OPINION
It’s clear as ice: The Arctic is unravelling
GLENN MCGILLIVRAY
CONTRIBUTED TO THE GLOBE AND MAIL
PUBLISHED AUGUST 19, 2020
Open this photo in gallery  

Sled dogs wade through standing water on the sea ice during an expedition in North Western Greenland on June 13, 2019.
STEFFEN OLSEN/DANISH METEOROLOGICAL INSTITUTE VIA AFP/GETTY IMAGES

Glenn McGillivray is managing director of the Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction, a not-for-profit research organization.

Unsettling news about climate change and the current state of the Arctic has been piling up as of late.

Last week saw ominous reports that Canada has lost its last permanent ice shelf. Using satellite photos, ice analysts noted that roughly more than 40 per cent of the 4,000-year-old Milne Ice Shelf, located on the northwestern edge of Ellesmere Island, broke off the main shelf into two very large and several smaller icebergs. The largest piece is nearly the size of Manhattan Island. The calving is thought to have occurred some time around July 30 or 31.

Glaciologists place the loss of the shelf squarely on the shoulders of climate change, with the Arctic facing summer temperatures this year that were about five degrees warmer than the 1980 to 2010 average. This, in a region already warming about three times faster than the global average.

And, in a study published Aug. 13 in the journal Communications Earth & Environment, researchers concluded that the warming Greenland ice sheet could pass the point of no return. The findings come after analysis of almost four decades of data indicated that even if climate change were to stop immediately, Greenland ice could continue to shrink under certain circumstances.


This news is sobering. It’s one thing to lose temporary sea ice. There is still a fair bit of annual variability with that – we have good years and bad years.

But loss of permanent ice (both sea and land) is another story.

Because loss of permanent ice is, well, permanent. Once gone, it doesn’t come back, and there are implications with that.

Other recent (bad) news includes a June report that permafrost at outposts in the Canadian Arctic is melting 70 years earlier than predicted, and a July study indicating that polar-bear populations could be wiped out by the end of the century if the current warming trend continues.

These stories are punctuated by the fact that Earth’s temperature is currently “warmer than at any time in the last 5,000 or more years.” The last time there was 415 parts per million of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, Homo sapiens didn’t exist.

It’s clear as ice – the Arctic is more than just fraying at the edges. It is unravelling altogether.

But why should we care? After all, what possible effect can melting sea ice and exhausted, hungry polar bears have on the lives of those in the urban south?

Science is quickly connecting the dots between the loss of Arctic ice and severe weather.

Well-publicized science has made a solid connection between disappearing Arctic sea ice and a weakening, meandering jet stream that is contributing to what some have characterized as “stuck” weather patterns. The uncharacteristically long blocking patterns being linked to the weakening circulation of upper atmospheric winds in the Northern Hemisphere are being connected not only to the bitter North American winter of 2013-14 (remember the polar vortex?) and to the uncommonly cool summer of 2014, but also to extreme weather events, many of them involving prolonged periods of extreme heat or copious amounts of precipitation.

So while many used to think that changes in the Arctic brought by a warming climate served as nothing more than as a canary in the coal mine for the rest of us, we now have a better understanding – and appreciation – of how changes in the high north are directly affecting the lives of people hundreds and even thousands of kilometres away.

The reasons why natural hazards become disasters are many and complex to be sure. To boil it down to the base concepts, however, three main drivers can be identified: concentration of assets, the state of public infrastructure, and climate change.


On the latter, there is speculation that 2020 could go down as the warmest year on record, when compared against the 20th-century average.

It’s clear that climate change is not coming. It’s already here.

I can’t help but think that Earth’s systems can be equated to the systems that reside in each of us. Just as we have skeletal, muscular, nervous and circulatory systems, the Earth has its analogues.

Thus, we can no longer view a problem in the Arctic in isolation and consider the ramifications only on that region and to those who live and do business in it, just as we cannot view a problem with one part of our body in isolation.

We can say with strong confidence that loss of sea ice at the North Pole is beginning to affect the weather where large numbers of people reside.

So we must understand, the Arctic is not the canary in the coal mine – it is the coal mine.

THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF KAMALA HARRIS
Harris sets off Democratic donor stampede

Biden's new running mate has energized some donors who were disappointed after the primary, piling on top of Biden's robust fundraising.

