Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar killed by Israeli forces in Gaza
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I'm Lucy Hockings from the Global Story podcast, where we're looking at disinformation online and its potential influence on the upcoming US presidential election. Why people fall for online conspiracy theories and what happens when real world events are shaped by online disinformation and how AI could affect the result of next month's election. The Global Story brings you unique perspectives from BBC journalists around the world. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.

This is the Global News Podcast on the BBC World Service. I'm Nick Miles and in the early hours of Friday the 18th of October, these are our main stories. The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that evil has been delivered a blow after it was confirmed that his country's forces had killed the leader of Hamas, Yahya Sinwa, in southern Gaza.

President Biden said Yahya Senwa's death was a good day for Israel, for the US and for the world. But Strett, it also presented an opportunity to end the war. Senators in Kenya have ousted the vice president, Rigati Gatkadwa, in a historic impeachment vote.

Also in this podcast, in the footsteps of Indiana Jones. It was an absolutely classic case of, you know, stones blocking an entrance and then we were able to crawl down into the tomb. This discovery of the bodies was made. The real-life archaeologist revealing the secrets of the ancient city of Petra. MUSIC

It was DNA and dental analysis which confirmed the news already circulating in Israel and abroad. The leader of Hamas, Yahya Sinwa, is dead. He was killed by Israeli soldiers during a raid on Wednesday in the south of the Gaza Strip. Details emerged a day later. Sinwa was widely believed to have been the architect of the attacks on Israel of October 7th last year, in which more than 1,000 people were killed and over 200 kidnapped.

Hamas is designated as a terrorist organisation by the United States and many other governments. The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced the killing on Israeli television and had this to say to the people of Gaza and the wider region. His words are spoken by an interpreter.

This is a milestone in taking down the evil rule of Hamas. And let me say very clearly once again, Hamas will no longer rule in Gaza. This is the beginning of the day after Hamas. This is an opportunity for you, residents of Gaza, to finally liberate yourself from his tyranny.

To Hamas terrorists, let me say this. Your leaders are running away and they will be taken down. I'm calling upon anyone holding our hostages. If you take down your weapons and return our hostages, we will allow you to come out and live. But at the same time, let me also say, if you hurt our hostages, you will be taken down. We will settle the score with you.

returning our hostages is an opportunity to achieve all of our goals, and it will make the end of the war nearer. The peoples of this region, let me say, in Gaza, in Beirut, across the region, the darkness is making way for light which is rising. Def, Haniya, Sinwa, Nasrallah, Muxin, Akil, and many of their partners are no longer.

A short time later, an IDF spokesman, Daniel Hagari, gave details of the final moments of the operation against Yahya Senwa in Gaza.

He ran away and hid in a little cave there. And you can see this in the film. He was wounded in his hand and you could see that he was masked. And he's throwing a little bit of wood against the drone. We identified him as a terrorist and we fought and we shot at him and we found him alive.

with a revolver and 40,000 Israeli shekels. He was running away and we killed him. As we record this podcast, there's been no confirmation so far from Hamas, but analysts say this would be the biggest blow yet to the group. David Petraeus is the former head of the American CIA. It's hard to overstate how important this is. This is bigger than Osama bin Laden, who is massively symbolic of

He was, at the end of the day, the complete leader of Hamas, especially after the political leader was killed in the guesthouse in Tehran some months back, but also hugely operational. So this is a major achievement.

