Hamas says it has been working to recover the remains of dead hostages beneath the rubble left by Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip
The Red Cross has received two bodies in Gaza that Hamas says are hostages, the Israeli military has said.
The remains will be transported to Israel and formally identified. Hamas earlier said the bodies had been recovered in the Palestinian territory on Saturday.
Prior to Saturday, the remains of 10 of 28 deceased hostages had been returned to Israel.
The delay has caused outrage in Israel, as the terms of last week's ceasefire deal stipulated the release from Gaza of all hostages, living and dead. Hamas says it has struggled to find the remaining bodies under rubble.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office has ordered the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt to remain closed until further notice, and said its reopening would be considered based on the return of the final hostage remains and the implementation of the ceasefire agreement.
The IDF has stressed that Hamas must "uphold the agreement and take the necessary steps to return all the hostages".
But the US has downplayed suggestions that the delay amounts to a breach of the ceasefire deal, which President Donald Trump claimed as a major victory on a visit to Israel and Egypt last week.
The text of the deal has not been published, but a leaked version that was seen in Israeli media appeared to account for the possibility that not all of the bodies would be immediately accessible.
Hamas has blamed Israel for making the task difficult, as air strikes on Gaza have reduced many buildings to rubble, and Israel does not allow heavy machinery and diggers into the territory.
UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher told the BBC News Channel that the Gaza Strip "is now a wasteland", with people picking through the rubble for bodies and trying to find their homes - many of which have been flattened.
As part of the US-brokered ceasefire deal, Hamas also returned all 20 living hostages to Israel.
Israel's military confirmed the identity of the tenth deceased hostage returned by Hamas on Friday. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) named him as Eliyahu Margalit, whose body was taken from Nir Oz kibbutz after he was killed on 7 October 2023.
Hostages and Missing Families Forum
Israel's Hostages and Missing Families Forum described Mr Margalit as "a cowboy at heart" who managed a horse stables for many years
Also as part of the deal, Israel freed 250 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and 1,718 detainees from Gaza.
The bodies of 15 Palestinians were handed over by Israel via the Red Cross to officials in Gaza on Saturday, the Hamas-run health ministry said, bringing the total number of bodies it has received to 135.
Separately on Saturday, 11 members of one Palestinian family were killed by an Israeli tank shell, according to the Hamas-run civil defence ministry, in what was the deadliest single incident involving Israeli soldiers in Gaza since the start of the ceasefire.
The Israeli military said soldiers had fired at a "suspicious vehicle" that had crossed the so-called yellow line demarcating the area still occupied by Israeli forces in Gaza.
There are no physical markers of this line, and it is unclear if the bus did cross it. The BBC has asked the IDF for the coordinates of the incident.
The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel and took 251 others hostage.
At least 68,000 people have been killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, whose figures are seen by the UN as reliable.
Indonesia is on a mission to turn Lombok island into another Bali - and put it on a tourist bucket list
Damar, one of the best surf guides on the Indonesian island of Lombok, feels right at home taking tourists out to sea.
With his fluent English and effortless banter, you would never guess what was his childhood fear: foreigners.
"When I was 10 or maybe seven, I used to cry - I used to just pee in my pants when I saw white people," Damar, now 39, tells the BBC.
That diffidence waned as the laidback island he calls home slowly found its popularity among Western travellers.
Just east of Bali, Lombok boasts the same azure beaches and stunning views as its famous neighbour, but without the exasperating crowds. Lombok's beaches are still a hidden gem among surfers, as is Mount Rinjani for hikers. Travel sites still liberally use the word "untouched" to describe the island as they offer reasons to venture beyond Bali.
So it should come as little surprise that the Indonesian government has sensed the opportunity to create another lucrative tourist haven on the sprawling archipelago.
The mission is to create more "Balis" - and Lombok will be one of them.
For islanders, this promise of "Balification" is a welcome opportunity but they are also wary of what it brings.
And the change has already begun to hit home in more ways than one.
Getty Images
Mount Rinjani, an active volcano sitting at Lombok's highest point, is a hiker's dream
Mandalika in the south has been chosen as the heart of the "new Bali".
Its rustic coastline has already given way to glitzy resorts, cafes and even a racetrack. Earlier this month, nearly 150,000 spectators showed up to watch the motorcycle Grand Prix.
Between 2019 and 2021, dozens of families were evicted from their village homes for the construction of the Mandalika circuit. Damar's was among them.
Confronted with what activists decried as a messy resettlement plan and unfair compensation, he and his neighbours were helpless, Damar recalls.
"I was angry, but I cannot do much. I cannot fight against the government," he says.
Since the eviction, Damar has bought a plot of land and built his own house, something that many of his neighbours haven't been able to do. As a surf guide, he estimates that he earns twice as much as a fisherman - a generational profession in his community.
"I've never really been to school, so joining the tourism industry was one of the best choices that I have ever made," Damar says. "Meeting a lot of people from many different countries… It has opened my mind."
Damar's indignation about his eviction even comes with a scrupulous caveat: "I'm not angry at the tourists. I'm just angry at my own government."
Supplied
Damar's own story mirrors the transformation of Lombok from a quiet island to a budding tourist spot
The makings of a tourist magnet
The drive to transform Lombok is part of a wider effort to lure travellers away from Bali, which has for decades played an outsized role in Indonesia's tourism industry.