PRESIDENT HARRIS 2024

Kamala Harris flashed her fundraising muscle with jaw-dropping totals: The Biden campaign raised $25.5 million the day following her addition to the ticket. | Carolyn Kaster/AP Photo


By ELENA SCHNEIDER
08/19/2020 

Kamala Harris is tapping into a new tranche of campaign cash for Joe Biden: money from both big and small donors who were reluctant to give to the white, male and over-70 nominee-in-waiting before she arrived.

Biden has turned things around since struggling to raise money in 2019, but Harris’ addition is exciting contributors anew. She has a deep familiarity with Democratic mega-donors from Silicon Valley to New York, and her history-making candidacy is now drawing interest from more casual givers as well as big donors who got a shot of excitement from Harris’ elevation.

The combination has jarred loose support among key constituency groups, according to interviews with more than a dozen Democratic donors, fundraisers and strategists, including women, Black and Indian American donors who still harbored feelings of concern about a Democratic primary that passed over the women and candidates of color.

Among Black donors, Biden’s new running mate has created “a much deeper level of enthusiasm that comes from Harris, a Black woman on the ticket,” said Steve Phillips, founder of Democracy In Color. Now, Phillips continued, “this is a chance to get someone who is in the family elected.”

While the money troubles that once plagued Biden disappeared the moment he notched his first primary win in South Carolina, Harris has quickly become a key piece of Biden’s finance operation. She is a more practiced manager of donor relationships than Biden, who has never counted that as a top priority, people familiar with his past fundraising struggles said. And enthusiasm for Harris’ elevation has pushed a new stream of donors toward the ticket.

Stacey Mason, executive director of Electing Women Bay Area, said that female donors were disappointed after the Democratic presidential primary, which saw four female senators ultimately pull out of the race without success. But now, Mason likened Harris’ selection as Biden’s running mate to an “awakening” among those contributors, adding there was “clearly a community of donors who were waiting for someone they wanted to get behind in a bigger way.”

“I’ve had a dozen calls from large donors, at least half of whom were sitting on the sidelines … now they’re saying, ‘What can we do to help? How can we give?” said Shekar Narasimhan, founder of the AAPI Victory Fund. “This takes it all to another level [because] she’s got a base she’s built over years that she can now bring to the table.”

A half-dozen donors and fundraisers said they expect Harris to take a larger role in donor management. And donors with an eye on the future are rushing not only to invest in a potential November victory but in a top potential contender for a future Democratic presidential nomination.

“Obviously, there’s a sense of — this is a two-fer here,” said Adrianne Shropshire, executive director of BlackPAC. “Not just for this moment and getting over the finish line in November, but setting up for the next Democratic presential race as well.”

For Wall Street executives and Big Tech megadonors worried Biden might select a foe, like Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Harris’ selection triggered a sigh of relief – and a willingness to fork over even more cash.

“For those that identify as more politically moderate, they see Harris as someone they deem as acceptable, so her selection was a signal – ok, it’s time to give,” said Cooper Teboe, a donor adviser and Democratic strategist based in Silicon Valley.

Harris flashed her fundraising muscle with jaw-dropping totals: The Biden campaign raised $25.5 million the day following her addition to the ticket. That number ballooned to $48 million in two days. The top four fundraising days for Biden’s campaign have now all come within a week of Harris’ selection.

For comparison, the campaign’s previous single best fundraising day came in at $10 million on June 30, at the close of the second quarter fundraising period. These totals also benefit from higher rates for individual giving, after Biden’s campaign merged forces with the Democratic National Committee to jointly fundraise earlier this year.

Before Harris joined the ticket, Biden had already nearly closed the cash gap between Democrats and President Donald Trump, outraising him in back-to-back months this summer.

A Women for Biden fundraiser, Harris’ first solo fundraising event as the vice presidential nominee, is already at capacity for $250,000-level tickets, according to an invitation obtained by POLITICO. Biden and Harris appeared together for their first fundraiser last week, drawing over 40,000 attendees and nearly $10 million in cash from more than 200,000 contributors.