Yahya Sinwa was widely reported to have been hiding in the group's network of tunnels in Gaza, surrounded by hostages to deter an Israeli strike. I spoke to our correspondent in Jerusalem, Wera Davis. How significant is the death of Yahya Sinwa? It is very significant, of course, because Sinwa had been a number one target for Israel ever since October 7th last year because of his role in organising and directing those attacks in which 1,200 people were killed.

and 240 people were taken hostage. And ever since that, he's had a target on his back. It was presumed he was living in tunnels underneath Gaza, surrounded by hostages. But the way it apparently has been relayed on Israeli television last night after an interview with a soldier involved in the operation was that soldiers in Rafah in southern Gaza saw suspicious activity in a house and decided to engage hostages

people in that house. It was a very fierce firefight, according to the soldier, in which three people who they described as Hamas terrorists were killed. And it was only subsequently that somebody noticed that one of the bodies that you've described seemed to resemble very strongly that of Yahya Sinwa, the leader of Hamas. And what we've heard over the last few hours is the body removed, taken to Israel for forensic examination, dental records and fingerprints, and

And tonight, a various succession of Israeli ministers, including the prime minister, have confirmed what we all now know, that Yahya Sinwa, the man who organised the 7th of October attacks...

The ultimate leader of Hamas is now dead. Now, Hamas is clearly not just Yayasinwa, but how significant a blow for the organisation is this? It's a huge blow, but you're right. I mean, and the fighting goes on, and both Netanyahu and Hamas probably don't see this as a moment when the war is going to end. The Israelis have been pounding parts of northern Gaza earlier today. They say they've killed several Hamas and Islamic Jihad members.

But that attack on a school in northern Gaza, which was also sheltering

Dozens of displaced families killed several civilians, according to a doctor in a nearby hospital. So the fighting goes on. Civilians are still being killed. More than 42,000 civilians killed, according to the Hamas-run health ministry and aid agencies who work in Gaza. Mr Netanyahu clearly doesn't feel that he can take the foot off the pedal yet. He doesn't want any Hamas fighting capability left, and only then will he declare victory and an end to the war in Gaza.

We're at Davis in Jerusalem. Yayas Senwa had only recently been chosen as overall leader of Hamas, but had served as the group's leader in Gaza for more than nine years. He'd been associated with Hamas since it was founded in the 1980s. Rushdie Abu-Aloof is the BBC's Gaza correspondent, who's now working from Turkey.

He was...

He's someone who appointed the head of the Hamas government committee in Gaza. He's the one who used to appoint all of the key players within the military wing in the movement. So he was the one man sure that controlled everything within the movement. So why I believe...

It's a very painful loss for Hamas. Maybe the killing of Yahya Sunwar wouldn't destroy Hamas, but it is a big blow. And it's not easy for them to find someone to replace him very quickly because he was controlling everything inside Gaza. He was not somebody who was a good friend.

of the Hamas leadership outside. And we believe that even he didn't tell the Hamas leaders outside about the nature of the 7th of October attack. So the people in Gaza were expressing their feeling. Very few people who have access to the internet. Some of them, they were saying that maybe this is the moment where Israel will declare victory and end the war. For the people, they don't care.

how this war will end. They want the war to end. Some of the Palestinians in Gaza and maybe outside who are against Hamas, they went even more far and they were like celebrating the death of Yahya Senwar. One person, he wrote in his Facebook, I can't feel sorry about him. He's the one who just ordered this attack and all of the suffering that we live throughout this year is because of him. That's not...

Reflect all of the views in Gaza. We have seen many people express their grief and sadness for the loss of Yahya As-Sunwar. Some of them call him a fighter. Some of them call him that he was killed by holding his gun and wearing the traditional Palestinian kufiya. He wasn't hiding in a tally like what the Israelis are said. So mixed feeling among the Palestinians. Rushdie Aba-Oluf.

A group representing families of Israeli hostages held by Hamas has welcomed Yahya Sinwa's death and said they hoped it would help secure the release of captives still in Gaza. President Biden has said the death was a good day for Israel, for the US and for the world, but stressed it also presented an opportunity to end the war and bring the hostages home. The US Vice President Kamala Harris also had this to say.

Israel has a right to defend itself, and the threat Hamas poses to Israel must be eliminated. Today, there is clear progress toward that goal. Hamas is decimated, and its leadership is eliminated.

The French President Emmanuel Macron also called for the release of the Israeli hostages in Gaza and damned Tsinwa as the main person responsible for the attacks of October 7th. Rebecca Kesby spoke to Stephen Brisley, who's in Wales here in the UK. His sister and her daughters were killed in their home in Israel on the 7th of October.

