Vikings were in North America in 1021, well before Columbus, researchers say


Tom Metcalfe
Wed, October 20, 202

Vikings from Greenland — the first Europeans to arrive in the Americas — lived in a village in Canada’s Newfoundland exactly 1,000 years ago, according to research published Wednesday.

Scientists have known for many years that Vikings — a name given to the Norse by the English they raided — built a village at L’Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland around the turn of the millennium. But a study published in Nature is the first to pinpoint the date of the Norse occupation.

The explorers — up to 100 people, both women and men — felled trees to build the village and to repair their ships, and the new study fixes a date they were there by showing they cut down at least three trees in the year 1021 — at least 470 years before Christopher Columbus reached the Bahamas in 1492.

“This is the first time the date has been scientifically established,” said archaeologist Margot Kuitems, a researcher at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands and the study’s lead author.

“Previously the date was based only on sagas — oral histories that were only written down in the 13th century, at least 200 years after the events they described took place,” she said.

The first Norse settlers in Greenland were from Iceland and Scandinavia, and the arrival of the explorers in Newfoundland marks the first time that humanity circled the entire globe.

But their stay didn’t last long. The research suggests the Norse lived at L’Anse aux Meadows for three to 13 years before they abandoned the village and returned to Greenland.

Image: reconstructed Norse buildings (Glenn Nagel Photography / Shutterstock)

The archaeological remains are now protected as a historic landmark and Parks Canada has built an interpretive center nearby. It’s listed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

The scientific key to the exact date that the Norse were there is a spike in a naturally radioactive form of carbon detected in ancient pieces of wood from the site: some cast-off sticks, part of a tree trunk and what looks to be a piece of a plank.

Indigenous people occupied L’Anse aux Meadows both before and after the Norse, so the researchers made sure each piece had distinctive marks showing it was cut with metal tools — something the indigenous people did not have.

Archaeologists have long relied on radiocarbon dating to find an approximate date for organic materials such as wood, bones and charcoal, but the latest study uses a technique based on a global “cosmic ray event” — probably caused by massive solar flares — to determine an exact date.

Three pieces of wood in the Norse layers of the site had been cut with metal tools – something the indigenous people did not have – and showed distinctive radiocarbon traces of a cosmic ray event in A.D. 993. (Petra Doeve)

Previous studies have established there was such a cosmic ray event in the year 993 that for a few months caused greater than usual levels of radioactive carbon-14 in the carbon dioxide of the atmosphere.

Trees “breathe” carbon dioxide as they grow, and so the researchers used that radioactive carbon signature to determine which of the annual growth rings seen in cross-sections of the wood was from 993, Kuitems said.

They then used a microscope to count the later growth rings until the bark of the wood, which gave them the exact year the tree had stopped growing — in other words, when it had been felled by the Norse.

To their surprise, each of the three pieces of wood they tested was from a tree cut down in 1021, although they were from three different trees — two firs and probably one juniper.

The researchers can’t tell if the date of 1021 was near the beginning or the end of the Norse occupation, but they expect further research on other wood from the site will expand the range of dates, Kuitems said.

The Norse voyages to Newfoundland are mentioned in two Icelandic sagas, which indicate L’Anse aux Meadows was a temporary home for explorers who arrived in up to six expeditions.

The first was led by Leif Erikson, known as Leif the Lucky — a son of Erik the Red, the founder of the first Norse settlement in Greenland.

L’Anse aux Meadows, too, was expected to be a permanent settlement, but the sagas indicate it was abandoned due to infighting and conflicts with indigenous people, whom the Norse called skræling — a word that probably means “wearers of animal skins.”

The sagas refer to the entire region as Vinland, which means “wineland” — supposedly because it was warm enough for grapes used for wine to grow.

Since Newfoundland itself was then too cold for grapes, the name suggests the Norse also explored warmer regions further south, and pieces of exotic wood found at the site also indicate that, Kuitems said.

The use of an ancient cosmic ray event to exactly date pieces of wood is a relatively new development, and similar techniques are being used to establish firm dates at other sites, said Sturt Manning, a professor of archaeology at Cornell University, who was not involved in the new study.

“It’s a clever application,” he said. “This is the first clear evidence of Europeans arriving in North America.”

Vikings settled in North America in 1021AD, study says

Thu, October 21, 2021

Replica Viking homes and other items at L'Anse aux Meadows, a Unesco world heritage site in Newfoundland, Canada

Vikings had a settlement in North America exactly one thousand years ago, centuries before Christopher Columbus arrived in the Americas, a study says.

Scientists say a new dating technique analysing tree rings has provided evidence that Vikings occupied a site in Newfoundland, Canada, in 1021AD.

It has long been known that Europeans reached the Americas before Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492.

But this is the first time researchers have suggested an exact date.

Writing in the journal Nature, scientists said they had analysed the tree rings of three pieces of wood cut for the Norse settlement at L'Anse aux Meadows.

They said that using an atmospheric radiocarbon signal produced by a dated solar storm as a reference, they were able to pin the "exact felling year of the tree" to 1021.

Such a solar storm - a huge blast of radiation from the Sun that hits Earth - was known to have taken place in the year 992AD, the scientists said. This enabled them to determine a more accurate date than previous estimates for the camp of about 1000AD.

"The association of these pieces with the Norse is based on detailed research previously conducted by Parks Canada," the study says, adding that there was clear evidence the sampled wood had been modified by metal tools.

It adds that the L'Anse aux Meadows camp was a base from which other locations, including regions further south, were explored.

The authors say the discovery represents a definitive point for future research into the initial consequences of transatlantic activity, such as the transfer of knowledge and the potential exchange of genetic information and pathologies.

Dr Colleen Batey, a Viking specialist associated with Institute for Northern Studies in Scotland, says the study does not necessarily suggest Vikings were not in the area in 1000AD.

"It suggests that the short-lived settlement was active in about 1021 when wood was being worked at the site, probably related to either building or ship repair," she says.

"As an archaeologist, I might interpret this as one stage of the occupation activity, not necessarily the first or indeed the last."

L'Anse aux Meadows, a Unesco world heritage site on the northernmost tip of the island of Newfoundland, is the first and only known site established by Vikings in North America and the earliest evidence of European settlement in the New World.

Radiocarbon dating is a technique that measures residual concentrations of a radioactive isotope of carbon (carbon-14) present in an object.

Carbon-14 decays over time and measuring how much is left tells you the age of a sample.

Goodbye, Columbus: Vikings crossed the Atlantic 1,000 years ago


Will Dunham
Wed, October 20, 2021

(Reuters) - Long before Columbus crossed the Atlantic, eight timber-framed buildings covered in sod stood on a terrace above a peat bog and stream at the northern tip of Canada's island of Newfoundland, evidence that the Vikings had reached the New World first.

