Former Proud Boys leader Henry "Enrique" Tarrio and Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes have been released from prison, as President Donald Trump sets free more than 1,500 people charged for the US Capitol riot four years ago.

Within less than 24 hours of Trump pardoning or commuting sentences of those who tried to violently overturn the 2020 election, the riot's two most prominent leaders left prison. Trump is also dismissing charges against those charged, but not yet tried, for the riot.

"My son, Enrique Tarrio, has been released officially as of now!" Zuny Tarrio posted on X.

Rhodes, who was not pardoned but had his sentence commuted, is waiting at the jail for defendants to be freed.

Rhodes, a former US Army paratrooper and Yale-educated lawyer, had been charged for leading a contingent of his Oath Keepers members to Washington.

Though Rhodes did not enter the Capitol, he directed his members from outside, and was sentenced in 2023 to 18 years in prison.

Tarrio was found guilty of seditious conspiracy - a rarely used charge of planning to overthrow the government - over the riot. He was not in Washington DC during the riots but directed others involved.

He received a sentence of 22 years, one of the longest given.

Amid the pardons and commutations, Trump also signed an order directing the Department of Justice to drop all pending cases against suspects accused in the riot.

A leading advocate for those defendants - Edward R Martin - was also made the acting US Attorney for Washington DC, showing the depth of Trump's desire to end the years-long prosecutions. The Washington office was in charge of trying the cases connected to 6 January.

Democrats have condemned the release of more than 1,000 people as an attempt to rewrite history and sanitise the violence of the riot which led to multiple deaths.

Trump has described the day as "peaceful" and the jailed or imprisoned rioters as "hostages".

Fans have queued up for Onyx Storm, the hotly-anticipated new book by best-selling fantasy author Rebecca Yarros, in one of the publishing events of the year.

Onyx Storm is the third novel in Yarros's Empyrean series, set in a world of dragons, magic, warfare and steamy romance.

Its publisher Little, Brown said it would be the company's biggest pre-ordered title since it released the Harry Potter play script in 2016.

Almost 60 branches of Waterstones held special events - either opening at midnight on Monday or early on Tuesday - and the chain said the book was likely to "completely eclipse our first day sales" of the previous instalment.

Shops also held special openings around the world, including in the US and Australia.

In the US, some avid readers waited until 3am for the online release of an exclusive special edition from Target - but many who had stayed up complained on social media that the store's website couldn't cope with the demand.

Rebekah West, editorial director of the Little, Brown's Piaktus imprint, told the Telegraph: "This level of fan devotion hasn't been seen since the days of Harry Potter."

In a message to fans on Instagram, Yarros wrote: "1. It's in your hands now. 2. Thank you for sharing this incredible experience with me. 3. Enjoy the ride."

One reader replied: "On chapter one and dying already", another wrote: "Thank you for sharing this incredible world with us!!!" and someone else asked: "Is it bad that I'm very close to calling off work to read?"

Magical and brutal world

US author Yarros is one of the biggest names in the booming "romantasy" genre.

In anticipation of Onyx Storm's release, the first two Empyrean books, Fourth Wing and Iron Flame, went back to the top two slots in the New York Times fiction bestsellers list.

They are also currently both in the top five of the Sunday Times paperback fiction chart in the UK, and they were the two most-read books of the past year around the world among users of Goodreads.

Fourth Wing introduced heroine Violet Sorrengail, a 20-year-old woman who is thrust into brutal training to become an elite dragon rider.

Like the author, Violet has a genetic condition that means the character dislocates joints and breaks bones easily - so must use her wits and inner strength to help her survive.

She is also entwined in a relationship with a fellow candidate called Xaden Riorson, who comes from a rival family.

Iron Flame was then set during Violet's second year at Basgiath War College, while in Onyx Storm, according to the publisher, she "knows there's no more time for lessons" because "the battle has truly begun".

A fire at a hotel in the Turkish ski resort of Bolu has left 10 people dead and 32 others injured, according to Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya.

At least two of the victims died after jumping from the hotel's windows, Turkish reports said.

The fire broke out at the 12-storey Grand Kartal Hotel at 03:27 local time (00:27 GMT) during a busy holiday period when 234 people were staying there, he added.

Footage circulating in Turkey showed linen hanging from windows which was used by those trying to escape the burning building.

Bolu governor Abdulaziz Aydin said initial reports suggested the fire had broken out in the restaurant section of the hotel's fourth floor and spread to the floors above.

The hotel was investigating whether guests had been trapped in their rooms as the fire spread.

The governor told reporters the distance between the hotel, in Kartalkaya, and the centre of Bolu, paired with the freezing weather conditions, meant it took more than an hour for fire engines to arrive.

Rescue efforts continued through the morning, and the interior minister said emergency services had deployed 267 people to respond to the fire.

By mid-morning the local mayor said they were still trying to reach parts of the hotel.

The Bolu mountains are popular with skiers from Istanbul and the capital Ankara and the hotel was operating at high occupancy at the start of two-week school holidays.

The north-western town is about 170km (105 miles) from Ankara.

Although the fire was confined to one hotel, the governor told Turkish media that a neighbouring hotel was evacuated as a precaution.

Ski instructor Necmi Kepcetutan told Turkish TV he had managed to escape because he knew the hotel, while guests who did not know it as well as him were not as fortunate.

"People were shouting at the windows, 'Save us,' because there was intense smoke inside. We pulled 20-25 people out," he told NTV.

The circumstances that led to the fire are not yet clear.

Justice minister Yilmaz Tunc said prosecutors had been allocated to investigate the blaze.

At least six Palestinians have been killed and 35 injured by Israeli security forces after they launched a major operation in Jenin in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry says.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel's military, police and Shin Bet security service had launched an "extensive and significant" operation to "defeat terrorism" in Jenin.

Palestinian media said Israeli military vehicles moved into Jenin and its refugee camp on Tuesday morning following several drone strikes.

It comes after a weeks-long operation by Palestinian security forces against armed groups, including Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which they see as a challenge to their authority.

A statement from Israel's prime minister said the operation was "additional step in achieving the objective we have set: bolstering security" in the West Bank.

"We are acting methodically and with determination against the Iranian axis wherever it reaches: in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, and [the West Bank] – and we are still active," he added.

An Israeli military statement said the operation was called "Iron Wall" and that it would continue "as long as necessary".

Jenin's governor, Kamal Abu al-Rub, told AFP news agency that "what is happening is an invasion of the camp".

"It came quickly, Apache [helicopters] in the sky and Israeli military vehicles everywhere," he added.

There has been a spike in violence in the West Bank since Hamas's deadly attack on Israel on 7 October 2023 and the ensuing war in Gaza.

Hundreds of Palestinians have been killed as Israeli forces have intensified their raids, saying they are trying to stem deadly Palestinian attacks on Israelis in the West Bank and Israel.

Israel has built about 160 settlements housing some 700,000 Jews since it occupied the West Bank in the 1967 Middle East war. The settlements are considered illegal under international law, although Israel disputes this.

Elon Musk has caused outrage over a one-armed gesture he gave during a speech celebrating the inauguration of Donald Trump.

Musk thanked the crowd for "making it happen", before placing his right hand over his heart and then thrusting the same arm out into air straight ahead of him. He then turned and repeated the action for those sitting behind him.

Many on X, the social medial platform he owns, have likened the gesture to a Nazi salute.

In response, Musk posted on X: "Frankly, they need better dirty tricks. The 'everyone is Hitler' attack is sooo tired."

Musk, the world's richest man and a close ally of President Trump, was speaking at the Capital One Arena in Washington DC when he made the gesture.

"My heart goes out to you. It is thanks to you that the future of civilisation is assured," he said, after giving the second one-armed salute.

There was immediate backlash on social media.

Claire Aubin, a historian who specializes in Nazism within the United States, said Musk's gesture was a "sieg heil", or Nazi salute.

"My professional opinion is that you're all right, you should believe your eyes," she posted on X, in reference to those who believed the gesture to be an overt reference to Nazis.

Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a history professor at New York University, said: "Historian of fascism here. It was a Nazi salute and a very belligerent one too."

Andrea Stroppa, a close confidant of Musk who has connected him with far-right Italian PM Giorgia Meloni, was reported by Italian media to have posted the clip of Musk with the caption: "Roman Empire is back starting from Roman salute".

The Roman salute was widely used in Italy by Benito Mussolini's Fascist Party, before later being adopted by Adolf Hitler in Germany.

Stroppa later deleted his post, Italian media said. He later posted that "that gesture, which some mistook for a Nazi salute, is simply Elon, who has autism, expressing his feelings by saying, 'I want to give my heart to you'," he said.

"That is exactly what he communicated into the microphone. ELON DISLIKES EXTREMISTS!"

The gesture comes as Musk's politics have increasingly shifted to the right. He has made recent statements in support of Germany's far-right AfD party and British anti-immigration party Reform UK.

But some have defended him, including the Anti-Defamation League, an organisation founded to combat anti-Semitism.

"It seems that Elon Musk made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute," the group posted on X.

Musk has become one of Trump's closet allies and has been tapped to co-lead what the president has termed the Department of Government Efficiency.

Australia's federal police have said they are investigating whether "overseas actors or individuals" are paying criminals to carry out antisemitic crimes in the country.

There has been a spate of such incidents in recent months, the latest of which saw a childcare centre in Sydney set alight and sprayed with anti-Jewish graffiti. No-one was injured.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called a snap cabinet meeting in response, where officials agreed to set up a national database to track antisemitic incidents.

Thus far, the federal police taskforce, set up in December to investigate such incidents, received more than 166 reports of antisemitic crimes.

"We are looking into whether overseas actors or individuals have paid local criminals in Australia to carry out some of these crimes in our suburbs," Australian Federal Police (AFP) Commissioner Reece Kershaw said, adding that it was possible that cryptocurrency was involved.

The digital currency can take longer to identify, Mr Kershaw said.

The commissioner said police were also investigating whether young people were carrying out these crimes and whether they had been radicalised online.

However, Mr Kershaw cautioned, "intelligence is not the same as evidence" and more charges were expected soon.

Last week, a man from Sydney became the first person to be charged by the federal taskforce, dubbed Special Operation Avalite, over alleged death threats he made towards a Jewish organisation.

Albanese said Tuesday's incident at a childcare centre in the eastern Sydney suburb of Maroubra was "as cowardly as it is disgusting" and described it as a "hate crime".

"This was an attack targeted at the Jewish community. And it is a crime that concerns us all because it is also an attack on the nation and society we have built together," he wrote on social media.

The Jewish Council of Australia, which was set up last year in opposition to antisemitism, said that it "strongly condemns" this and all such incidents.

"These acts underscore the urgent need for cooperation, education and community dialogue to combat prejudice and promote understanding," it said in a statement.

Most of the recent incidents have taken place in Sydney and have involved antisemitic graffiti, arson and vandalism of buildings including synagogues.

New South Wales has set up its own state-level taskforce to address these incidents and 36 people been charged so far with antisemtic related offences.

A further 70 arrests have been made for similar crimes in the neighbouring state of Victoria, where a synagogue was set on fire last month.

