Israelis and Palestinians rejoice after more hostages and prisoners are freed

KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip (AP) — Hamas-led militants freed eight more hostages from the Gaza Strip and another 110 Palestinian prisoners were released by Israel as part of a ceasefire that began earlier this month. The chaotic handover of some of the hostages, through an unruly crowd by masked militants, drew an angry protest from Israel. The prisoner-swap was briefly put on hold by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who demanded that mediators assure the safe exit for hostages going forward — a commitment he said he later received. Later Thursday, Hamas confirmed the death of Mohammed Deif, head of its military wing, six months after Israel announced he was killed in an airstrike in southern Gaza.

Hospital nurse in Uganda dies in country’s first Ebola outbreak in 2 years

KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — A Ugandan health official says a nurse in the capital, Kampala, has died of Ebola, in the first recorded fatality since the country’s last outbreak ended in 2023. Diana Atwine, permanent secretary of the health ministry, told reporters Thursday that the 32-year-old male patient was an employee of Mulago Hospital, the main referral facility in Kampala. After developing a fever, he was treated at multiple locations in Uganda before lab tests confirmed he had been suffering from Ebola. The patient died on Wednesday, and Ebola was confirmed following postmortem tests, Atwine said. Ebola, which is spread by contact with bodily fluids of an infected person or contaminated materials, manifests as a deadly hemorrhagic fever.

A Russian drone strikes an apartment building in Ukraine, killing at least 6

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Officials say a Russian drone has blasted a hole in an apartment building in northeastern Ukraine during a nighttime attack that killed at least six people and wounded nine others. Regional authorities said that the Shahed drone blew out a wall and surrounding windows in the apartment building in Sumy early Thursday. It said a child was among the wounded. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called it “a terrible tragedy” and “a terrible Russian crime.” The United Nations says that the full-scale war between Russia and Ukraine that began nearly three years ago has killed more than 10,000 Ukrainian civilians.

European Central bank cuts benchmark rate by a quarter percentage point

FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — The European Central Bank is cutting its key interest rate, a step to boost an economy that’s struggling to grow as consumers burned by inflation warily eye price tags and businesses try to chart a course amid political turmoil in leading economies France and Germany. The cut on Thursday comes a day after the U.S. Federal Reserve held off on reducing rates, underlining the contrast between more robust growth in the U.S. economy and stagnation in Europe, which recorded zero growth at the end of last year. The ECB’s rate-setting council cut the benchmark rate by a quarter percentage point to 2.75%.