But precisely when the Vikings journeyed to establish the L'Anse aux Meadows settlement had remained unclear - until now.

Scientists on Wednesday said a new type of dating technique using a long-ago solar storm as a reference point revealed that the settlement was occupied in 1021 AD, exactly a millennium ago and 471 years before the first voyage of Columbus. The technique was used on three pieces of wood cut for the settlement, all pointing to the same year.

The Viking voyage represents multiple milestones for humankind. The settlement offers the earliest-known evidence of a transatlantic crossing. It also marks the place where the globe was finally encircled by humans, who thousands of years earlier had trekked into North America over a land bridge that once connected Siberia to Alaska.

"Much kudos should go to these northern Europeans for being the first human society to traverse the Atlantic," said geoscientist Michael Dee of the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, who led the study published in the journal Nature.

The Vikings, or Norse people, were seafarers with Scandinavian homelands: Norway, Sweden and Denmark. They ventured through Europe, sometimes colonizing and other times trading or raiding. They possessed extraordinary boat-building and navigation skills and established settlements on Iceland and Greenland.

"I think it is fair to describe the trip as both a voyage of discovery and a search for new sources of raw materials," Dee said. "Many archaeologists believe the principal motivation for them seeking out these new territories was to uncover new sources of timber, in particular. It is generally believed they left from Greenland, where wood suitable for construction is extremely rare."

Their wooden vessels, called longboats, were propelled by sail and oars. One surviving example, called the Oseberg ship, is roughly 70 feet (21.6 meters long).

The Viking Age is traditionally defined as 793-1066 AD, presenting a wide range for the timing of the transatlantic crossing. Ordinary radiocarbon dating - determining the age of organic materials by measuring their content of a particular radioactive isotope of carbon - proved too imprecise to date L'Anse aux Meadows, which was discovered in 1960, although there was a general belief it was the 11th century.

The new dating method relies on the fact that solar storms produce a distinctive radiocarbon signal in a tree's annual growth rings. It was known there was a significant solar storm - a burst of high-energy cosmic rays from the sun - in 992 AD.

In all three pieces of wood examined, from three different trees, 29 growth rings were formed after the one that bore evidence of the solar storm, meaning the wood was cut in 1021, said University of Groningen archaeologist Margot Kuitems, the study's first author.

It was not local indigenous people who cut the wood because there is evidence of metal blades, which they did not possess, Dee said.

The length of the occupation remains unclear, though it may have been a decade or less, and perhaps 100 Norse people were present at any given time, Dee said. Their structures resembled Norse buildings on Greenland and Iceland.

Oral histories called the Icelandic Sagas depict a Viking presence in the Americas. Written down centuries later, they describe a leader named Leif Erikson and a settlement called Vinland, as well as violent and peaceful interactions with the local peoples, including capturing slaves.

The 1021 date roughly corresponds to the saga accounts, Dee said, adding: "Thus it begs the question, how much of the rest of the saga adventures are true?"

(Reporting by Will Dunham in Washington, Editing by Rosalba O'Brien)

Tiny wrists in cuffs: How police use force against children

By HELEN WIEFFERING, COLLEEN LONG and CAMILLE FASSETTyesterday

CHICAGO (AP) — Royal Smart remembers every detail: the feeling of the handcuffs on his wrists. The panic as he was led outside into the cold March darkness, arms raised, to face a wall of police officers pointing their guns.

He was 8 years old.

Neither he nor anyone else at his family’s home on Chicago’s South Side was arrested on that night two years ago, and police wielding a warrant to look for illegal weapons found none. But even now, in nightmares and in waking moments, he is tormented by visions of officers bursting through houses and tearing rooms apart, ordering people to lie down on the floor.

“I can’t go to sleep,” he said. “I keep thinking about the police coming.”



AP Video/Serginho Roosblad

Children like Royal were not the focus after George Floyd died at the hands of police in 2020, prompting a raging debate on the disproportionate use of force by law enforcement, especially on adults of color. Kids are still an afterthought in reforms championed by lawmakers and pushed by police departments. But in case after case, an Associated Press investigation has found that children as young as 6 have been treated harshly — even brutally — by officers of the law.


They have been handcuffed, felled by stun guns, taken down and pinned to the ground by officers often far larger than they were. Departments nationwide have few or no guardrails to prevent such incidents.

The AP analyzed data on approximately 3,000 instances of police use of force against children under 16 over the past 11 years. The data, provided to the AP by Accountable Now, a project of The Leadership Conference Education Fund aiming to create a comprehensive use-of-force database, includes incidents from 25 police departments in 17 states.

It’s a small representation of the 18,000 overall police agencies nationwide and the millions of daily encounters police have with the public.

But the information gleaned is troubling.

Black children made up more than 50% of those who were handled forcibly, though they are only 15% of the U.S. child population. They and other minority kids are often perceived by police as being older than they are. The most common types of force were takedowns, strikes and muscling, followed by firearms pointed at or used on children. Less often, children faced other tactics, like the use of pepper spray or police K-9s.

In Minneapolis, officers pinned children with their bodyweight at least 190 times. In Indianapolis, more than 160 kids were handcuffed; in Wichita, Kansas, police officers drew or used their Tasers on kids at least 45 times. Most children in the dataset are teenagers, but the data included dozens of cases of children ages 10 or younger who were also subject to police force.

Force is occasionally necessary to subdue children, some of whom are accused of serious crimes.

Police reports obtained for a sample of incidents show that some kids who were stunned or restrained were armed; others were undergoing mental health crises and were at risk of harming themselves. Still other reports showed police force escalating after kids fled from police questioning. In St. Petersburg, Florida, for instance, officers chased a Black boy on suspicion of attempted car theft after he pulled the handle of a car door. He was 13 years old and 80 pounds (36 kilograms), and his flight ended with his thigh caught in a police K-9′s jaw.

LONG READ SPECIAL MULTIMEDIA FEATURE

READ ON

Tiny wrists in cuffs: How police use force against children (apnews.com)

In Ghana, Rastafarian high schooler fights to keep his hair

By KWASI GYAMFI ASIEDU

October 19, 2021

Tyrone Iras Marhguy, 17, pose for a photograph at his home in Accra, Ghana, Sunday, Oct. 10, 2021. An official at the academically elite Achimota School in Ghana told the teen he would have to cut his dreadlocks before enrolling. For Marhguy, who is a Rastafarian, cutting his dreadlocks is non-negotiable so he and his family asked the courts to intervene. (AP Photo/Nipah Dennis)


Tyrone Iras Marhguy had to make a difficult decision after being accepted to the high school of his choice: his faith or his education.

An official at the academically elite Achimota School in Ghana told the teen he would have to cut his dreadlocks before enrolling. For Marhguy, who is a Rastafarian, cutting his dreadlocks is non-negotiable so he and his family asked the courts to intervene.