A fire at a hotel in the Turkish ski resort of Bolu has left 10 people dead and 32 others injured, according to Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya.

At least two of the victims died after jumping from the hotel's windows, Turkish reports said.

The fire broke out at the 12-storey Grand Kartal Hotel at 03:27 local time (00:27 GMT) during a busy holiday period when 234 people were staying there, he added.

Footage circulating in Turkey showed linen hanging from windows which was used by those trying to escape the burning building.

Bolu governor Abdulaziz Aydin said initial reports suggested the fire had broken out in the restaurant section of the hotel's fourth floor and spread to the floors above.

The hotel was investigating whether guests had been trapped in their rooms as the fire spread.

The governor told reporters the distance between the hotel, in Kartalkaya, and the centre of Bolu, paired with the freezing weather conditions, meant it took more than an hour for fire engines to arrive.

Rescue efforts continued through the morning, and the interior minister said emergency services had deployed 267 people to respond to the fire.

By mid-morning the local mayor said they were still trying to reach parts of the hotel.

The Bolu mountains are popular with skiers from Istanbul and the capital Ankara and the hotel was operating at high occupancy at the start of two-week school holidays.

The north-western town is about 170km (105 miles) from Ankara.

Although the fire was confined to one hotel, the governor told Turkish media that a neighbouring hotel was evacuated as a precaution.

Ski instructor Necmi Kepcetutan told Turkish TV he had managed to escape because he knew the hotel, while guests who did not know it as well as him were not as fortunate.

"People were shouting at the windows, 'Save us,' because there was intense smoke inside. We pulled 20-25 people out," he told NTV.

The circumstances that led to the fire are not yet clear.

Justice minister Yilmaz Tunc said prosecutors had been allocated to investigate the blaze.

Two Americans held by the Taliban authorities in Afghanistan have been exchanged for an Afghan imprisoned in the US on drug trafficking and terrorism charges.

The news emerged after Ryan Corbett and William Wallace McKenty were freed. The Afghan, Khan Mohmmad, had been serving a life sentence in a federal prison in California on drug trafficking and terrorism charges.

A statement from the Taliban government in Kabul announced the agreement, which was concluded just before President Joe Biden ended his term in office.

Mr Corbett's release was confirmed by his family. US media, quoting official sources, identified Mr McKenty as the second American.

The deal – reportedly the culmination of two years of negotiations - was done just before Joe Biden handed over power to Donald Trump on Monday.

"An Afghan fighter Khan Mohammed imprisoned in America has been released in exchange for American citizens and returned to the country," the Taliban foreign ministry said in a statement.

The family of Ryan Corbett thanked both administrations as well as Qatar for what they described as its vital role.

"Today, our hearts are filled with overwhelming gratitude and praise to God for sustaining Ryan's life and bringing him back home after what has been the most challenging and uncertain 894 days of our lives," the family said.

Mr Corbett had lived in Afghanistan for many years with his family and was detained by the Taliban more than two years ago when he returned on a business trip.

There are few details about Mr McKenty, whose family have asked for privacy.

Khan Mohammad was a member of the Taliban taken captive in Afghanistan during the US's military engagement. He was jailed in 2008. Joe Biden commuted his sentence just before he left office.

The Taliban called the exchange the result of "long and fruitful negotiations" with the US and "a good example of resolving issues through dialogue".

"The Islamic Emirate looks positively at the actions of the United States of America that help the normalisation and development of relations between the two countries," it said.

Since the Taliban took power in 2021, they have not been formally recognised by any government.

While the move is not likely to change relations between Kabul and Washington, more negotiations may follow – two other Americans are still in Afghanistan, believed to be George Glezmann and Mahmood Habibi.

The Taliban are also seeking the release of an Afghan who is one of the few remaining prisoners at the US's Guantanamo Bay detention camp.

At a rally in Washington on the eve of his inauguration, President Trump threatened to cut humanitarian aid to Afghanistan unless the Taliban returned the military equipment seized after the US pulled out in 2021.

A US Department of Defense report in 2022 estimated that military equipment worth $7bn had been left behind in Afghanistan after US forces withdrew.

South Korea's suspended president Yoon Suk Yeol has made his first appearance at his impeachment trial, where he denied ordering the arrest of lawmakers during his attempt to impose martial law.

Parliament voted to impeach Yoon last month, and last week the constitutional court began a trial to decide whether to permanently remove him from office.

Yoon is also facing a separate criminal investigation into whether he led an insurrection. He has been detained since last week.

Security was tight on Tuesday as Yoon was transported by van from the detention centre, where he is being held, to the constitutional court.

Police formed human walls and held up anti-riot barricades to stop hundreds of his supporters who had gathered nearby from getting too close. Last weekend saw violence as dozens of Yoon's supporters clashed with law enforcers and broke into another court house.

On Tuesday, Yoon was asked if he had ordered military commanders to "drag out" lawmakers from parliament on the night he declared martial law, in order to prevent them from overturning his order.

He replied: "No."

Military commanders had earlier alleged that Yoon had given such an order on 3 December, after lawmakers climbed fences and broke barricades to enter the parliament building and vote down Yoon's martial law declaration.

"I am a person who has lived with a firm belief in liberal democracy," Yoon said in his opening remarks on Tuesday.

"As the constitutional court exists to safeguard the constitution, I ask that you thoroughly examine all aspects of this case," he told the judges.

During the hearing, which lasted nearly two hours, Yoon and his lawyers argued that the martial law order was "a formality that was not meant to be executed".

Yoon had cited threats from "anti-state forces" and North Korea when he declared martial law, but it soon became clear that his move had been spurred not by external threats but by his own domestic political troubles.

The lawyers prosecuting the case, who were selected by the parliament, accused Yoon and his lawyers for making "largely contradictory, irrational, and unclear" comments.

"If they continue to evade responsibility as they did today, it will only work against them in the impeachment trial and cause even greater disappointment among the public," the prosecutors told reporters after the hearing.

Outside the courtroom, his supporters became more agitated and aggressive as they demanded that Yoon be released and restored to office immediately.

Those were forced to set up some distance from the court due to tight security. Waving their trademark combination of Korean and US flags, some wore Maga-style baseball caps embossed with the slogan "Make Korea Free Again", an echo of the campaign slogan used by US President Donald Trump.

Some of their chants included calls for the leader of South Korea's main opposition party, Lee Jae Myung, and the investigator leading Yoon's criminal case to be executed.

Several of the supporters told the BBC they believed Yoon's martial law declaration was an attempt to protect the country's democracy.

They accused the opposition party of being pro-China and pro-North Korea, and for wanting to turn South Korea into a communist country.

"This is a conflict between people who pursue communism and people who pursue democracy," said Wongeun Seong, a 49-year-old businessman who joined the protest on the way back from a lunch meeting.

Former defence minister Kim Yong-hyun, who reportedly suggested martial law to Yoon, will testify during the next hearing on Thursday.

Yoon will be removed from office if at least six of the eight-member constitutional court bench votes to uphold the impeachment. A presidential election must then be called within 60 days.

South Korea has been in political chaos since 3 December. Thousands of protesters and supporters of Yoon have taken to the streets multiple times despite the winter cold.

The crisis has hit the country's economy, with the won weakening and global credit rating agencies warning of weakening consumer and business sentiment.

Additional reporting by Hosu Lee in Seoul

A fire at a hotel in the Turkish ski resort of Bolu has left 10 people dead and 32 others injured, according to Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya.

At least two of the victims died after jumping from the hotel's windows, Turkish reports said.

The fire broke out at the 12-storey Grand Kartal Hotel at 03:27 local time (00:27 GMT) during a busy holiday period when 234 people were staying there, he added.

Footage circulating in Turkey showed linen hanging from windows which was used by those trying to escape the burning building.

Bolu governor Abdulaziz Aydin said initial reports suggested the fire had broken out in the restaurant section of the hotel's fourth floor and spread to the floors above.

The hotel was investigating whether guests had been trapped in their rooms as the fire spread.

The governor told reporters the distance between the hotel, in Kartalkaya, and the centre of Bolu, paired with the freezing weather conditions, meant it took more than an hour for fire engines to arrive.

Rescue efforts continued through the morning, and the interior minister said emergency services had deployed 267 people to respond to the fire.

By mid-morning the local mayor said they were still trying to reach parts of the hotel.

The Bolu mountains are popular with skiers from Istanbul and the capital Ankara and the hotel was operating at high occupancy at the start of two-week school holidays.

The north-western town is about 170km (105 miles) from Ankara.

Although the fire was confined to one hotel, the governor told Turkish media that a neighbouring hotel was evacuated as a precaution.

Ski instructor Necmi Kepcetutan told Turkish TV he had managed to escape because he knew the hotel, while guests who did not know it as well as him were not as fortunate.

"People were shouting at the windows, 'Save us,' because there was intense smoke inside. We pulled 20-25 people out," he told NTV.

The circumstances that led to the fire are not yet clear.

Justice minister Yilmaz Tunc said prosecutors had been allocated to investigate the blaze.

Donald Trump has promised he will "make heads spin" on his first day back in office on Monday, with a blitz of executive orders expected in the hours after he is sworn in as the 47th US president.

He has offered a preview of some of these yet-to-be-signed directives, saying they will target issues like illegal immigration, climate rules, diversity policies, classified documents and more.

It is common for presidents to sign a range of executive orders when they enter office. Such orders carry the weight of law but can be overturned by subsequent presidents or the courts.

But the scale of what Trump has planned could be unprecedented, with legal challenges expected.

Here is what to know.

Immigration and the border

Deportations

Trump has vowed to "launch the largest deportation program in American history", starting from day one.

He is expected to declare a national border emergency, and order the military to help secure the southern border, according to Fox News.

Trump has also said he will end a longtime policy that has kept federal immigration authorities from conducting raids on churches and schools.

Any mass deportation programme is expected to face logistical difficulties, billions in costs and a flurry of legal challenges.

Remain in Mexico

Trump may quickly move to re-implement his "Remain in Mexico" policy, which during his first term returned about 70,000 non-Mexican asylum seekers across the border to Mexico to await hearings.

End birthright citizenship

Trump has called the 150-year-old constitutional right that says anyone born on US soil is an American citizen "ridiculous" and vowed to scrap it on day one.

But doing that is much more difficult than simply issuing an executive order, because birthright citizenship is explicitly guaranteed by the US Constitution.

Closing the border on health grounds

A 1944 measure called Title 42 allows the US government to curb migration to protect public health. It was last used during the pandemic, but US media reports that the incoming administration is looking for a disease that would help justify its plans to close the southern US border with Mexico.

Drug cartels

Trump is expected to classify drug cartels as "foreign terrorist organisations", putting them on a list alongside groups like Al Qaeda, so-called Islamic State and Hamas.

Build the wall

When Trump was first elected president in 2016, he signed an executive order to build a border wall. Although parts of the wall have been built, there is still much left uncompleted, and he may try to finish what he started.

Trade and economy

Tariffs

Trump has vowed sweeping tariffs on imported goods as part of his promise to prioritise American manufacturing.

Trump introduced tariffs in his first term, including some on China that Joe Biden retained.