His brother-in-law is still being held hostage by Hamas. My sister and my 13 and 16-year-old nieces were murdered in their home on Kibbutz Berri and my sister's husband, Eli Sharabi, was taken hostage to Gaza.

We obviously hope that he remains alive in captivity, but we've not had any news about him to know one way or the other. So obviously every passing day just continues the nightmare for us. Well, it must have been a dreadful year. Every day must have been very stressful for you and your family. And I'm so sorry for your loss. What would you like Mr Netanyahu's government to do now?

Well, I think this is a window of opportunity that has presented itself, whether by luck or judgment.

It's very clear now that it's time to bring the hostages home. It's time to bring my brother-in-law, Eli, and all the other hostages back. We need all stakeholders, all governments to make a clear statement to Hamas that they must immediately and unconditionally release the hostages. It's over for them. We need to take this opportunity to end the war on both sides, you know, to make sure that there is no more loss of life.

Stephen Brisley, whose brother-in-law is still being held hostage by Hamas. Let's move on to some other news now. Senators in Kenya have voted to remove the deputy president, Rigata Keshagwa, from office over accusations that include corruption and undermining the government. Anne Soy reports from Nairobi. This is the first time in Kenya's history that a deputy president has been impeached.

Mr. Rigadiga Shagwa was scheduled to defend himself earlier, but his lawyer informed the House that he is admitted in hospital. The Senate rejected a proposal to adjourn the proceedings by two days, and the trial continued without him. The decision bars him from ever holding public office.

and denies him his exit benefits. Mr Dashagwa faced 11 charges, including corruption, undermining the president and inciting ethnic divisions, all of which he denied. Anne Soy in Kenya.

Experts appointed by the UN Human Rights Council have accused the two sides in Sudan's civil war of using starvation tactics against 25 million civilians, or about half the country's entire population. The fighting has been going on since April of last year. Our Africa regional editor Will Ross reports. The UN experts said the rapid support forces in the Sudanese army must immediately stop obstructing the delivery of aid. The

They said both sides, along with their foreign supporters, were responsible for the deliberate use of starvation, a war crime. At the beginning of August, a famine was declared in Darfur's Zamzam camp, where 400,000 displaced civilians live. Later that month, US-brokered peace talks led to commitments from the warring sides to allow aid into Darfur. But the promise was broken, and humanitarian workers recently stopped feeding thousands of malnourished children in the camp. Will Ross...

The dominant presence of social media in the lives of teenagers leaves many parents with one looming question. Is it safe? Its role in poor mental health and criminal activity has been well documented. But now Instagram has introduced new features to protect young people from one of the big risks of the platform, sextortion. This from the BBC's senior technology reporter, Chris Vallance. Let's talk about sextortion.

That's when someone threatens to expose a sexual image or video to get you to do something like send money.

An educational video that Instagram is posting directly into teenagers' feeds in the UK, US, Canada and Australia, warning about sextortion. The crime is particularly cruel. In the US, nearly 30 teenagers have taken their own lives as a result of being blackmailed. The international criminal groups behind these scams target victims on social media. Now Instagram is rolling out a range of new features to disrupt sextortion.

including making it harder for the blackmailers to contact under-18s, rolling out tools to detect automatically and blur nude images in direct messages more widely, and new educational campaigns.

Here's how to take control of the situation if you need help. Stop responding and tell someone you trust. Report the account. Instagram's move follows the UK and US governments' recent joint message to tech firms to go further, faster, to protect children.

Wayne May of Scam Survivors said that while Instagram's latest action against sextortion was welcome, others needed to follow suit. I think it's definitely a good start. But I think not just Meta, but every site should be doing more, should be making more announcements about how sextortion works. But if firms don't do more, then calls in many countries for tougher action against the online platforms will only get louder.

