GM investing $920 million in Ohio diesel engine plant



Tue, June 20, 2023 
By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - General Motors on Tuesday said it was investing $920 million to expand operations at its Ohio diesel engine plant for production of future internal combustion engine (ICE) heavy-duty truck powertrain products.

In total, the largest U.S. automaker has announced in June more than $3.2 billion in investments to support next-generation ICE production, even as it vows to stop the sale of new gasoline- and diesel-powered vehicles by 2035 in favor of electric vehicles.

GM on Tuesday said it will build a 1.1-million-square-foot expansion of the its Brookville, Ohio, diesel engine facility and install new technology and equipment, more than quadrupling the current size of the facility, which produces Duramax diesel engines for the Chevrolet Silverado HD and the GMC Sierra HD.

GM declined to release "product details and timing related to its "future HD truck powertrain products."

GM also announced this month that it plans to invest more than $1 billion to re-tool two manufacturing sites in Flint, Michigan, to prepare for a new generation of its ICE heavy-duty trucks and more than $500 million in its Arlington, Texas, assembly plant to prepare it for production of next-generation ICE full-size SUVs.

GM also announced C$280 million ($210 million) in its Canadian Oshawa Assembly and $632 Million in Fort Wayne, Indiana, for future next-generation ICE full-size trucks.

GM, like other automakers, faces increasingly stringent emissions requirements from California and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. It will need to boost the efficiency of internal combustion models and ramp up zero-emission model sales to meet tougher regulations.

GM paid $128.2 million in penalties for the 2016 and 2017 model years for failing to meet Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) program requirements, Reuters reported this month.

GM did not post an announcement on its website about the $920 million Ohio investment, but sent a press release to Reuters after Senator Sherrod Brown, of Ohio, issued a statement touting the plan.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Leslie Adler)

China's state planner signs letter of intent to cooperate with European corporate giants

STATE CAPITALI$M IS STILL CAPITALI$M

Reuters
Wed, June 21, 2023 at 9:15 AM MDT·1 min read


BEIJING, June 21 (Reuters) - China's state planner this week signed letters of intent in Berlin on cooperation with European corporate heavyweights in areas ranging from aviation and chemicals to automobiles, as the world's second-largest economy seek to lobby for stronger ties with Europe.

European companies including Airbus, BASF , Siemens, Mercedez-Benz, BMW and Volkswagen were among those that signed agreements with China, according to statements from China's National Development and Reform Commission on Wednesday.

The Chinese state planner said it will work with the relevant companies to advance cooperation in areas including sustainable aviation fuel, low-carbon product production, and new-energy vehicles.

The signing came as a Chinese delegation led by Premier Li Qiang was in Berlin for intergovernmental talks with Germany, their first face-to-face summit since the COVID-19 pandemic.

The talks had came under fire as critics say the symbolism is not appropriate anymore given rising tensions between the West and China, and as the European Union is seeking to reduce its dependence on the Asian powerhouse.

On Tuesday, the European Union executive presented an economic security plan seeking consensus among the bloc's 27 states for stronger controls on exports and outflows of technologies that could be put to military use by rivals like China.

Li, who was on his first overseas visit since becoming premier in March, had warned against any economic decoupling from Beijing.

"We should not artificially exaggerate 'dependence', or even simply equate interdependence with insecurity," he told Germany's top CEOs in a meeting on Monday.

"Lack of cooperation is the biggest risk, and lack of development is the biggest insecurity," he said. (Reporting by Ethan Wang and Ryan Woo in Beijing, Twinnie Siu in Hong Kong; Editing by Jonathan Oatis)

Abu Dhabi pours $738.5M into China's Tesla challenger Nio


Image Credits: Nio

Rita Liao
Tue, June 20, 2023 

China's electric vehicle companies are pouring into the Middle East where both investors and consumers have a growing appetite for the country's Tesla challengers.