But this time he is promising 10% tariffs on all imports, 25% on Canadian and Mexican goods and 60% on things coming from China. He has said he will begin signing executive orders imposing these on day one.

Tariffs are likely to make consumer goods more expensive and could fuel inflation, experts say. Some countries are considering retaliatory tariffs.

Crypto pile

Trump has championed cryptocurrency and his election saw the value of Bitcoin increase by 30%.

Some believe Trump will move quickly to create a federal "Bitcoin stockpile" - a strategic reserve similar to the US's stockpile of gold and oil - that he has said would serve as a "permanent national asset to benefit all Americans".

Climate and energy

Scrap Joe Biden's climate policies

The outgoing president sees the series of directives, laws and funding programmes he championed to boost green jobs, regulate pollution and fund infrastructure as one of his biggest accomplishments.

Trump has made it clear he wants to undo much of it. He is expected to use executive orders to remove drilling restrictions offshore and on federal land - fulfilling his promise to "drill, baby drill" and increase US energy production and independence.

He has also pledged to ban new wind projects and cancel electric vehicle mandates.

Pull out of the Paris Agreement (again)

Within six months of taking office in 2017, Trump withdrew from the Paris climate agreement - a landmark international deal designed to limit rising global temperatures.

Biden moved to rejoin the accord on his first day in office in 2021, but Trump is expected to again pull out of it.

Capitol riot

Free Jan 6 'hostages'

Hundreds of people convicted after the 2021 US Capitol riots are awaiting potential pardons on Monday, when Trump returns to office.

​​"I am inclined to pardon many of them," he told CNN over the summer. "I can't say for every single one, because a couple of them, probably they got out of control."

More than 1,500 individuals were arrested in relation to the event. At least 600 were charged with assaulting or impeding federal officers.

Secret documents

At his pre-inauguration victory rally on Sunday, Trump said he would release classified documents related to the assassination of President John F Kennedy in 1963, a subject of countless conspiracy theories.

He said he would do the same for files related to the 1968 killings of Senator Robert Kennedy and civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

Foreign policy

Ukraine war

Trump claimed during the campaign that he would end the conflict on day one of his presidency. He has since said that he may need six months. It's unclear what he might do in his first days.

Cuba and Venezuela

Trump could use executive orders to undo Biden's recent decision to remove Cuba from the US list of state sponsors of terrorism. He could also reinstate sanctions against Venezuela. Both countries were frequent targets of his ire during his first administration.

Diversity and gender

DEI

In recent years, schools and businesses across the US have adopted policies designed to support women and racial minorities.

These practices, often classified under "diversity, equity and inclusion" (DEI), have angered many conservatives and faced legal challenges. Trump has promised to dissolve them and major corporations including Meta, Walmart and Amazon have already begun rolling back related initiatives.

Trump could use an executive order to forbid federal funding going to schools or other institutions that have DEI programmes. He could also ban funding for schools that teach "critical race theory" (CRT).

Abortion

Like most Republican presidents before him, Trump is expected to reinstate the "Mexico City policy", which bans federal aid to international groups that provide abortion counselling.

He is also expected to reinstate an abortion rule that prohibits Title X federal health providers, a low-income family planning programme, from mentioning abortion to patients. The change effectively stripped tens of millions of dollars from organisations that offer abortion or provide referrals.

Transgender women in sports

Trump has repeatedly criticised what he calls "transgender lunacy" in schools and healthcare, and has specifically vowed to bar transgender women from competing in women's sports.

TikTok

On Sunday morning, Trump promised to issue an executive order that would postpone a law banning Chinese-owned social media platform TikTok from being implemented.

His order, he said, would give them time to find a US partner to buy a 50% stake in the company.

Trump previously backed a TikTok ban, but recently reversed his stance, pointing to the billions of views he says his videos attracted on the platform during last year's presidential campaign.

The mysterious balls that forced the closure of several beaches in Sydney last week were found to contain saturated acids, E. coli and faecal bacteria, authorities say.

Sydney's Northern Beaches council said it has sent the debris to the New South Wales Environment Protection Authority (EPA) for further analysis.

Nine beaches, including popular spots Manly and Dee Why, were closed on 14 January after the marble-sized balls started washing up.

It came months after thousands of black blobs started appearing on the city's coasts in October, prompting authorities to close some of its most famous beaches for several days and order a massive clean-up.

The latest batch of balls was cleaned up from harbour beaches this week, the Northern Beaches council said in its statement on Tuesday.

It urged anyone who spotted the balls not to handle them and to contact authorities.

Besides the acids and bacteria, the balls also contained volcanic rock pumice.

Northern Beaches mayor Sue Heins said she hopes the EPA analysis will "identify the source so that they can stop this from happening at other beaches".

"We are continuing to conduct regular inspections of our beaches and encourage the community to report any sightings," she said.

The first batch of debris in October were at first mistakenly called "tar balls" but were later found to contain everything from cooking oil and soap scum molecules, to blood pressure medication, pesticides, hair, methamphetamine and veterinary drugs.

Scientists said they resembled fat, oil and grease blobs - often called "fatbergs" - which are commonly formed in sewage systems.

But Sydney Water has reported that its water treatment plans are operating normally and that there were no known issues with waste systems in the city.

A UN official in Gaza has warned that the rebuilding process in the devastated Palestinian territory will "take an awful lot of time" despite the promised surge in humanitarian deliveries under a ceasefire and hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas.

"We're not just talking about food, healthcare, buildings, roads, infrastructure. We've got individuals, families, communities that need to be rebuilt," Sam Rose, acting director of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) in Gaza, told the BBC.

More than 630 aid lorries crossed into Gaza, with at least 300 going to the north, after the ceasefire took effect on Sunday. Mr Rose said he hoped for the same number or more would enter on Monday.

The lorries brought in desperately needed food, tents, blankets, mattresses and clothes for the winter which had been stuck outside Gaza for months.

The ceasefire deal reportedly requires 600 aid lorries, including 50 carrying fuel, to be allowed into Gaza every day during the first phase lasting six weeks, during which Hamas should release 33 Israeli hostages in return for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.

"We're expecting a major uptick in the volume of aid that's coming in, and of course it's far easier for us to go and collect that aid because many of the problems that we have faced so far in the war go away when the fighting stops," Mr Rose said.

"We're no longer moving through an active conflict zone. We no longer need have to co-ordinate all these movements with the Israeli authorities," he added. "And we've not today... faced any major problems with looting and criminality."

But he also stressed that "we have to get away from thinking of people's needs in Gaza as a function of the volume of aid".

"Every person in Gaza has been traumatised by what's gone on. Everyone has lost something. Most of those homes are now destroyed, most of the roads are now destroyed," he added. "It's going to be a long, long process of rehabilitation and rebuilding."

The World Health Organization's regional director, Hanan Balkhy, meanwhile said it had a 60-day plan to get Gaza's health system back on its feed to meet the population's urgent needs and prioritize care for the thousands of people with life-changing injuries.

The plan includes repairing Gaza's hospitals - half of which are out of service and the others are only partially functional - setting up temporary clinics in the hardest-hit areas, addressing malnutrition and controlling disease outbreaks.

• 'I want to fulfil my dead brother's dream' - rebuilding life in Gaza's ruins
• Video: Hugs and tears: How Israeli hostage return unfolded
• 'I came back to life' says freed British-Israeli hostage
• Joy fades as Gazans return to destroyed homes

On Sunday night, UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher warned that the humanitarian needs of Palestinians in Gaza were "staggering".

UN officials have previously blamed the humanitarian crisis on Israeli military restrictions on aid deliveries, the hostilities and the breakdown of law and order.

Israel has insisted there are no limits to the amount of aid that can be delivered into and across Gaza and blames UN agencies for failing to distribute supplies. It also accuses Hamas of stealing aid, which the group denies.

The Israeli military launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to an unprecedented cross-border attack on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 were taken hostage. Israel says 91 of the hostages remain in captivity.

More than 47,000 people have been killed and 111,000 injured in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

Most of Gaza's 2.3 million population has also been displaced multiple times, 60% of buildings are estimated to be damaged or destroyed, the healthcare, water, sanitation and hygiene systems have collapsed, and there are severe shortages of food, fuel, medicine and shelter.

In October, the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) estimated 1.84 million people across Gaza were experiencing high levels of acute food insecurity, and that 133,000 people were facing catastrophic levels, which can lead to starvation and death.

The following month, an IPC committee warned that there was strong likelihood that famine was "imminent" in some areas of northern Gaza.

Before the ceasefire, the UN said the besieged northern towns of Jabalia, Beit Lahia and Beit Hanoun had been largely cut off from food assistance since the Israeli military launched a ground offensive in October with the stated aim of preventing a Hamas resurgence.

A Palestinian woman who returned to her destroyed home in northern Gaza on Monday after the ceasefire took effect expressed shock at what she had found after Israeli soldiers withdrew.

"The whole place looked as if it had been hit by an earthquake due to the severity of the aggression," Manal Abu al-Dragham told BBC Arabic's Gaza Today programme.

"I will set up my tent in the north no matter what it costs... I do not want to be displaced from my land again."

Mr Rose said Unrwa teams in southern Gaza, where he is based, had not yet been able to cross into northern Gaza because the Israeli military had not yet opened up routes through the east-west Netzarim corridor.

But he said Unrwa, as the largest humanitarian organisation in Gaza, had the networks and the people on the ground who could help if they were given access.

However, Unrwa is facing looming Israeli bans which could make it impossible to operate in Gaza.

Two laws passed by the Israeli parliament, which are due to take effect next week, will prohibit the agency from operating within Israeli territory and prevent Israeli state agencies from communicating with it.

Israel has accused Unrwa of being complicit with Hamas and said 18 of its staff took part in the 7 October attack. The agency has fired nine employees that a UN investigation found may have been involved and insisted that it is committed to neutrality.

The UN has said Unrwa is irreplaceable in Gaza while the agency's commissioner general, Philippe Lazzarini, has declared that its thousands of Palestinian staff in Gaza will "stay and deliver" if the Israeli government enforces the two laws, even though it would "come at considerable personal risk" to them.

Alongside the former presidents, family members and US officials you would expect to see at Donald Trump's inauguration, there have also been a host of faces familiar for less traditional reasons.

We've seen OpenAI CEO Sam Altman taking selfies with influencer brothers Logan and Jake Paul, and controversial Irish mixed martial arts fighter Conor McGregor chatting to British politician Nigel Farage.

Also in attendance are tech billionaires like Meta's Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon's Jeff Bezos, media tycoon Rupert Murdoch and FIFA president Gianni Infantino.

We will continue spotting the notable and unusual names among the crowd as the day progresses.

Tech billionaires

Trump's close and controversial friendship with X owner Elon Musk is well known but Musk isn't the only tech chief at Monday's inauguration.

Mark Zuckerberg, who earlier this month announced Meta was to get rid of factcheckers and "dramatically reduce the amount of censorship" on its platforms, is also in attendance.

Influencers

Another tech billionaire in attendance is Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, who was pictured posing for a group selfie with boxer and influencer Jake Paul, and Paul's brother, wrestler and influencer Logan.

Logan and Jake Paul also shared a selfie of them travelling to the inauguration with controversial Irish MMA fighter Conor McGregor.

