Members of South Korea’s opposition have moved to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol after he plunged South Korea into crisis by declaring martial law in a surprise broadcast late on Tuesday. Shortly after the announcement, live television footage showed heavily armed South Korean troops attempting to enter the National Assembly building, where parliamentary aides were seen trying to hold the soldiers back with furniture and fire extinguishers. The extraordinary scene played out as South Korean lawmakers gathered inside to vote down the martial law order and declare it invalid. This is Speaker of the National Assembly Woo Won-shik. 

Speaker Woo Won-shik: “Everyone, please be assured: The National Assembly will defend democracy together with the people. For the soldiers and police who are currently in the National Assembly, please leave this place immediately.”

As details emerged that the order would ban all political activities, protests and labor strikes, the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions announced an indefinite general strike and called on the president to resign. Meanwhile, thousands of people gathered outside the National Assembly protesting the president’s order. Amid widespread and growing opposition, President Yoon backed down and revoked his order six hours later. His entire Cabinet then offered their resignations, though President Yoon ordered them to “fulfill your duties even after this moment.” After headlines, we’ll go to Seoul, South Korea, for the latest.

In Gaza, at least five people, including four children, were killed today in an Israeli drone strike on a food distribution center and a house in the Nuseirat refugee camp. Elsewhere, at least two people were killed when Israel bombed residential buildings in Deir al-Balah, where others remain missing under the rubble. In the Bureij refugee camp, Israeli warplanes struck a U.N.-run school sheltering displaced Palestinians, setting more than a dozen tents ablaze and killing a Palestinian medic. Meanwhile, in Beit Lahia, three medical workers were wounded on Tuesday, one of them critically, when Israel bombed the Kamal Adwan Hospital. The hospital’s director reported quadcopter drones were seen dropping bombs packed with shrapnel. It was Israel’s fifth attack on the hospital in recent weeks. In Khan Younis, a massive line formed Tuesday as Palestinians queued for rations of flour at a U.N.-run food distribution center. Many of them described long and fruitless days searching for bread or other staples amid Israel’s stifling blockade.

Lina al-Basiouni: “This bag of flour we received won’t last a month, not even with careful rationing. We appeal to the United Nations, UNRWA, UNICEF and all international organizations working to support displaced people or Palestinian refugees to preserve our cause, to help us, to do everything they can and dedicate all their efforts to help the displaced in Gaza, because our situation is so difficult.”

In Ottawa, Canada, over 100 Jewish peace activists staged a sit-in protest Tuesday inside a parliamentary building, demanding Canada stop arming Israel. At least 14 protesters were arrested and issued trespass notices. The Jews Say No to Genocide Coalition is demanding Canada cancel all active military export permits to Israel and close loopholes allowing weapons to reach Israel via the United States without requiring permits. They’re also calling on Canada to halt purchases of Israeli military hardware. Click here to see our interview with one of the protesters as the sit-in was taking place.

Syria’s state news agency reports Syrian troops backed by Syrian and Russian warplanes are fighting fierce battles in the central Hama province, as rebels seek to build on their surprise takeover of Aleppo last week. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports the armed groups had captured several settlements just outside Hama city and have begun shelling some neighborhoods. Meanwhile, the Pentagon said Tuesday the United States had carried out strikes in eastern Syria in response to a rocket launch near a base housing U.S. troops. The Pentagon did not say who was responsible for the rocket attacks or who it had fired on. Elsewhere, Israel carried out an airstrike on a car near Syria’s capital Damascus on Tuesday. A Lebanese security source told Reuters the attack killed a senior Hezbollah figure responsible for liaising with the Syrian Army.

President-elect Trump’s transition team has belatedly signed an agreement to allow the FBI to conduct background checks on Trump’s picks to serve in his new administration. Trump had allowed weeks to pass without signing the agreement. The news site Semafor reports some of Trump’s Cabinet nominees remain opposed to submitting themselves to an FBI check until the bureau is revamped by a director chosen by Trump. The Trump transition team is reportedly still looking into tapping into the private sector — rather than the FBI — to conduct background checks on some of Trump’s nominees.

The Wall Street Journal reports Trump is considering replacing current Pentagon nominee Pete Hegseth with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis amid reports that Hegseth sexually harassed women and misused funds at two veterans organizations. The New Yorker also reported he once shouted “Kill All Muslims! Kill All Muslims!” while publicly drunk. On Tuesday, NBC News reported that on more than a dozen occasions during Hegseth’s time as a co-host of “Fox & Friends Weekend,” colleagues smelled alcohol on Hegseth before he went on air. Prior to entering politics, Ron DeSantis served in the Navy as an attorney, first at Guantánamo Bay prison in Cuba and later in Iraq. Former Guantánamo prisoners say DeSantis personally witnessed them being force-fed and tortured. Click here to see our interview with one of the former prisoners, Mansoor Adayfi.