“It’s been Joe, Joe, Joe or his surrogates for weeks, and now they’ve got a new person to roll out and they’re taking full advantage of it,” said one Democratic donor. “She’s the one who everyone wants right now, but it’s also the logical time for Joe to pull back to prepare for debates, too.”

During the coronavirus pandemic, as fundraising has converted to a virtual world, fundraisers are still figuring out how to recreate a sense of intimacy without in-person connection. But donors said Harris hasn’t skipped a beat despite moving her fundraising to Zoom, “where she greets people one-by-one, making it very intimate, recreating that sense of a personal connection,” Narasimhan said.

Some donors said they expect a steady crescendo in Harris’ fundraising events, as well as more direct donor engagement shifting to her.

Those donors who expect Harris to take a leading role with contributors said it matches the pair’s skill sets: Harris is well-practiced in donor management, while Biden, who struggled to raise money for his previous presidential bids, “would be the first to tell you that” fundraising “was not at the top of his priority list because Joe went home every night to see his kids,” said former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, who served as the DNC’s chairman from 2001 to 2005. “But he’s put together a perfect ticket that’s going to maximize our ability to do the fundraising.”

“She’s been much more geared toward modern campaigning and fundraising, which requires the cultivation of the donor class,” said Ami Copeland, the former deputy national finance director during Obama’s 2008 campaign. “Biden, meanwhile, as a senator from Delaware, that’s not something you really need to do.”

Harris is “very good at cultivating those warm and fuzzy friendships with donors,” Teboe said. “She will be the more front-facing of the two with donors.”

Harris isn’t the only new surrogate on the fundraising circuit. Doug Emhoff, Harris’ husband, is also taking on solo fundraising events, like he did during the Democratic primary. On Thursday, Emhoff, who is taking a leave of absence from his legal firm, is headlining a fundraiser with musician James Taylor, according to an invitation obtained by POLITICO. On Friday, the Democratic ticket-mates and their spouses will appear again together at a grassroots event, according to another invitation.

But the stakes for Harris’ role in the fundraising operation differ greatly than even when Biden joined Obama on the ticket, several donors said. Back in 2008, Biden wasn’t expected to run for higher office, while Harris backers see her as a rising leader in the party. Biden himself has regularly acknowledged that he sees himself as a “bridge” to the next generation of Democratic leaders.

“Donors weren’t investing in Obama thinking they’d also get Biden in 2016,” Copeland said. “I’m betting that everyone in Harris-land is thinking about 2024.”

Even though it’s early, donors are taking note — though they’ll only acknowledge it privately.

"There’s a dash among donors, who have ingratiated themselves to Biden, to now ingratiate themselves to Harris, which certainly wasn’t the case with Kaine in 2016 or Biden in 2008,” said one New York-based bundler. “People are getting their ducks in a row for 2024.”

The turnaround in fundraising capacity is a marked shift from the presidential primary, when Biden struggled to keep up with his Democratic rivals and Harris, too, saw her fundraising dry up in the back half of 2019, particularly among small-dollar givers.

Still, many of her high-dollar backers remained loyal, assembling a super PAC just hours before Harris ultimately withdrew from the presidential race. Now, those same backers are shelling out money anew.

“We have so much on the line in this election. There is so much on the line and it is certainly about, as Joe talks about, the soul of our nation,” said Harris at a recent grassroots fundraiser. “[And] I'm just thrilled to be with you Joe. I'm just thrilled.”

Dutch online store to halt sales depicting ‘Black Pete’
Activists say the character from the children’s holiday is a racist stereotype. 

The sale of Black Pete products will be halted by Bol | Valerie Kuypers/AFP via Getty Images

By HANNE COKELAERE
8/19/20

Online retailer Bol.com will ban products that reference Zwarte Piet or Black Pete, a character from a popular children's holiday, it announced Wednesday.

The company will also drop 'Black' from the character's name and will only refer to the character as "Piet" from late September.

Bol.com is a leading online store in the Netherlands and Belgium, where the winter tradition of Sinterklaas has come under fire for including a character called “Black Pete,” a blacked-up helper many see as a racist stereotype.

"Bol.com is a store for every one of us. ... Feeling welcome cannot be reconciled with an assortment that encourages discrimination/hate and is therefore experienced as hurtful," the web store said in a statement.

