Hurricane Florence Makes Its Presence Felt, Days Before Landfall

In her first letter from Gaza, the former blogger Amal Murtaja described daily life in war. A second dispatch closed with the news that she had managed to escape to Egypt with her children. Murtaja, who taught English at Gaza’s American International School, wrote this from Giza, outside Cairo. As the potential cease-fire agreement neared, the news was a whirlwind of conflicting reports.

TEL AVIV, Israel— Relatives of hostages still being held by militants in Gaza called on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Friday to ensure all remaining captives are freed, while also appealing to U. S. President Donald Trump to continue pressing for their release. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] As a fragile six-week ceasefire between Israel and Hamas entered its sixth day, Israelis waited anxiously for the names of the next four hostages who will be released from among the more than 90 still held in Gaza. In the Palestinian enclave, civilians in the central and southern part of the Gaza Strip hoping to return to the remnants of their home in the battered north faced an agonizing wait. Israel believes about a third, or possibly as many as half, of the more than 90 hostages still in Gaza have died.

The last time Belarus staged a presidential election in 2020, authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko was declared the winner with 80% of the vote. That triggered cries of fraud, months of protests and a harsh crackdown with thousands of arrests. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Not wanting to risk such unrest again by those opposing his three decades of iron-fisted rule, Lukashenko advanced the timing of the 2025 election—from the warmth of August to frigid January, when demonstrators are less likely to fill the streets. With many of his political opponents either jailed or exiled abroad, the 70-year-old Lukashenko is back on the ballot, and when the election concludes on Sunday, he is all but certain to add a seventh term as the only leader most people in post-Soviet Belarus have ever known. Here’s what to know about Belarus, its election and its relationship with Russia: ‘Europe’s last dictator’ and his reliance on Russia Belarus was part of the Soviet Union until its collapse in 1991.

mdash; President Donald Trump used an address Thursday to the World Economic Forum to promise global elites lower taxes if they bring manufacturing to the U. S. and threatened to impose tariffs if they don’t. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Speaking by video from the White House to the annual summit in Davos, Switzerland, on his third full day in office, Trump ran through his flurry of executive actions since his swearing-in and claimed that he had a “massive mandate” from the American people to bring change.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Saudi Arabia’s crown prince said Thursday the kingdom wants to invest $600 billion in the United States over the next four years, comments that came after President Donald Trump earlier put a price tag on returning to the kingdom as his first foreign trip. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Trump’s 2017 trip to Saudi Arabia upended a tradition of U.