Gaza authorities say two newborn lion cubs just unveiled by Hamas as prized additions in a zoo they run have died. Mohammad Abdel-Rahman, the acting manager of the Beit Lahiya zoo in northern Gaza, said Thursday the cubs died of an unspecified illness. He said the zoo's staff was unable to save them because they lacked experience in caring for newborn cubs. Photo: Two-day-old lion cubs Fajr and Sjel are fed at a zoo in the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Lahia, on November 19, 2013. (Photo by Mohammed Abed/AFP Photo)

Damselflies covered in dew rest on a wild flower by the Po River, northern Italy on August 15, 2016. (Photo by Alberto Ghizzi Panizza/Barcroft Images)

An Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga takes part in a graduation ceremony at the Zakho military academy in the Iraqi Kurdish town of Zakho, some 500 kilometres north of Baghdad, on January 30, 2018. (Photo by Safin Hamed/AFP Photo)

From towering elephants to tiny insects, photographers will be offering a rare insight into the natural world at this year’s Wildscreen Photography Festival 2014. The festival, formerly known as WildPhotos, is the UK’s largest wildlife photography show. The Wildscreen Photography Festival 2014 will be taking place between 24-26 October at London’s Royal Geographical Society. (Photo by Sam Hobson/Wildscreen Photography Festival 2014)

Bloodthirsty by Thomas P. Peschak, Germany/South Africa — winner, Behaviour: birds. When rations run short on Wolf Island, in the remote northern Galápagos, the sharp-beaked ground finches become vampires. Their sitting targets are Nazca boobies and other large birds. The finches rely on a scant diet of seeds and insects, which regularly dries up, so they drink blood to survive. ‘I’ve seen more than half a dozen finches drinking from a single Nazca booby,’ says Tom. Rather than leave their nests the boobies tolerate the vampires, and the blood loss doesn’t seem to cause permanent harm. (Photo by Thomas P. Peschak/2018 Wildlife Photographer of the Year)

A pair of otters share a soft kiss over seaweed on the Isle of Mull, Scotland in the first decade of October 2025. (Photo by David Akers/Solent News & Photo Agency)

Birds behaviour winner: Land of the Eagle by Audun Rikardsen, Norway. High on a ledge, on the coast near his home in northern Norway, Rikardsen carefully positioned an old tree branch that he hoped would make a perfect golden eagle lookout. To this, he bolted a tripod head with a camera, flashes and motion sensor attached, and built himself a hide a short distance away. From time to time, he left road‑kill carrion nearby. Very gradually – over the next three years – a golden eagle got used to the camera and started to use the branch regularly to survey the coast below. (Photo by Audun Rikardsen/2019 Wildlife Photographer of the Year)

Lioness and hyena posture to one another, in Masai Mara, Kenya, August 2015. A photographer captured one of the oldest rivalries in the animal kingdom as a pair of lions went head to head with a pack of hungry hyenas. (Photo by Ingo Gerlach/Barcroft Images)