“I manifest my faith through my hair,” Marguy, 17, told The Associated Press. “I assume it to be like telling a Christian not to read the Bible or go to church.”

Hair is an important part of the Rastafarian faith; believers grow their hair out naturally in locks in obedience to Biblical commandments. It is a public symbol “that we have made a vow,” said Tereo Kwame Marhguy, who is Tyrone’s father.

Although many Rastafarians believe in the Bible, it is a distinct religion guided by unique practices including the adherence to a strict Ital vegetarian diet, the use of cannabis for spiritual purposes and the avoidance of alcohol.

Short hair is a requirement at the Achimota School, a co-ed public institution in the northern outskirts of Ghana’s capital, Accra. The school did not respond to the AP’s repeated requests for comment, but argued in court documents that all boys, regardless of their religion, must “keep hair low and neatly trimmed.”

The school was founded nearly a century ago during British colonial rule. Among its alumni are many of Ghana’s social and political elite, including four former presidents, as well as the former presidents of Zimbabwe and Gambia.

Unhappy about the school’s reluctance to accommodate their son’s beliefs, the Marhguys sued Achimota School and the government in March. A separate suit was filed by another Rastafarian student, Oheneba Kwaku Nkrabea, who was also denied admission to the school.

The Marhguys’ ongoing case is one of many instances in which Ghana’s public high schools, mostly started by Christian missionaries during and after European colonization, have become a battleground for the fight for religious tolerance. In a separate incident earlier this year, a Muslim student was prevented by school authorities from fasting during Ramadan, Islam’s holiest month.

Ghana, a majority-Christian country, prides itself as democratic and religiously tolerant in a region plagued by interreligious conflicts. Government and faith leaders have signaled their commitment to religious harmony, including recent financial donations by top officials, who are Muslim, to church building projects.

For the Marhguys, the case highlights the discrimination Rastafarians face in Ghana, where they are a small but visible minority. They hope that with the attention the case has received, local attitudes will become more tolerant.

  

From left, Tereo Awareness Marhguy, Nikita Hive Marhguy, 17, Tyrone Iras Marhguy, 17, and Amrita Sheeba Marhguy poses for a photograph at their home in Accra, Ghana, Sunday, Oct. 10, 2021. An official at the academically elite Achimota School in Ghana told Tyrone he would have to cut his dreadlocks before enrolling. For Marhguy, who is a Rastafarian, cutting his dreadlocks is non-negotiable so he and his family asked the courts to intervene. (AP Photo/Nipah Dennis)

A high court judge ruled in May that the school’s ultimatum “amounts to an illegal and unconstitutional attempt to suspend the manifestation of the applicant’s constitutionally guaranteed freedom to practice and manifest his religion,” according to court documents viewed by the AP.

While the school has admitted Tyrone with his uncut hair into its science program, the school and Ghana’s attorney general have commenced legal proceedings in the Court of Appeal to reverse the earlier ruling.

The attorney general and the information ministry did not respond to repeated attempts by the AP for an interview.

The legal standoff, fronted by the attorney general, has raised questions about the country’s self-image as the region’s most stable democracy.

“Inter-religious tolerance in Ghana is very fragile,” said John Azumah, visiting professor of interfaith dialogue at Yale Divinity School and executive director of The Sanneh Institute at the University of Ghana. “It looks like religious minorities have the heavier burden to sustain inter-religious tolerance. It has to be inter-religious tolerance on the terms of the Christian majority.”

Despite being offered a scholarship to study at a private school where he wouldn’t be required to cut his hair, Tyrone, with the support of his family, has chosen to stay at Achimota School. Nkrabea, the other student -- who also won his suit against the school -- has however taken the scholarship.

The Marhguys believe they have been divinely chosen to keep fighting the school so no other student has to pick between their faith and their education again.

“They have done it to other people before and they just kept quiet and walked away,” said Tereo Marhguy. “Jah, the Most High has given us the authority and the strength to do it.”

__

Associated Press writer Francis Kokutse in Accra, Ghana contributed to this report.

___

Associated Press religion coverage receives support from the Lilly Endowment through The Conversation U.S. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

Workers fed up with nights, weekends seek flexible schedules

By ANNE D'INNOCENZIO

yesterday

1 of 5

Balsam Hill Outlet sales associate Rickey Haynes, right, listens to manager Kelly Bratt during training in Allen, Texas, Monday, Sept. 20, 2021. Retailers, restaurants and others are grappling with increasing demands in the last few months from hourly workers for more flexible schedules, going beyond a better salary and bonuses. (AP Photo/LM Otero)

NEW YORK (AP) — After struggling to hire workers for its outlet store in Dallas, Balsam Hill finally opened on Sept. 1. But the very next day, the online purveyor of high-end artificial holiday trees was forced to close after four of its five workers quit.

The main gripe for three of them? Working on weekends. So they found jobs elsewhere with better hours.

Balsam Hill reopened weeks later with nine workers, hiking the hourly pay by $3 to $18 per hour. But more importantly, it changed its approach: Instead of only focusing on the needs of the business, it’s now closely working with each employee to tailor their schedules based on when they want to work.

“We’re working against people who have the choice of wherever they want to work,” said Kendra Gould, senior retail strategist at Balsam Hill. “Now, it’s more about what do you need as an employee and how can we make you happy?”

Companies are confronting demands by hourly workers on terms that often used to be non-negotiable: scheduling. Taking a page from their white-collar peers who are restructuring their workdays to accommodate their lifestyles, hourly workers are similarly seeking flexibility in how — and when — they do their jobs. That means pushing back on weekend, late night or holiday shifts.

Job openings are plentiful, so workers can afford to be picky. There were 10.4 million job openings at the end of August and 11.1 million openings the month before, the highest on record since at least December 2000, when the government started recording that figure. At the same time, the Labor Department said that the number of people quitting their jobs jumped to 4.3 million in August from 4 million in July.

Among the new workers Balsam Hill hired was Rickey Haynes, 62, a pastor for a local Baptist church. He retired in July but still preaches in the community. He said he was looking for part-time work in retail, but didn’t want to work Sundays because of his preaching. Balsam Hill was willing to work around his schedule.

“They were accommodating,” he said. “If I could, I could work with them until I am done.”

A recent study from ManpowerGroup revealed that nearly 40% of job candidates worldwide said schedule flexibility is one of their top three factors in career decisions.

The shifting mindset is showing up in data from job site platforms.

SnagAJob.com, an online marketplace for hourly workers, says the word “flexibility” now accounts for roughly 11% of the more than 7 million job postings on its site compared with 8% earlier in the year. But overnight shifts at restaurants have also increased significantly since January.

Instawork, a staffing marketplace that connects local businesses with skilled hourly workers, says the rate at which employers were able to fill weekend shifts dropped significantly from January through August compared with weekday shifts.