The retailer's announcement comes in the wake of anti-racism protests that began in the U.S. after the killing of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man, by the police in May. The protests also spread through Europe, including Belgium and the Netherlands.

Bol.com said it will halt sales of books, movies or toys that depict or reference Black Pete as a "stereotypical caricature." Costumes of the character will remain available on the condition that they don't include caricatural elements such as a black wig, golden earrings or a ruff, it said.

The platform carved out an exception for products that are important from a historical or educational perspective, for instance books explaining the history of the character. It may decide to keep those online, but add a label to highlight their content as controversial, it said.

The web shop banned pictures containing blackface last year.

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Facebook last week announced it had updated its hate speech policy to include racist depictions of Jewish and Black people — including blackface — a decision the Belgian far right denounced as censure on the part of the social media giant.

WALL ST. AIN'T MAIN STREET

Global trade plumbs lowest level since 2007 
WTO cautions rebound might take longer than expected.

The Volkswagen factory in Zwickau, Germany | Jens Schlueter/Getty Images

By GIORGIO LEALI
8/19/20,

Trade in goods hit the lowest level since 2007 in the second quarter of 2020 and a V-shaped rebound "may prove overly optimistic," the World Trade Organisation said on Wednesday.

During the second quarter of the year, global trade in goods registered a "historic fall" and touched the levels of the 2008 financial crisis. Wednesday's figure "was the lowest on record in data going back to 2007," the WTO said.

A "goods trade barometer" published by the WTO takes into account recent trends in order to draw a real-time trajectory of global trade. Wednesday's reading was 84.5 on a scale where 100 corresponds to a trade growth in line with medium-term trends. Automotive goods and air freight were the worst-hit.

Wednesday's data are consistent with a previous WTO forecast that merchandise trade would have fallen by 18.5 percent in the second quarter, the organization said.

The WTO also noted the first signs of a recovery next year but cautioned the rebound might take longer than expected.

"The heavy economic toll of the COVID-19 pandemic suggests that the projections for a strong, V-shaped trade rebound in 2021 may prove overly optimistic," the WTO said, adding that "an L-shaped recovery is a real prospect."

Tasmanian tiger discovery: What we got wrong about Australia’s famous extinct thylacine

Isabelle LaneJournalist@isabellelane

The thylacine, better known as the Tasmanian tiger, is a tragic and enigmatic creature in Australia’s history, having been hunted to extinction nearly a century ago.

The last thylacine died in captivity in 1936, but the public fascination with the long lost species has remained alive.

Researchers have continued to mine the past for clues about the thylacine, which was one of Australia’s largest apex predators to survive into the modern era.

Now scientists from Monash University have discovered the marsupial (mammal with a pouch) would have looked quite different to what was previously thought.

The last thylacine died in 1936. Photo: Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery

The research shows that the Tasmanian tiger was much less intimidating than its name suggests, and was the size of a small dog rather than a wolf.

Using advances in 3D analysis, the study by Monash University’s Biomedicine Discovery Institute and School of Biological Sciences, showed that the thylacine weighed around half what was previously thought, clocking in at about 17 kilograms on average.

The researchers combined traditional measurement techniques with advanced 3D scanning and volumetric methods, and the largest database of museum specimens that spans 6 countries and incorporates 93 individual thylacines.

Previously, thylacines were most commonly estimated to weigh about 29.5 kilograms, and the findings “substantially revise how we understand its biology and role in Australian ecosystems”, the researchers said.

Once thought to behave more like wolves – hunting in packs for prey larger than themselves – the new findings instead suggests that thylacines preyed on much smaller animals.Thylacine mesh models. Image: Douglass Rovinsky

“Rewriting the thylacine as a smaller animal changes the way we look at its position in the Australian ecosystem – because what a predator can (and needs to) eat is very much dependent on just how big they are,” lead researcher Dogulass Rovinsky said.
Many of the 19th century newspaper reports just might have been ‘tall tales’ – told to make the thylacine seem bigger, more impressive … and more dangerous!”

The researchers established that there were strong differences in the average male and female body size, with the male mean of 19.7 kilograms and female mean of 13.7 kilograms. The mixed-sex population mean of 16.7 kilograms is then well below the 21 kilogram threshold for predators likely to take large prey.

