Plus, US election wins for abortion rights advocates.

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Daily Briefing

Israel hunts Hamas in tunnel network after encircling Gaza City, abortion rights advocates and Democrats score wins in US elections, and how shipping more US natural gas to Europe helped fuel CO2 pollution.

 

Plus, star-filled Euclid images spur mission to probe the "dark universe".

 

By Kate Turton

Today's Top News

 

Flares burn in the sky as seen from the Israeli side of the border with Gaza, in southern Israel. REUTERS/Ammar Awad

ISRAEL AND HAMAS AT WAR

  • Israel's ground forces in the Gaza Strip aimed to locate and disable Hamas militants' vast tunnel network beneath the enclave, the next phase in an Israeli offensive that has killed thousands of Palestinians.
  • According to the World Health Organization patients from Gaza usually receive care each day for complex health needs at hospitals in Jerusalem, the West Bank, Israel and other countries. That came to a halt after Oct. 7. Now the WHO wants the most vulnerable among the chronically ill to be allowed out for treatment.
  • Listen to Reuters World News podcast host Kim Vinnell, in New York for Reuters Next, report on the U.N.'s calls for a ceasefire.

US NEWS

  • Democrats and abortion rights advocates notched electoral victories, including in conservative Ohio and Kentucky, a signal that reproductive rights remain a potent issue for Democrats ahead of the 2024 presidential race. Here are the US Election Day results, including governor races, abortion rights and more.
  • An intensifying rivalry between Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley could dominate today's Republican debate as the two 2024 presidential hopefuls seek to present themselves as their party's best alternative to former President Donald Trump.

IN OTHER NEWS

  • Ukraine's military said its troops had repelled Russian assaults in widely separated sectors of the war and braced for a fresh attempt to capture the key frontline eastern town of Avdiivka.
  • This year is "virtually certain" to be the warmest in 125,000 years, European Union scientists said, after data showed last month was the world's hottest October in that period. Meanwhile, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov accused the West of provoking crises on the global oil and gas market by rushing to switch to green energy.
  • The worst flooding to hit Somalia in decades has killed 29 people and forced more than 300,000 to flee their homes, the National Disaster Management Agency said, following heavy rains that have inundated towns across East Africa.
 

Business & Markets

 
  • Chinese authorities have asked Ping An Insurance Group to take a controlling stake in Country Garden, the nation's biggest private property developer, four people familiar with the plan said. China's State Council has instructed the local government of Guangdong province to help arrange a rescue of Country Garden by Ping An.
  • Carbon dioxide emissions from US liquefied natural gas facilities have jumped to 18 million tons per year, up 81% since 2019 according to US government data. The emissions figures and projections reflect a troublesome tradeoff for the Biden administration, which wants to boost fuel shipments to European allies.
  • Lloyd's of London will invest 40 million pounds ($49.6 million) in regions affected by the transatlantic slave trade, it said after a report showed the commercial insurance market had strong links to the trade.
  • For millions of Australians who could not pay for goods, book rides, get medical care or even make phone calls, a nine-hour near-total service blackout from the company which provides 40% of the country's internet became a lesson in the risks of a society that has moved almost entirely online.
  • Oil prices remained under pressure on Wednesday after sliding to their lowest in more than three months in the previous session, slipping further on concern over waning demand in the United States and China.
  • Flexible workspace provider WeWork sought US bankruptcy protection, crippled by a large debt pile and soaring losses due to lower demand for office space from cost-conscious customers. We look at how WeWork's meteoric rise and fall reshaped the office sector globally.
 

Taiwan's land squeeze pits advanced chips against ancestral temples

 

Wei Hsin-hsi and his wife pose for a picture outside their family’s temple that is located inside the proposed expansion area of an industrial park. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins 

Wearing rain ponchos and holding photos of their ancestral temples near Hsinchu, Taiwan's semiconductor capital, 40 residents braved lashing winds in early October to protest plans to take their rural land for cutting-edge chip production.

 

Two weeks later, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co, the world's largest contract chipmaker, dropped plans to build a factory as part of the science park expansion in the bucolic Longtan district nearby - a development that heartened protesters and laid bare one of Taiwan's increasingly fraught "five shortages".

  • Residents are protesting against the expansion of an industrial park for advanced chip manufacturing
 

And Finally...

 

An irregular-shaped dwarf galaxy called NGC 6822, which is located 1.6 million light-years from Earth. European Space Agency/Handout via REUTERS

European astronomers released the first images from the newly launched Euclid space telescope, designed to unlock the secrets of dark matter and dark energy - hidden forces thought to make up 95% of the universe.

 

The European Space Agency, which leads the six-year mission with NASA as a partner, said the images were the sharpest of their kind, showcasing the telescope's ability to monitor billions of galaxies up to 10 billion light years away.

  • Read more: Star-filled images spur mission to probe 'dark universe'
 

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