Such challenges are happening as companies struggle to hire holiday workers. Target Corp. said this month it will pay $2 an hour more to employees who pick up shifts during peak days of the holiday season, including Saturday and Sunday, as well as on Christmas Eve or on the day after Christmas. That’s on top of companies already dangling bonuses and loosening requirements for drug testing and educational minimums that have kept some people out of the workforce.

Sumir Meghani, co-founder and CEO and founder of Instawork, says such perks don’t solve the root of the problem.

“It’s about flexibility,” said Meghani, noting that available shifts on Instawork have surged eightfold from right before the pandemic to August 2021. “It’s about workers saying ‘I don’t want to work weekends’ or ‘I can’t work Mondays, Tuesday and Wednesdays because I don’t have child care or schools haven’t reopened’ or ‘I am worried about COVID.’”

Meghani says hourly workers are asking how can they get the same work-life balance as their peers who can work remotely.

“The challenge is, if you are a bartender you have to work until 2 a.m.,” he says.

Employers of such jobs are limited in what they can do given the nature of how they operate, especially with customers having grown accustomed to getting what they want when they want it.

Radial, which fills online orders for retailers like Dick’s Sporting Goods and PetSmart, says it’s working to align its schedules with candidate expectations at each location. Increasingly, it’s accommodating popular shifts such as Monday through Friday only, or Saturday and Sunday only.

But Sabrina Wnorowski, Radial’s vice president of human resources, says it’s difficult to address everyone’s needs given the unpredictable nature of spending during the holidays.

On the flipside, the working poor have long struggled with erratic work schedules, particularly in the food service and retail sectors, says Daniel Schneider, professor of public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government whose Shift Project focuses on inequality of low-income workers.

“The problem isn’t new, and we’ve shown that the consequences for workers and their families are dire,” said Schneider, noting day-to-day instability of work schedules is inextricably linked to job instability. That leads to high job turnover for workers, which in turn imposes costs on individuals and on firms.

During the pandemic, hourly workers were hit especially hard when non-essential businesses like department stores and restaurants were forced to close for a few months during the spring of 2020. Those who remained employed at essential businesses like grocery stores found themselves overworked under the crush of shoppers’ purchases for basic items.

When demand for dining and shopping rebounded as more people got vaccinated this past spring, businesses couldn’t hire workers fast enough. And many of the hourly employees found new jobs as they redefined their priorities. That contributed to a labor shortage, forcing employers to look for ways to make their jobs seem more attractive while also cutting back on hours of operation.

The National Restaurant Association says that 68% of the 4,000 operators it polled in a September survey say their restaurants reduced hours of operation on days it was open for business from June through August. The survey also found that 45% of the operators polled said they closed their restaurant on the days that it would normally be open during that time frame.

Donald Minerva is the owner of a restaurant called Scottadito Osteria Toscana in Brooklyn, New York. He says that right before the pandemic he had 16 workers who worked various shifts at his restaurant, which was open six days a week. Now, Minerva has 14 workers but a good chunk of them don’t want to work double-shifts and so the restaurant is now open just five days a week with limited hours.

Minerva says 70% of his staff are from the pre-pandemic days and want to work 40 hours a week. But the new workers want more flexibility.

For Minerva, that means he has to spend more time working on their schedules and less time on priorities like coming up with new strategies to bring in customers.

“It’s a juggle to find them, and a juggle to keep them,” he said.

_______

Follow Anne D’Innocenzio: http://twitter.com/ADInnocenzio

THEY NEED TO BE A CONFEDERATION
New airstrikes hit capital of Ethiopia’s Tigray region


1 of 9

People run next to black smoke and flames in the aftermath at the scene of an airstrike in Mekele, the capital of the Tigray region of northern Ethiopia Wednesday, Oct. 20, 2021. New airstrikes have hit Mekele, residents said Wednesday, as Ethiopia's government said it was targeting facilities to make and repair weapons, which a spokesman for the rival Tigray forces denied. (AP Photo)


NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — New airstrikes hit the capital of Ethiopia’s Tigray region and another community on Wednesday, as video from Mekele showed injured people with bloodied faces being rushed to vehicles and thick black smoke rising in the sky. Ethiopia’s government said it targeted facilities to make and repair weapons, which a spokesman for the rival Tigray forces denied.

Meanwhile, the United Nations told The Associated Press it is slashing by more than half its Tigray presence as an Ethiopian government blockade halts humanitarian aid efforts and people die from lack of food.

The war in Africa’s second-most populous country has ground on for nearly a year between Ethiopian and allied forces and the Tigray ones who long dominated the national government before a falling-out with Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize winner.

At least 14 people were injured in the airstrikes in Mekele and three were in critical condition, Hayelom Kebede, the former director of Tigray’s flagship Ayder Referral Hospital, told the AP.

“Indeed there have been airstrikes in Mekele today,” Ethiopian government spokesman Legesse Tulu told the AP, saying they targeted facilities at the Mesfin Industrial Engineering site that Tigray forces use to make and repair heavy weapons. Legesse said the airstrikes had “no intended harm to civilians.”

Another airstrike hours later hit Agbe between the communities of Hagere Selam and Tembien, he said, describing the site as a “center of military training and heavy artillery depot.”

A Tigray spokesman denied the Mekele site was related to weapons. “Not at all,” Kindeya Gebrehiwot told the AP, calling it a garage “with many old tires. That is why it is still blazing.”

Amit Abrha, who said she was a worker at the site, said she didn’t hear the airstrike coming and collapsed when the attack occurred. “People picked me up. And when the explosions continued, I went out and saw a person that I know injured and on the ground,” she said in video footage obtained by the AP, as the smoke billowed behind her and fellow residents tried to control the flames.

The attack came two days after Ethiopia’s air force confirmed airstrikes in Mekele that a witness said killed three children. The air force said communications towers and equipment were attacked. Mekele hadn’t seen fighting since June, when Tigray forces retook much of the region in a dramatic turn in the war.

The airstrikes have caused fresh panic in a city under siege, where doctors and others have described running out of medicines and other basic needs.

Despite pleas from the U.N. and others to allow basic services and humanitarian aid to Tigray’s 6 million people, Ethiopia’s government this week called those expectations “absurd” while the Tigray forces now fight in the neighboring regions of Amhara and Afar. Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced there, widening the deadly crisis.

“Although not all movements have yet taken place, there will probably be a reduction from nearly 530 to around 220 U.N. staff on the ground in Tigray,” U.N. humanitarian spokesman Saviano Abreu told the AP. The decision is “directly linked to the operation constraints we have been faced with over the last months” along with the volatile security situation, he said.

The lack of fuel and cash because of the government’s blockade on Tigray “has made it extremely challenging for humanitarians to sustain life-saving activities” at the time they’re needed most, Abreu added.

