麻豆社

Nearly a month into the current conflict between Israel and Hamas, health officials in Gaza say 1,800 Palestinians, most of them civilians, have been killed, along with sixty-six Israelis, all but two of them soldiers. But the names of the dead are not widely reported in Israel. As fighting continues 27-year-old Michal Rotem has taken on a unique role: she translates the names of those killed in Gaza from Arabic into Hebrew and publishes them on her blog.

Grandmaster Flash is known as one of the founding fathers of hip-hop. He was one of rap music's earliest pioneers. In New York in the 1970s he was among the first DJs to devise the then innovative technique of scratching vinyl records back and forth to create new sounds - sounds that have become synonymous with rap and hip-hop today.

Dolores Balderamos Garcia is the only female member of Belize's House of Representatives. Before she got involved in politics she hosted her own jazz show on the radio and owns an enormous jazz collection. In the last of our series of Commonwealth heritage tracks, she's chosen the music of Lord Rhaburn Combo to express her deep love of the close-knit communities of Belize and to give us a sense of the Belizean zest for life.

Professor Peter Piot once described himself as 'an outbreak detective'. In 1976, he helped identify the deadly Ebola virus. And as the founder of UNAIDS - for many years - he led the global fight against HIV/Aids.

James Nestor is an American journalist who stumbled across freediving whilst on a reporting trip. James was fascinated and horrified by what he saw - and he went on to explore for himself the power of the ocean in his new book, "Deep". He tells us about learning to dive without breathing equipment - and about swimming with sperm whales.

Photo: Mourners pray over bodies wrapped in white at a Gazan funeral
Credit: Said Khatib/AFP/Getty Images