Last year, a civil court found McGregor had raped Nikita Hand in a Dublin hotel in December 2018.

The Paul brothers have also had their own controversies. In 2021, Jake Paul denied sexually assaulting TikTok star Justine Paradise, after she accused him online.

At the end of last year, Logan Paul faced fresh questions over his cryptocurrency dealings amid ongoing concerns he may have profited from misleading fans. Paul denied any wrongdoing.

McGregor was also pictured alongside the head of the Reform UK political party, Nigel Farage, at a Trump rally on Sunday night.

Media names

Rupert Murdoch, chairman emeritus of News Corporation, which owns Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, the Sun and the Times, is attending with his fifth wife Elena Zhukova.

Mr Murdoch, 93, married the retired Russian biologist last year in a ceremony at his Californian vineyard.

Politicians and former presidents

As is customary at presidential inaugurations, a host of former US presidents are in attendance.

Much has been made in the media of Michelle Obama, who attended the first Trump inauguration in 2017, not accompanying her husband Barack to Monday's event.

There alongside Obama, who was in power before Trump's last term began, are former presidents including Bill Clinton and George W Bush.

Another familiar face is former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

When Johnson took to power in 2019, Trump described him as "a good man", adding: "They call him Britain's Trump."

Every new president begins a fresh chapter in American history. And when Donald Trump is inaugurated in a frigid Washington DC on Monday, he will be hoping to usher in a new era for this country.

The ceremony in the rotunda of the US Capitol, moved indoors for the first time in decades due to the bitter cold, will also mark the moment he starts being judged on action and not promises.

And he has promised seismic change as well as action on day one. At a raucous rally in the city on Sunday, Trump said he would sign a flurry of executive orders within moments of being inaugurated, covering issues ranging from immigration and deportations to the environment and transgender rights.

"You're going to have a lot of fun watching television tomorrow," he told the crowd here.

But even if his presidency begins with a serious bang, there are still questions about what Trump's second act will look like.

Will we feel the tectonic plates of power shift beneath our feet as he re-enters the White House? Can he deliver his pledged sweeping reforms? Will it be as apocalyptic as his opponents suggest?

Listening to some of his detractors, you would be forgiven for thinking the skies will darken and the birds will flee Washington as soon as he takes the oath of office.

Many worry he will try to rule as an autocrat and undermine American democracy. His predecessor, Joe Biden, pointedly used his final Oval Office address to warn of a dangerous oligarchy of unaccountable billionaires forming around Trump that threatens the basic rights and freedoms of Americans.

But no one can deny Trump, 78, has a clear mandate after his decisive election victory in November. He won the popular vote and the electoral college. He won a clean sweep of swing states. His agenda has the green light from voters.

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This time around, Trump is determined his agenda will be enacted. He has a far more experienced and deeply loyal team behind him to make sure that happens.

He also plans - presumably with the help of Elon Musk's "Department of Government Efficiency" - to swiftly fire huge numbers of civil servants and officials.

Trump still believes there is a "deep state" within the US government that will try to frustrate his agenda. So we can expect a far more drastic clear-out of federal employees than would normally come with a change of administration, and a far more politicised government machine behind him.

Many of his plans, like major tax cuts for big corporations and the very wealthy, will need legislation passed by Congress.

But that will not be a problem, as he has control of the Republican Party and its majority in both chambers. Senators and Representatives are unlikely to defy him in significant numbers. And he has Musk on hand to wield his social media platform and vast wealth to pressure any rebels back into line.

Is there anything that could prevent Trump from rounding up and deporting millions of undocumented migrants or using the justice system to target political opponents he sees as his enemies?

There are logistical and financial hurdles no doubt, particularly when it comes to mass deportations, but Democratic opposition alone is unlikely to be enough to stop this. The party, after all, is still reeling from its resounding election defeat.

There is internal strife as members carry out a prolonged post-mortem over that result. And the resistance movement that mobilised before Trump's first term, prompting days of nationwide protests after his inauguration that brought more than a million people onto the streets, appears less energised this time.

After his 2020 election defeat, Trump was kicked off social media platforms following the Capitol riot and his baseless claims of voter fraud. These companies are already treating him differently this time around, as he prepares to be inaugurated inside the rotunda where his supporters roamed on 6 January 2021.

Prominently seated in the VIP section to watch will be a collection of the richest men in the world. Musk, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg will all be there. So will the CEOs of Google, Apple and TikTok. It is the living embodiment of the ultra-wealthy "tech-industrial complex" that Biden warned about in his farewell address.

These men have already moved to warm relations with Trump. Zuckerberg's Meta is abandoning fact-checking on Facebook and Instagram, Bezos prevented the Washington Post (which he owns) from endorsing Kamala Harris. And all of them have donated millions to Trump's inaugural fund.

Whether it is in Congress or the corporate world, Trump is taking office this time around with a warm welcome from America's powerbrokers.

There's little doubt that his mass of executive orders on day one will feature some eye-catching actions designed to titillate his base. Like issuing presidential pardons for many, if not all, of the people convicted over the Capitol riot. His supporters will be thrilled to see the people they regard as political hostages freed from jail.

Trump will need a steady stream of populist moves like this. Because there is a risk some of his plans are at odds with what a section of his supporters voted for.

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Many wanted lower prices after years of high inflation. But most economists suggest tariffs on imported goods will probably push prices up further.

Mass deportations could lead to a labour shortage in construction - complicating his pledge to build more houses - and in the agricultural sector, which could further increase the price of food. And it is billionaires, not the working class, who look set to benefit from the biggest tax cuts.

Eye-catching proposals, like promising to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America, may well excite many of those who put him in office. But it remains to be seen how many Americans will feel the benefit of his headline policies.

Trump, however, is the ultimate political showman. His ability to entertain is part of his power and appeal. But his second term agenda goes deeper than pure showmanship and would be transformative if enacted.

His White House comeback will be dramatic and eventful, with consequences felt around the world. It may change America in fundamental and lasting ways.

Donald Trump, who rode back into power on a wave of voter dissatisfaction with the status quo, promised a new "golden age" for America in his inaugural address.

The speech was a mix of promises – and contradictions – that underlined some of the opportunities and challenges the new president will face in his second term in office.

He paid particular attention to immigration and the economy – issues that polls suggest American voters cared about most last year. He also promised to end government-promoted diversity programmes and noted that US official policy would only recognise two genders, male and female.

That last line generated an enthusiastic response at the Capitol and wild cheers from his crowd of supporters gathered at a nearby sport arena. It's a sign that cultural issues - where he drew the most vivid contrasts with Democrats in last year's election - will continue to be one of Trump's most powerful ways the new president connects with his base.

Before he outlined what this new age would entail, however, Trump painted a dark picture of the current American political climate.

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As his predecessor, Joe Biden, and other Democrats sat stone-faced to one side, Trump said the government faces a "crisis of trust". He condemned the "vicious, violent and unfair weaponisation" of the US Justice Department, which had investigated and attempted to prosecute him for contesting the 2020 election results.

He claimed a mandate to reverse "horrible betrayals" and lashed out at a "radical and corrupt establishment" that he said extracted power and wealth from America's citizens.

It was the kind of populist, anti-elite rhetoric that has been a staple of Trump's speeches for a decade. Unlike when Trump first began his ascent to the pinnacles of US political power in 2015, however, Trump represents the current emerging establishment as much as any one man. And sitting behind him on the dais were a collection of some of the wealthiest, and most influential, corporate leaders in the world.

On the day of his inauguration, Trump has the attention – and the initiative. His aides have promised hundreds of executive actions – on a range of subjects, including immigration, energy, trade, education and hot-button cultural issues.

In his inaugural address, he detailed a handful of them. He pledged to declare national emergencies on energy and immigration, allowing him to put the US military on the border, drastically limit the rights of asylum-seekers and reopen large swaths of federal land to energy extraction. He repeated his pledge to change the name of Gulf of Mexico to the "Gulf of America" and to take back the Panama Canal.

He made an unfounded claim that China was running the key waterway and said that US ships, including naval vessels, were paying too much in transit fees – perhaps a hint at the real objective in future negotiations with the Panamanian government.

"The US will once again consider itself a growing nation," he said, pledging to increase American wealth and expand "our territory".

That last bit might catch the ear of US allies, who have already been concerned by Trump's interest in acquiring Greenland and quips about making Canada the 51st US state.

On the campaign trail, and in this speech, Trump made a series of big promises. Now that he is president, he will be challenged to deliver – and show what the "golden age" he heralds actually means.

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"It's insane! We're heading for a general election. The country feels broken. Our economy is stagnant... But most German news outlets just seem obsessed with Trump, Trump, Trump!"

Iris Mühler, a teacher in engineering in north-east Germany is one of a number of voters I've been talking to ahead of February snap elections. She isn't alone in her perception.

Despite facing a whole raft of its own domestic difficulties - not least in leading EU countries, Germany and France - Europe has been very Trump-focused since he won the US presidential election in November.

The continent had a bumpy ride last time he was in the White House. Many fear Trump 2.0 could be a lot worse. And Europe's traditional powers are already struggling with their own problems.

France and Germany are mired in political and economic woes, the EU as a whole lags behind China and the US in terms of competitiveness, while in the UK, public services are in a woeful state.

So: is the continent prepared for Donald Trump or has it been caught napping at the wheel (again)?

A businessman who dismisses alliances

When it comes to trade and defence, Trump acts more like a transactional businessman than a US statesman who prizes transatlantic alliances dating back to World War Two.

"He simply doesn't believe in win-win partnerships," the former German Chancellor Angela Merkel told me. She experienced Trump last time he was in office and concluded he views the world through the prism of winners and losers.

He's convinced that Europe has taken advantage of the US for years and that's got to stop.

Leaders in Europe have watched open-mouthed these last weeks since Trump won the US presidential election, for the second time. He's chosen to publicly lambast allies in Europe and Canada, rather than focus his ire on those he recognises as a strategic threat, like China.

Trump dangles the possibility of abandoning Nato - the transatlantic military alliance that Europe has relied on for its security for decades. He has said he'd "encourage" Russia to do "whatever the hell they want" with European allies if they "don't pay" their way more and boost their defence spending.

When it comes to trade, Trump is clearly as livid with the EU now as he was during his first term in office. The bloc sells far more to the United States than it imports from the US. In January 2022, the trade surplus was €15.4 billion (£13 billion).

Donald Trump's answer? He says he'll impose blanket tariffs on all foreign imports of 10-20%, with even higher tariffs on certain goods like cars.

That's a disaster scenario for Germany, which relies on exports and the automobile industry in particular. Its economy is already spluttering - last year it shrunk by 0.2%.

As the biggest economy in the eurozone, financial difficulties in Germany risk affecting the currency as a whole.

Germany is 'top of Trump's hit list'

Merkel has said that when he was president last time, Trump appeared to have it in for Germany.

Ian Bond, the deputy director for the Centre for European Reform, believes the country will remain "top of Trump's (European) hit list."

"What he said in the past is things like, he doesn't want to see any Mercedes-Benz on the streets of New York. Now, this is kind of nuts, because, actually, most of the Mercedes-Benz that you see on the streets of New York are made in Alabama, where Mercedes has a big plant.