Shanghai-based Nio announced Tuesday that CYVN Holdings, a smart mobility-focused investment vehicle majority-owned by the Abu Dhabi government, will invest a total of $738.5 million in the Chinese EV maker.

Nio, which is listed on NYSE, will issue 84,695,543 Class A ordinary shares at $8.72 apiece. In addition, CYVN has entered into an agreement with an affiliate of Tencent, which invested in Nio back in 2017, to purchase 40,137,614 Class A ordinary shares from the social and gaming giant.

Upon completion of the deals, the Abu Dhabi-backed firm will own a roughly 7% stake in Nio. CYVN will have the right to nominate one director to Nio's board of directors so long as it continues to own no less than 5% of the EV maker.

Abu Dhabi's strategic investment will also initiate a partnership to help Nio expand globally. Nio launched its internalization in 2021, starting with Norway followed by several other European markets. But now the United Arab Emirates, in its transition to net zero, has become an attractive market to China's EV companies that are facing mounting price competition at home that's in part sparked by Tesla.

Last year, a senior minister of the UAE unveiled that the country had plans to invest $160 billion in clean and renewable energy sources over the next three decades, building on top of the $40 billion already committed to clean energy over the last 15 years.

BYD, which is quickly catching up on Tesla's global market share, announced its entry into the UAE in March through a partnership with local distributor Al-Futtaim, with plans to bring four of its models, including all-electric and hybrid vehicles, to the Middle Eastern country.

Geely, the largest private automaker in China with an expanding line of electric models, has also plugged itself into the UAE market by working with the luxury car importer AGMC.

Chinese EV startup Nio’s journey to the West

BYD is overtaking Tesla, but its EV dream skips the US for now

China Begins Nationwide Push to Reveal Hidden Government Debt

Bloomberg News
Wed, June 21, 2023 




(Bloomberg) -- China has begun a fresh round of nationwide inspections to work out how much money local governments’ owe, according to people familiar with the matter, a sign that authorities are preparing to take concrete steps to tackle a key financial risk.

Local officials will be pressed to come clean about their so-called hidden debt as national leaders attempt to get a fuller picture of liabilities across all levels of government, the people said, asking not to be named discussing private information. The campaign is being led by the Ministry of Finance, one of the people said.

It’s not clear when the survey will end or what will follow it, but an accurate accounting of the size of the liabilities would be key to formulating policies to address the problem. The assessment has been underway at least since May, one of the people said. The people asked not to be identified as the discussions were private.

The finance ministry didn’t respond to a fax requesting comment.

There are more than 3,000 individual administrative units in China, with 31 provinces, 333 cities and almost 3,000 counties. Many of them use companies called ‘local government financing vehicles’ to borrow money to pay for infrastructure and other services that can’t be paid for from their official budgets. The companies are controlled by the local authorities but are not officially part of the government so their debts don’t appear on official balance sheets, making local finances appear to be in better shape than they really are.

The central government officially denies that government is responsible for these debts, but investors and banks lend to the LGFVs at low interest rates because it is assumed that local authorities will not let any of them fail but will eventually repay their debts.

However, many of the investments made by the LGFVs have struggled to make a profit or even enough money to repay their loans, and investors increasingly see the whole sectors as a financial risk. LGFVs were the most frequently cited top risk in a Bloomberg survey earlier this year of 53 economists, money managers and strategists at financial institutions ranging from sovereign wealth funds to banks and pensions.

Official Debts


Ministry of Finance data showed governments across China had 37 trillion yuan ($5.1 trillion) in on-book debt outstanding at the end of April, but there is no official total for how much hidden debt there is and who owes it.

The International Monetary Fund estimated in February that nationwide there was 66 trillion yuan of LGFV hidden debt at the end of 2022, up from 40 trillion yuan in 2019, with that quick increase underscoring how local governments ramped up off-book borrowing and spending during the pandemic to support their local economies.