The island makes up less than 1% of the country's land area and less than 2% of its 280 million-plus population. Yet last year it accounted for nearly half of all visitors to Indonesia.
But increasingly Bali's unrelenting traffic and pollution - a direct result of its success as a top tourist pick- are leaving those very tourists disappointed with what has long been touted as the "last paradise".
As it turns out, that elusive paradise lies just an hour's boat ride away.
But perhaps not for long.
More and more travellers are catching on to Lombok's appeal. Last year, 81,500 foreign tourists touched down at its airport, a 40% jump from the year before - still, a far cry from the 6.3 million foreigners who flocked to Bali.
Eager for Lombok to follow in Bali's footsteps, Indonesian authorities have secured hundreds of millions of dollars in investment, along with a $250m loan from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank.
Getty Images
"Bali-fication" has come to Kuta
This has accelerated the island's makeover.
In Kuta, a popular town in Mandalika, scrappy surfers' hostels have been replaced by a mosaic of chlorinated pools and plushy sunbeds, and an international school for the children of expats.
While authorities are hailing it as Lombok's success story, some see a cautionary tale.
The cost of paradise
A stone's throw away on the beach of Tanjung Aan, cafe owner Kartini Lumban Raja told the BBC that locals there "don't want to be 'organised' like Kuta".
"When beaches start to look like Kuta, they lose their charm. We lose opportunities. We lose natural beauty," she said.
For months, rumours of evictions had been swirling on Tanjung Aan, which was earmarked for ambitious development plans.
Days after the BBC's visit in July, they came like a rolling wave.
Security forces descended upon the beach to demolish nearly 200 stalls, including Kartini's.
Videos from that day show masked men tearing shop fences down with their bare hands as stall owners protested.
"They were banging on things, kicking plywood… it's truly inhumane," Ella Nurlaila, a stall owner, told the BBC. "My goodness, this eviction was so cruel."
Just Finance International
Ella Nurlaila had sold food on Tanjung Aan for three years before the beach was cleared of all stalls in July
The state-owned company leading Mandalika's tourism drive, InJourney Tourism Development Corporation (ITDC), has secured 2.1 trillion rupiah ($128m; £96m) to build a luxury hotel on Tanjung Aan.
Authorities said the project will create jobs and boost the local economy. But that's little consolation for stall owners like Ella and her husband Adi, who have sold coconuts and coffee on the beach for the past three years.
"Thousands of people here depend on [coastal land] for their livelihood," Adi said. "Where else are we supposed to go to earn a living?"
The couple said they had paid taxes for their stall - which, according to Adi, sat on land belonging to his parents.
But ITDC representatives told the BBC that Tanjung Aan is "state-owned land", and that the tax paid by those businesses "does not equate to legal ownership or land legitimacy".
This is just the latest bout of tensions over Mandalika's tourism push.
Just Finance International, a development finance watchdog, has repeatedly flagged "a pattern of rights violations linked to the Mandalika project" in recent years.
Just Finance International
Security forces arrived on 15 July to demolish the stalls on Tanjung Aan beach
UN human rights experts estimate that more than 2,000 people "lost their primary means of livelihood overnight" because of the Tanjung Aan evictions. Stall owners were given neither "adequate notice" nor "suitable" resettlement plans, they said in a statement in August.
"The people of Mandalika must not be sacrificed for a project that promises economic growth at the expense of human rights," they said.
'If they want Bali, they should go to Bali'
In its quest for a remarkably different future, Lombok will also have to contend with what this means for local culture.
The predominantly Muslim island is home to thousands of mosques and the indigenous Sasak ethnic group. Compared to Bali, alcohol is not as readily available in parts of the island. On travel forums, tourists are encouraged to ditch bikinis and hot pants for more modest attire.
Such conservative sensitivities may change, or at least be driven further inland, as tourism heats up along the coastline. Travellers who have come to love Lombok are not happy about that either.
"Lombok is so special because it still has its own nature and people come to see that," said Swiss tourist Basil Berger, a sceptic of the"Bali-fication" of the island.
"If they want to see Bali, they [should] go to Bali," he said. Turning Lombok into another Bali "is the "the worst thing that they can do".
There are also environmental concerns. The motorcycle Grand Prix last year drew 120,000 spectators to Mandalika, leaving behind 30 tonnes of rubbish that authorities struggled to clear.
"Before it gets to Bali's stage of development, Lombok could learn. Because it's showing the same kind of strain," says Sekar Utami Setiastuti, who lives in Bali.
The government should ensure "tourism development brings welfare to a lot of people, instead of just bringing tourists to Lombok", she adds. "Lombok has to find its own identity - not just [become] a less crowded Bali."
Getty Images
The race track is just one of many development plans that worry locals and regular visitors who have come to love a quieter Lombok
No matter where that search leads, a new era has dawned on Lombok.
Andrew Irwin is among the foreign investors who have taken an early interest in Lombok's budding tourism. The American is the co-owner of LMBK Surf House, one of Mandalika's most popular surf camps.
The way he sees it, businesses like his are helping to uplift local employees and their families.
"It's giving people more opportunities to earn more money, send their kids to proper school, get proper insurance, get proper healthcare, and essentially live a better quality of life," he said.
While there's "not necessarily much one can do" about Lombok's changing landscape, he says, "we can just hope to bring a positive change to the equation".