"He has often been more hostile to Germany than any other country in Europe. It might be slightly easier for Germany with a new and more conservative government (after the upcoming general election), but I wouldn't be holding my breath."

The UK hopes to avoid Trump tariffs as it doesn't have such a trade imbalance with the US, but it may well get lashed by tail winds if it comes to an EU-US trade war.

How prepared Europe is, really

Trump's bullish style can come as no surprise to allies after his first term in the White House. The real conundrum for Europe now is his unpredictability: How much is bluster and intimidation and how much is a promise of action?

Ian Lesser, vice president at the German Marshall Fund of the United States think tank, believes Trump's tariff threats are real and that Europe is far from ready.

"They're not prepared, no one really is. This very different approach to global trade upsets many cornerstones of the international economy, which has evolved over decades."

The European Commission claims to be ready for any number of moves by Trump when he returns to the White House. It is a huge trade power on the world stage. But Mr Lesser says the biggest impact on Europe could come if Trump launches an aggressive trade war against China. That could result in supply chain disruptions for Europe and Beijing dumping even more cheap products on European markets, to the detriment of local businesses.

"For Europe it's double exposure: exposure to what America might do and then what China will do in response."

Trade, defence and the Musk factor

What complicates things further is that trade and defence aren't separate issues for Trump and his administration. He recently refused to rule out economic and/or military action against EU and Nato member Denmark if it didn't hand over the autonomous territory Greenland to the US.

And Trump's incoming vice president appeared, this autumn, to make US defence of Europe conditional on EU regulatory bodies stepping away from the social platform X.

JD Vance warned the US could pull its support for Nato if the EU continued a longstanding investigation into X, which is owned by Trump's Golden Boy, Elon Musk.

Recently, Mr Musk also displayed a keenness for taking sides in European politics. He launched repeated online attacks against centre-left European leaders Sir Keir Starmer in the UK and outgoing German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. Musk posted on X that the extreme anti-migration AfD party was Germany's only hope.

This shocked many in Europe but pollsters suggest Mr Musk's controversial posts have little actual influence on European public opinion.

Trump and Mr Musk are widely distrusted in Europe, as clearly illustrated in a new poll commissioned by the European Council of Foreign Relations, entitled The EU and global public opinion after the US elections.

From ego flattering to flashing cash

In the end, different European leaders have different approaches to "Taming the Trump," as insiders describe attempts. Some flatter his not-exactly-tiny ego.

French President Emmanuel Macron is the expert here. He was one of the first world leaders to congratulate Trump on social media after his re-election in November and he swiftly invited him to attend the glittering and dignitary-resplendent re-opening of the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

When he was first in the White House, President Macron wowed Trump as guest of honour at the annual display of pomp and military might of Bastille Day in Paris.

The UK, meanwhile, knows Trump has a soft spot for Scotland, where his mother comes from, and for the British Royal Family. He visibly relished attending a state banquet with the now-late Queen Elizabeth II in 2019. He heaped praise on Prince William after sitting down with him this autumn.

Others in Europe favour flashing the cash.

European Central Bank (ECB) chief, Christine Lagarde, has advised Europe's leaders to adopt a "cheque-book strategy" and negotiate with Trump rather than retaliate against his proposed tariffs.

Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, speaks of buying more (expensive) US liquified natural gas (LNG) as part of Europe's effort to diversify its energy supplies. It has been weaning itself off a reliance on cheap Russian gas since the Kremlin launched its large-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Sources in the Commission also speak of possibly buying more US agricultural products and weapons.

Should Europe be more self-sufficient?

Macron, meanwhile, has long advocated what he calls "strategic autonomy" - essentially Europe learning to be more self-sufficient, in order to survive.

"Europe... can die and that depends entirely on our choices," he said this spring.

Covid showed Europe how dependent it was on Chinese imports, like medicines. Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine exposed Europe's over-reliance on Russian energy.

Macron is now sounding the alarm about the US: "The United States of America has two priorities. The USA first, and that is legitimate, and the China issue, second. And the European issue is not a geopolitical priority for the coming years and decades."

Trump's return to the White House is making European leaders think about continental weaknesses.

The big question around defence

When it comes to defence, Trump's insistence that Europe spend more is generally accepted (though how much more is a hot topic of debate). But where Trump talks in terms of increasing GDP spending, Europeans are discussing how to spend their defence budgets more wisely and in a more joined-up way to boost continental safety.

Emmanuel Macron wants an EU-wide industrial defence policy. He says the war in Ukraine illustrated that "our fragmentation is a weakness... We have sometimes discovered ourselves, as Europeans, that our guns were not of the same calibre, that our missiles did not match."

Europe frets that Trump will not want to continue being the main sponsor of military aid to Ukraine as was the case under the Biden administration.

Next month, EU leaders have invited the UK - one of Europe's two big military powers - to an informal summit to discuss working together better on security and defence.

The EU's defence chief and former Estonian prime minister, Kaja Kallas, believes European unity of purpose is needed. "We need to act in a united way. Then, we are strong. Then, we are also serious on the world stage."

Weaker and more fractured? Europe today

There are analysts who say Europe is in a far weaker, more fractured state to deal with Trump 2.0 than it was in 2016 when he was first elected. I'd say the answer to that is yes. But also no.

Yes - as discussed, economic growth is sluggish and politics are volatile.

Populist nationalist eurosceptic parties are gaining strength in many European countries. Some, like Germany's AfD, are soft on Moscow - while others like Italian PM Giorgia Meloni may be tempted to prioritise transatlantic ties with Trump rather than European unity.

But beware of looking back at Europe when Trump was first elected president through rose-tinted spectacles.

Financially, northern Europe was definitely doing better than it is now, but, in terms of unity, the continent was deeply divided on the back of the migrant crisis in 2015. Populist eurosceptic parties were also on the rise then and, following the Brexit vote in June 2016, there were widespread predictions the EU would soon lose other member countries and fall apart altogether.

Fast forward to 2025 and the EU has weathered Brexit, the Covid pandemic, the migration crisis and Trump's first term in office - and countries very much pulled together after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

It was more of a stumbling, rather than sailing through these successive crises, but the EU is still standing and the wounds of Brexit, for example, have healed with time.

Post-Brexit UK is seen by the EU as a close ally that shares the same values in a world threatened by an ambitious China, an expansionist Russia and an unpredictable, bullish incoming US president.

Nato, meanwhile, though worried about Trump's commitment to the alliance, has been boosted militarily and geostrategically by Sweden and Russian neighbour Finland becoming members following the Kremlin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Maybe, just maybe, Trump will see fewer differences that frustrate and antagonise him about Europe this time round.

It's a Europe that recognises the need to spend more on defence, as he demands; that is far warier of China, as he expects, and that is more right-leaning in its politics, as he prefers.

Is it a Europe whose leaders also stand up to Trump, despite threats and bluster, if they feel he crosses a line - be it over human rights, free speech or dallying with dictators?

The next chapter in relations between transatlantic frenemies waits to be written.

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On the first full day of peace in Gaza on Monday, rescue workers and civilians began to reckon with the sheer scale of the destruction to the Strip.

Gaza's Civil Defence agency – the strip's main emergency response service – said it feared there were more than 10,000 bodies still buried under the vast sea of rubble.

Spokesman Mahmoud Basal told the BBC that they hoped to recover the dead within 100 days, but were likely to be delayed by a deficit of bulldozers and other essential equipment.

New images from Gaza following Sunday's ceasefire showed scenes of total devastation wrought during 15 months of Israeli offensive, particularly in the north of the enclave.

The UN has previously estimated that 60% of structures across Gaza have been damaged or destroyed.

Though the sounds of bombing were replaced by celebrations as the ceasefire began on Sunday, the reality facing people across Gaza remains desperate.

According to the UN World Food Programme (WFP), the war has left more than two million Gazans homeless, without income, and completely dependent on food aid to survive.

That aid began to enter Gaza immediately after the ceasefire on Sunday and the UN said at least 630 lorries went into the Strip before the end of the day - the highest number since the start of the war 15 months ago.

Sam Rose, acting director of Unrwa, the UN's Palestinian refugee agency in Gaza, said the aid supplies were just the beginning in the challenge of bringing the strip back to life.

"We're not just talking about food, healthcare, buildings, roads, infrastructure, we've got individuals, families, communities that need to be rebuilt," he said.

"The trauma that they've gone through, the suffering, the loss, the grief, the humiliation, and the cruelty that they've endured over the past 16 months - this is going to be a very, very long road."

In Israel, the families of the three hostages who were freed in the first exchange spoke at a news conference in Tel Aviv on Monday night. Mandy Damari, the mother of dual Israeli-British citizen Emily Damari, said Emily was in "high spirits" and "on the road to recovery" despite losing two fingers in the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023.

Meirav Leshem Gonen, the mother of Romi Gonen, said: "We got our Romi back, but all families deserve the same outcome, both the living and the dead. Our hearts go out to the other families."

Before the news conference, Israeli authorities released new footage showing Damari, 28, Gonen, 24, and Doron Steinbrecher, 31 tearfully greeting their mothers on Sunday just moments after being taken out of Gaza.

If the first phase of the ceasefire holds, 30 more hostages will be released from Gaza over the next 40 days in return for about 1,800 Palestinians freed from Israeli jails.

Palestinian health authorities estimate that more than 46,900 people were killed in Gaza during the more than 15 months of war and more than 110,700 were wounded.

The ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but it says the majority of the dead are women and children – an assertion backed by the UN.

A UK-led study published by the medical journal The Lancet this month suggested that the health ministry figures may underestimate the death toll by more than 40%.

The Gaza Civil Defence agency said in a statement on Monday that 48% of its own personnel had been killed, injured or detained during the conflict, and 85% of its vehicles and 17 out of 21 facilities had been damaged or destroyed.

Though the risk from air strikes is gone, for now, the grim work continues for the remaining Civil Defence workers. Pictures shared with the BBC by members of the agency in northern Gaza on Monday showed them performing harrowing work, including the recovery of dead babies and of human remains in poor condition.

"In every street there are dead. In every neighbourhood there are people under the buildings," said Abdullah Al-Majdalawi, a 24-year-old Civil Defence worker in Gaza City.

"Even after the ceasefire we received many calls from people saying please come, my family is buried under the rubble."

Malaak Kasab, a 23-year-old recent graduate displaced from Gaza City, told the BBC on Monday that members of her own family were among those yet to be recovered.

"We have lost a lot of members of our family and some are still under the destroyed buildings," she said. "There are a lot of people under the rubble – everybody knows about this."

Kasab's family home in an apartment building was not completely destroyed, she said, but very badly damaged. "There are no doors, no windows, no water, no electricity, nothing. Not even wood to make a fire. It is unliveable."

• Joy fades as Gazans return to destroyed homes
• How 15 months of war has devastated Gaza
• 'I want to fulfil my dead brother's dream' - rebuilding life in Gaza's ruins

Movement is still dangerous for displaced Gazans as the Israeli military begins the process of withdrawing from populated areas of the Strip.