Chris Vallance. Still to come... Moldovan police said that since June, groups of up to 20 people had been travelling to Russia to train in civil unrest, with paramilitary instructors teaching techniques such as seizing weapons and even taking over state-run buildings. A police investigation in Moldova as it prepares for presidential elections on Sunday and a referendum on whether to join the European Union.

I'm Lucy Hockings from the Global Story podcast, where we're looking at disinformation online and its potential influence on the upcoming US presidential election. Why people fall for online conspiracy theories and what happens when real world events are shaped by online disinformation and how AI could affect the result of next month's election. The Global Story brings you unique perspectives from BBC journalists around the world. Find us wherever you get your podcasts. Bureaucratic.

Complacent and static. That is the damning assessment of America's Secret Service by an independent panel into security failures during July's assassination attempt on Donald Trump. The report recommends a complete overhaul of the US Secret Service leadership. I heard more from Gordon Carrera, our correspondent in Washington.

It's a very scathing report when it comes to what happened in Butler, Pennsylvania. It really focuses on failures in a series of areas, most prominently the failure to secure the building which had a line of sight of where Donald Trump was speaking, a set of buildings about 130 yards away from which a gunman then took that series of shots.

So a very specific criticism of that, but then building on that are a series of criticisms about the training of the officers who'd been deployed to the scene. For instance, the counter drone technology, the person using it had barely used it just a couple of times before. The relative lack of experience of the person in charge of protecting that site and the whole event.

and then building upwards to really the whole culture and prioritisation within the Secret Service. So a pretty damning report overall, yes. And Gordon, it recommends a complete overhaul of the Secret Service. Do we know what that would entail? Well, it's interesting because there's a series of very specific reforms it calls for, but also really, I think, a cultural change at the Secret Service.

saying it's not just about money, which is what the Secret Service have been saying, that they're simply short of resources, but it's about leadership, that the leadership needs to come from outside, not from within, including at the director level. Also prioritisation. One of the oddities, really, of the Secret Service is that it has other functions, as well as protecting people like presidents. For instance, it investigates aspects of financial crime and fraud.

And I think the panel suggests that actually it really needs to prioritise and focus on protecting individuals rather than some of these other functions as well. Now, the Secret Service was heavily criticised in the 1960s after JFK and his brother Robert Kennedy were assassinated, and then after the attempted assassination of Reagan in the 80s.

Is it fair to say that the reputation of the Secret Service is at its lowest ebb now? I think it is at a very low ebb in Washington. I think people are understanding that it's got some serious problems and that it's not just about this one event, although I think that is emblematic of some of those other problems.

and that it does require deeper reform, and that it's not just about money, which the Secret Service has been saying for some time. Now, the Secret Service itself has responded to this report saying that it's already made changes to implement some reforms and prioritise its protection, but I still think there's going to be a sense that more needs to be done, and it is still very much in focus as being an area which has got a problem and which needs fundamental change. Gordon Carrera in Washington.

Police in Moldova say pro-Kremlin supporters have taken hundreds of Moldovan citizens to Russia in recent months to train them in staging riots and civil unrest.

The police investigation comes as Moldova prepares for presidential elections on Sunday and the referendum on whether to join the EU. Warren Bull reports. At a news conference, Moldovan police said that since June, groups of up to 20 people had been travelling to Russia to train in civil unrest, with paramilitary instructors teaching techniques such as seizing weapons and even taking over state-run buildings.

Investigators say they believe the camps are organised by a group linked to the fugitive pro-Kremlin businessman Ilan Shaw. The Moldovan government accuses him of offering bribes to persuade people to vote no in Sunday's referendum on EU membership and back a rival to the pro-Europe president, Maya Sandu. Warren Bull.

Italians who want to travel abroad to have children using a surrogate mother have been reacting to the news that they could end up in prison. The practice is illegal in many countries, including Italy, but now the Italian government has gone further, pushing a law through Parliament to make it punishable by a fine of up to a million euros. That's just over a million dollars and two years in prison.

