NPR News Now - NPR News: 11-30-2024 4PM EST

Episode Date: November 30, 2024

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Noor Ram, NPR News. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Noor Ram. The charity World Central Kitchen has said it will pause its operations in Gaza after an Israeli airstrike hit one of its vehicles. As Villa-Marx reports, the Israeli military says a Hamas militant was traveling in the vehicle at the time. Gaza's health ministry says at least five people in total, including three aid workers, were killed. In a statement, World Central Kitchen said its organization was heartbroken,

but that it was working with, quote, incomplete information and was urgently seeking more details. The Israeli military said a Hamas operative previously under intelligence surveillance had been in the vehicle and it was only fired upon after credible information indicated he was inside it. The military said the man, Hazmi Qadi, had taken part in the attack on a kibbutz close to Gaza last October and Israeli authorities were now demanding details from the charity about its hiring practices. World Central Kitchen said it had quote no knowledge that anyone in the vehicle had alleged ties to the October 7th attacks. For NPR News I'm Billon Marks.

Hamas released a video today of an Israeli AmericanAmerican who had been abducted during the attack on southern Gaza in October of last year. Edan Alexander pleads for President-elect Donald Trump to secure his release, suggesting the video was filmed since the U.S. presidential election. Israeli officials say there are still 101 hostages in Gaza. About a third are believed to be dead. Congress returns next week for a three-week lame duck session with some must-pass legislation on its plate. NPR's Deidre Walsh reports

a priority is to agree on a spending deal to avoid a government shutdown. Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh,

NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre Walsh, NPR's Deidre reaching a bipartisan agreement before federal agencies run out of money on December 20th. Top leaders are negotiating another short-term bill that continues the current spending levels through sometime in early 2025 to give the Trump-Vance administration time to get in place. Congressional leaders also plan to approve disaster assistance for states impacted by hurricanes, floods, and wildfires, but the amount is likely to be less than the nearly 100 billion requested by President Biden. Deidre Walsh, NPR News, the Capitol.

A state of emergency is in place in parts of New York because of the first major snowfall this season. Buffalo could get as much as two feet of snow by Monday morning. Erie County Executive Mark Polenkers says the snow and the wind will make driving hazardous. It won't qualify for a blizzard because of the winds, but when the winds do pick up, and they will pick up to over 30 miles an hour at times, you will have whiteouts. You will have blizzard-like conditions.

Polenkers says the heaviest snow is expected to be over by tomorrow night, when the Buffalo Bills play the San Francisco 49ers. The team is preparing to play in any conditions and has put out a call for volunteers to shovel out the stadium if needed. This is NPR News. The 2024 Atlantic hurricane season officially comes to a close today. Scientists say it was a busy season with 11 hurricanes. Barrel was the earliest hurricane ever forming in the month of June.

Scientists say there were more hurricanes this year because of unusually warm temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean. Next month, a NASA probe will fly closer to the Sun than any spacecraft in history. As Joe Palka reports, it's the crowning event of a mission to explore the Sun's atmosphere. There are many questions about the Sun's atmosphere that the Parker Solar Probe is designed to study. In particular, it will investigate how the solar wind is generated and why the Sun's atmosphere is hotter than its surface. To gather that information, the probe has to get very close to the Sun, and that's a challenge. The spacecraft must withstand temperatures of around 2500 degrees Fahrenheit.

To make this close encounter, the spacecraft has been using flybys of Venus to adjust its trajectory. Earlier this year, it made its seventh and final Venus flyby, setting it on a course that will take it approximately 3.9 million miles from the sun. The close encounter will occur on December 24. For NPR News, I'm Joe Palca. Fishermen in Indonesia rescued 116 Rohingya refugees in the northern province of Anche today. Officials say the group had sailed from a refugee camp in Bangladesh hoping for a better life in Indonesia or Malaysia when their boat sank. About a

million predominantly Muslim who need to live in Bangladesh after being driven from Myanmar where they faced widespread discrimination. This is NPR News.