The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) has warned people not to approach its personnel or installations, nor enter a buffer zone it created around the border of Gaza and around the Netzarim corridor, which bisects Gaza separating north from south.

But many residents were eager to see what was left of their homes sooner than they had been advised. Hatem Eliwah, a 42-year-old factory supervisor from Gaza City, said he was considering setting out on foot from his shelter in Khan Younis in the south.

"We have been waiting for this ceasefire like people waiting to enter heaven," Eliwah said. "I lost two of my brothers and their families. I lost cousins, uncles. The only thing I still hope for is to go home."

There are grave concerns on both sides that the deal could collapse even before the first phase is complete in roughly six weeks, and Israel has stressed it reserves the right to resume military action in Gaza at any time.

Speaking at a meeting of the UN Security Council on Monday, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres welcomed the deal as a "ray of hope" and said its obligations must be met.

But Guterres warned of a worsening situation in the occupied West Bank, which has seen a huge rise in Israeli settler attacks against Palestinian villages since the Hamas attack on Israel of 7 October 2023.

"Senior Israeli officials openly speak of formally annexing all or part of the West Bank in the coming months," Guterres said, adding: "Any such annexation would constitute a most serious violation of international law."

Muath Al-Khatib contributed to this report

Niluper says she has been living in agony.

A Uyghur refugee, she has spent the past decade hoping her husband would join her and their three sons in Turkey, where they now live.

The family was detained in Thailand in 2014 after fleeing increasing repression in their hometown in China's Xinjiang province. She and the children were allowed to leave Thailand a year later. But her husband remained in detention, along with 47 other Uyghur men.

Niluper – not her real name – now fears she and her children may never see him again.

Ten days ago, she learned that Thai officials had tried to persuade the detainees to sign forms consenting to be sent back to China. When they realised what was in the forms, they refused to sign them.

The Thai government has denied having any immediate plans to send them back. But human rights groups believe they could be deported at any time.

"I don't know how to explain this to my sons," Niluper told the BBC on a video call from Turkey. Her sons, she says, keep asking about their father. The youngest has never met him.

"I don't know how to digest this. I'm living in constant pain, constant fear that at any moment I may get the news from Thailand that my husband has been deported."

'Hell on earth'

The last time Thailand deported Uyghur asylum seekers was in July 2015. Without warning, it put 109 of them onto a plane back to China, prompting a storm of protest from governments and human rights groups.

The few photos that were released show them hooded and handcuffed, guarded by large numbers of Chinese police officers. Little is known about what happened to them after their return. Other deported Uyghurs have received long prison sentences in secret trials.

The nominee for Secretary of State in the incoming Trump administration, Marco Rubio, has promised to press Thailand not to send the remaining Uyghurs back.

Their living conditions have been described by one human rights defender as "a hell on earth".

They are all being held in the Immigration Detention Centre (IDC) in central Bangkok, which houses most of those charged with immigration violations in Thailand. Some are there only briefly, while waiting to be deported; others are there much longer.

Driving along the narrow, congested road known as Suan Phlu it is easy to miss the non-descript cluster of cement buildings, and difficult to believe they house an estimated 900 detainees – the Thai authorities give out no precise numbers.

The IDC is known to be hot, overcrowded and unsanitary. Journalists are not allowed inside. Lawyers usually warn their clients to avoid being sent there if at all possible.

There are 43 Uyghurs there, plus another five being held in a Bangkok prison for trying to escape. They are the last of around 350 who fled China in 2013 and 2014.

They are kept in isolation from other inmates and are rarely allowed visits by outsiders or lawyers. They get few opportunities to exercise, or even to see daylight. They have been charged with no crime, apart from entering Thailand without a visa. Five Uyghurs have died in custody.

"The conditions there are appalling," says Chalida Tajaroensuk, director of the People's Empowerment Foundation, an NGO trying to help the Uyghurs.

"There is not enough food – it is mostly just soup made with cucumber and chicken bones. It is crammed in there. The water they get, both for drinking and washing, is dirty. Only basic medicines are provided and these are inadequate. If someone falls ill, it takes a long time to get an appointment with the doctor. And because of the dirty water, the hot weather and bad ventilation, a lot of the Uyghurs get rashes or other skin problems."

But the worst part of their detention, say those who have experienced it, is not knowing how long they will be imprisoned in Thailand, and the constant fear of being sent back to China.

Niluper says there were always rumours about deportation but it was difficult to find out more. Escaping was hard because they had children with them.

"It was horrible. We were so scared all the time," recalls Niluper.

"When we thought about being sent back to China, we would have preferred to die in Thailand."

China's repression of the Muslim Uyghurs has been well documented by the UN and human rights groups. Up to one million Uyghurs are believed to have been detained in re-education camps, in what human rights advocates say is a state campaign to eradicate Uyghur identity and culture. There are many allegations of torture and enforced disappearances, which China denies. It says it has been running "vocational centres" focused on de-radicalising Uyghurs.

Niluper says she and her husband faced hostility from Chinese state officials over their religiosity - her husband was an avid reader of religious texts.

The couple made the decision to flee when people they knew were being arrested or disappearing. The family were in a group of 220 Uyghurs who were caught by the Thai police trying to cross the border to Malaysia in March 2014.

Niluper was held in an IDC near the border, and then later in Bangkok, until with 170 other women and children, she was allowed in June 2015 to go to Turkey, which usually offers Uyghurs asylum.

But her husband remains in the Bangkok IDC. They were separated when they were detained, and she has had no contact with him since a brief meeting they were permitted in July 2014.

She says she was one of 18 pregnant women and 25 children crammed into a room that was just four by eight metres. The food was "bad and there was never enough for all of us".

"I was the last one to give birth, at midnight, in the bathroom. The next day the guard saw my condition and that of my baby was not good, so they took us to the hospital."

Niluper was also separated from her eldest son, who was just two years old at the time and held with his father – an experience which she says has traumatised him, after experiencing "terrible conditions" and witnessing a guard beating an inmate. When the guards brought him back to her, she says, he did not recognise her.

"He was so scared, screaming and crying. He could not understand what had happened. He did not want to talk to anyone."

It took a long time before he accepted his mother, she says, and after that he would not leave her even for a moment, even after they had arrived in Turkey.

"It took a really, really long time for him to understand that he was finally in a safe place."

Pressure from Beijing

Thailand has never explained why it will not allow the remaining Uyghurs to join their families in Turkey, but it is almost certainly because of pressure from China.

Unlike other inmates in the IDC, the fate of the Uyghurs is not handled by the Immigration Department but instead by Thailand's National Security Council, a body chaired by the prime minister in which the military has significant influence.

As the influence of the US, Thailand's oldest military ally, wanes, that of China has been steadily increasing. The current Thai government is keen to build even closer ties to China, to help revive the faltering economy.

The United Nations Refugee Agency has been accused of doing little to help the Uyghurs, but says it is given no access to them, so is unable to do much. Thailand does not recognise refugee status.

Accommodating China's wish to get the Uyghurs back is not without risk though. Thailand has just taken a seat on the UN Human Rights Council, for which it lobbied hard.

Deporting 48 men who have already endured more than a decade of incarceration would badly tarnish the image the Thai government is trying to project.

Thailand will also be mindful of what happened just a month after the last mass deportation in 2015.

On 17 August that year a powerful bomb exploded at a shrine in Bangkok which was popular with Chinese tourists. Twenty people were killed, in what was widely assumed to be a retaliation by Uyghur militants, although the Thai authorities tried to downplay the link.

Two Uyghur men were charged with the bombing, but their trial has lasted for nine years, with no end in sight. One of them, say his lawyers, is almost certainly innocent. A veil of secrecy surrounds the trial; the authorities seem reluctant to let anything from the hearings tying the bomb to the deportation to get out.

Even those Uyghurs who have managed to get to Turkey must then deal with their uncertain status there, and with the severance of all communications with their families in Xinjiang.

"I have not heard my mother's voice for 10 years," says Hasan Imam, an Uyghur refugee who now works as a lorry driver in Turkey.

He was in the same group as Niluper caught by the Malaysian border in 2014.

He remembers how the following year the Thai authorities deceived them about their plan to deport some of them to China. He says they were told some men would be moved to a different facility, because the one they were in was too crowded.

This was after some women and children had been sent to Turkey, and, unusually, the men in the camp were also allowed to talk to their wives and children in Turkey on a phone.

"We were all happy, and full of hope," Hassan says. "They selected them, one by one. At this point they had no idea they would be sent back to China. It was only later, through an illicit phone we had, that we found out from Turkey that they had been deported."

This filled the remaining detainees with despair, recalls Hasan, and two years later, when he was moved temporarily to another holding camp, he and 19 others made a remarkable escape, using a nail to make a hole in a crumbling wall.

Eleven were recaptured, but Hasan managed to cross the forested border into Malaysia, and from there reached Turkey.

"I do not know what condition my parents are in but for those still detained in Thailand it is even worse," he says.

They fear being sent back and imprisoned in China – and they also fear that it would mean more severe punishment for their families, he explains.

"The mental strain for them is unbearable."

Mozambique's main opposition leader Venâncio Mondlane has told the BBC he is prepared to serve in the government if President Daniel Chapo meets his demands to end the political crisis that has hit the country following disputed elections.

Chapo said he had set up a team that was "considering" whether his rival should be invited to join a new "inclusive" government.

The two men outlined their positions in separate interviews with the BBC, giving the impression that they were open to rapprochement after the deaths of about 300 people in post-election unrest.

Mondlane rejected his defeat in October's election, saying the result was rigged - something that Chapo denied.

Mozambique's highest court declared Chapo the winner with 65% of the vote to Mondlane's 24%.

Chapo was the candidate of the ruling Frelimo party, as his predecessor, Filipe Nyusi, had to step down after serving two terms in office.

Chapo was officially sworn in as president on 15 January, about a week after Mondlane held his own inauguration to declare himself the "people's president".

Mondlane told the BBC that Chapo was "forced" on the nation, and was the "president of the defence force".

Mondlane said that he had, nevertheless, decided to suspend protests for the first 100 days of his rival's term on condition he did the following:

• unconditionally release about 5,000 people detained for participating in demonstrations against the election result
• pay financial compensation to the families of people killed by police during the protests and
• offer free medical treatment for about 200 people injured by the police.

Mondlane said that if Chapo agreed to this, he would "open a window" for negotiations or else he would call on his supporters to renew protests.

Asked whether he was prepared to work in Chapo's government, Mondlane replied: "Yes, if he has a genuine interest to work with me. He's got a chance to invite me to the table of dialogue."

In his interview with the BBC, Chapo said he wanted to "govern in an inclusive way", and to introduce reforms to address concerns about the electoral law, human rights and freedom of expression.

He said talks were currently taking place with opposition parties represented in the new parliament, and they would later be widened to include "all segments of society".

Chapo added that wanted to form a government that was "open to all Mozambicans", but he wanted to stress that "the profile of the people is very important".

Asked whether he believed Mondlane qualified to serve in government, Chapo replied: "It will depend... because there is a team that is right now considering that, on the profile of the people, their competencies, their meritocracy, the patriotism - all these pre-requisites that I'm alluding to.