The bill was driven through by the far-right Brothers of Italy party of the Prime Minister, Giorgia Maloney, who was elected on a manifesto of what are broadly called traditional family values. She has described the move as protecting women against commodification. Domenica Spinelli is a senator from the Brothers of Italy party.

This law for us is very important because the real challenge is to protect the men and to protect the women. For us, it's important to stop the procreative tourism because in Italy, the rent-a-ring uterus is important.

Domenica Spinelli describing there what she called renting a uterus and procurative tourism.

Most Italians who travel often to the United States to use surrogates are heterosexual and either can't or choose not to carry their own child. But many are same-sex couples, like Maurizio and Mauro, who had twins, Luisa and Giorgio, via a surrogate in America. Here's their reaction to the new law.

We are horrified because we hear a lot of lies. We, as many intended parents and parents in Italy, work hard to reach the dream of our family and to listen to lies and disinformation and fear-mongering. It's terrible because it's a unique law in the world. No other country has a law that says that surrogacy is something similar to

war crimes or genocide and that people who are trying to pursue this road to have a family has to go to jail for two years and to pay a fine of one million euros. It creates a great stigma on our children because now they are a

children of a crime, a universal crime. I remember that the government, when I was based in Rome, they would call it utero in affito, uterus for rent. That's how they present it. How does that make you feel? Shocking. I am horrified by this kind of expression. First of all, I'm respectful for the women because it's incredible that somebody can define them as a part of their body.

instead of thinking that they are perfectly aware of what they're doing. Do you have friends who are planning to become parents and who now will not be able to do so? Yes, we have friends in the middle of this journey, which are horrified, of course, because going to the States is expensive. People have to put away money for years to pursue their journey.

and they are all horrified but they are all going on with their project because even if they risk criminal prosecution

Yes, yes, because we have faced many hurdles to pursue this family from the other side of the ocean and we continue to create families. People are scared, of course, but they are ready to fight. They are not willing to go to prison, but they are willing to fight. Maurizio and Mauro talking to the BBC's former Rome correspondent, Mark Lowen.

Politicians in Australia's Northern Territory have passed a law lowering the age of criminal responsibility from 12 to 10 years old. Katie Watson has this report. The new government says it has a mandate to keep people safe. It won a landslide following campaigning that focused on security and crime. They say locking up children as young as 10 will allow authorities to intervene earlier and help them turn their lives around.

But doctors, lawyers, human rights groups and indigenous organisations have all voiced concerns saying that the law is inhumane and won't fix the inequalities in the region. The Northern Territory has the highest incarceration rate in Australia, while Aboriginal people make up about a quarter of the population. Almost all of the children put in jail are First Nations people. Katie Watson.

We return now to our top story. The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has applauded the killing of the Hamas leader Yahya Sinwa by Israeli troops on Wednesday. The death of the architect of the October 7th attacks was confirmed after DNA and dental analysis. Mr Netanyahu said his killing would enable light to prevail over darkness across the Middle East, but he insisted that it did not spell the end of the war.

Christian Fraser spoke to the BBC's international editor, Jeremy Bowen, and asked him for his thoughts on the future of Gaza in the wake of the killing of Yachar Sinwa. The Israelis, from the very outset...

have made it very clear that their war aims are to destroy Hamas as a political and military organisation and to get those hostages back. There are estimated, I think, to be 101 hostages in Gaza and perhaps, the Israelis say, half of them are dead.

But while they are still there, the war definitely goes on. And I suppose it's a question of who Hamas come up with as a successor for Senua. His brother could be a possibility. You know, the thing about succession in Hamas is that since the 1990s, I believe I'm right in saying that every Hamas leader has been assassinated by Israel.

And every time they find somebody else and the organisation continues. Now, of course, because of the way that Gaza is in ruins, because of the way that the Israelis have been fighting there for actually over a year now, they're under immense pressure. But they've been under immense pressure like that for months now.

