schedule
Happy Tuesday! We’d like to offer our congratulations to Delilah, a critically endangered Sumatran rhino, who did her part for the species over the weekend when she welcomed a 55-pound male calf. He joins a very small family—there are fewer than 50 Sumatran rhinos left in the world, all of them in Indonesia.
Quick Hits: Today’s Top Stories
- The Qatari foreign ministry announced Monday that Israel and Hamas would extend an internationally-brokered temporary ceasefire until Thursday morning, as 11 more Israeli hostages held by Hamas—all women and children, including 3-year-old twins—and 33 Palestinian prisoners charged or convicted of violent crimes in Israel were released Monday as part of the existing deal. The extended agreement could allow for the release of at least 20 more Israeli hostages, with Israel continuing to release three prisoners for every one hostage freed—as well as permit additional humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip.
- Tech billionaire Elon Musk visited Israel on Monday and toured the sites of the October 7 Hamas massacre of Israelis alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The X owner sparked outrage earlier this month when he seemed to endorse antisemitic speech, prompting a significant exodus of major advertisers like IBM and Apple from his social media platform. Musk, the richest man in the world, owns important technologies like internet service provider Starlink, which makes him a key ally for world leaders. “It was jarring to see the scene of the massacre,” Musk told Netanyahu during the visit.
- A Defense Department spokesman said Monday that initial reports suggest the five individuals who attacked a commercial vessel in the Gulf of Aden over the weekend were Somali pirates. The USS Mason, a U.S. Navy destroyer, and other nearby allied ships responded to the cargo ship’s distress calls and forced the five attackers to flee before they were caught and taken aboard the destroyer. Two-and-a-half hours later, Houthi rebels fired ballistic missiles from Yemen in the Mason’s direction, though the missiles fell well short and it’s yet unclear if the ship was even the intended target of the attack.
- Argentine President-elect Javier Milei will be in Washington, D.C. today to meet with representatives of the International Monetary Fund, of which his country is the top debtor. Milei is also set to meet with several Biden administration officials, including National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, but not with Joe Biden himself, as the president is traveling to Atlanta to attend memorial services for former first lady Rosalynn Carter. Milei, a libertarian economist and political outsider who won a presidential run-off earlier this month, was in New York City on Monday, where he had lunch with former President Bill Clinton and visited the grave of Chabad-Lubavitch movement leader Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson in Queens.
- Biden will reportedly not attend COP28, a two-week United Nations summit on climate change set to begin in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, on Thursday. Biden attended the previous two meetings, but officials said he was focusing his attention on the wars in the Middle East and Ukraine—though the White House has not officially confirmed his planned absence.
‘A Complete Lunatic Hooligan Faction’
A middle-aged man wielding a knife attacked a line of young children outside a Dublin school on Thursday afternoon, injuring three children and leaving a five-year-old girl and a teaching assistant who tried to defend the kids in critical condition. Bystanders intervened to stop the attacker before he could injure more people. The suspected assailant—an Algerian-born naturalized citizen who’s lived in Ireland for 20 years and been arrested multiple times—is in custody and being treated for serious injuries.
The brazen attack in broad daylight sent shockwaves throughout the city and country, and sparked some of the worst rioting and looting Ireland has seen in decades. The mayhem, fanned by online extremists denounced as “far-right” by Irish leaders, came as a surprise to some as ...
As a non-paying reader, you are receiving a truncated version of The Morning Dispatch. Our full 1,600-word story on the recent riots in Ireland is available in the members-only version of TMD.
Worth Your Time
- For many of us, education simply wasn’t complete without a few cursive handwriting lessons. Though instruction in the style has waned over the last decade, it’s making a comeback in several states’ curricula as it’s become clear students may have lost the ability to read historical documents like the Constitution—or letters from grandma. “Many states dropped cursive instruction beginning with the 2010s adoption of the Common Core, a set of shared standards in English and math,” Sara Randazzo reported for the Wall Street Journal. “It says nothing about cursive, only that by first grade, students should be able to print all upper- and lowercase letters. Common Core’s backers have said cursive took a back seat to technology and skills like typing that children need in the modern world. In Indiana, state Sen. Jean Leising has put a cursive bill forward each year for a dozen years, only to have it killed by the Indiana House Education Committee. ‘My whole premise when I started this was, gee, if kids can’t be taught cursive, they’re not even going to have a signature,’ Leising said. Over the years, people have shared horror stories of a cursive-illiterate generation with her, including a land appraiser who had to fire a young man because he couldn’t go to the courthouse and read old land-transfer documents, and a family whose 15-year-old son couldn’t sign his name at the passport counter.”
Presented Without Comment
Reason: Elizabeth Warren Wants the Government to Investigate America’s ‘Sandwich Shop Monopoly’
Also Presented Without Comment
NBC News: Southwest Airlines Passenger Hospitalized After Opening Emergency Exit and Climbing onto Wing, Officials Say
Toeing the Company Line
- It’s Tuesday, which means Dispatch Live (🔒) returns tonight at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT! The team will discuss the news of the week and, of course, take plenty of viewer questions! Keep an eye out for an email later today with information on how to tune in.
- Our fact checker extraordinaire Alex Demas assessed claims that an IDF helicopter fired on and killed Israelis on October 7.
- In the newsletters: Kevin argued (🔒) in favor of legislative branch supremacy, the Dispatch Politics crew examined Trump’s alarming campaign rhetoric, and Nick wondered (🔒) how a former vocal Trump critic can rationalize voting for him again.
- On the podcasts: Sarah and David discuss the Voting Rights Act and look into Elon Musk’s case against Media Matters for America.
- On the site: Stirewalt tackles the intractable nature of the immigration debate.
James Scimecca is the editorial partnerships manager at The Dispatch, and is based in Washington, D.C. Prior to joining the company in 2023, he served as the director of communications at the Empire Center for Public Policy. When James is not busy generating shareholder revenue, he can usually be found running along the Potomac River, cooking up a new recipe, or scoping out a new karaoke bar.
Mary Trimble is a former editor of The Morning Dispatch.
Grayson Logue is a staff writer for The Dispatch and is based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Prior to joining the company in 2023, he worked in political risk consulting, helping advise Fortune 50 companies. He was also an assistant editor at Providence Magazine and is a graduate student at the University of Edinburgh, pursuing a Master’s degree in history. When Grayson is not writing pieces for the website, he is probably working hard to reduce the number of balls he loses on the golf course.
Please note that we at The Dispatch hold ourselves, our work, and our commenters to a higher standard than other places on the internet. We welcome comments that foster genuine debate or discussion—including comments critical of us or our work—but responses that include ad hominem attacks on fellow Dispatch members or are intended to stoke fear and anger may be moderated.
With your membership, you only have the ability to comment on The Morning Dispatch articles. Consider upgrading to join the conversation everywhere.