Tourism has certainly ushered prosperity into the lives of many locals, who have decided to try their hand at entrepreneurship.
"As long you want to work, you'll make money from tourism," says Baiq Enida Kinang Lare, a homestay owner in Kuta, known to her guests as Lara. Her neighbours too have started homestays.
Lara started her business in 2014 with four rooms. She's now at 14, not counting a separate villa under construction.
As excited as she is about her prospects, she is also a little wistful as she recalled life before the hustle.
"It's difficult to find time to gather and see everyone. This is what we miss. We feel like the time flies very, very fast because we're busy," she says.
This is a feeling that would surely be shared by locals from Bali to Mykonos to Cancun, whenever tourism took off in their patch of paradise: "I miss the past, but we like the money."
President Donald Trump has said the US will return two people who survived a strike on what he called a "drug-carrying submarine" to their countries of origin, Ecuador and Colombia.
Writing on social media, Trump said two other people were killed in the US strike on the vessel, which he said US intelligence confirmed was "loaded up with mostly Fentanyl, and other illegal narcotics".
The attack on Thursday is at least the sixth US strike on ships in the Caribbean Sea in recent weeks. It is the first time survivors have been reported.
At least 27 people were killed in the prior five boat strikes in the waters off Venezuela, according to figures released by the administration.
The two survivors were rescued by a US military helicopter and then shuttled onto a US warship in the Caribbean, unnamed US officials told US media earlier.
In recent weeks, Trump has ramped up threats against Venezuela's leadership over claims that the country is sending drugs to the US. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has accused Trump of trying to make the South American nation "an American colony".
Trump has defended the ongoing boat attacks, saying they are aimed at stemming the flow of drugs from Latin America into the US, but his government has not provided evidence or details about the identities of the vessels or those on board.
"It was my great honor to destroy a very large DRUG-CARRYING SUBMARINE that was navigating towards the United States on a well known narcotrafficking transit route," Trump said in his Truth Social post on Saturday.
"The two surviving terrorists are being returned to their Countries of origin, Ecuador and Colombia, for detention and prosecution."
He added that no US military personnel were injured in the attack.
On Friday, the US president had said the submarine targeting the latest attack was "built specifically for the transportation of massive amounts of drugs".
"This was not an innocent group of people. I don't know too many people who have submarines, and that was an attack on a drug-carrying, loaded submarine," he added.
UN-appointed human rights experts have described the US strikes as "extrajudicial executions".
Trump earlier told reporters that he had authorised the CIA to conduct covert operations in Venezuela, and that he was considering launching attacks on Venezuelan soil.
Narco-subs have become a popular way to transport drugs as they can go largely undetected, and can be sunk after delivery. They are often homemade and constructed using fibreglass and plywood.
The US, as well as other coastal nations, have previously intercepted some of these subs.
Hamas says it has been working to recover the remains of dead hostages beneath the rubble left by Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip
The Red Cross has received two bodies in Gaza that Hamas says are hostages, the Israeli military has said.
The remains will be transported to Israel and formally identified. Hamas earlier said the bodies had been recovered in the Palestinian territory on Saturday.
Prior to Saturday, the remains of 10 of 28 deceased hostages had been returned to Israel.
The delay has caused outrage in Israel, as the terms of last week's ceasefire deal stipulated the release from Gaza of all hostages, living and dead. Hamas says it has struggled to find the remaining bodies under rubble.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office has ordered the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt to remain closed until further notice, and said its reopening would be considered based on the return of the final hostage remains and the implementation of the ceasefire agreement.
The IDF has stressed that Hamas must "uphold the agreement and take the necessary steps to return all the hostages".
But the US has downplayed suggestions that the delay amounts to a breach of the ceasefire deal, which President Donald Trump claimed as a major victory on a visit to Israel and Egypt last week.
The text of the deal has not been published, but a leaked version that was seen in Israeli media appeared to account for the possibility that not all of the bodies would be immediately accessible.
Hamas has blamed Israel for making the task difficult, as air strikes on Gaza have reduced many buildings to rubble, and Israel does not allow heavy machinery and diggers into the territory.
UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher told the BBC News Channel that the Gaza Strip "is now a wasteland", with people picking through the rubble for bodies and trying to find their homes - many of which have been flattened.
As part of the US-brokered ceasefire deal, Hamas also returned all 20 living hostages to Israel.
Israel's military confirmed the identity of the tenth deceased hostage returned by Hamas on Friday. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) named him as Eliyahu Margalit, whose body was taken from Nir Oz kibbutz after he was killed on 7 October 2023.
Hostages and Missing Families Forum
Israel's Hostages and Missing Families Forum described Mr Margalit as "a cowboy at heart" who managed a horse stables for many years
Also as part of the deal, Israel freed 250 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and 1,718 detainees from Gaza.
The bodies of 15 Palestinians were handed over by Israel via the Red Cross to officials in Gaza on Saturday, the Hamas-run health ministry said, bringing the total number of bodies it has received to 135.
Separately on Saturday, 11 members of one Palestinian family were killed by an Israeli tank shell, according to the Hamas-run civil defence ministry, in what was the deadliest single incident involving Israeli soldiers in Gaza since the start of the ceasefire.
The Israeli military said soldiers had fired at a "suspicious vehicle" that had crossed the so-called yellow line demarcating the area still occupied by Israeli forces in Gaza.
