Learn German: Gibt es heute keine Nachrichten?

The infinitive of the verb is geben (to give). It is a strong verb that undergoes a vowel change. For the second and third person singular (du and er/sie/es), the stem vowel e changes to i. Since the subject here is es, the verb correctly changes to gibt.

What does gibt es literally mean?

It literally translates to "gives it". In German, the fixed phrase es gibt is the standard way to say "there is" or "there are". To turn it into a yes/no question ("is there?" or "are there?"), you simply swap the verb and subject to make gibt es.

Nachrichten (news) is plural, so why do we use the singular verb gibt instead of geben?

In English, the verb matches the things being discussed: "there is a book" but "there are books". In German, the grammatical subject of the phrase is always the singular pronoun es (it). Because es is always singular, the verb stays singular (gibt) regardless of whether you are talking about one thing or many things.

Why do we use keine to say "no news" instead of nicht?