China has already conducted several audits of local debt over the past decade. After a 2013 audit, Beijing banned local authorities from borrowing except through the sale of official bonds, and then in 2015 launched a campaign to swap local governments’ off-balance-sheet debt for bonds.

The Ministry of Finance more recently allowed some regions to issue bonds to repay LGFV borrowings in an attempt to eliminate the remaining hidden debt, after another round of checks in 2018. Guangdong province became the first to claim it had successfully done so in 2021. Other LGFVs have been allowed to renegotiate their loans, including one in Guizhou province agreeing with its banks in December last year to extend its loans for two decades.

This new audit of local government debt risks comes just as China’s economic recovery is losing momentum. The real estate sector shows no sign of rebounding, global demand for Chinese goods and domestic consumption are both weakening, and local authorities’ ability to spur growth with infrastructure spending has been limited by their massive debt stockpile and falling income.

Expectations for more monetary and fiscal stimulus have risen following the surprise rate cut last week by the People’s Bank of China. The State Council, China’s cabinet, said late last week it was discussing stimulus proposals, and a major policy announcement is expected to come after the July meeting of the Communist Party’s powerful Politburo.

Morgan Stanley analysts expects China to roll out rate cuts, widen the fiscal deficit by expanding government bond quotas, announce more infrastructure investment, provide tax incentives to support high-end manufacturing and ease home purchase restrictions. The government announced Wednesday that it would extend tax breaks for people to buy electric cars through 2027, in an effort to boost both demand and industrial output.

However, more and more domestic economists are urging Beijing to shift the focus of fiscal stimulus toward boosting household income, as the return on investment of infrastructure projects has declined, leaving local authorities struggling to repay the debt taken on to fund the constructions.

Spat at UN rights council over open-ended Israel probe

Agnès PEDRERO
Tue, June 20, 2023

Room XX at the UN Palais des Nations in Geneva, which hosts the Human Rights Council, features a ceiling created by contemporary Spanish artist Miquel Barcelo (FABRICE COFFRINI)

The United States, on behalf of 27 countries, condemned Tuesday the open-ended nature of the UN investigation into alleged human rights violations in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the "disproportionate" attention on Israel.

US ambassador Michele Taylor told the United Nations' Human Rights Council that the group of countries was "deeply concerned" about the Commission of Inquiry (COI), with its "open-ended mandate with no sunset clause" or closing date.

The countries, including Austria, Britain, Canada and Italy, demanded an end to the "long-standing disproportionate attention given to Israel in the council".


The COI, which is the highest-level investigation that can be ordered by the Human Rights Council, was set up in May 2021 following a surge in deadly violence between Israelis and Palestinians earlier that month.

The council established an ongoing independent, international COI to investigate "all alleged violations of international humanitarian law and all alleged violations and abuses of international human rights law" in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem.

It is also charged with looking into "all underlying root causes of recurrent tensions, instability and protraction of conflict".

- 'Punitive methods' -

The first-ever open-ended COI is being conducted by UN rights chief Navi Pillay of South Africa, along with India's Miloon Kothari and Chris Sidoti of Australia.

At a press conference in Geneva on Tuesday, Kothari referenced the calls for a sunset clause.

"We would like to see a sunset of the Israeli occupation... but until that time, an open-ended mandate is more than justified," he said.

Israel is refusing to cooperate with the investigation.

"Isn't it a spurious, very silly reason not to talk to the commissioners because they have an open mandate?" Pillay told the press conference.

In their second report published earlier this month, the investigators found that authorities both in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories were violating Palestinian civil society rights through harassment, threats, arrests, interrogations, detention and torture.

Israel's authorities were responsible for the majority of the violations, the report said.

"Our report found that Israeli authorities have used a variety of punitive methods intended to deter and interfere with the activities of Palestinian civil society members," Pillay told the Human Rights Council on Tuesday.

- China, Russia back mandate -

After the report was published, Israel slammed the findings, saying the country had a "robust and independent civil society... that can operate freely".

