A battle for southern Gaza looms after the truce

Hello from London,

Do readers prefer drama to complexity? As editors, we sometimes assume so. A news outlet that publishes simple stories on extreme weather, for example, expects to thrill its audience. Wrap up! You’ll be freezing this winter. Crack open the sun cream! The summer will be a scorcher. In contrast, weighty talk about the changing climate rarely brings a spark of excitement. Your reaction to a climate story is probably a feeling of unease or worry—or perhaps a wish to look away.?

As the world gathers this week in Dubai for the start of the latest round of climate talks, don’t look away. For COP28, we at least can bring you some modestly encouraging news. As our cover story points out, compared with expectations at the Paris COP, in 2015, there has been some progress. Back then, experts said that the planet was set to warm by 3°C above pre-industrial levels by 2100 if policies didn’t change. Eight years on, thanks to a boom in renewable energy and the growth of carbon-pricing schemes, central estimates suggest that the planet is set to warm, instead, by 2.5-2.9°C. That’s still far, far too high. But it’s also a marked improvement. We set out what needs to be done next to double down on that progress.

That meeting deserves to dominate the headlines for the next couple of weeks. But the war between Israel and Hamas, despite a pause in the past few days, has not gone away. Since Friday Hamas has released 40 of the Israeli hostages it seized during its attack on October 7th, including some dual nationals, plus 18 foreigners. Israel has freed 117 Palestinians from its prisons. Will the fighting in Gaza resume soon? The Israeli government has repeatedly said it expects to restart its attack on Hamas’s structures. But Joe Biden has urged Israel to extend the truce. Read our story on what may come after the lull.

I have to admit to feeling dismissive about the Dutch election last week, wondering why outsiders would want to pay close attention to a usually pretty uneventful corner of northern Europe. Then Dutch voters gave Geert Wilders, a far-right, anti-Muslim figure, a huge vote of support. Read our profile of the man and our analysis of how he poses a threat to Europe as a whole. Populism isn’t dead (Americans, take note).

For those of you eager to kick back and indulge in some guilty reading pleasures, I’d recommend our latest “Economist reads”, on the eight best spy novels ever published (I’ve already added a couple of them to my own Christmas list). And if listening is your preference, guilty or otherwise, our pick of the best podcasts of 2023 may be for you.

Which are the most, and the least, expensive cities to live in around the world? Each November our sister company, EIU, publishes a worldwide cost-of-living survey and delivers the answer. We’ll unveil the next one, for 2023, on Wednesday. (While you wait, you can be reminded of the priciest city of 2022.)

Thanks for your predictions. Alina Wasim (in an email last Monday) correctly forecast that Sam Altman would be reinstated at OpenAI. What a torturous saga that proved to be. Sylvain Gaillaud, in Romainville, France, foresees Iran becoming an openly nuclear-armed power in 2024, but doubts that the world, including America, would be willing to engage it. And A. Pieter expects that Binyamin Netanyahu will be gone as prime minister of Israel by early spring and that, in the next election, voters will crush the parties in his coalition.

If you have any thoughts, questions or feedback, you can reach us at: [email protected]

Adam Roberts, Digital editor

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DeSantis v Newsom: the presidential match-up that isn’t

Picture it: two of America’s most powerful governors take the debate stage. One is sporting copious amounts of hair gel. The other may, or may not, be wearing lifted boots to appear taller. Gavin Newsom, the Democratic governor of California, and Ron DeSantis, his Republican counterpart in Florida, spend 90 minutes trying to convince viewers that their own state represents the very best of America, and that their relative youth and respective flavour of crusading politics are just what the country needs. Donald Trump is heckling both men in ALL CAPS on Truth Social, from his armchair at Mar-a-Lago, having decided not to seek a second term. Joe Biden is looking forward to retirement, secure in the belief that his presidency was a bridge to the next generation. Sean Hannity, of Fox News, does a passable impression of a neutral moderator.

In another universe this could have been a prime-time debate during the 2024 presidential campaign. Instead, Messrs DeSantis and Newsom will face off on Fox News on November 30th for reasons unclear even to the governors themselves.

A battle for southern Gaza looms after the truce

They were rare moments of peace after weeks of agony. Dozens of Israelis, held in captivity for seven weeks, have been reunited with their families over the past few days. A brief halt in the Gaza war has allowed Palestinians to emerge from their shelters and search for food and fuel and for missing relatives, and to see what remains of their homes.

Geert Wilders’s Dutch election win is a headache for Europe

Since Geert Wilders’s surprise triumph in the Dutch election on November 22nd, plaudits have poured in from across Europe—but overwhelmingly from his political family on the hard right of the spectrum. Marine Le Pen of France and Viktor Orban of Hungary are thrilled; but not many others relish the prospect of working with the anti-immigrant firebrand. Mr Wilders presents a political headache for the EU, a club used to moving forward by helping centrists of the left and right politely thrash out their differences. But in many ways the populists are melding the consensus rather than threatening to overthrow it.

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