Israel has received two bodies that Hamas says are two more deceased hostages who had been held in Gaza.

The Israeli military said two coffins were handed over to troops in the Palestinian territory by the Red Cross, which had earlier received them from Hamas.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the coffins - which were escorted by the military - had crossed into Israel and will be taken to be formally identified in Tel Aviv.

Confirmation of their identies would mean that Hamas has transferred 15 out of 28 deceased Israeli hostages under the first phase of a US-brokered ceasefire deal earlier this month. All 20 living hostages were released shortly after the agreement was reached.

Hamas has handed over a Palestinian body in a previous hostage transfers, which it said was accidental due to difficulties locating the bodies.

The IDF urged the Israeli public on Tuesday evening to "act with sensitivity and wait for the official identification, which will first be provided to the families of the hostages".

It also stressed that "Hamas is required to uphold the agreement and take the necessary steps to return all the deceased hostages".

Israeli officials said the families of the hostages will be notified once the bodies are identified.

There has been outrage in Israel that Hamas has not yet returned all the deceased hostages.

The Palestinian group says it is trying to do this but that it faces difficulty finding bodies under rubble of buildings bombed out by the IDF in Gaza.

Under the ceasefire and hostage release agreement, Israel has freed 250 Palestinian prisoners and 1,718 detainees from Gaza, and returned 15 bodies of Palestinians for every Israeli hostage's remains.

The first phase of the agreement has also seen an increase of aid into Gaza, a partial withdrawal of Israeli forces, and a halt in fighting - though deadly violence flared up over the weekend as both sides accused one another of breaching the terms of the deal.

The IDF launched a military campaign in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel and took 251 others hostage.

More than 68,000 people have been killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, whose figures are seen by the UN as reliable.

Irish police have come under attack at a protest outside a hotel used to house asylum seekers in Dublin.

Footage from the scene at the Citywest Hotel showed a police vehicle on fire.

Broadcaster RTÉ is reporting that several thousand people have gathered outside the hotel.

Ireland's Justice Minister Jim O'Callaghan said there was "no excuse" for the violent scenes.

O'Callaghan said people threw missiles and fireworks at gardaí (Irish police).

"This is unacceptable and will result in a forceful response from the gardai," he said. "Those involved will be brought to justice.

"It is clear to me from talking to colleagues that this violence does not reflect the people of Saggart. They are not the people participating in this criminality, but rather the people sitting at home in fear of it.

"Attacks on gardaí will not be tolerated. Peaceful protest is a cornerstone of our democracy. Violence is not."

The history of the Labour Party oozes out of the valleys of south Wales, perhaps like nowhere else in the UK.

Keir Hardie, that founding figure of the party, was elected to Parliament in Merthyr Tydfil in 1900.

Aneurin Bevan, the founder of the NHS, was elected as the MP for Ebbw Vale in 1929.

Even in recent years, when the so called Red Wall of formerly solid Labour seats in many parts of the north of England and the Midlands crumbled, with the Conservatives as the beneficiary, much of south Wales stuck with Labour.

The Red Wall and plenty more besides have since swung to Labour, but now things seem to be changing in Wales.

Local sentiment, polling and the mood within the parties all suggests something is up, ahead of a by-election to the Welsh Parliament in Caerphilly.

Labour gloom

Talking to folk around town, there is a deep-seated frustration.

A stubborn lack of evidence, as many see it, of things getting better.

And there is a recurring sense of a declining sense of community: a sense that the ties that have long bound the town, the area together, are perhaps continuing to fray.

Something which began with the closure of the coal mines and loss of much heavy industry has continued, some feel, as so many of us retreat behind a phone screen; our increasingly digital lives splintering and atomising us further from each other.

Is that a contributor to political volatility and a dilution of the loyalty people may once have had to particular political parties?

Whatever the contributory factors, Labour are gloomy here, even on their upbeat days.

In Caerphilly, they are the essence of the political establishment: they run the council, they run the Welsh devolved government and they run the UK government as well.

This, if you are the Welsh Labour candidate, can cause issues.