Israel, the United States and other Western countries regularly criticise the amount of attention devoted to Israel by the Human Rights Council.

As Israel is not cooperating with the investigation, its representative did not take part in Tuesday's discussion of the report in the council.

Palestinian ambassador Ibrahim Khraishi condemned the US-led joint statement, calling it "disgraceful".

Venezuela, speaking on behalf of several countries including China, Russia, Iran, North Korea and Syria, gave its full support to the commission's mandate.

"We express grave concern over attempts to undermine the... COI," said Venezuelan ambassador Hector Constant Rosales.

The European Union's representative noted that some EU member states had not supported setting up the commission "because of concerns about its broad mandate" and permanent nature.

apo/rjm/rox

Israeli police clash with Druze protesters in the Golan Heights. The rare violence leaves 20 injured

Associated Press
Wed, June 21, 2023

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli police on Wednesday fired tear gas, sponge-tipped bullets and a water canon during mass demonstrations by Druze Arabs in the Golan Heights — a rare burst of violence in the normally quiet area. At least 20 people were reported injured.

Thousands of Druze residents of the Golan took part in the demonstrations against the construction of massive wind turbines. The windswept area is an ideal spot for the turbines, but residents fear damage to their properties and landowners have said they did not understand the agreements they signed with a local power company, according to Israeli media.

Israeli police said a large crowd attempted to storm a police position in the town of Masade, throwing stones, fireworks, setting tires on fire, vandalizing police cars, blocking roads and even shooting live fire into the air.

A video released by police showed the crowd pelting riot police with objects.

The video showed Israeli riot police, accompanied by a large armored vehicle equipped with a water canon, marching through the streets, firing tear gas. The sound of rapid gunfire is heard in the background.

Israel’s Ziv Hospital reported 20 injuries — including 12 members of the police with light wounds and eight civilians, four of whom were in serious condition.

Israel captured the Golan, a strategic plateau overlooking northern Israel, from Syria in the 1967 Mideast war. It subsequently annexed the area in a move that was recognized by former President Donald Trump. But most of the international community considers the area to be occupied territory.

While Druze leaders still profess allegiance to Syria, relations with Israel are normally good. The Golan is a popular vacation destination for Israelis and is filled with hotels and restaurants, and most residents speak Hebrew fluently. Violent clashes with Israeli authorities are rare.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said he met with a Druze spiritual leader on Wednesday afternoon as officials tried to defuse the situation.

“I view with great severity and concern what is happening at the moment on the Golan Heights,” he said.

Israeli police in riot gear stand near Druze protesters as thousands took part in the demonstrations against the construction of massive wind turbines in the Golan Heights,, Wednesday, June 21, 2023. Israeli police fired tear gas, sponge-tipped bullets and a water canon during the mass demonstrations by Druze Arabs — a rare burst of violence in the normally quiet area. **ISRAEL OUT**

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for DRUZE 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Druze

Druze - Wikipedia 

The Druze faith is one of the major religious groups in the Levant, with between 800,000 and a million adherents. They are found primarily in Lebanon, Syria, ...

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Druze

Druze | History, Religion, & Facts - Encyclopedia Britan... 

May 12, 2023 ... Druze, also spelled Druse, Arabic plural Durūz, singular Darazi, small Middle Eastern religious sect characterized by an eclectic system of ...

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2016/03/21/5-facts-about-israeli-druze-a-unique-religious-and-ethnic-group

5 facts about Israeli Druze, a unique religious and ethnic g... 

Mar 21, 2016 ... But unlike the Kurds, who are largely Muslim, the Druze are a unique religious and ethnic group. Their tradition dates back to the 11th century ...

https://www.americandruzefoundation.org/about-the-druze

About the Druze 

The Druze are followers of the Tawheed faith that centers on the belief in the oneness of God. According to most sources, lacking exact census, the Druze number ...

https://www.arabnews.com/Druze

Druze: the great survivors - Arab News 

To many, the Druze are an enigma, Arabic-speaking followers of an esoteric Abrahamic faith rooted in Islam, but which branched out on a different spiritual ...