"If the team reaches the conclusion that these people have the right profile, they will be part of the government. Those who do not have that profile, will not take part."

Aged 47, Chapo was chosen by Frelimo, which has been in power since independence 49 years ago, as its candidate to rally young voters affected by high unemployment, and fed up with the party's decades-long rule.

• Mozambique at a crossroads as new president sworn in

He told the BBC that he wanted both local and foreign investment to increase in Mozambique in order to make the economy "more dynamic".

This would help create jobs for young people so that they could "build their homes, establish their families and stabilize their lives".

Mondlane, 50, was seen to have considerable support among young people after he rallied them during the election campaign with the slogan "Save Mozambique - this country is ours".

He contested the poll as an independent after breaking away from the main opposition Renamo party.

A small party that backed his candidacy won a few parliamentary seats in the election.

You may also be interested in:

• Children shot dead after joining pot-banging protests in Mozambique
• Why Africa's governing parties are having a tough time in elections
• The poet who caught the eye of Mozambique's freedom fighters

Go to BBCAfrica.com for more news from the African continent.

Follow us on Twitter @BBCAfrica, on Facebook at BBC Africa or on Instagram at bbcafrica

British-Israeli national Emily Damari says she has "returned to my beloved life" in her first comments since being released from captivity in Gaza.

The 28-year-old was shot in the hand and dragged from her home in southern Israel on 7 October 2023.

She was one of the first three hostages to be released on Sunday as part of the long-awaited ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas.

In an Instagram post published following her release, Ms Damari also wrote "love, love, love", and thanked God, her family and "the best friends I have in this world".

According to a translation of the message, which is in Hebrew, she also suggests she was able to see some of the reaction on Sunday to her release, saying "you broke my heart with excitement, thank you".

At the bottom of the message, Ms Damari includes a hand emoji with two of the fingers curled. She lost two fingers after being shot in the hand during her capture.

• Follow our live updates on the Gaza ceasefire
• British-Israeli hostage reunited with mother after release
• What we know about the Gaza ceasefire deal

Ms Damari's family has also spoken about her delight at her return. They had been told in March 2024 she was still alive but had been given no information about her condition since.

Her mother Mandy, who has spent that time campaigning for her release, said in a statement: "After 471 days Emily is finally home.

"I want to thank everyone who never stopped fighting for Emily throughout this horrendous ordeal, and who never stopped saying her name. In Israel, Britain, the United States, and around the world. Thank you for bringing Emily home."

She added that while "Emily's nightmare" is over "the impossible wait" continues for other families.

UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said the release of the three hostages was "wonderful and long overdue".

Ms Damari's release - alongside that of Romi Gonen, 24, and Doron Steinbrecher, 31- was the first of several due to take place over the next six weeks – if the ceasefire holds.

They will continue until a total of 33 Israeli hostages have been returned and about 1,900 Palestinians have been freed in exchange.

Since the war started the job had become his life. Many of the people being bombed were his neighbours, people he'd grown up with.

Hatem Al-Atar, 25, wasn't married. His bravery was not reckless, or born of ignorance. He knew he could die any second.

"All days of war since 7 October until now were difficult. Every second in this war was hard. You could lose your life, of a beloved one any second," Hatem says.

He is sitting in the civil defence office in Deir al-Balah with his comrades. They chat and check their phones. Each one is a survivor.

Ninety-four of their comrades were killed. More than 300 were wounded - nearly half the civil defence organisation in Gaza.

For Hatem, death was as close as the explosion that blew him off his feet in a house near Nasser hospital.

"There were people injured and killed around the house," he remembers.

"I entered to check if there is anyone there, alive or dead. Once I did, a reconnaissance missile hit the house."

The footage taken by a colleague shows him striding into the building. A fire is burning to the left of frame.

Then there is a loud blast, clouds of smoke, a man staggering out, but it's not Hatem.

His friends go back inside and drag him out. He's coughing and has to be held up. But he survives.

Others close to him were not so fortunate.

On 14 March last year - the start of Ramadan - he got a call at four in the morning from one of his brothers.

Nobody in Gaza, in the time of war, called at that time with good news.

"He told me that our house in al-Bureij was hit and my dad was killed."

Hatem went to al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah and met a family friend who directed him to the mortuary.

"When I went there, my father was laid on the floor next to eight other bodies. They were my sister-in-law and her seven children! I was in shock."

Still, Hatem kept going, into the place of explosions, collapsing buildings, the rubble where the dead and occasionally the living were buried. He pulled out bodies, and parts of bodies.

Then came the hour when the bombing and shooting stopped.

The first night without air strikes. The time to start thinking of something that had not been guaranteed over the last 15 months - a future.

His thoughts turn to education, and romance.

"With the deal, I should think what to do next. I will pursue my university study once universities are back in business. I'm single but I will think about getting married."

To try to tell the story of how the people of Gaza experienced this war, I and BBC colleagues have depended on the tireless efforts of local journalists working on our behalf.

Israel banned the foreign media from entering Gaza to report the war independently.

The BBC's local journalists have been on the streets almost non-stop for the last 24 hours capturing the mood of Gaza in the time of ceasefire: a gunman standing in the roadway in Nuseirat in central Gaza, firing into the air; Hamas fighters and police re-emerging; a few yards down the road another group of men shooting towards the sky; crowds gathering at cross streets and on corners; a man kneeling and kissing the ground.

But all of this is taking place against a backdrop of ruin. Trucks and cars trundle past, weighed down with people's belongings. Some use donkey carts to haul what possessions have survived after their multiple displacements.

There are hundreds of thousands of journeys in Gaza today. Some are actually under way. Others exist in the imagination. All have one direction - home.

Prof Jumaa Abu Shiha arrives at what remains of his house in Nuseirat.

First, he says the feeling of having survived is "indescribable". He prays to himself: "God is the best disposer of our affairs."

He repeats this as he goes from one ruined room to another. His wife and several children follow.

Walls are blown out. The interiors are scarred with machine gun and shrapnel marks.

Prof Abu Shiha describes how he built the house "block by block", painted it and cherished the moment he brought his family to live here.

"I can't find a house, I can only see destruction not a house," he says. "I didn't expect this. I was expecting to come back to a house and find a place to shelter me and my children."

He points to his daughters' room, and his sons' room, so carefully decorated and now laid waste. "The feeling is indescribable," he says.

There is a massive task of rebuilding ahead. The UN and aid agencies have repeatedly accused Israel of obstructing the flow of aid; the United States at one point threatened to curb military assistance to Israel unless more aid was allowed into Gaza. Israel denies restricting aid.

Aid trucks were crossing into the strip throughout the afternoon. Among them was a convoy from the Jordan Hashemite Charity Organization, which we reported on last week, on the journey from Amman towards Gaza.

Forklift trucks moved tonnes of medicine and food to help the nearly two million displaced in Gaza - roughly 90% of the population.

Such aid is tangible assistance. It can be weighed, counted, loaded, and ultimately distributed. People can be fed and given medicine. But there is another challenge whose demands are immense, and which will have a profound impact on the future of Gaza.

The war has created unknown numbers of traumatised adults and children. We have recorded some of their stories but are aware of the tens of thousands more that remain untold.

Children have faced acute suffering. According to a survey of the caregivers of 504 children, for the UK charity War Child, 96% of children felt death was imminent.

The interviews also found that 49% had a desire to die. Frequently our journalists have heard young survivors say they wished they could join a dead mother, father, or sibling.

Ten-year-old Amr al Hindi was the sole survivor of an Israeli strike on the building where he lived in Beit Lahia last October. Our colleague in the area filmed Amr in hospital just after the attack.

The floor around him was covered with the wounded. A woman sat with blood seeping from her ear. Nearby a man had just died.

"Where's Sherif?" Amr asked repeatedly. A nurse told him Sherif was OK. "I will take you upstairs to see him." But Sherif, his brother, did not survive. Nor did his other brother, Ali, or his sister Aseel, or his mother and father. The whole family was gone.

Just after the ceasefire agreement was announced we went back to see what had become of Amr al Hindi. He was living with his grandparents, and it was clear they loved him with care and tenderness. The child had three of his toes amputated after the bombing, but was managing to walk normally.

Amr sat on his grandfather's lap and stared directly at the camera. He was still, and composed, as if he was looking out from behind a thick protective screen. He began to speak about his brother Ali and how he had wanted to go to Jordan and study to become a doctor.

"I wish to become like Ali. I want to fulfil his dream, and travel to Jordan to become a doctor," he said. But over the last few words tears began to fall and he broke into sobs.

Amr's grandfather kissed him on the cheek; he said "darling" and patted his chest.

In this moment it is understood that there are many wars here.

Some that have paused. Others that, for the survivors, will live long into the future.

With additional reporting by Alice Doyard, Malaak Hasona and Adam Campbell.

On her first day of freedom, Bushra al-Tawil was enjoying a morning coffee and looking forward to lunch when we arrived at the family apartment in Ramallah.

"In prison it was just hummus, hummus, hummus. Now, I can have something different," she joked.

In the kitchen, there were hugs from family members and friends, her mother sitting at the table watching on, happy her only daughter was finally home as a result of the Gaza ceasefire deal that saw Hamas start to release hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails on Sunday.

The 32-year-old journalist has spent more than five years in Israeli jails at various times.

She has always been held without charge, most recently since March 2024, apart from on one occasion when she was prosecuted over a talk she gave in a mosque.

"I am a journalist, she said. "I have the right to express myself."

It is not the first time Bushra al-Tawil has been part of a prisoner exchange.

In 2011, she was freed along with 1,000 other Palestinian prisoners as part of the deal to release Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier who was held hostage in Gaza for more than five years.

Not long after that deal, she was quickly rearrested by Israeli forces.

She said that during her various arrests, she was badly beaten, threatened with being shot in the leg and having a cigarette stubbed out on her back.

In prison, she said, she was humiliated on a daily basis by the guards.

"The worst thing was not being allowed to wear my headscarf," she said.

"And when we first entered the prison, I was made to strip naked."

Israel's prison service has said all prisoners are treated according to the law.

The young bespectacled journalism graduate is a conservative Muslim.

In the living room, on the wall is a picture of her father, Jamal al-Tawil, a prominent Hamas politician in the occupied West Bank.

He is a former mayor of the village of al-Bireh, just outside Ramallah. He has spent more than 19 years in an Israeli jail.

I asked Bushra if she supported Hamas.

"I don't want to be rearrested," she said, declining to answer.

I also asked whether she had any sympathy for the three Israeli hostages, young women like her, who were released from more than a year of Hamas captivity in Gaza on Sunday.

"We got to return back home, and they got to go back home," she said.

"The hostages meant I got out. As long as there are hostages, prisoners like me will get their freedom."

Thirty more Israeli hostages are expected to be freed in the first phase of the ceasefire deal, in exchange for about 1,800 more Palestinian prisoners.

Some of those prisoners have been convicted of much more serious offences, including multiple murders.

They are likely to be deported outside of Israel and the Palestinian Territories to countries like Qatar and Turkey.

But all of the Palestinians released on Sunday, among them several children, were convicted of relatively minor offences.

Many, like Bushra, were never charged at all and were held in Israeli prisons under what is called "administrative detention", a process strongly condemned by human rights groups.