There are no physical markers of this line, and it is unclear if the bus did cross it. The BBC has asked the IDF for the coordinates of the incident.
The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel and took 251 others hostage.
At least 68,000 people have been killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, whose figures are seen by the UN as reliable.
President Donald Trump has said the US will return two people who survived a strike on what he called a "drug-carrying submarine" to their countries of origin, Ecuador and Colombia.
Writing on social media, Trump said two other people were killed in the US strike on the vessel, which he said US intelligence confirmed was "loaded up with mostly Fentanyl, and other illegal narcotics".
The attack on Thursday is at least the sixth US strike on ships in the Caribbean Sea in recent weeks. It is the first time survivors have been reported.
At least 27 people were killed in the prior five boat strikes in the waters off Venezuela, according to figures released by the administration.
The two survivors were rescued by a US military helicopter and then shuttled onto a US warship in the Caribbean, unnamed US officials told US media earlier.
In recent weeks, Trump has ramped up threats against Venezuela's leadership over claims that the country is sending drugs to the US. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has accused Trump of trying to make the South American nation "an American colony".
Trump has defended the ongoing boat attacks, saying they are aimed at stemming the flow of drugs from Latin America into the US, but his government has not provided evidence or details about the identities of the vessels or those on board.
"It was my great honor to destroy a very large DRUG-CARRYING SUBMARINE that was navigating towards the United States on a well known narcotrafficking transit route," Trump said in his Truth Social post on Saturday.
"The two surviving terrorists are being returned to their Countries of origin, Ecuador and Colombia, for detention and prosecution."
He added that no US military personnel were injured in the attack.
On Friday, the US president had said the submarine targeting the latest attack was "built specifically for the transportation of massive amounts of drugs".
"This was not an innocent group of people. I don't know too many people who have submarines, and that was an attack on a drug-carrying, loaded submarine," he added.
UN-appointed human rights experts have described the US strikes as "extrajudicial executions".
Trump earlier told reporters that he had authorised the CIA to conduct covert operations in Venezuela, and that he was considering launching attacks on Venezuelan soil.
Narco-subs have become a popular way to transport drugs as they can go largely undetected, and can be sunk after delivery. They are often homemade and constructed using fibreglass and plywood.
The US, as well as other coastal nations, have previously intercepted some of these subs.
Indonesia is on a mission to turn Lombok island into another Bali - and put it on a tourist bucket list
Damar, one of the best surf guides on the Indonesian island of Lombok, feels right at home taking tourists out to sea.
With his fluent English and effortless banter, you would never guess what was his childhood fear: foreigners.
"When I was 10 or maybe seven, I used to cry - I used to just pee in my pants when I saw white people," Damar, now 39, tells the BBC.
That diffidence waned as the laidback island he calls home slowly found its popularity among Western travellers.
Just east of Bali, Lombok boasts the same azure beaches and stunning views as its famous neighbour, but without the exasperating crowds. Lombok's beaches are still a hidden gem among surfers, as is Mount Rinjani for hikers. Travel sites still liberally use the word "untouched" to describe the island as they offer reasons to venture beyond Bali.
So it should come as little surprise that the Indonesian government has sensed the opportunity to create another lucrative tourist haven on the sprawling archipelago.
The mission is to create more "Balis" - and Lombok will be one of them.
For islanders, this promise of "Balification" is a welcome opportunity but they are also wary of what it brings.
And the change has already begun to hit home in more ways than one.
Getty Images
Mount Rinjani, an active volcano sitting at Lombok's highest point, is a hiker's dream
Mandalika in the south has been chosen as the heart of the "new Bali".
Its rustic coastline has already given way to glitzy resorts, cafes and even a racetrack. Earlier this month, nearly 150,000 spectators showed up to watch the motorcycle Grand Prix.
Between 2019 and 2021, dozens of families were evicted from their village homes for the construction of the Mandalika circuit. Damar's was among them.
Confronted with what activists decried as a messy resettlement plan and unfair compensation, he and his neighbours were helpless, Damar recalls.
"I was angry, but I cannot do much. I cannot fight against the government," he says.
Since the eviction, Damar has bought a plot of land and built his own house, something that many of his neighbours haven't been able to do. As a surf guide, he estimates that he earns twice as much as a fisherman - a generational profession in his community.
"I've never really been to school, so joining the tourism industry was one of the best choices that I have ever made," Damar says. "Meeting a lot of people from many different countries… It has opened my mind."
Damar's indignation about his eviction even comes with a scrupulous caveat: "I'm not angry at the tourists. I'm just angry at my own government."
Supplied
Damar's own story mirrors the transformation of Lombok from a quiet island to a budding tourist spot
The makings of a tourist magnet
The drive to transform Lombok is part of a wider effort to lure travellers away from Bali, which has for decades played an outsized role in Indonesia's tourism industry.
The island makes up less than 1% of the country's land area and less than 2% of its 280 million-plus population. Yet last year it accounted for nearly half of all visitors to Indonesia.
But increasingly Bali's unrelenting traffic and pollution - a direct result of its success as a top tourist pick- are leaving those very tourists disappointed with what has long been touted as the "last paradise".
As it turns out, that elusive paradise lies just an hour's boat ride away.
But perhaps not for long.