Trump has offered the Pentagon’s number two job of deputy defense secretary to billionaire private equity investor Stephen Feinberg. Feinberg is CEO of Cerberus Capital Management, which heavily invests in the weapons industry. He’s been a major donor to Trump’s campaigns, including a nearly $1 million gift to a pro-Trump super PAC in 2016.

On Tuesday, Trump’s pick to lead the Drug Enforcement Agency withdrew his nomination. Florida Sheriff Chad Chronister had come under fire from Trump supporters who objected to his enforcement of COVID regulations during the pandemic, including the arrest of a Florida pastor who held a church service in violation of lockdown rules.

In California, former state lawmaker and Democrat Adam Gray has defeated Republican Congressmember John Duarte to win the last outstanding House race of the 2024 election. Gray’s victory flips another House seat for Democrats, giving them 215 seats to Republicans’ 220 when the new Congress is sworn in on January 3. The slim Republican majority could become even more narrow, after President-elect Trump tapped two Republican congressmembers to serve in his administration and after Florida Representative Matt Gaetz resigned from Congress, putting an end to a House Ethics Committee probe over allegations that Gaetz was involved in the sex trafficking of an underage girl.

In Sacramento, California, lawmakers have begun a special legislative session to shield the state from potential federal interference by the incoming Trump administration. Democrats who hold the majority are seeking to “Trump-proof” laws, including those guaranteeing reproductive freedoms and protecting undocumented immigrants. Robert Rivas is speaker of the California State Assembly. 

Robert Rivas: “If LGBTQ people come under attack, if hard-working immigrants are targeted, if women’s reproductive freedom is threatened, we will fight back with everything we have.”

In a blow to reproductive rights, a federal appeals court has ruled that Idaho can enforce its abortion travel ban, blocking people who need an abortion from seeking the procedure in other states where abortion is legal. The law makes so-called abortion trafficking a crime punishable by up to five years in prison and prohibits Idaho residents from transporting a minor who needs an abortion across state lines where the procedure is legal, such as Idaho’s neighboring states of Oregon, Washington and Montana. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals only struck down a portion of the law, which would have prohibited providers from talking to pregnant teens about their reproductive healthcare options, saying it violated First Amendment rights. 

In related news, Arizona providers will be allowed to perform abortions past 15 weeks of pregnancy while a new lawsuit seeking to overturn the state’s abortion ban plays out in court. The suit was filed by reproductive care advocates who argue the ban is now unconstitutional after Arizona voters earlier this month overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure enshrining abortion rights in the state’s constitution.

President Biden met his Angolan counterpart President João Lourenço in the capital Luanda on Tuesday, becoming the first U.S. president to visit the former Portuguese colony. Biden used the trip to promote the Lobito Corridor, a U.S.-funded multibillion-dollar rail and port infrastructure project connecting Angola to Central Africa, as multinational corporations seek to access the region’s vast mineral resources. Biden delivered a speech after touring Angola’s National Museum of Slavery, built on the site of a 17th century Portuguese chapel where enslaved people were forcibly baptized before being forced into the Middle Passage.

President Joe Biden: “We remember the stolen men and women and children who were brought to our shores in chains, subjected to unimaginable cruelty. … The United States is founded on an idea, one embedded in our Declaration of Independence. That is that all men and women are created equal and deserve to be treated equally throughout their lives. It’s abundantly clear today we have not lived up to that idea.”

Voters in Namibia have elected their nation’s first woman president. On Tuesday, Namibia’s Electoral Commission reported Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah of the governing South West Africa People’s Organization had won the first round of voting outright with 57% of the vote. Opposition politicians contested the result, claiming a “deeply flawed” electoral process and promising a legal challenge.

In Afghanistan, the Taliban government is drawing renewed outrage after it banned Afghan women from receiving midwifery and nursing educational training. This was one of the last remaining options for Afghan women and girls to further their studies under Taliban rule, which prohibits them from obtaining secondary and higher education. Human rights groups warn the new decree halting the training of new female healthcare workers will also impede access to medical care as male providers are not allowed to treat women and girls unless there is a male guardian present.

Tuesday marked the 40th anniversary of one of the worst industrial disasters of the 20th century. Shortly after midnight on December 3, 1984, in the city of Bhopal, India, tons of lethal gases leaked from a pesticide factory run by the U.S. company Union Carbide. Between 8,000 to 10,000 people lost their lives within days. Thousands more died in the following years, while survivors, their children and grandchildren are still suffering from chronic health issues due to the leak and the toxic waste that was left behind by Union Carbide, which was later purchased by the U.S. multinational Dow Chemical. Survivors and their advocates took to the streets of Bhopal Tuesday as they continue to fight for justice four decades later.

Rachna Dhingra: “Today, 40 years later, we are asking pretty much the same things as people were asking 40 years ago. People of Bhopal are seeking that there be a special medical commission on Bhopal, be set up so that there is appropriate, free healthcare for gas victims and their children, who continue to bear the scars of the Union Carbide disaster even today. We are asking that the global toxic hot spot that emerges in the middle of the city be cleaned up by Union Carbide and Dow Chemical.”