Good morning and happy Friday. If someone brought donuts to the office, go get one. You deserve it.

Tesla finally unveiled its kinda-maybe-bulletproof Cybertruck at flashy event yesterday. The truck’s three versions will retail for $60k, $80k, and $100k. The cheap one, however, won’t debut until 2025.

What’s in store today:

• Updates on the Israel-Hamas war

• America loses a legend

• Saving wolverines from extinction

• A real (or fake?) da Vinci painting

• And much more!

Here’s today’s edition of The Elective:

 WORLD 

The Israel-Hamas truce ends

The war between Israel and Hamas rages on. Since the daily four-hour humanitarian pauses began Nov. 9, a delicate truce was signed, twice extended, and has now expired. Dozens of hostages were also released. A quick timeline:

Nov. 14: Israel opens additional evacuation corridors. Hundreds of thousands of Gazans who remained in the besieged north flee south. Humanitarian aid floods in. Israel’s defense ministry claims it controls most of northern Gaza, including Gaza City.

Nov. 15: Israel Defense Forces (the IDF) continues to raid a hospital they claim Hamas is using as a base in violation of international law. U.S. intelligence backs the claim. Fuel enters Gaza for the first time since the war began.

Nov. 20: The United Nations and the Palestinian Red Crescent (the Islamic world's branch of the Red Cross) evacuate dozens of premature babies from Gaza hospitals into Egypt.

Nov. 21: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the war won’t end until Hamas is destroyed, hostages are freed, and “no element in Gaza” threatens Israel.

Nov. 22: Israel and Hamas approve a four-day truce to allow for the release of hostages. Hamas will release 50 hostages (including one American) captured in its Oct. 7 attack. Israel will release 150 Palestinian prisoners.

Nov. 27: The truce is extended by two days. The deal is negotiated in Qatar. Hamas agrees to continue to release 10 hostages per day as Israel releases 30. President Biden praises the agreement.

Nov. 29: Minutes before it’s set to expire, the truce is extended by one day. Hamas claims earlier Israeli attacks killed three hostages.

Nov. 30: U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken meets with Netanyahu in Israel. He warns him to avoid a conflict in southern Gaza that could result in "massive" loss of civilian life. He also meets with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank (Palestine's primary territory).

Dec. 1: Hostilities resume northern Gaza as the truce ends. Both parties accuse the other of violating the truce in its final hours.

Going forward, ceasefire negotiations may change as Hamas runs out of women and children to release. But international pressure continues to mount. Thousands of Palestinians are dead and three-fourths of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have fled their homes.

 NEWS 

🇺🇸 Kissinger: Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger passed away Wednesday. He was the last surviving member of President Nixon’s cabinet. From 1969 to 1975, he served as National Security Advisor. And from 1973 to 1977 he served as Secretary of State — yes, he held both jobs simultaneously for a stretch (no biggie). Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Price in 1973 for his role in negotiating a ceasefire in the Vietnam War. Controversially, that is a war he also helped wage. Accordingly, he’s either regarded as a diplomatic legend or a war criminal. He advised every single president (of both parties) from Nixon to Trump. Policy aside, Kissinger was an American success story. In a few short decades, he rose from 15 year-old Jewish refugee of Nazi Germany to America’s top diplomat (despite his thick accent). Henry Kissinger was 100.

🌳 COP28: A United Nations climate summit, called COP28, began yesterday in Dubai. COP28 stands for the 28th meeting of the “Conference of the Parties.” Goofy name aside, its just the UN’s annual climate conference. The event kicked off with wealthy nations pledging hundred of millions of dollars to a so-called “damage fund” to assist poor countries with climate-associated natural disaster response. Countless world leaders are among the ~70,000 delegates attending. Though unable to attend due to illness, Pope Francis sent a supportive message. Though neither President Biden nor Chinese President Xi Jinping will make the trip, King Charles III is attending. The summit runs through Dec. 12.