More and more travellers are catching on to Lombok's appeal. Last year, 81,500 foreign tourists touched down at its airport, a 40% jump from the year before - still, a far cry from the 6.3 million foreigners who flocked to Bali.
Eager for Lombok to follow in Bali's footsteps, Indonesian authorities have secured hundreds of millions of dollars in investment, along with a $250m loan from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank.
Getty Images
"Bali-fication" has come to Kuta
This has accelerated the island's makeover.
In Kuta, a popular town in Mandalika, scrappy surfers' hostels have been replaced by a mosaic of chlorinated pools and plushy sunbeds, and an international school for the children of expats.
While authorities are hailing it as Lombok's success story, some see a cautionary tale.
The cost of paradise
A stone's throw away on the beach of Tanjung Aan, cafe owner Kartini Lumban Raja told the BBC that locals there "don't want to be 'organised' like Kuta".
"When beaches start to look like Kuta, they lose their charm. We lose opportunities. We lose natural beauty," she said.
For months, rumours of evictions had been swirling on Tanjung Aan, which was earmarked for ambitious development plans.
Days after the BBC's visit in July, they came like a rolling wave.
Security forces descended upon the beach to demolish nearly 200 stalls, including Kartini's.
Videos from that day show masked men tearing shop fences down with their bare hands as stall owners protested.
"They were banging on things, kicking plywood… it's truly inhumane," Ella Nurlaila, a stall owner, told the BBC. "My goodness, this eviction was so cruel."
Just Finance International
Ella Nurlaila had sold food on Tanjung Aan for three years before the beach was cleared of all stalls in July
The state-owned company leading Mandalika's tourism drive, InJourney Tourism Development Corporation (ITDC), has secured 2.1 trillion rupiah ($128m; £96m) to build a luxury hotel on Tanjung Aan.
Authorities said the project will create jobs and boost the local economy. But that's little consolation for stall owners like Ella and her husband Adi, who have sold coconuts and coffee on the beach for the past three years.
"Thousands of people here depend on [coastal land] for their livelihood," Adi said. "Where else are we supposed to go to earn a living?"
The couple said they had paid taxes for their stall - which, according to Adi, sat on land belonging to his parents.
But ITDC representatives told the BBC that Tanjung Aan is "state-owned land", and that the tax paid by those businesses "does not equate to legal ownership or land legitimacy".
This is just the latest bout of tensions over Mandalika's tourism push.
Just Finance International, a development finance watchdog, has repeatedly flagged "a pattern of rights violations linked to the Mandalika project" in recent years.
Just Finance International
Security forces arrived on 15 July to demolish the stalls on Tanjung Aan beach
UN human rights experts estimate that more than 2,000 people "lost their primary means of livelihood overnight" because of the Tanjung Aan evictions. Stall owners were given neither "adequate notice" nor "suitable" resettlement plans, they said in a statement in August.
"The people of Mandalika must not be sacrificed for a project that promises economic growth at the expense of human rights," they said.
'If they want Bali, they should go to Bali'
In its quest for a remarkably different future, Lombok will also have to contend with what this means for local culture.
The predominantly Muslim island is home to thousands of mosques and the indigenous Sasak ethnic group. Compared to Bali, alcohol is not as readily available in parts of the island. On travel forums, tourists are encouraged to ditch bikinis and hot pants for more modest attire.
Such conservative sensitivities may change, or at least be driven further inland, as tourism heats up along the coastline. Travellers who have come to love Lombok are not happy about that either.
"Lombok is so special because it still has its own nature and people come to see that," said Swiss tourist Basil Berger, a sceptic of the"Bali-fication" of the island.
"If they want to see Bali, they [should] go to Bali," he said. Turning Lombok into another Bali "is the "the worst thing that they can do".
There are also environmental concerns. The motorcycle Grand Prix last year drew 120,000 spectators to Mandalika, leaving behind 30 tonnes of rubbish that authorities struggled to clear.
"Before it gets to Bali's stage of development, Lombok could learn. Because it's showing the same kind of strain," says Sekar Utami Setiastuti, who lives in Bali.
The government should ensure "tourism development brings welfare to a lot of people, instead of just bringing tourists to Lombok", she adds. "Lombok has to find its own identity - not just [become] a less crowded Bali."
Getty Images
The race track is just one of many development plans that worry locals and regular visitors who have come to love a quieter Lombok
No matter where that search leads, a new era has dawned on Lombok.
Andrew Irwin is among the foreign investors who have taken an early interest in Lombok's budding tourism. The American is the co-owner of LMBK Surf House, one of Mandalika's most popular surf camps.
The way he sees it, businesses like his are helping to uplift local employees and their families.
"It's giving people more opportunities to earn more money, send their kids to proper school, get proper insurance, get proper healthcare, and essentially live a better quality of life," he said.
While there's "not necessarily much one can do" about Lombok's changing landscape, he says, "we can just hope to bring a positive change to the equation".
Tourism has certainly ushered prosperity into the lives of many locals, who have decided to try their hand at entrepreneurship.
"As long you want to work, you'll make money from tourism," says Baiq Enida Kinang Lare, a homestay owner in Kuta, known to her guests as Lara. Her neighbours too have started homestays.
Lara started her business in 2014 with four rooms. She's now at 14, not counting a separate villa under construction.
As excited as she is about her prospects, she is also a little wistful as she recalled life before the hustle.