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Druze - History, Modern era, Immigration and settlement patt... 

The Druze, also known as the "Sons of Grace," are a secretive, tightly-knit religious sect whose origins can be traced to Egypt a thousand years ago.

ZIONIST KRISTALLNACHT
ILLEGAL Israeli settlers torch Palestinian homes and cars to avenge deadly shooting. 

A Palestinian is killed





























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Palestinians are seen in their home behind a broken window,  damaged by Israeli settlers, in the West Bank village of A Laban al-Sharkiyeh, Wednesday, June 21, 2023. Israeli settlers set fire to cars after four Israelis were killed by Palestinian gunmen in the northern West Bank on Tuesday.

 (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)


ISABEL DEBRE
Wed, June 21, 2023 

TURMUS AYYA, West Bank (AP) — Hundreds of Israeli settlers stormed into a Palestinian town in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday, setting fire to dozens of cars and homes to avenge the deaths of four Israelis killed by a pair of Palestinian gunmen the previous day, residents said. Palestinians said one man was killed in the violence.

The settler attack came as the Israeli military deployed additional forces across the occupied West Bank, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced plans to build 1,000 new settler homes in response to the deadly shooting.

The moves threatened to further raise tensions after two days of deadly fighting in the West Bank that included a daylong Israeli military raid in a Palestinian militant stronghold and Tuesday's mass shooting.

Palestinian residents and human rights groups have long complained about Israel's inability or refusal to halt settler violence. In Wednesday's rampage, residents in Turmus Ayya said some 400 settlers marched down the town's main road, setting fire to cars, homes and trees.

Mayor Lafi Adeeb said some 30 houses and 60 cars were partly or totally burned.

“The attacks intensified in the past hour even after the army came,” he said. At least eight Palestinians were hurt during the ensuing clashes, which the army tried to disperse by firing rubber bullets and tear gas.

Palestinian medical officials said one man — identified as 27-year-old Omar Qatin — was killed by army fire and two other people were wounded. Residents said Qatin was a father of two small children and worked as an electrician for the local municipality.

“He was just standing there, innocent, he is such a kind hearted kid. He had no stones, he was totally unarmed, he was at least half a mile (one kilometer) away from the military,” said Khamis Jbara, his neighbor. “He works from 6am to 6pm. He is a peaceful man.”

Palestinian residents of the town, known for its large number of American citizens, were seething and in shock after the attack.

Streets were littered broken pots, uprooted trees, charred yard furniture and skeletons of cars. At least one house was completely torched, the living room blackened, the furniture burned to ashes.

“It was terrifying, we just saw mobs of people in the streets, masked, armed,” said Mohammed Suleiman, a 56-year-old Palestinian-American who lives in Chicago and was visiting his hometown. He said his brother, who is currently in Chicago, owns one of the burned houses.

Suleiman blamed the Israeli military, saying the soldiers turned their guns on the Palestinian residents instead of the vandals marching into the town with guns and firebombs, throwing fuel oil and setting alight everything in their path. The army "literally clearing the way for them,” he said.

Abdulkarim Abdulkarim, a 44-year-old resident of Ohio, said his family’s four cars were burned and house damaged. “They call us terrorists but here you have terrorism supported by the government,” he said.

In the home of the Shalaby family, eight children hid on the third floor when they saw a mob of masked settlers slash tires and throw fuel on three cars. Within moments, their front yard erupted into a giant fireball. At least one of the armed settlers burst through the front door, trashing the sunroom and breaking windows.

“I just kept thinking I was going to die,” said 15-year-old Mohammed Awwad, an American citizen from northern California who was visiting his grandparents. He was removing glass from his foot as his family packed up their valuables to take to their aunt’s house in the hills, fearing the settlers’ return.