Richard Tunnicliffe, a book publisher by trade, has campaigned in recent weeks to keep some local libraries threatened with closure open.

The thing is, it is the local Labour council which runs the very libraries threatened with being shut. Awkward.

It is a case study in the potential consequences for a party of near political ubiquity for such a long time.

Perhaps little wonder Reform UK and Plaid Cymru are upbeat.

Giants squeezed

Anecdotally, and for what it is worth, they both appear to have considerably more posters dotted around the place than Labour.

And they definitely have broader smiles and a greater spring in their steps.

The big change round here is Reform UK.

As has so often happened in the last six months or so, they are compelling their rivals to react to what they are doing.

The party leader Nigel Farage has been here twice, drawing big crowds.

But the security guard on their campaign office front door reminds you they provoke strong opinions, positive and negative.

Some are incensed with their focus on immigration, in an area with barely any.

Reform's candidate Llŷr Powell argues they are offering something new and are untainted by the blame being heaped on both Labour and the Conservatives.

But they do come with their own Welsh branded baggage.

The party's former leader in Wales, Nathan Gill, has admitted taking bribes to make statements in favour of Russia, of all countries, while he was a member of the European Parliament.

He is expected to be jailed next month.

Powell tells me Gill deserves to face the full force of the law.

Lindsay Whittle, the Plaid candidate, is no stranger to elections.

He has stood in ten general elections and every devolved election for over a quarter of a century – and victory has remained elusive.

He has been a local councillor for nearly 50 years.

Whittle reckons that when it comes to what appears to be a cratering in support for Labour, he has never seen anything like it.

He is buoyant and thinks that in a tight tussle with Reform UK, he can squeak a win.

Plaid are allowing themselves to dream, with some supportive polling evidence right now at least, that they could be running the Welsh government after next May's devolved elections across Wales. They see Reform as their big opponent.

But some of Labour's opponents fret that they may be under pricing what they fear could be a new phenomenon – what one figure described to me as "shy Labour voters."

Some people might be unwilling to admit it, or saying they are undecided, but could they plump for Labour in the end? Let's see.

The Welsh Conservatives, in a part of the world rarely fertile for them, find themselves cropped further out of the picture, again courtesy of Reform.

Perhaps little wonder when former Conservative cabinet minister Sir Jacob Rees Mogg is suggesting Tory voters in Caerphilly should consider voting Reform to prevent Plaid from winning.

Incidentally, he also suggests Labour supporters should back Reform too, for the same reason.

Both of Westminster's giants – Conservatives and Labour – are feeling squeezed here.

The Liberal Democrats, the Green Party and others are vying for support too.

You can see a full list of the candidates standing in the by election here.

As I say, next May, there will be elections across Wales to the Welsh Parliament, the Senedd.

By Friday morning here, we could be seeing the first big indicator of a seismic change to come.

British designer Grace Wales Bonner has been named as the new creative director of men's wear for French fashion house Hermès.

The appointment means Wales Bonner, a 35-year-old Londoner, is now the first black woman to lead design at a major fashion house, according to the New York Times.

In a statement, Wales Bonner said she was "deeply honoured to be entrusted with the role".

She replaces Véronique Nichanian, who has been the company's artistic director of men's wear division for 37 years.

Her final collection for the brand will be shown in Paris in January, while Wales Bonner's first collection will launch in 2027.

In her statement, Wales Bonner said: "It is a dream realised to embark on this new chapter, following in a lineage of inspired craftspeople and designers."

She also thanked the company's bosses "for the opportunity to bring my vision to this magical house".

Reporting the news on Tuesday, Vogue said: "While industry insiders were betting on a promotion from within, Hermès went for a renowned talent."

Wales Bonner, who was born in London to an English mother and Jamaican father, founded her own label in 2014, not long after graduating from London's Central Saint Martins College of Art.

According to Vogue, Wales Bonner will continue her namesake brand alongside her new Hermès role.

She dressed F1 driver Lewis Hamilton, musician FKA Twigs, and actor Jeff Goldblum for this year's Met Gala and has made T-shirts with musician Solange Knowles, younger sister of Beyoncé.