"It's difficult to find time to gather and see everyone. This is what we miss. We feel like the time flies very, very fast because we're busy," she says.
This is a feeling that would surely be shared by locals from Bali to Mykonos to Cancun, whenever tourism took off in their patch of paradise: "I miss the past, but we like the money."
On Friday evening, President Trump commuted the sentence of former Representative George Santos. “Good luck George, have a great life!” the president said.
George Santos, the disgraced former congressman from New York, had pleaded for mercy for months before President Trump commuted his sentence on Friday.
Andrew Cuomo, trailing in the New York City mayor’s race, sought to contrast his role in legalizing same-sex marriage with the views of some of Mr. Mamdani’s supporters.
Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo campaigning in the Bronx on Saturday. Mr. Cuomo criticized his opponent Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani after Mr. Mamdani met with an imam who has opposed homosexuality.
Republican governors in several US states have placed National Guard troops on standby in preparation for a nationwide protest to oppose Donald Trump and his policies.
The organisers of the "No Kings" protests say that gatherings will take place at more than 2,500 locations around the US. Trump allies have accused the protesters of being allied with the far-left Antifa movement.
Governors in Texas and Virginia have activated their state's National Guard troops, however it is unclear how visible the military presence will be.
Organisers say that at the last No Kings protest, held in June, more than five million people took to the streets to denounce Trump's political agenda.
The protest organisers say the protest will challenge Trump's "authoritarianism".
"The president thinks his rule is absolute," they say on their website.
"But in America, we don't have kings and we won't back down against chaos, corruption, and cruelty."
Some Republicans have dubbed the protests "Hate America" rallies.
"We'll have to get the National Guard out," Kansas Senator Roger Marshall said ahead of the rallies, according to CNN.
"Hopefully it'll be peaceful. I doubt it."
Texas Governor Greg Abbott on Thursday activated the state's National Guard ahead of a protest scheduled in Austin, the state's capital.
He said the troops would be needed due to the "planned antifa-linked demonstration".
Democrats denounced the move, including the state's top Democrat Gene Wu, who argued: "Sending armed soldiers to suppress peaceful protests is what kings and dictators do — and Greg Abbott just proved he's one of them."
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin also ordered the state National Guard to be activated.
After serving 43 years in prison for a murder he did not commit, Subramanyam "Subu" Vedam was finally free.
New evidence had exonerated him earlier this month of the murder of his former roommate.
But before he could reach his family's arms, Mr Vedam was taken into custody by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), who want to deport him to India - a country he has not lived in since he was a baby.
Now, Mr Vedam's legal team is fighting a deportation order and his family is determined to get him out of custody, for good.
His family are now working to navigate a new and "very different" situation, his sister Saraswathi Vedam told the BBC.
Her brother has gone from a facility where he knew inmates and guards alike, where he mentored fellow inmates, and where he had his own cell, to a facility where he shares a room with 60 men and where his history of good behaviour and mentorship is unknown.
Mr Vedam has been repeating one message to his sister and other family members in the wake of the new situation: "I want us to focus on the win."
"My name has been cleared, I'm no longer a prisoner, I'm a detainee."
The 1980 murder
More than 40 years ago, Mr Vedam was convicted of murdering his once-roommate Tom Kinser, a 19-year-old college student.
Kinser's body was found nine months after he went missing in a wooded area with a bullet wound in his skull.
On the day of Kinser's disappearance, Mr Vedam had asked him for a ride. While the vehicle Kinser drove was returned to its usual spot, no one saw it being returned.
Mr Vedam was charged with Kinser's murder. He was denied bail, had his passport and green card seized by authorities and was labelled a "foreigner likely to flee".
Two years later he was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. In 1984, he was sentenced to a separate two-and-a-half to five years for a drug offence, as part of a plea agreement. That sentence was to be served simultaneously with his life sentence.
Throughout that time, Mr Vedam maintained his innocence on the murder charges.
His supporters and family members stressed there was no physical evidence tying him to the crime.
Getty Images
Mr Vedam's exoneration
Mr Vedam repeatedly appealed the murder conviction and a few years ago new evidence in the case surfaced which exonerated.
Earlier this month, Centre County District Attorney Bernie Cantorna said he would not pursue a new trial against Mr Vedam.
But Mr Vedam's family knew there was one hurdle left before he was free: he still had a 1988 deportation order, based on his convictions for murder and a drug offence.
The family expected they would have to file a motion to have his immigration case reopened, Ms Vedam said.
The facts of the case are different now, she stressed.
But when they arrested him, ICE cited the immigration order as their reasoning for quickly detaining him in a different Pennsylvania facility.
While he was exonerated for the murder charge, his drug conviction still stands, they have said. The immigration agency said it acted on a lawfully issued order.
ICE did not respond to the BBC's request for comment, but told other US outlets that Mr Vedam will remain in custody pending his deportation.
Mr Vedam's family has said his decades of good behaviour, completion of three degrees and community service while behind bars should be considered when the immigration court examines his case.
"What was deeply disappointing was that we didn't even have a moment to hold him in our arms," Ms Vedam said. "He was held wrongly and one would think that he conducted himself with such honour and purpose and integrity that that should mean something."
Potential deportation to India
The family has stressed Mr Vedam's ties to India - where ICE has said they would like to deport him to - are weak at best.
