The Israeli military launched its second strike in two days on Gaza’s largest refugee camp, according to the Israel Defense Forces. 
 

• The IDF continued its air and artillery strikes targeting the Gaza Strip, which it said was aimed at destroying tunnels and other infrastructure used by Hamas. Wednesday’s airstrike on the Jabalia refugee camp, located in northern Gaza was described by one witness as “a massacre.” The Gaza Health Ministry has reported that at least 8,796 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed since October 7, including 3,648 children.  Jabalia is a neighborhood and refugee camp established decades ago to house Palestinians displaced by the 1948 Arab-Israeli war that followed Israel’s creation, as well as those Palestinians’ descendants. 
   

• At least 320 foreign passport holders as well as dozens of severely-injured Gazans  were allowed to evacuate to Egypt as part of a deal brokered between Egypt, Israel, and Hamas. This was the first such evacuation since the conflict began more than three weeks ago, during which time Israel and Egypt have blocked all crossings in and out of the territory. The director of Gaza’s Nasser Hospital told Reuters that some of the evacuees require “advanced surgeries that can’t be done here because of the lack of capabilities.” A growing number of Gaza’s hospitals have closed due to damage from air strikes and shortages of fuel, which Israel has blocked from entering the strip.
   

• National Security Spokesman John Kirby said on Wednesday that Hamas cannot be involved in the future governance of Gaza once the war is over. Elections have not been held in the Palestinian territories since 2006, when Hamas narrowly won against the more moderate Fatah. The next year, the Hamas-Fatah unity coalition collapsed in armed conflict, which ended with Fatah in control of the West Bank and Hamas of Gaza. Ever since, Hamas has largely ruled by coercion and force, while Israel has put the territory under near-total blockade, restricting the flow of essential goods coming into the enclave as well as the movement of Gaza residents. The United States and European Union have designated Hamas as a terrorist group.

Meanwhile, low-level fighting has persisted for weeks along the Israel-Lebanon border. 
 

• Since fighting in Gaza began, the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah has fired a number of rockets into Israel, with Israel returning artillery and air strikes. The faction has long been an ally of Hamas in opposing Israel, but now finds itself hesitating to become involved in a full-scale war. The group is Lebanon’s most powerful military force and the most powerful Iran-backed militia in the region. Hezbollah’s last major war with Israel was in 2006, and the group has gained more sophisticated weaponry since then, though its capabilities have also been strained by years of fighting in Syria’s civil war alongside that country’s government. 
   

• Lebanon is suffering through a crippling economic downturn, sapping any possible enthusiasm for war. The United States has also stationed two aircraft carriers nearby, a signal meant to deter Hezbollah or other groups from getting involved in the conflict. Lebanon’s foreign minister Abdallah Bou Habib said, “All of Lebanon, including Hezbollah—we don’t want a war…We have dialogued with Hezbollah and my impression is that they won’t start a war. But will Israel start a war? We need equal pressure on them, too.” Amnesty International said on Tuesday that civilians in Southern Lebanon have been injured by IDF use of the toxic incendiary munition white phosphorus. Jordan, one of the few Arab states that has normalized relations with Israel, announced that it will be pulling its ambassador from Tel Aviv until the country stops its bombardment of Gaza. 
   

On Wednesday evening, President Biden called for a “pause” in the fighting, saying, in apparent reference to the 200-some hostages held by Hamas, “A pause means give time to get the prisoners out.” 

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Infant mortality is on the rise in the United States for the first time in twenty years. The Centers for Disease Control recorded a 3% rise across the board in infant deaths; the two leading causes were premature delivery and bacterial sepsis, the latter caused by an extreme reaction to an infection in the baby’s body. Infant and maternal mortality rates are higher in the United States than those of other industrialized Western nations. Black and Native American mothers in particular are roughly three times as likely to die during and after pregnancy as White and Hispanic mothers. Black infants have the highest mortality rate in the United States, with more than 10 in 1000, or 1% of all births. The increase in infant mortality rates of both White and Native American and Alaska Native babies in 2022 was also statistically significant. 

The majority of infant deaths reported were neonatal—meaning before the baby is 28 days old—rather than postneonatal, which the CDC defines as anywhere from 29 to 364 days old. The last time the U.S. saw infant deaths increase year-on-year like this was 2002. It’s difficult to decipher how much of this alarming change can be attributed to the overturn of Roe vs. Wade in June 2022, but states that saw some of the sharpest increases—Georgia, Iowa, Missouri, and Texas—all have severe restrictions on abortion that can put both fetal and maternal life in grave danger. This data assigns even greater urgency to the efforts to regain and expand reproductive rights, like the upcoming ballot initiative in Ohio, and reminds us that Republican laws curtailing reproductive justice can have far-reaching and fatal consequences.

Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson has chosen Raj Shah, whom you may remember as one of the Fox News executives exposed during the Dominion Voting Systems defamation lawsuit, as his new chief spokesperson and head of the House GOP communications operation. Shah also previously served in the Trump White House. The perfect slimeball for the job of representing other slimeballs!

Leading offshore wind development company Orsted announced that it is scrapping plans to build two wind farms off the coast of New Jersey, a major blow to the state’s plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

Newly elected Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson (R-LA) does not have a bank account, at least if you go by his financial disclosures. Or a savings account, or a retirement account. Huh, weird! Good thing there’s no recent history of cartoonishly flagrant corruption among Republican elected officials or that would seem really suspicious!

Workers at children’s publishing powerhouse Scholastic are on strike after the company refused to give them their annual raises.

House Republicans failed—no, wait, let us finish—to expel Anthony Devolder, sorry, George Santos, the New York Republican who lied about everything up to and including his name during his campaign, and has now been indicted for stuff like stealing his campaign donors’ credit cards. 

Rep. Ken Buck (R-CO) announced that he is retiring and will not seek reelection, because the House Republican conference is filled with cranks. Better late than never, Ken!

Under Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) a slew of statewide laws have been enacted restricting student behavior and expression in schools, drawing rightful ire from non-conservatives. But one statewide measure passed recently has drawn support from across the political spectrum.  (And before you think I’m going to say something NICE about RON FUCKING DESANTIS please know that I am not/how dare you/over my dead body! But I digress.) A new Florida law requires public schools to prohibit student cell phone use during instructional time and block access to social media on district Wi-Fi. Perhaps most importantly, the law also requires schools to teach students about “how social media manipulates behavior.” According to 2021 statistics from the Department of Education, about 77 percent of schools prohibit nonacademic cell phone use during school hours, but some districts are taking restrictions even further. This fall, Orange County, FL—home to America’s eighth-largest school system—decided to ban cell phone use not just during instruction but for the entire school day, including in-between classes. After the first week, administrators saw a huge dropoff in needing to confiscate student cell phones, and phone-related negative social incidents like bullying have also decreased. Teachers have reported that students are more talkative and engaged. Many of the district’s students find the ban oppressive, as they have grown accustomed to constant access to and dependency on their cellphones, especially during the pandemic. 

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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (R-GA) resolution to censure Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) over her criticism of Israel failed, with 23 Republicans joining all Democrats to kill it. 

The Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged this month, acknowledging that the United States economy is “strong.” 

Teachers in Portland, OR went on strike for the first time in the district’s history, citing lagging contract negotiations in which there has been no movement from the district on issues like cost-of-living increases, class size limits, and student mental health support.