Turmus Ayya, a town with luxurious villas with gardens and views of rolling olive groves, is frequently a target of settler attacks from the nearby Shilo settlement. Tayem Abu Awwad, whose old car was torched in a separate attack last week, said his brand new Toyota was charred in Wednesday's rampage.

The Israeli military said it sent forces into the town “to extinguish the fires, prevent clashes and to collect evidence.” It said the settlers had left the town, and Israeli police opened an investigation.

The military said it “condemns these serious incidents of violence and destruction of property," adding that settler violence prevents it from carrying out its “main mission” of protecting national security and battling militants.

The settler attack brought back memories of a rampage last February in which dozens of cars and homes were torched in the town of Hawara following the killing of a pair of Israeli brothers by a Palestinian gunman.

Tuesday's shooting in the settlement of Eli came a day after seven Palestinians were killed in a daylong battle against Israeli troops in the militant stronghold of Jenin. The worsening violence has created a test for Israel’s government and prompted calls for a widespread military operation in the West Bank.

As Israel deployed more forces to the area, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had approved plans to build 1,000 new homes in Eli.

“Our answer to terror is to strike it hard and to build our country,” Netanyahu said.

The international community opposes settlements on occupied lands sought by the Palestinians for a future independent state. Netanyahu's far-right government is dominated by settler leaders and supporters.

Israeli media identified the four killed in the shooting as Harel Masood, 21, Ofer Fayerman, 64, and Elisha Anteman, 18, Nahman-Shmuel Mordoff, 17. An Israeli civilian killed one assailant at the scene, while Israeli troops chased and killed the second shooter after he fled.

Tuesday’s shooting followed a massive gunbattle between Palestinian militants and Israeli troops in the northern Jenin refugee camp a day earlier. On Wednesday, the Palestinian death toll from the raid rose to seven when 15-year-old Sadeel Naghniyeh succumbed to wounds sustained in the gunbattle, Palestinian health officials said.

Some 90 Palestinians, and eight Israeli soldiers were also wounded in the shootout.

Tuesday's deadly shooting was the latest in a long string of violence in the region over the past year and half that shows no sign of relenting. At least 130 Palestinians and 24 people on the Israeli side have been killed so far this year, according to a tally by The Associated Press.

Israel says most of the Palestinians killed were militants, but stone-throwing youths protesting the incursions and others not involved in confrontations have also been killed.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians seek those territories for a future independent state.

Palestinian villagers attacked in wake of Israeli settler killings, Palestinian official say


Kareem Khadder

CNN
Wed, June 21, 2023 

Hundreds of Israeli settlers attacked the Palestinian village of Turmusayya in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday, the day after the killing of four settlers nearby, according to the mayor of the village.

One Palestinian man was killed, the Palestinian Ministry of Health said. Palestine TV named him as Omar Quttain, 27.

At least 12 people from the town were injured by live fire, Mayor Adeeb Laffi said, shortly before the announcement of Quttain’s death. He said masked settlers were setting fire to cars and homes.

The health ministry said three people had arrived at a hospital in Ramallah with injuries in the lower limbs from live fire.

“The Israeli army is not doing anything to stop them,” Laffi said, in reference to the settlers.

The Israel Defense Forces did not respond Wednesday to multiple CNN questions about settler violence against Palestinian villagers in the region.

Turmusayya is less than five miles (eight kilometers) from Eli, where the four Israelis were killed on Tuesday.

Laffi said more than 50 vehicles and 15 houses had been set on fire in his village by Israeli settlers who arrived in the town after Muslim noon prayers.

Many of the settlers were masked and carried guns, he said.

Overnight attacks

The attack comes after a Palestinian official who monitors settler violence against Palestinians in the northern West Bank said dozens of villagers had been injured overnight in settler attacks.

At least 37 villagers were injured by live or rubber-coated bullets, stones, or tear gas according to the official, Ghassan Douglas.