While he was born there, he moved to the US at nine months old. What relatives are still alive, are distant ones, Ms Vedam told the BBC.
His community - Ms Vedam, her four daughters and other cousins - are in the US and Canada.
"He will again be robbed and miss out on the lives of the people closet to him, by being half way across the world," she said. "It's almost like having his life stolen twice."
Mr Vedam, who is a legal permanent resident, had his citizenship application accepted before he was arrested. Both of his parents were also both US citizens.
"We believe deportation from the United States now, to send him to a country where he has few connections, would represent another terrible wrong done to a man who has already endured a record-setting injustice," his lawyer, Ava Benach said in a statement to the BBC.
Trump says he has faith in Putin, but Zelensky does not
One word sticks out in the Ukrainian leader's description of his latest high-stakes foray into the nerve-centre of American power.
His White House conversation with President Donald Trump, Volodymyr Zelensky wrote on X, was "pointed".
But we don't need to parse his semantic description of the exchange to know that this was not the meeting that the Ukrainian side had been expecting.
If the old British adage holds true that a week is a long time in politics, then Zelensky appears to have set a new record.
A short transatlantic flight, it seems, is now an age.
As they set off for Washington on Thursday, the Ukrainian side was in high spirits.
Listen to the words of Ruslan Stefanchuk, the speaker of Ukraine's parliament – effectively the country's second in command – and a politician fiercely loyal to Zelensky.
In an interview with the BBC shortly before the president's plane took off, Stefanchuk described the trip as a "very important historical moment".
The meeting, he said, would leave the world in no doubt that Trump "finally understands that Putin is a liar, he can't be trusted, and actions are needed to stop the war".
And, he appeared to suggest, the crucial question for Ukraine – whether Trump would agree to its use of American long-range Tomahawk missiles - was close to being "solved".
But it was as Zelensky's flight was in the air that news of the two-and-a-half-hour Trump-Putin phone call began to emerge and, before its wheels were even on the Washington tarmac, we had the announcement that another summit between the two was in the offing.
The Ukrainians descended the steps, to be met with a low-key American greeting, and with their optimism, like a piece of waylaid luggage, lost somewhere en route.
Trump tells BBC Putin 'wants to make a deal', cites threat of Tomahawks
Just a few weeks ago, the US president appeared to be running out of patience with Russian President Vladimir Putin, suggesting he thought he might be stringing him along, that his continuing attacks on Ukraine were "crazy" and that he was growing "very angry" with him.
But Friday's meeting confirmed that the sense of frustration was gone.
"I think he wants to make a deal," Trump said, and then proceeded to repeat some of his old talking points, framing the conflict as, in essence, a personal gripe between two leaders.
"There's a lot of bad blood," he said.
Zelensky has learned from bitter experience that there are great risks in being seen to challenge Trump inside the walls of the White House.
And so, the underlying tension was - once again - palpable as Trump, his secretary of state, the war secretary and treasury secretary looked on sternly, while prominent members of the MAGA (Make America Great Again)-leaning media clustered around the back of his chair.
As expected, Zelensky was careful to offer effusive praise for the host's prowess as a peacemaker and to repeatedly express his gratitude.
Flattery is the currency of diplomacy in Washington nowadays.
But Zelensky also made it clear he did not share Trump's apparent confidence that Russia is acting in good faith.
"We understand that Putin is not ready," he said.
The outcome, though, appears to have been a foregone conclusion.
Trump ended the day insisting that the war should simply be frozen on the existing battle lines and both sides should simply "go home to their families".
For Ukraine and its allies, the conflict is not a personal dispute but a war of aggression being fought by an authoritarian state, with imperial ambitions, against a European democracy.
Ukraine wants the US Tomahawk missiles to help it pressure Putin into genuine negotiations, and it wants US security guarantees to make sure he is forced to abide with any future peace settlement.
Zelensky left the White House without either of those things.
Watch: How might Tomahawk missiles change the Ukraine-Russia war?
What do Ukrainians think of it all?
In a suburb of Kyiv, recently hit by two Russian missiles, I spoke to some of the residents still working to repair the damage to their homes and businesses.
I asked Volodymyr Tsepovatenko - still busy fixing windows that were blown out of the small shop he owns – for his views on where Ukraine stands after the latest White House meeting.
Volodymyr Tsepovatenko has been fixing windows at a shop he owns after Russian missiles struck a suburb in Kyiv
"If we make a peace deal now," he told me, "Russia will start to prepare a new more professional war against Ukraine, or maybe other countries."
"I see one way for our safety and it's to destroy the possibility of Russia occupying or fighting any country in Europe."
Ukraine needs to keep fighting, he said.
Oleksandr Vilko's car was destroyed by the blast wave when the missiles struck. He is not too worried, he says, about the decision on the Tomahawks.
"The only power who decides what's going to be next is our army," he told me.
Oleksandr Vilko's car was damaged by the blast wave when the missiles struck
While Ukraine is grateful for any assistance provided so far, he said, it was Washington's sovereign right whether or not to give Ukraine its own long-range missiles to fight back.
But with or without them, Ukrainians would fight on, he said.
"It's almost the fourth year of the war with the biggest country in the whole world," he said.
Republican governors in several US states have placed National Guard troops on standby in preparation for a nationwide protest to oppose Donald Trump and his policies.