Some 1,200 humanitarian workers including the reduced U.N. presence will remain in Tigray, he said.

The AP in recent weeks has confirmed the first starvation deaths in Tigray under the government blockade.

Humanitarian workers are also trying to reach the displaced and often hungry people in the Amhara and Afar regions, where communications blackouts and active fighting challenge efforts to confirm claims by the warring sides. Witnesses have told the AP that some Tigray forces are killing civilians, the latest abuses in a war marked by gang-rapes, mass expulsions and widespread detentions of ethnic Tigrayans.

This week’s airstrikes in the Tigray capital “appear to be part of efforts to weaken Tigray’s armed resistance, which has recently made further gains in the eastern Amhara region, with fighting ongoing in some areas. Along with superior manpower, control of the skies is one of the few remaining areas of military advantage for the federal government,” International Crisis Group analyst William Davison said in a statement. “The bombing of urban areas, however, reinforces the impression that Addis Ababa is willing to risk civilian lives in Tigray as part of its military efforts.”

Arbitrator: Official wrongly fired in Flint water scandal


- In this Feb. 5, 2018, file photo, defendant Liane Shekter Smith listens during a preliminary examination in the cases of four defendants, all former or current officials from the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, in Flint, Mich. Shekter Smith, the only Michigan official fired in the Flint water disaster, was likely a “public scapegoat” who lost her job because of politics, an arbitrator said in ordering $191,880 in back pay and other compensation. (Jake May/The Flint Journal via AP, File)


DETROIT (AP) — The only Michigan official fired in the Flint water catastrophe likely was a “public scapegoat” who lost her job because of politics, an arbitrator said in ordering $191,880 in back pay and other compensation.

It’s a remarkable victory for Liane Shekter Smith, who served as head of the state’s drinking water office when Flint’s water system was contaminated with lead. She was removed and then fired in 2016 and subsequently faced criminal charges in one of the worst environmental disasters in U.S. history.

Shekter Smith was dismissed while engineers in her department — the “boots on the ground” in Flint — were suspended with pay before ultimately returning to work, the arbitrator said in a 22-page report obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press.

Sheldon Stark said the state had failed to offer enough evidence to justify the firing of Shekter Smith, who had an “exemplary” record in government.

The arbitrator noted that Keith Creagh, director of the Department of Environmental Quality, fired Shekter Smith without even speaking to her about Flint or waiting for a state police investigation that exonerated her.

“No one ever asked (Shekter Smith) for her story,” Stark said.

“Politics and the need for a public scapegoat helps explain why Shekter Smith might have been terminated when so many others who were directly involved and actually did make” decisions in Flint were not fired, Stark said in his September report.

He ordered $166,053 in lost wages before a likely spring 2017 retirement and $25,827 in 401(k) retirement compensation. The state agency, which now is known as the Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy, declined to comment on the arbitrator’s decision but said an appeal was being considered.

A message seeking comment was left for Shekter Smith’s attorney.

“I’m dumbfounded. She was their boss,” said LeeAnne Walters, a Flint resident who is credited with exposing the lead contamination. “The system just spit in the face of every resident who died or was harmed. She should not be compensated for harming people.”

Walters took her concerns to Shekter Smith in 2015 but felt “an air of untouchability.”

The department defended the firing in a legal brief.

“Part of accepting a high-level position in government is also to accept responsibility for oneself and for the actions of those one supervises and accountability for results,” the agency told the arbitrator.

In 2014-15, Flint’s water was pulled from the Flint River, a money-saving decision that was made by state-appointed managers who were running the ailing city. The highly corrosive water wasn’t properly treated before it flowed through aging pipes to roughly 100,000 residents, causing lead to leach from old pipes.

The disaster in majority-Black Flint has been described as environmental racism. In 2016, a task force appointed by then-Gov. Rick Snyder, a Republican, said his environmental agency misapplied lead-and-copper rules and “caused this crisis to happen.”

The arbitrator’s report reveals behind-the-scenes moves by Snyder’s influential fix-it man, Rich Baird, who asked Creagh to take control of the department after a director quit amid the scandal.

Creagh testified that Baird “encouraged Shekter Smith’s termination.”

Richard Benzie, who supervised the state engineers making key decisions in Flint, was not disciplined but “promoted and given more responsibility!” the arbitrator said in highlighting different treatment.

After her discharge, Shekter Smith was charged with misconduct in office and neglect of duty, and put on notice that an involuntary manslaughter case would be pursued because bacteria in the water were linked to a fatal outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease.

But charges were dropped in 2019 in exchange for a no-contest plea to an obscure misdemeanor. The case was erased after a year, under a deal with special prosecutor Todd Flood.

Flint’s water quality greatly improved after it returned to a regional water supplier and replaced thousands of lead or steel service lines. Meanwhile, nine people, including Snyder and Baird, were charged with crimes in January after a new investigation. Their cases are pending.

___

Follow Ed White at http://twitter.com/edwritez

Chapelle special spurs Netflix walkout; ‘Trans lives matter’

By ALEX VEIGA and LYNN ELBER

yesterday

1 of 14

People protest outside the Netflix building on Vine Street in the Hollywood section of Los Angeles, Wednesday, Oct. 20, 2021. Critics and supporters of Dave Chappelle's Netflix special and its anti-transgender comments gathered outside the company's offices Wednesday. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Netflix employees who walked out Wednesday in protest of Dave Chappelle’s special and its anti-transgender comments were joined by allies who chanted “Trans lives matter,” getting pushback from counterprotesters who also showed up.

A pre-noon rally at a Netflix office-studio complex drew about 100 people, most on the side of an estimated 30 workers at the streaming giant that joined in afterward. Some were willing to identify themselves as Netflix employees, but all declined to provide their names.

Joey Soloway, creator of the groundbreaking Emmy-winning comedy “Transparent,” was among the speakers at the rally.

Chappelle’s decision to share “his outrage as comedic humiliation in front of thousands of people, and then broadcasting it to hundreds of millions of people is infinitely amplified gender violence,” they said.

“I want trans representation on the Netflix board, this (expletive) week,” the writer-director said.

Ashlee Marie Preston, an activist and the event’s organizer, addressed the rally and spoke to The Associated Press afterward. She said that calling out Chappelle for his remarks wasn’t enough.

“It was important to shift the focus to the people that sign the checks, because Dave Chappelle doesn’t sign checks, Netflix does,” Preston said. “If we have companies like Netflix who aren’t listening to their employees, who are forcing their employees to participate in their own oppression, that’s unacceptable.”

“We’re here to keep people accountable. We’re not going anywhere,” she said, adding that efforts are underway to start a dialogue with Netflix executives.

There were a few moments of shoving and pushing among the competing demonstrators, but the conflict was mostly limited to a war of words.