So, you know, question, how directly did Sinwar actually give orders to the Hamas fighters who are still taking on the Israelis in Gaza? Or has this, as many people would say, it's no longer a question of an organized group.

It's more a question of small groups of people popping out of holes in the ground and shooting at the Israelis and trying to hit them in, if you like, a kind of guerrilla counterinsurgency campaign. So I think my instinct is that until other factors change, until there's a ceasefire agreement, and at the moment...

no negotiations at all are going on. And until those hostages are freed, then there will be no deal and the war will go on. Jeremy Bowen reporting. We're going to take you in a completely different direction now on the podcast.

And that is the direction of Indiana Jones, the dramatic theme music there from Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade, the epic Steven Spielberg movie, which followed the journey of an archaeologist whose mission is to save the Holy Grail.

In some Christian traditions, this is thought to be the holy chalice or vessel that Jesus used. This movie was filmed in the ancient Jordanian city of Petra, known for its distinctive rose-coloured rock. Now, a real group of archaeologists have made their own discovery of a dozen skeletons and their grave treasures in a tomb beneath Petra. Petra was the capital of the ancient civilisation of the Nabataeans and it's hoped the discovery will yield important information about their culture.

The archaeologists were alerted to the existence of the tomb by the geophysicist Richard Bates, who explains now the technique he used to locate the bodies. I use remote sensing tools, really, to look into the rock, to look into the ground and see if there are things that you can't see from just walking over a ground surface or looking at a building.

And the ground penetrating radar that we did identified a big void. The only way to really then prove that I was correct in my data was to get the permission to excavate. And we got that and the Jordanian team started uncovering an entrance to this void. And of course, it turns out the void is a tomb.

It was an absolutely classic case of, you know, stones blocking an entrance and the stones when they were lifted out of there and then we were able to crawl down into the chamber, the tomb as we now know it. This discovery of the bodies was made. I mean, that must have been a remarkable moment, not least because presumably you didn't know if you had it right. The actual physics is remote sensing. At the end of the day, it's a bunch of numbers and you have to interpret them.

You know, the data seemed to imply that the void wasn't just a void, that it did have things in it. What was in there? The chamber's about two metres tall by about four metres by five metres. And then the bodies are distributed between the walls. Twelve individuals, probably some children and adults.

And there are grave goods with the bodies. OK, now, when you say grave goods, people have a picture of sort of gold chalices. What was in there? There's a lot of pottery, mainly. There has been a lot made of this one that looks like a chalice. And, of course, the connotations from certain films, you know, people would like to jump onto that. Indiana Jones and the Holy Grail. It's the...

Yes, it's the neck of a jug, more than likely, or a vessel of some form that does give the appearance of a chalice. It's not a chalice at all. It is treasure, isn't it, in terms of what it could yield about the Nabataeans? It is the tip of the iceberg in terms of what one should be able to, in the future, say about the kingdom.

about the people, about society, when we really get to fully analyse everything that's in there. It's really exciting, actually, because what more could there be? You know, yeah, get back there and find out. Professor Richard Bates of St Andrews University in Scotland, talking to Sarah Montagu.

And that's all from us for now. But before I go, I just wanted to ask you a favour. We're recording a special edition of the podcast ahead of this year's UN Climate Change Conference, which starts on November the 11th. I'll be hosting that programme with two of the BBC's top climate change experts. We want you to send us your questions for them right now, preferably as a voice note.

Manuel Nunez from Panama has already sent us his question. He wants to know how wealthy nations are helping small islands at risk from rising sea levels. Great question. Please send yours to the usual address, globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. This edition of the podcast was mixed by Hannah Montgomery. The producer was Liam McSheffrey. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Nick Miles, and until next time, goodbye.

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I'm Lucy Hockings from the Global Story podcast, where we're looking at disinformation online and its potential influence on the upcoming US presidential election. Why people fall for online conspiracy theories and what happens when real world events are shaped by online disinformation and how AI could affect the result of next month's election. The Global Story brings you unique perspectives from BBC journalists around the world. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.