Wales Bonner has also curated an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and hosted musical performances at London's Serpentine Galleries.

She has had a long-standing collaboration with Adidas and was made a MBE in 2022 for services to fashion.

Pierre-Alexis Dumas, general artistic director of Hermès, said: "I am really pleased to welcome Grace to the Hermès artistic director family.

"Her take on contemporary fashion, craft and culture will contribute to shaping Hermès men's style, melding the house's heritage with a confident look on the now.

"Grace's appetite and curiosity for artistic practice strongly resonate with Hermès's creative mindset and approach. We are at the start of an enriching mutual dialogue."

Jewellery stolen from the Louvre in Paris in a daring daylight robbery has been valued at 88 million euros (£76m; $102m), a French public prosecutor has said, citing the museum's curator.

Laure Beccuau told RTL radio the sum was "extraordinary" but said the greater loss was to France's historical heritage. Crown jewels and pieces gifted by two Napoleons to their wives were among the items taken.

Thieves wielding power tools took less than eight minutes to make off with the loot shortly after the world's most-visited museum opened on Sunday morning.

With the thieves having not been caught more than two days on from the heist, experts fear the jewellery will already be long gone.

• How Louvre gang carried out France's most shocking theft

Ms Beccuau said she hoped announcing the estimated worth of the jewellery would make the robbers think twice and not destroy them.

She added the thieves would not pocket the full windfall if they had "the very bad idea of melting down these jewels".

The items taken, previously described as having inestimable worth, include a diamond and emerald necklace Emperor Napoleon gave to his wife, a tiara worn by Empress Eugenie, the wife of Napoleon III, and several pieces previously owned by Queen Marie-Amelie.

Investigators found a damaged crown that used to belong to Empress Eugenie on the thieves' escape route - apparently having been dropped as they departed in haste.

Four masked thieves used a truck equipped with a mechanical lift to gain access to the Galerie d'Apollon (Gallery of Apollo) via a balcony close to the River Seine.

Two of them cut through a glass window on the first floor using a battery-powered disc cutter and entered the museum. They then threatened the guards inside, who evacuated the building.

The thieves had tried to set fire to their vehicle outside but were prevented by the intervention of a member of museum staff. They were seen making off on scooters.

French President Emmanuel Macron described the robbery as an attack on France's heritage.

Security measures have been tightened around the country's cultural institutions, after a preliminary report found one in three rooms in the Louvre lacked CCTV and that its wider alarm system did not go off.

Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin said security protocols had "failed", lamenting that the thieves being able to drive a modified truck up to the museum had left France with a "terrible image".

Authorities believe they are chasing a team of professionals, given how quick and organised they were.

Experts in art recovery previously told the BBC investigators had just one or two days to track down the items before they could be considered gone for good.

It is most likely they have been broken down into precious metals and gems, smuggled out of the country and sold for a fraction of their worth, other experts have said.

US Vice-President JD Vance has arrived in Israel as part of the Trump administration's efforts to strengthen the Gaza ceasefire agreement.

He is expected to push the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to start negotiations on long-term issues for a permanent end to the war with Hamas.

The two special US envoys who helped negotiate the deal, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, also held talks with Netanyahu on Monday.

Their visits come after a flare-up of violence on Sunday that threatened to derail the 12-day-old truce. Israel said a Hamas attack killed two soldiers, triggering Israeli air strikes which killed dozens of Palestinians.

US President Donald Trump insisted on Monday that the ceasefire was still on track but also warned Hamas that it would be "eradicated" if it violated the deal.

Trump is said to have dispatched his deputy and envoys to Israel to keep up the momentum and push for the start of talks on the second critical phase of his 20-point Gaza peace plan.

It would involve setting up an interim government in the Palestinian territory, deploying an international stabilisation force, the withdrawal of Israeli troops, and disarmament of Hamas.

Vance, Witkoff and Kushner are also attempting to ensure the ceasefire deal, which is based on the first phase of the peace plan, does not collapse first.

The New York Times cited US officials as saying they were concerned that Israel's prime minister might "vacate" the deal and resume an all-out assault against Hamas.