Despite extinction in the 1930s and film footage, the species is a true enigma, with almost no direct observations supporting an understanding of their behaviour and biology.

“We wish we could watch just how the thylacine hunted, and what sort of prey it could take – this is our closest look yet at an essential ingredient of the predator’s behaviour, how big it really was,” research supervisor Associate Professor Alistair Evans said.
Could the Tasmanian tiger come back from extinction?

In an incredible feat of science, the extinct thylacine’s entire genetic blueprint, or genome, was sequenced in 2017 by an international team of researchers led by scientists from the University of Melbourne.

It is one of the most detailed blueprints ever recorded for an extinct species, with researchers able to obtain the genome from the preserved specimen of a 106-year-old pouch-held young animal

A thylacine at Tasmania’s Beaumaris Zoo circa 1930s. Photo: National Museum Australia

The research team used cutting-edge techniques to extract DNA and sequence the genome of this juvenile thylacine.

“Our hope is that there is a lot the thylacine can tell us about the genetic basis of extinction to help other species,” Project leader Associate Professor Andrew Pask said.

“As this genome is one of the most complete for an extinct species, it is technically the first step to ‘bringing the thylacine back’, but we are still a long way off that possibility.”

Trump calls for Goodyear boycott after alleged employee MAGA hat ban

‘Two can play the same game, and we have to start playing it now!’, president tweets

HE HATE'S WOMEN IN POWER

Louise Hall

President Donald Trump has urged Americans not to purchase tyres from Goodyear Tyre & Rubber Company company after one of their plant’s allegedly banned the wearing Make America Great Again merchandise.

The president hit out at the manufacturer after a WIBW report claimed that a plant in Kansas had put out a policy banning workers from wearing MAGA attire, among other political clothing.

“Don’t buy GOODYEAR TYRES—They announced a BAN ON MAGA HATS,” Mr Trump tweeted on Wednesday. “Get better tyres for far less!”

“(This is what the Radical Left Democrats do. Two can play the same game, and we have to start playing it now!),” he added.

The comments came after the NBC affiliate reported an image of a Powerpoint slide directing employees what was not acceptable as part of its “zero tolerance” policy.
The image, which surfaced on social media, was allegedly taken by an anonymous employee during the Topeka company’s diversity training.

The photo appeared to show that “Black Lives Matter” and “LGBT+ pride” are “acceptable” while “Blue Lives Matter”, “All Lives Matter”, “MAGA attire”, and “political affiliated slogans” were listed as “unacceptable”.

The individual alleged that the company’s policy was discriminatory, according to WIBW.

The company has since released a lengthy statement saying that the slide “was not created or distributed by Goodyear corporate nor was it part of a diversity training class”

Goodyear maintained that it requests employees not to express support for political candidates or party’s in the workplace.

“We ask that associates refrain from workplace expressions in support of political campaigning for any candidate or political party, as well as similar forms of advocacy that fall outside the scope of racial justice and equality issues,” they wrote.

The organisation added that it “has always wholeheartedly supported both equality and law enforcement and will continue to do so.”

“We have heard from some of you that believe Goodyear is anti-police after reacting to the visual,” the company said.

They added: “nothing could be further from the truth, and we have the upmost appreciation for the vital work police do on behalf of our shared communities. This can’t be said strongly enough.”

The company’s statement did not directly address the president’s tweet, which was broadcast to his 85 million followers and has been retweeted almost 70,000 times as of Wednesday.

Goodyear’s stock declined 3.4 per cent on Wednesday morning, following the president’s message, The Hill reported.

The company did not immediately respond to The Independent’s request for further comment regarding the tweet.

When questioned on the president’s proposed boycott of a company in a ”battleground” state of Ohio ahead of the presidential election, White House Counselor Kellyanne Conway told reporters on Wednesday that she was not aware of the tweet.

She directed the reporter to ask the president about the incident himself at his next press briefing.

“I think he’s done plenty for companies in Ohio and elsewhere, far more than Joe Biden ever did,” she added.