🐾 Wolverines: In a move that will make Hugh Jackman both happy and sad, wolverines are now protected under the Endangered Species Act. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) blamed habitat loss and climate change for the species’ difficulties — wolverines make their dens in deep snow banks. The USFWS is part of the Department of the Interior. They enforce the non-ocean parts of the Act. The ocean part goes to the (totally real) National Marine Fisheries Service. The designation requires federal agencies to ensure their actions, like issuing logging permits, won't harm wolverines. Of species listed under the law, 99% have thus far avoided extinction.

 POLITICS 

🔴 He’s going down with the ship. The fabulous Frank Abagnale Jr. Rep. George Santos (R) defiantly refused to resign his House seat yesterday ahead of an expulsion vote today. Congressional insiders expect the vote to succeed. If it does, Santos will become only the 21st person in history to get kicked out of either house of Congress. Even more shockingly, he’ll be only the third since the Civil War (and the first Republican ever). Reminder: a two-thirds vote is required for expulsion (that comes from Article I of the Constitution). Here’s a quick overview of the others:

• No. 1 got kicked out way back in 1797 for treason.

• Nos. 2-18 got the boot for supporting the Confederacy during the Civil War (also treason).

• Nos. 19-20 both got axed after bribery convictions in 1980 and 2002.

🔵 President Biden just won the Florida Democratic primary. No, it’s not supposed to be held until March. But Florida law gives wide leeway to political parties to determine the rules of their own primaries, including who appears on the ballot. So the Florida Democratic Party decided it would allow only one name on that ballot — President Joe Biden’s. Predictably, his two (longshot) primary challengers are not thrilled. Rep. Dean Phillips compared the Florida Democratic Party to the Iranian regime, while author Marianne Williamson called the policy “authoritarian.” The Phillips campaign is considering a lawsuit. They say the move is a violation of national Democratic Party rules. For most of American history, voters got no say in nominations at all — they were simply chosen by political insiders at party conventions. The primary system we use today solidified in 1972.

🔴 Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) saved the life of Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA). All 49 Senate Republicans hold a weekly lunch where they outline priorities, policies, and strategies for the week ahead and chat about area nursing homes. Sen. Paul used the Heimlich maneuver on Sen. Ernst after she choked on a bite of food. A similar incident occurred at a 2018 Democratic lunch. Paul is a medical doctor (ophthalmologist) and the son of former Rep. Ron Paul. Despite the nursing home joke, these two are on the younger side of the Senate — Paul is 60 and Ernst is 53.

 TRIVIA 

 BRIEFS 

🇨🇦 Google agreed to pay Canadian news companies for their content. Google had threatened to pull all such news from its platforms. The fight arose when the Canadian government passed a law forcing them to pay news groups for posting their content.

👨‍⚖️ Judge Arthur Engoron reinstated a gag order against former President Trump in his ongoing $250 million civil trial in New York. The order prohibits Trump from making public statements about court staff.

⚖️ The jury has been selected in Marvel actor Jonathan Majors’ domestic violence trial. If found guilty, he faces up to a year in prison. The trial begins Monday.

🤑 More and more retailers are offering a “keep it” policy on some returns. Returns of products purchased online often cost the seller more to ship and process than the items are worth.

🎨 An early draft of Leonardo da Vinci’s “Mona Lisa” painting is on display in Italy. Or is it? The art world fiercely disagrees on the work’s validity. It’s either priceless or “junk.”

🤬 Elon Musk told advertisers boycotting his X platform to “go f*ck yourselves” live on CNBC. If only cable news were always that dramatic.

 QUOTE 

 ANSWER 

Madeleine Albright served as President Clinton’s ambassador to the United Nations and later secretary of state. She was the first of woman to serve in the role (the others: Condoleezza Rice and Hillary Clinton). Born in Prague, Czechoslovakia, Albright’s family fled communism when she was 11. She passed away in 2022.