Netanyahu told the Israeli parliament on Monday that he would discuss "security challenges" and "political opportunities" with Vance during his visit.

He also said Israeli forces had dropped 153 tonnes of bombs on Gaza in response to what he called a "blatant" breach of the ceasefire by Hamas on Sunday.

"One of our hands holds a weapon, the other hand is stretched out for peace," he said. "You make peace with the strong, not the weak. Today Israel is stronger than ever before."

The Israeli military blamed Hamas for an anti-tank missile attack on Sunday that killed two Israeli soldiers in southern Gaza and then carried out dozens of strikes across the territory which hospitals said killed at least 45 Palestinians.

Afterwards, the Israeli military said it was resuming enforcement of the ceasefire, while Hamas said it remained committed to the agreement.

However, four Palestinians were reportedly killed by Israeli fire east of Gaza City on Monday. The Israeli military said its troops fired towards " terrorists" who crossed the agreed-upon ceasefire line in the Shejaiya area.

Later, Trump told reporters at the White House: "We made a deal with Hamas that they're going to be very good. They're going to behave. They're going to be nice."

"If they're not, we're going to go and we're going to eradicate them, if we have to. They'll be eradicated, and they know that," he added.

Hamas's chief negotiator Khalil al-Hayya, who is in Cairo, meanwhile insisted that his group and other Palestinian factions were committed to the ceasefire deal and "determined to fully implement it until the end".

"What we heard from the mediators and the US president reassures us that the war in Gaza is over," he told Egypt's Al-Qahera News TV .

Hayya also said Hamas was serious about handing over the bodies of all the deceased hostages still in Gaza despite facing what he described as "extreme difficulty" in its efforts to recover them under rubble because of a lack of specialist equipment.

Overnight, Israeli authorities confirmed that Hamas had handed over the body of another deceased Israeli hostage to the Red Cross in Gaza.

The remains were identified as those of Tal Haimi, 41, who the Israeli military said was killed in Kibbutz Nir Yitzhak during the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October, which triggered the war.

That means 13 of the 28 hostages' bodies held in Gaza when the ceasefire took effect on 10 October have so far been returned.

Twenty living Israeli hostages were also released last week in exchange for almost 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and detainees in Israeli jails.

There has been anger in Israel that Hamas has not yet returned all the dead hostages, with the Israeli prime minister's office saying that the group "was required to uphold its commitments".

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people and took 251 others as hostages.

At least 68,216 have been killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

Jewellery stolen from the Louvre in Paris in a daring daylight robbery has been valued at 88 million euros (£76m; $102m), a French public prosecutor has said, citing the museum's curator.

Laure Beccuau told RTL radio the sum was "extraordinary" but said the greater loss was to France's historical heritage. Crown jewels and pieces gifted by two Napoleons to their wives were among the items taken.

Thieves wielding power tools took less than eight minutes to make off with the loot shortly after the world's most-visited museum opened on Sunday morning.

With the thieves having not been caught more than two days on from the heist, experts fear the jewellery will already be long gone.

• How Louvre gang carried out France's most shocking theft

Ms Beccuau said she hoped announcing the estimated worth of the jewellery would make the robbers think twice and not destroy them.

She added the thieves would not pocket the full windfall if they had "the very bad idea of melting down these jewels".

The items taken, previously described as having inestimable worth, include a diamond and emerald necklace Emperor Napoleon gave to his wife, a tiara worn by Empress Eugenie, the wife of Napoleon III, and several pieces previously owned by Queen Marie-Amelie.

Investigators found a damaged crown that used to belong to Empress Eugenie on the thieves' escape route - apparently having been dropped as they departed in haste.

Four masked thieves used a truck equipped with a mechanical lift to gain access to the Galerie d'Apollon (Gallery of Apollo) via a balcony close to the River Seine.

Two of them cut through a glass window on the first floor using a battery-powered disc cutter and entered the museum. They then threatened the guards inside, who evacuated the building.

The thieves had tried to set fire to their vehicle outside but were prevented by the intervention of a member of museum staff. They were seen making off on scooters.

French President Emmanuel Macron described the robbery as an attack on France's heritage.