Australia says it found no evidence to suggest a TikTok ban is necessary

By Shubham Agarwal

August 5, 2020

Australia has completed its security probe into TikTok and found no evidence of data misuse to warrant a ban. The country’s security agencies concluded that at this stage, the short-form video platform doesn’t pose any national security concerns, according to Reuters.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the country will “keep watching” the China-based app but “there’s no evidence to suggest today that that is a step that is necessary.”

“There’s nothing at this point that would suggest to us that security interests are being compromised or Australian citizens are being compromised,” Morrison told the Aspen Security Forum on Tuesday, August 4.

Morrison also warned citizens to be aware of the fact that the “line connects right back to China” and they should “exercise their own judgment about whether they should participate in those things or not.”

Australia launched an official investigation into the potential security threats posed by TikTok and several other China-based platforms such as WeChat last month. The action was taken soon after India had banned dozens of Chinese services including TikTok. However, similarly to the United States, TikTok use will remain blocked on the Australian Defense Force’s devices.

Owned by the Chinese startup, Bytedance, TikTok is in the middle of negotiating a deal with Microsoft in an attempt to escape a ban from the United States. If the sale goes through, TikTok’s operations in four countries — United States, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada — will be acquired by the Redmond, Seattle-based software giant. It remains unclear, at the moment, whether the announcement of this potential deal had any role to play in Australia’s security review.

“Microsoft will move quickly to pursue discussions with TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, in a matter of weeks, and in any event completing these discussions no later than September 15, 2020,” Microsoft wrote in a blog post on Sunday, August 2. “During this process, Microsoft looks forward to continuing dialogue with the United States government, including with the President.”

Unlike Australia, the Trump administration hasn’t explicitly commented yet on the results of its security probe into TikTok that it launched in November.

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Facebook removes nearly 800 QAnon-related groups, pages, hashtags, and ads

By Meira Gebel August 19, 2020 

Facebook took down nearly 800 groups associated with the far-right conspiracy theory group QAnon on Wednesday, as well as more than 1,500 advertisements and 100 pages tied to the group in a move to restrict “violent acts.”

In a blog post, Facebook said the action is part of a broader “Dangerous Individuals and Organizations” policy measure to remove and restrict content that has led to real-world violence. The policy will also impact militia groups and political protest organizations like Antifa.

“While we will allow people to post content that supports these movements and groups, so long as they do not otherwise violate our content policies, we will restrict their ability to organize on our platform,” the company said.

QAnon supporters believe in a widely disproven “deep state” conspiracy that President Donald Trump is working to eradicate pedophilia and Satanism throughout Washington D.C. The conspiracy theorists have recently latched onto the COVID-19 public health crisis, calling it a “bioweapon.”

QAnon theories hit the mainstream after the controversy surrounding #Pizzagate, in which a man brought a gun to a pizzeria, claiming he would find victims of child abuse. The group has also been linked to dozens of other violent incidents that stem from baseless theories shared on private Facebook groups and message boards.

Facebook took action against QAnon earlier this month, when it yanked down an influential group with more than 200,000 members, but Wednesday’s move is perhaps the social media giant’s most substantial move yet.

The company said it will limit QAnon content from appearing in its recommendations tab, reduce its content in search results, and prohibit QAnon-related accounts and groups from monetizing content, selling merchandise, fundraising, and purchasing advertising on both Facebook and Instagram. The company plans to continue to investigate just how QAnon operates on its platform, by observing “specific terminology and symbolism used by supporters to identify the language used by these groups and movements indicating violence and take action accordingly.”

In recent months, other social media sites like Twitter and TikTok have banned and disabled popular QAnon hashtags and accounts for inauthentic, coordinated behavior and for spreading disinformation.

However, do not expect QAnon to disappear quietly: Experts have called QAnon members “really good at adapting” to online ecosystems, and several QAnon supporters have won primaries for public office on platforms that represent the conspiracy theories shared within the group.

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Over half of Lebanon 'trapped in poverty' even before blast: UN
Issued on: 19/08/2020 -
Lebanese display their mostly empty refrigerators as they struggle with a steep economic crisis that has led to the collapse of the local currency and purchasing power. The UN over half the population is now "trapped in poverty" ANWAR AMRO, IBRAHIM CHALHOUB, Mahmoud ZAYYAT AFP/File

VIDEO AT THE END

Beirut (AFP)

Lebanon's economic crisis doubled poverty rates to reach more than half of its people even before this month's cataclysmic explosion at Beirut's port, a United Nations agency said Wednesday.