Leia Figueroa, a student from Los Angeles, doesn’t work at Netflix but said she wanted to back the walkout. While the streaming service offers positive fare for the LGBTQ community, she said, it’s having it both ways by also offering a show like Chappelle’s that includes disparaging comments about trans women.

If Netflix wants to be “an apolitical platform then they should be that,” Figueroa said. “But they’re saying things like ‘Black lives matter’ and ‘We don’t stand for transphobia.’ If you say things like that, then you have to be vetting all of your content to reflect your values.”

As she spoke, a protestor shouted, “We like jokes.”

“I like funny jokes, and transphobia is not a joke,” Figueroa replied.

Belissa Cohen, a former journalist, said she was on hand to “support Netflix’s decision not to pull” the special.

“We want to show that there isn’t unanimous support about transgender ideology when it comes to Netflix viewers,” Cohen said.

She was among about a dozen people who carried placards reading “Free speech is a right” and “Truth is not transphobic.” Opposite them were those carrying signs that included “Black Trans Lives Matter” and “Transphobia is not Funny.”

Elliot Page, who stars in Netflix’s “The Umbrella Academy” and is transgender, tweeted that he stands with the trans, nonbinary and people of color working at Netflix who are “fighting for more and better trans stories and a more inclusive workplace.”

Team Trans(asterisk), which identifies itself as supporting “trans people working at Netflix trying to build a better world for our community,” posted what it called a list of “asks” being made of Netflix by trans and nonbinary workers and allies at the company.

They are calling on the company to “repair” its relationships with staff and the audience with changes involving the hiring of trans executives and increased spending on trans and nonbinary creators and projects.

“Harm reduction” is another demand, which according to the list includes acknowledgment of what it called Netflix’s “responsibility for this harm from transphobic content, and in particular harm to the Black trans community.”

It also called for disclaimers to flag content that includes “transphobic language, misogyny, homophobia” and hate speech.

In a statement, the media watchdog group GLAAD said it salutes the Netflix’s employees, allies and LGBTQ and Black advocates “calling for accountability and change within Netflix and in the entertainment industry as a whole.”

The employees who walked out uniformly referred reporters to the GLAAD statement.

Netflix ran into a buzz-saw of criticism not only with the special but in how internal memos responded to employees’ concerns, including co-CEO Ted Sarandos’ assertion that “content on screen doesn’t directly translate to real-world harm.”

Sarandos also wrote that Netflix doesn’t allow titles that are “designed to incite hate or violence, and we don’t believe ‘The Closer’ crosses that line.”

In interviews Tuesday, Sarandos said he failed to recognize that “a group of our employees was really hurting,” as he told The Wall Street Journal, and that his comment about the effect of TV on viewers was an oversimplification.

Terra Field, who identifies herself on Twitter as a senior software engineer at Netflix and as trans, posted tweets critical of Chappelle’s special immediately after it aired and the comments were widely shared.

In her posts, Field said the comic was being criticized not because his remarks are offensive but for the harm they do to the trans community, especially Black women. Field included a list of trans and nonbinary men and women of color who she said had been killed, adding in each case that the victim “is not offended.”

___

Across Africa, major churches strongly oppose LGBTQ rights

THROUGH IMPRISONMENT AND LYNCHING

By KWASI GYAMFI ASIEDU, CHINEDU ASADU, RODNEY MUHUMUZA and MOGOMOTSI MAGOME

PHOTO ESSAY 1 of 9

Associate Pastor Caroline Omolo stands for a portrait at the Cosmopolitan Affirming Community church, which serves a predominantly LGBTQ congregation, in Nairobi, Kenya Monday, Oct. 11, 2021. “They have always organized a group to maybe silence us or make the church disappear,” Omolo says. “They don’t want it to appear anywhere.” (AP Photo/Brian Inganga)

In Ghana, home to a diverse array of religions, leaders of major churches have united in denouncing homosexuality as a “perversion” and endorsing legislation that would, if enacted, impose some of the harshest anti-LGBTQ policies in Africa.

In Nigeria, the umbrella body for Christian churches depicts same-sex relationships as an evil meriting the lengthy prison sentences prescribed under existing law.

And in several African countries, bishops aligned with the worldwide United Methodist Church are preparing to join an in-the-works breakaway denomination so they can continue their practice of refusing to recognize same-sex marriage or ordain LGBTQ clergy.

In the United States, Western Europe and various other regions, some prominent Protestant churches have advocated for LGBTQ inclusion. With only a few exceptions, this hasn’t happened in Africa, where Anglican, Methodist, Presbyterian and Lutheran leaders are among those opposing such inclusion.

“The mainstream churches — all of them — they actually are totally against it,” said Caroline Omolo, associate pastor at the Cosmopolitan Affirming Community in Nairobi, Kenya. It is a rare example of a church in Africa serving a predominantly LGBTQ congregation.

“They have always organized a group to maybe silence us or make the church disappear,” Omolo said. “They don’t want it to appear anywhere.”

Ghana, generally considered more respectful of human rights than most African countries, now faces scrutiny due to a bill in Parliament that would impose prison sentences ranging from three to 10 years for people identifying as LGBTQ or supporting that community. The bill has been denounced by human rights activists even as Ghanaian religious leaders rally behind it.

“Their role in perpetuating queerphobia and transphobia is clear and it’s very troubling and dangerous,” said Abena Hutchful, a Ghanaian who identifies as queer and co-organized a recent protest against the bill in New York City.

“The bill’s strongest supporters claim to be doing this in the name of religion,” says Graeme Reid, director of Human Rights Watch’s LGBT Rights Program. He called the measure “a case study in extreme cruelty.”

The lawmakers proposing the bill said they consulted influential religious leaders while drafting it. Among those endorsing it are the Christian Council of Ghana, the Ghana Catholic Bishops’ Conference and the country’s chief imam.

“We don’t accept murderers, why should we accept somebody who is doing sex in a sinful way?” Archbishop Philip Naameh, president of the bishops’ conference, told The Associated Press. “If you take a stance which is against producing more children, it is a choice which is injurious to the existence of the Ghanaian state.”

The Christian Council — whose members include Methodist, Lutheran, Presbyterian and Anglican churches — considers homosexuality “an act of perversion and abomination,” according to its secretary general, the Rev. Dr. Cyril Fayose of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church.

“Homosexuality is not a human right and we reject it in all uncertain terms,” he declared earlier this year.

In Africa’s most populous country, the Christian Association of Nigeria has threatened to sanction any church that shows tolerance for same-sex relationships.

Such acceptance “will never happen,” Methodist Bishop Stephen Adegbite, the association’s director of national issues, told the AP.

Asked about Nigeria’s law criminalizing same-sex relationships with sentences of up to 14 years in prison, Adegbite said there are no alternatives.