Security measures have been tightened around the country's cultural institutions, after a preliminary report found one in three rooms in the Louvre lacked CCTV and that its wider alarm system did not go off.

Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin said security protocols had "failed", lamenting that the thieves being able to drive a modified truck up to the museum had left France with a "terrible image".

Authorities believe they are chasing a team of professionals, given how quick and organised they were.

Experts in art recovery previously told the BBC investigators had just one or two days to track down the items before they could be considered gone for good.

It is most likely they have been broken down into precious metals and gems, smuggled out of the country and sold for a fraction of their worth, other experts have said.

The Ukrainian city of Chernihiv is in total blackout following what the authorities describe as a "massive" assault by Russian missiles and drones, with hundreds of thousands of people affected.

Across the wider Chernihiv region, four people are reported to have been killed as residential neighbourhoods were struck in the town of Novhorod-Siverskyi.

Ten others were injured, including a 10-year-old girl.

The country's most northerly region is the latest to be hit in an intensifying series of attacks on civilian infrastructure as Russia targets energy supplies, the rail network, homes and businesses in its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

"I personally heard the drones flying overhead," 55-year-old Oleksandr Babich said.

The Chernihiv city resident spoke in matter-of-fact terms about a night filled with the low whine of Iranian-designed Shahed drones, a sound now being increasingly heard far from the war's front lines.

"Unfortunately, our region is very close to our scheming neighbour," he said, adding an expletive for good measure.

The Chernihiv region shares a border with both Russia and Belarus, giving the air defences here less time to react to any incoming attacks.

In a raid involving more than 100 Shahed drones - each of which carry a 50kg warhead - and six ballistic missiles, the direct strikes on Chernihiv's electricity generating facilities left the whole city without power, as well as large parts of the surrounding area.

Andriy Podorvan, the deputy head of the Chernihiv Regional Military Administration, told the BBC that it was part of a pattern across much of the country, with things getting much worse in recent months.

"For around half a year we have been experiencing targeted strikes on the energy infrastructure in our region," he said.

"The number of attacks has significantly increased over the last two months."

When I asked him if he believed that any of the targets were of military value - Moscow's usual justification for these sorts of attacks - he pointed out that Russia has even been targeting petrol stations.

"I can only see strikes on civilian infrastructure," he said.

The attack on the electricity grid has also meant the loss of power to water pumping stations, seriously impacting supplies. Residents have been told to stock up on bottled water or are having to rely on emergency deliveries.

With the attacks ongoing in the morning, electrical engineers had to delay their initial response - but were later able to begin working to restore power.

The wider concern is that, if the intensity of Russia's bombardment continues, it risks rapidly depleting the country's energy resilience, taking a heavy toll on the economy and - with a harsh winter ahead - dealing a psychological blow to the public too.

Up until now, the country's generating companies - working together in a war-time spirit of co-operation - have been able to restore power relatively quickly, but stocks of replacement equipment are not unlimited.

A single transformer can take more than a year to produce, with added time for transportation and installation.

The country is having to look for all the help it can get.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's recent meeting with US President Donald Trump in Washington may have been seen as a strategic disappointment, coming away without having secured a supply of long-hoped for long-range Tomahawk missiles.

But his meetings with the heads of leading US energy companies, in which they discussed ways of helping Ukraine to shore up and modernise its energy sector, were reportedly a success.

Some estimates put the total cost of the damage to Ukraine's energy infrastructure so far at more than $16bn (€13.7bn; £11.9bn).

In Chernihiv, the regional official Andriy Podorvan told the BBC that he believes Russia is unable to make any significant progress on the front lines and so now sees the civilian population as a weak point.

But he thinks this is misjudged.

"People understand who the enemy is and who is guilty in this situation," he said. "It will lead to the even greater unity of the population."

Mr Babich agrees.

"Although, yes, there are inconveniences, the majority of the population is ready for this," he insisted.

Many have been going to work as normal, he pointed out, with back-up generators in place for important facilities like hospitals and government buildings, and neighbours are helping each other.

"The hero city of Chernihiv did not give up and is not going to give up. Morale is high."