"Estimates reveal that more than 55 percent of the country's population is now trapped in poverty and struggling for bare necessities," the UN Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) said.

That figure for May 2020 was almost double the rate of 28 percent for last year, it said.

Extreme poverty had shot up to an estimated 23 percent of the population, up from eight percent in 2019, it added.

Lebanon's economic and political crisis deepened when on August 4 a massive blast at the Beirut port killed 181 people, wounded thousands and ravaged huge areas of the capital.

The disaster came on the heels of the country's worst financial crunch in decades, which had already seen tens of thousands lose their jobs or much of their income, even as the novel coronavirus pandemic hit.

Official estimates had last put Lebanon's poverty rate at 45 percent.

UN humanitarian agency OCHA on Wednesday said tens of thousands more people had now seen their source of income vanish after the Beirut blast.

"Over 70,000 workers are estimated to have lost their jobs as a result of the explosions, with direct implications for over 12,000 households," it said.

ESCWA said Lebanon's middle class has shrunk from 57 percent of the population in 2019 to less than 40 percent this year, warning of an accelerating exodus of Lebanese citizens.

"The real challenge facing Lebanon is that this group, which represents the bulk of the country's human capital, may shun the uncertain economic opportunities in Lebanon and seek to emigrate," it said.

In past months, middle-class Lebanese frustrated with a plummeting local currency, banks trapping their dollar savings, and deteriorating public services have increasingly decided to seek better lives abroad.

In a country which has long had one of the most unequal wealth distributions in the region, the group of people deemed affluent has shrunk from 15 to five percent of the population, ESCWA said.

The economic crisis has sparked widespread popular anger against a ruling class deemed inept and corrupt by many, and protesters have clashed again with security forces since the explosion disaster.

On Friday, Lebanon starts a new two-week coronavirus lockdown after a string of record daily tallies that has brought the total number of cases to 9,758 including 107 deaths.

© 2020 AFP

Special edition: Could the Beirut blast be one tragedy too many for Lebanon

Issued on: 19/08/2020 -

MIDDLE EAST MATTERS © France 24 screengrab
By:Clovis CASALI   VIDEO AT THE END

Two weeks after massive dual explosions at the port in Beirut killed more than 170 people and destroyed a large part of the Lebanese capital, we bring you this special edition of Middle East Matters direct from Lebanon. In the devastating aftermath, the Lebanese capital is in mourning – everyone here knows someone who was affected by the blast. Our correspondents and reporters on the ground take a look at how the tragedy unfolded and consider what the future might hold for this shattered country.

When 2,700 tonnes of ammonium nitrate caught fire in the port of Beirut on August 4, locals were stunned to see a huge mushroom cloud emerge over the city's skyline and began to broadcast the images live on social networks — then the sound of explosions bellowed. Our correspondent Charbel Abboud met with some of these witnesses, who recount the very moments before and after the blast.

Teams of rescuers, first on the scene of the explosions, worked around the clock to pull out the injured and search for survivors under the rubble. For the victims’ families, the wait has been unbearable. In the last few days, some have come to the port with the slim hope of finding their loved ones alive. Our team on the ground, Nadia Massih, Abdallah Malkawi and Karim Yahiahoui, went to meet some of the families.

While aid is filtering down to those left homeless, public anger against the state continues unabated. Under pressure from the streets, the government was forced to resign, but the Lebanese are hungry for answers. How could officials have authorised the storage of 2,700 tonnes of such a dangerous substance as ammonium nitrate? In Martyrs Square in the heart of the capital, tens of thousands demonstrated to demand the removal of the entire ruling class. Among them, activist Lucien Bourjeily, a film director who took part in last year's big rallies. For Bourjeily, this disaster may be one tragedy too many for Lebanon.

Also, our correspondents head to the Karantina neighbourhood in Beirut, whose large Syrian community was among the most affected by the blast. With its inhabitants in urgent need of help, the tension inside the neighbourhood is palpable.

Finally, we look at how the Lebanese global diaspora is pitching in to send money and basic necessities to Lebanon. This report from Paris is by Jade Levin.

Programme presented by Clovis Casali.