The organisers of the "No Kings" protests say that gatherings will take place at more than 2,500 locations around the US. Trump allies have accused the protesters of being allied with the far-left Antifa movement.
Governors in Texas and Virginia have activated their state's National Guard troops, however it is unclear how visible the military presence will be.
Organisers say that at the last No Kings protest, held in June, more than five million people took to the streets to denounce Trump's political agenda.
The protest organisers say the protest will challenge Trump's "authoritarianism".
"The president thinks his rule is absolute," they say on their website.
"But in America, we don't have kings and we won't back down against chaos, corruption, and cruelty."
Some Republicans have dubbed the protests "Hate America" rallies.
"We'll have to get the National Guard out," Kansas Senator Roger Marshall said ahead of the rallies, according to CNN.
"Hopefully it'll be peaceful. I doubt it."
Texas Governor Greg Abbott on Thursday activated the state's National Guard ahead of a protest scheduled in Austin, the state's capital.
He said the troops would be needed due to the "planned antifa-linked demonstration".
Democrats denounced the move, including the state's top Democrat Gene Wu, who argued: "Sending armed soldiers to suppress peaceful protests is what kings and dictators do — and Greg Abbott just proved he's one of them."
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin also ordered the state National Guard to be activated.
So, what does life after the royal shake up look like for the women of the York Family?
For Ferguson, 66, the change will be the most visible.
For all these years, she has kept the courtesy royal divorcee title Sarah, Duchess of York. Now, she reverts to her maiden name of Ferguson.
And while arguably we've always referred to her as "Fergie", royal commentator Richard Palmer said that will "no doubt" have an impact.
"She will have lost a bit of cachet over this," he said. "She certainly does use the title – even her Twitter bio is @SarahTheDuchess."
But the loss of her title may impact her much less than the scandal she's facing separately about her own links with the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Last month, several charities dropped her as patron or ambassador after an email from 2011 revealed that she called Epstein her "supreme friend" and seemed to apologise for her public criticism of him.
"I think as far as Sarah is concerned, her own recent controversy involving the email she is said to have sent Epstein is what has had the biggest impact for her of late," said royal commentator Victoria Murphy.
"Prior to that, she had sidestepped the firing line of the controversy around Epstein and I think may have continued to do so, albeit without calling herself Duchess of York, had that not happened."
Away from her philanthropy, Ferguson also has various business ventures.
And these, too, are more likely to be affected by the Epstein controversy than any change in title, says Murphy.
"I would say it's likely they will be impacted by the revaluations of her own contact with Epstein, in the same way her charity work was and the fact that charities didn't want to be associated with her."
But Ferguson has been a great survivor in royal circles. She's kept bouncing back.
Even though she split from Prince Andrew more than three decades ago, she has remained his strong supporter and still lives in his Windsor estate.
The Christmas before last, she was back in the royal fold, joining a royal Christmas gathering in Sandringham the first time in decades. That was despite she and her ex-husband not being working royals or allowed to be part of official royal events.
That ability to bounce back may help her this time too.
"She's the ultimate survivor and master of reinvention," said royal author Katie Nicholls.
"Not only has she been reaccepted by the public, but the late Queen Elizabeth II brought her back into the fold, and Charles is also very fond of her."
Nicholls argues that Ferguson, over the years, has been through "much worse", and won't be too impacted by the loss of her title.
"Having been a royal outcast for all these decades, she's learnt not to attach too much weight to things like that."
Getty Images
Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie pictured at a Coronation Big Lunch in Chalfont St Giles, Buckinghamshire in 2023
For the couple's two daughters, Beatrice, 37, and Eugenie, 35, there's no formal change.
They will still be known as princesses, which they have been entitled to since birth.
There is also no change to the line of succession.
Andrew remains eighth in line to the crown, followed by his daughters Beatrice and Eugenie, in ninth and twelfth place respectively.
But in reality their positions are "low down" and will likely become much further down as time goes on, says Murphy.
"So practically, their positions have little meaning for the future," she says.
Beatrice and Eugenie are also currently non-working royals, and while they do sometimes take on roles – Princess Eugenie was recently announced as a mentor for the King's Foundation's 35 under 35 network for example - Murphy also says she "can't see a world" in which they would step up into royal duties in any official way.
"I don't think that was ever really on the cards, and I certainly don't see it as an option," she said.
They have also benefited from all of the contacts their parents have made over the years, says Palmer. And while Andrew still remains a prince, losing the dukedom could have a knock-on impact there.
Prince Andrew will also no longer join the King and the rest of the royal family at Christmas at Sandringham, but it's possible his daughters will still attend, says Palmer.
"As far as Beatrice and Eugenie go, I think there's an appreciation of the fact that this scandal doesn't involve them, and it's not fair for it to impact them directly in the independent lives they are carving out for themselves," says Murphy.
"Their daughters are most unfortunate victims, they've had to suffer in silence and have been dignified in their silence," adds Nicholls.
"It can't be easy to see their parents dragged through something like this, and they remain very much loved nieces for the King. It wouldn't surprise me at all to see them at Christmas occasions in the future. They're largely untarnished."
Ultimately, there seems to be little doubt that the person who will be most affected by all of this will be Prince Andrew himself.
For a man who always liked the trappings of royalty, the pomp and the ceremony, the loss of his titles is deeply humiliating.
So to not have those, on a personal level, will really matter.
Login