“The church can never be compromised,” he declared.

Such comments dismay Nigerian LGBTQ activists such as Matthew Blaise, who told the AP of being manhandled by a Catholic priest distraught that Blaise wasn’t heterosexual.

“The church has been awful when it comes to LGBTQ issues, instead of using love as a means of communicating,” Blaise said.

In Nigeria’s commercial capital, Lagos, Catholic Archbishop Alfred Adewale Martins told the AP that Catholic teaching “recognizes in the dignity of every human person.” However, he said LGBTQ people who enter into same-sex relationships are leading “a disordered way of life” and should change their behavior.

Nigeria is home to one of the United Methodist bishops, John Wesley Yohanna, who says he plans to break away from the UMC and join the proposed Global Methodist Church. That new denomination, likely to be established next year, results from an alliance between Methodists in the United States and abroad who don’t support the LGBT-inclusive policies favored by many Methodists in the U.S.

Bishops Samuel J. Quire Jr. of Liberia and Owan Tshibang Kasap of the UMC’s Southern Congo district also have indicated they would join the breakaway.

Wilhemina Nyarko attends a rally against a controversial bill being proposed in Ghana's parliament that would make identifying as LGBTQIA or an ally a criminal offense punishable by up to 10 years in prison, in the Harlem neighborhood of New York on Monday, Oct 11, 2021. "It's a scary bill," says Nyarko, who is from Ghana and has lived in New York for thirty years. "I felt I needed to come and support this." (AP Photo/Emily Leshner)

The Rev. Keith Boyette, a Methodist elder from the United States who chairs the Global Methodist initiative, said the African bishops’ views reflect societal and cultural attitudes widely shared across the continent.

“Same-sex orientation is viewed negatively,” he said. “That’s true whether a person is from a Christian denomination, or Muslim or from a more indigenous religion.”

In Uganda, where many LGBTQ people remain closeted for fear of violence and arrests, there is a retired Anglican bishop who in 2006 was barred from presiding over church events because he voiced empathy with gays.

In decades of ministering to embattled LGBTQ people, Christopher Senyonjo said he learned that sexuality “is a deep, important part of who we are. We should be free to let people be who they are.”

“Ignorance is a big problem in all this,” Senyonjo told the AP. “When there is ignorance, there is a lot of suffering.”

In 2014, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni signed a harsh anti-gay law that, in its original version, prescribed the death penalty for some homosexual acts. Later that year, amid intense international pressure, a judicial panel annulled the legislation on a technicality.

However, a colonial-era law criminalizing sex acts “against the order of nature” remains in place.

Frank Mugisha, a prominent gay activist in Uganda, described church leaders as “the key drivers of homophobia in Africa.” Some Anglican leaders, he said, have deepened their hostility toward LGBTQ people in a bid to not lose followers to aggressively anti-LGBTQ Pentecostal churches.

In all of Africa, only one nation — South Africa — has legalized same-sex marriage. Even there, gay and lesbian couples often struggle to be accepted by churches, let alone have their marriages solemnized by clergy.

“People tell me, ‘I grew up in this church, but now I am not accepted,’” said Nokuthula Dhladhla, a pastor with the Global Interfaith Network, which advocates for LGBTQ rights within the religious sector.

She said some religious leaders are privately supportive of same-sex marriage, but reluctant to do so openly for fear of being sidelined by their more conservative peers.

South Africa’s Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu, world-renowned for his opposition to apartheid, has been an outspoken supporter of LGBTQ rights.

“I would not worship a God who is homophobic,” he once said. “I would refuse to go to a homophobic heaven. No, I would say ‘Sorry, I would much rather go to the other place.’”

Caroline Omolo, the activist pastor in Nairobi, said some Kenyan religious leaders blame LGBTQ people for the coronavirus pandemic.

“When we say we are still serving God, they don’t see something that’s possible,” she said. “They think it’s something unfamiliar and should be stopped.”

However, she said some faculty and students at Kenya’s theological schools support her LGBTQ church, which has about 300 members.

“The students, we call them the future generation, leaders of tomorrow,” she said. “When we have that population on our side, I believe there’s nothing that can shake us.”

___

Asiedu reported from New York, Asadu from Lagos, Nigeria; Muhumuza from Kampala, Uganda; and Magome from Johannesburg, South Africa. Associated Press writers Cara Anna in Nairobi, Kenya, and David Crary in New York contributed.

___

Associated Press religion coverage receives support from the Lilly Endowment through The Conversation U.S. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

Cargo backlog creates traffic headaches on sea and land



1 of 20

Parked cargo container trucks are seen in a street, Wednesday, Oct. 20, 2021 in Wilmington, Calif. California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday issued an order that aims to ease bottlenecks at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach that have spilled over into neighborhoods where cargo trucks are clogging residential streets. (AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu)


LOS ANGELES (AP) — A Los Angeles neighborhood just outside the nation’s busiest port complex has become a perpetual traffic jam, with trucks hauling cargo containers backed up day and night as workers try to break through an unprecedented backlog of ships waiting to unload.

About 40% of all shipping containers entering the U.S. come through the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports. The logjam of ships has interrupted the global supply chain and last week prompted the Biden administration to allow the port complex to operate 24 hours a day to try to get goods unloaded and out to consumers.

Since then, residents of the Wilmington neighborhood just north of the ports have complained that trucks are backed up in the streets at all hours. Meanwhile, cargo companies running out of space to store containers off-loaded from ships are stacking them outside overloaded warehouses and in parking lots.

This week a container slid off a truck making a turn on a narrow street, pancaking a parked car. Nobody was hurt, but local officials say with so many trucks crammed into a small area it was an accident waiting to happen.

“This is becoming an issue of safety,” said Jacob Haik, deputy chief of staff for LA City Councilman Joe Buscaino, who represents the working-class area. Haik said the city would start issuing citations to firms that stack containers unsafely or whose trucks clog streets.

As of Tuesday, there were 63 ships berthed at the two ports and 96 waiting to dock and unload, according to the Marine Exchange of Southern California that oversees port vessel traffic. On Monday, the number of ships waiting to enter the ports hit a record 100.

Wilmington resident Sonia Cervantes said her driveway was blocked by a truck as she tried to leave for work at 6:30 a.m. Her whole block is fed up with the traffic, she said.

“It’s a bunch of neighbors that are very upset because it’s a non-stop situation,” Cervantes told CBS LA.

Maria Arrieran, who owns the UCTI Trucking Company along with her husband, Frank, said she sympathizes with the community, but the truck traffic is a result of limited container storage.

“It’s an ongoing problem. We’re just trying to get these truckers in and out,” she said Wednesday. “I’m literally out on the streets directing traffic.”

California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday issued an executive order that aims to ease the backlog. He directed California government agencies to look for state-owned properties that could temporarily store goods coming into the ports. Newsom, a Democrat, asked the state’s Department of General Services to review potential sites by Dec. 15.

