even for a photo opp. If caught taking a seat, tourists risk a €250 (£214) fine.)
But it’s not just bad behaviour Italy is contending with. It’s sheer overtourism too.
“When I first moved to Rome, I couldn’t wrap my mind around the number of tourists wandering the streets regardless of the time of the day. But when the high season finished, the number of tourists didn’t change,” said Viktoriia Khutorna, a communications specialist who has been living in Rome for nearly two years. “In October, reality kicked in harshly – I realised that there is no such thing as ‘off season’ for Italy. People come to the country regardless of the month of the year thanks to the good weather.”
Khutorna acknowledges that tourism is a major contributor to the Italian economy. In fact, it accounts for more than 10% of Italy’s gross domestic product, with one out of every nine jobs in the country coming from hospitality. Nonetheless, “overtourism is a problem in Italy,” she said. “For instance, the sidewalks in Rome are very narrow, so with so many tourists, it’s impossible to walk comfortably in the streets. Another challenging thing is public transportation. People are squished in autobuses and metro trains sardines in a can. And don’t even let me start on the litter problem.”
(Credit: Getty Images)
The effects of overtourism across Italy
Starting this June, tour groups in Venice will be capped at 25 people per group, officials announced in December. And tour leaders will no longer be allowed to use loudspeakers to communicate with their flocks as this “can generate confusion and disturbances”. The devices will be banned in the city and on nearby islands, officials said in a statement. And, as part of the new rules, tourists are also asked to no longer pause while traversing the city’s bridges.
“It is an important measure aimed at improving the management of groups in the historic centre and on the islands of Murano, Burano and Torcello,” said Elisabetta Pesce, the official in charge of security in Venice. “It’s about promoting sustainable tourism and guaranteeing the protection and safety of the city.”
Venice and Rome aren’t the only destinations in Italy enacting regulations to both encourage better traveller etiquette and curb overcrowding issues.
In Portofino, tourists can get fined for “lingering” too long while taking a selfie. In Alto Adige, a region in Northern Italy, overnight tourism is capped to 2019 levels to prevent overcrowding. In the summer, visitors to Sardinia must book a reservation to use the beach via the app Cuore di Sardegna. And all over Italy, short-term rentals are being heavily regulated, including in Florence, where new short-term licenses have been completely banned in the city’s centre to help free up housing for locals, which could in turn lessen the overtourism issue as people will have fewer places to stay.
“We are putting a simple ban in the UNESCO area to meet our responsibilities of protecting the cultural and material identity of the centro storico, and to dampen the effect of rent increases across the entire city – which are directly linked to the boom of short-term tourist rentals,” Dario Nardella, the mayor of Florence, told reporters in 2023.
BBC Travel reached out to Airbnb for comment and a brand rep responded that Airbnb wants to “work with Florence to create a way forward that protects local families who rely on the income they make from hosting. Airbnb is an economic lifeline for many Italians; one in three Hosts say the extra income helps them afford their homes and rising living costs. We recognize the challenges facing historical cities and welcome progress from the Italian government on new national rules, which will help support the policy goals of cities like Florence.”
Still, will all these rules be effective in paring down visits to Italy?
“Italy has been experiencing overtourism, but [it’s also happening in] many cities in Europe and countries around the world,” said Simone Amorico, CEO of the destination management company Access Italy. Amorico says the best solution may be to get off the beaten path and, unsurprisingly, invest in a tour guide. “It is important to be advised by a travel advisor… For us, it is not only about the popular bridges, but we can show the insider Venice – the neighbourhoods that are less known and more authentic, to see where local artisans restore and build gondolas, for example. Or visit the Doge Palace after hours when it is less crowded, or a cooking class in a private home.”
As for destinations limiting the number of short-term rentals, Amorico doesn’t see that as a problem. As he says, “There are so many amazing family-owned hotels” to check into instead.
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