Israel's military argues it often cannot release details of the charges people face, not even to the detainees and their lawyers, for security reasons, to avoid revealing the identities of informants.

In the shadow of Iceland’s largest geothermal power station, a large warehouse houses a hi-tech indoor farm of sorts that’s like nothing I’ve ever seen.

Under a strange pink-purple glow, illuminated panels buzz and cylindrical columns of water bubble away, as a futuristic crop of microalgae grows.

It's here that Iceland's Vaxa Technologies has developed a system that harnesses energy and other resources from the nearby power plant, to cultivate these tiny aquatic organisms.

“It's a new way of thinking about food production,” says general manager, Kristinn Haflidason as he gives me a tour of the space-age facility.

For much of our history, humans have consumed seaweed, also know as macroalgae.

But its tiny relative, microalgae has been a less common food source, although it was eaten for centuries in ancient Central America and Africa.

Now scientists and entrepreneurs are increasingly exploring its potential as a nutrition-rich, sustainable food.

About 35 minutes from the capital Reykjavik, the Vaxa site produces the microalgae Nannochloropsis, both as food for people, and for feed in fish and shrimp farming.

It also grows a type of bacteria called Arthospira, also known as blue-green algae, as it shares similar properties with microalgae.

When dried out it's know as spirulina and is used as a dietary supplements, a food ingredients, and as a bright-blue food colouring.

These tiny organisms photosynthesise, capturing energy from light to absorb carbon dioxide and release oxygen.

“The algae is eating CO2, or turning the CO2 into biomass,” explains Mr Haflidason. “It's carbon negative.”

Vaxa's plant has a unique situation.

It's the only place where algae cultivation is integrated with a geothermal power station, which supplies clean electricity, delivers cold water for cultivation, hot water for heating, and even pipes across its CO2 emissions.

“You end up with a slightly negative carbon footprint,” says Asger Munch Smidt-Jensen, a food technology consultant at Danish Technology Institute (DTI), who co-authored a study assessing the environmental impact of Vaxa’s spirulina production.

“We also found a relatively low footprint, both in terms of land and water use.”

Round-the-clock renewable energy, plus a stream of CO2, and nutrients with a low carbon footprint, are needed to ensure the setup is climate-friendly, and he thinks that isn’t easily replicated.

“There is a huge input of energy to run these photo-bioreactors, and you have to artificially simulate the sun, so you need a high energy light source,” he explains.

"My main takeaway is that we should utilise these areas [like Iceland] where we have low impact energy sources to make energy intensive products,” adds Mr Munch Smidt-Jensen.

Back at the algae plant, I climb onto an elevated platform, where I’m surrounded by noisy modular units called photo-bioreactors, where thousands upon thousands of tiny red and blue LED lights fuel the microalgae’s growth, in place of sunlight.

They’re also supplied water and nutrients.

“More than 90% of the photosynthesis happens within very specific wavelengths of red and blue light,” explains Mr Haflidason. “We are only giving them the light that they use.”

All the conditions are tightly controlled and optimised by machine learning, he adds.

About 7% of the crop is harvested daily, and rapidly replenished by new growth.

Vaxa’s facility can produce up to 150 metric tonnes of algae annually, and it plans to expand.

As the crops are rich in protein, carbohydrate, omega-3s, fatty-acids, and vitamin B12, Mr Haflidason believes growing microalgae this way, could help tackle global food insecurity.

Many other companies are betting on the potential of microalgae - it's estimated the market will be worth $25.4bn (£20.5bn) by 2033.

Danish start-up Algiecel has been trialling portable shipping container-sized modules that house photo-bioreactors, and which could link up to carbon-emitting industries to capture their CO2, while simultaneously producing food and feed.

Crops are also being used in cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, biofuel and a replacement for plastic.

Perhaps also microalgae could be produced in space.

In a project funded by the European Space Agency, the Danish Technological Institution plans to test if a microalgae can be grown on the International Space Station.

Despite all the investment, there’s some way to go before micro-algae become an everyday part of our diet.

It still needs a lot of development, according to Mr Munch Smidt-Jensen.

He points out that the texture lacks firmness. Meanwhile the taste can be "fishy" if the algae is a saltwater variety.

“But there are ways of coming overcoming this,” he adds.

There’s also the societal question.

“Are people ready for it? How do we make it so that everyone wants to eat this?"

Malene Lihme Olsen, a food scientist at Copenhagen University who researches micro algae, says its nutritional value needs more research.

"Green microalgae [chlorella] have a very robust cell wall, so it can be difficult for us to digest and get all the nutrients,” she says.

For now she says microalgae is better added to other “carrier products” like pasta or bread to help with taste, texture and appearance.

However, Ms Olsen believes microalgae are a promising future food.

“If you compare one hectare of soy in Brazil, and imagine we had one hectare of algae field, you could produce 15 times more protein a year [from the algae].”

Back at the plant I'm looking at an unappetising green sludge. It's the harvested microalgae with the water squeezed out, ready for further processing.

Mr Haflidason offers me a taste and, after initial reluctance, I try some and find its flavour neutral with a texture like tofu.

“We are absolutely not proposing that anyone should eat green sludge,” jokes Mr Haflidason.

Instead the processed algae is an ingredient for everyday foods, and in Reykjavik one bakery makes bread with Spirulina and a gym puts it in smoothies.

“We’re not going to change what you eat. We're just going to change the nutritional value of the foods that you eat,” he says.

A man who killed dozens by driving his car into people exercising outside a stadium in southern China has been executed, state media reported.

Fan Weiqiu, 62, killed at least 35 people and injured more than dozens on 11 November after he ploughed his car onto an exercise track in Zhuhai, in what is thought to be the deadliest attack on Chinese soil for a decade.

The rampage was sparked by Fan's "dissatisfaction" over how his property had been divided following his divorce, the court heard.

His execution on Monday comes less than a month after a court sentenced him to death.

Fan was found guilty of "endangering public safety", with the court describing his motive as "extremely vile" and "the methods" used "particularly cruel".

The attack was one of 19 targeting strangers to take place across China in 2024, including two within a week of the Zhuhai attack.

Tanzania's president has announced an outbreak of Marburg virus, an Ebola-like virus, just a week after her health minister denied that there were any cases in the country.

President Samia Suluhu Hassan said at a press conference on Monday that health authorities had confirmed one case of Marburg in the north-western region of Kagera.

"We are confident that we will overcome this challenge once again," Samia said, referring to a previous outbreak in Tanzania two years ago.

On 14 January, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported a suspected Marburg outbreak in the country, having recorded nine suspected cases and eight deaths over five days in Kagera.

But Tanzania's Health Minister Jenista Mhagama said in a statement that after samples had been analysed, all suspected cases were found negative for Marburg.

• What is the Marburg virus and how dangerous is it?

At Monday's press briefing, which was held jointly with the WHO, President Samia said her government had stepped up its efforts and that a rapid response team had been dispatched to follow up on all suspected cases.

Marburg is highly infectious, with symptoms including fever, muscle pains, diarrhoea, vomiting and, in some cases, death through extreme blood loss.

On average, the virus kills half of the people it infects, according to the WHO.

Tanzania says that along with the one confirmed case, authorities took samples from 24 other people suspected of having Marburg. These all tested negative.

Meanwhile, the cause of the eight deaths reported by the WHO has yet to be revealed.

Tanzania experienced its first Marburg outbreak in March 2023 in the Bukoba district. It killed six people and lasted for nearly two months.

WHO director general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the global risk from Tanzania's current outbreak was "low".

"Even though there is no approved treatment or vaccines, outbreaks can be stopped quickly," he said. "WHO advises against restrictions. Now is the time for collaboration."

On Thursday, Africa CDC, the African Union's public health agency, said more than 300 contacts had been identified for further testing. Health workers make up 56 of these contacts, while 16 on the list are known to have had direct contact with those suspected to have had Marburg.

The International Health Regulations (IHR) of 2005 require countries to report public health events and emergencies that could cross borders. Kagera is a transit hub with many people travelling to and from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Burundi and Rwanda.

In December, neighbouring Rwanda declared that an outbreak in the country, which had infected 66 people and killed 15, was over.

The Marburg virus is transmitted to humans from fruit bats and then through contact with bodily fluids of infected individuals.

There are no specific treatments or a vaccine for the virus, although trials are under way.

More BBC stories on Tanzania:

• Tanzania's fuel revolution slowed down by lack of filling stations
• Why Samia's hesitant reforms are fuelling Tanzanian political anger
• All aboard the sparkling railway breaking new ground for East Africa

Go to BBCAfrica.com for more news from the African continent.

Follow us on Twitter @BBCAfrica, on Facebook at BBC Africa or on Instagram at bbcafrica

President Joe Biden has pre-emptively pardoned a number of people including Covid response chief Anthony Fauci and the members of the January 6 riot investigation, to prevent "unjustified... politically motivated prosecutions".

Biden said: "Our nation owes these public servants a debt of gratitude for their tireless commitment."

Trump, how will be inaugurated later on Monday, has suggested he would take action against those who tried to hold him accountable for an attempt by his supporters to overthrow the 2020 presidential vote.

Biden also issued a pre-emptive pardon to the retired general Mark Milley, who has described Trump as "fascist to the core" and "dangerous".

"These public servants have served our nation with honour and distinction and do not deserve to be the targets of unjustified and politically motivated prosecutions," the White House statement says.

"The issuance of these pardons should not be mistaken as an acknowledgment that any individual engaged in any wrongdoing, nor should acceptance be misconstrued as an admission of guilt for any offence."

This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly. Please refresh the page for the fullest version.

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Incoming first lady Melania Trump has launched a cryptocurrency on the eve of her husband's inauguration as US president.

The announcement comes a day after President-elect Donald Trump launched the $Trump cryptocurrency. Both coins have risen but have seen volatile trade.

"The Official Melania Meme is live! You can buy $MELANIA now," she posted on the social platform X on Sunday.

The website for the "Official Melania Meme" says it is a crypto asset created and tracked on the Solana blockchain.

Disclaimers on the websites of both the $Trump and $Melania coins said they were "not intended to be, or the subject of" an investment opportunity or a security.

According to the CoinMarketCap website, $Trump currently has a total market valuation of about $8.7bn (£7.1bn), while $Melania's stands at around $1.3bn.

Trump had previously called crypto a "scam" but during the 2024 election campaign became the first presidential candidate to accept digital assets as donations.

On the campaign trail, Trump also said he would create a strategic bitcoin stockpile and appoint financial regulators that take a more positive stance towards digital assets.

That spurred expectations that he would strip back regulations on the crypto industry.

In the wake of Trump's victory, bitcoin jumped to a record high is currently trading at $140,000, according to crypto trading platform Coinbase.

On Friday, the incoming artificial intelligence (AI) and crypto tsar David Sacks held a "Crypto Ball" in Washington, DC.

Other cryptocurrencies, including dogecoin - which has been promoted by high-profile Trump supporter Elon Musk - have also risen sharply this year.

Under President Joe Biden, regulators cited concerns about fraud and money laundering as they cracked down on crypto companies by suing exchanges.