He also ordered the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development to examine other properties not owed by the state, such as private or locally owned parcels, that could also be used for storage, though he didn’t give a timeline for that review.

Newsom’s order is a start, Haik said, but he urged the governor to also allow cities to make it easier to change zoning rules. The city has identified several port-owned plots that could be quickly paved and transformed into storage sites if not for existing red tape, he said.

“The lots are quite small. But if you could pull together 10 or 12 lots, and put 40 containers on each of them, that’s 500 containers,” Haik said. “That’s some serious relief.”

More relief could come by diverting cargo ship traffic to the Port of Oakland. Mayor Libby Schaaf told KRON-TV on Wednesday that her city’s port “has unused capacity right now” and Oakland can “take some of those ships off your hands, L.A.”

Newsom’s order also directed the state’s transportation agency to look for freight routes where vehicle weight limits can be exempt to help with the movement of goods. He asked his administration to come up with port and transportation improvements that could be included in the next state budget, which he will introduce in January.

A coalition of business groups including retailers, truckers, grocers and others said Wednesday that Newsom’s order doesn’t go far enough.

“There are additional real, tangible actions the governor could take to meet the moment and tackle this crisis head-on, but convening taskforces in 2022, delaying urgent actions for at least a month, and pushing funding discussions to the January budget proposal do not provide the sense of urgency needed to address this crisis now,” the coalition said in a letter.

The group urged Newsom to take drastic steps including suspending air quality rules governing truck emissions, allowing cities to drop prohibitions on unloading goods at stores after hours and expediting permitting processes for warehouses.

___

Associated Press writer Kathleen Ronayne in Sacramento, California, contributed to this report.

Israeli minister sees opportunity at UN climate conference

By JOSEF FEDERMAN

1 of 6

Israel's new Minister of Environmental Protection, Tamar Zandberg, poses for a portrait in her office in Jerusalem, Wednesday, Oct. 20, 2021. Zandberg has set some ambitious goals: She believes she can use her office to play an important role in the global battle against climate change while also promoting peace in the volatile Middle East.

 (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo)


JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel’s new environmental protection minister has set some ambitious goals: She believes she can use her office to play an important role in the global battle against climate change while also promoting peace in the volatile Middle East.

Tamar Zandberg laid out her agenda in an interview with The Associated Press ahead of the upcoming U.N. climate conference in Glasgow. She says Israel, despite its small size and own inability to reach the global goal of zero net emissions by 2050, has the potential to be a key player.

Zandberg said the country is eager to share its expertise in green technologies. Israel is widely considered a world leader in areas such as solar energy storage, sustainable protein alternatives, agriculture technology and desalination.

“These are fields where Israel is already in the cutting edge frontier of global innovation, and we hope that this is something that small Israel can contribute to bigger countries than us to adjust better to the new climate reality,” she said.

Major countries, including China and India, have become important markets for Israeli environmental technologies. Zandberg said she already has held a pair of meetings with her counterpart in the United Arab Emirates, which established diplomatic ties with Israel just over a year ago, and that the two countries have teams working together on issues like agriculture and water in the arid Middle East.

Israel and Jordan last week held a signing ceremony on a new water-sharing agreement, and Zandberg said the two countries are having “extensive talks” on various environmental issues.

“Our neighbors share our region and share our climate,” she said. “So it’s only natural that we will face them together. That can contribute to climate change, but also to the regional stability and to our peace in the Middle East.”

Zandberg took office in June as part of Israel’s new government — a diverse patchwork of small and midsize parties spanning the political spectrum. This includes deep ideological differences over how to handle the decades-long conflict with the Palestinians.

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett heads a religious, ultranationalist party that opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state, and Bennett, a former leader of the West Bank settlement movement, has ruled out peace talks with the Palestinians.

Zandberg’s Meretz party is the most dovish member of the eight-party coalition and supports a two-state solution with the Palestinians. As part of the coalition deal, forged to prevent the country from plunging into a fifth election in a two-year span, all members were forced to compromise on their core beliefs.

Zandberg acknowledged some frustration with the limitations created by the political reality, but said environmental cooperation provides an opportunity to improve the atmosphere and lay the groundwork for future negotiations. She said she has met with her Palestinian counterpart, and that professional teams meet regularly to work on issues of mutual concern, such as protecting shared water resources.

“We live here together and we share the land and we share the air and share the water,” she said. “The better we communicate, the better our peoples will live.”

At home, Zandberg has a long to-do list.

Israel has acknowledged it will fall short of the goal of the international community to reach zero net emissions by 2050. It expects to reduce emissions by 85% by that time. Environmentalists have cited a lack of political will by previous governments and the country’s reliance on newly discovered natural gas for energy for the lower target.

Zandberg said this figure was calculated based largely on a situation inherited from previous governments. She also said Israel’s relatively high population growth is an obstacle. And while Israel lags on its own renewable energy goals, she said the government is determined to help the world reach the zero-emissions target through its technology exports and to do more on the domestic front.

“That’s our goal to close that gap,” she said. “We are working on new climate legislation for the first time in the Israeli parliament. We are working on the series of implementation plans, how to take the low carbon economy governmental declaration and make it a reality in sectors of energy, transportation, waste, agriculture. So we are serious.”

There are other challenges. The Dead Sea, which is actually a salty lake situated at the lowest place on earth, is slowly shrinking. This is the result of years of water diversion from the Jordan River for drinking and agriculture and from damage caused by mineral-extraction companies. A secretive oil pipeline deal between Israel and the United Arab Emirates has raised fears that an oil spill might one day destroy the Red Sea coral reefs, prized by scientists for their unique resilience against warming seas. Water resources that traverse Israel and the occupied West Bank are threatened by sewage and pollution.

Zandberg said her team is involved in negotiations to ensure that Dead Sea factories, which are among Israel’s worst polluters, address environmental concerns as licenses are renewed in the coming years. The Israel-UAE pipeline is now under review by the government, “and we will express our concerns in those discussions,” she said. Zandberg has been pushing for a new tax on single-use plastics to go into effect next year.

Gidon Bromberg, the Israeli director of EcoPeace, an environmental advocacy group with offices in Israel, Jordan and the West Bank, said it is too early to judge Zandberg’s performance. But he said her appointment has raised hopes that Israel can finally make some progress on long-festering issues.

“We’re in a very unique position where we have a minister of environment who is extremely committed to the issue and wants to succeed,” Bromberg said. “You have an environment minister who’s an environmentalist.”

Whether she succeeds, he said, will depend in part on her political skills, largely her relationship with Bennett. Despite their different backgrounds, Bromberg said that so far they appear to have a good rapport.

“It’s still very early days. The issues are enormous,” he said.