He said 147 vehicles were damaged with stones or set on fire, including an ambulance, and that 23 houses and 16 shops were damaged, and crops set on fire in fields.

The violence was reminiscent of settler attacks in and around the village of Huwara in February in response to the killing of two Israeli settler brothers in the village. February’s violence was so severe that the commander of Israeli forces in the West Bank called it a “pogrom,” evoking historic memories of ethnic violence targeting Jews.

The attacks overnight on Tuesday took place over a wide area of the northern West Bank, from Turmusayya east of Ramallah to Deir Sharaf west of Nablus, he said. The area is about 50 kilometers (30 miles) north from Jerusalem.

Different Israeli officials sent different messages in the wake of Tuesday’s shooting of the settlers which included two teenagers, a man in his 20s and a man in his 60s.

Scorched cars, including some junked for spare parts, left in the West Bank village of A Laban al-Sharkiyeh on June 21, 2023. - Majdi Mohammed/AP

Israel Defense Forces (IDF) chief spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari urged people not to take the law into their own hands.

But far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, speaking at the scene of the killings near Eli, called on settlers to arm themselves to avoid becoming sitting ducks for Palestinian attacks.

On Monday, an Israeli raid in Jenin, one of the tensest cities in the occupied West Bank, erupted into a massive firefight that left at least seven Palestinians dead and dozens wounded.

The following day, two Palestinian gunmen shot dead the four Israelis near Eli. Both gunmen were subsequently killed by Israeli forces. Hamas, the Palestinian militant movement, claimed the two gunmen as members. It said the attack was “a natural response” to the Israeli raid on Jenin a day earlier.

CNN’s Hadas Gold contributed reporting.

Scientists have discovered an alarming new side effect of air pollution: ‘We had not thought about this before’



Eliot Engelmaier
Tue, June 20, 2023 

Air pollution is having an unbelievable effect on flies, altering how they attract one another and mate.

What’s happening?

Insects typically find their mates by heavily relying on pheromones –– chemicals that allow males and females to locate each other and mate.

These pheromones are distinctive to males and females of a species, and in the case of flies, they are being disrupted and degraded by the pervasive increase of ozone in the air, which is a result of air pollution.

Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology in Germany discovered these effects by developing an experiment that mimicked ozone levels similar to what is measured during the summertime in cities.

Typically, male flies’ pheromones attract females while simultaneously repelling other males. But increased ozone levels caused a decrease in pheromones, which caused females to be less attracted to males and led to courtship between male flies.

“We could explain that males started courting each other after a short ozone exposure because they obviously could not distinguish ozonated males from females,” said researchers Nanji Jiang and Markus Knaden. “However, we had not thought about this before. Therefore, we were quite puzzled by the behavior of the ozone-exposed males, which lined up in long courtship chains.”

Why is this important?

The effects of this news are substantial. It is not just flies that are affected –– ozone is thought to affect the patterns of many insects.

Pheromone communication is not only used for mating. It also helps insects identify members of the same species and their communities, such as bee hives, wasp nests, and ant colonies. Nothing sounds more chaotic than a bunch of ants, bees, and wasps confused and out of place.

The chaos doesn’t stop there –– insects such as bees and butterflies are vital pollinators. A decrease in pheromones equals a decline in reproduction and population. The effects could be detrimental, as 80% of our crops require insect pollinators.
What can I do to help prevent this?

According to Bill Hansson, head of the Evolutionary Neuroethology Department and co-founder of the Max Planck Center Next Generation Insect Chemical Ecology, “the only solution to this dilemma is to immediately reduce pollutants in the atmosphere.”

Immediately reducing pollutants in the atmosphere will require efforts from large brands and corporations that release a significant amount of pollutants. Still, some steps can be taken on an individual level as well. Individuals can drive their cars less, use less energy, and opt for more sustainable shopping options, to name a few.

NATIONALIZE BIG PHARMA

Pharmaceutical trade group sues US over Medicare drug price negotiation plans

Wed, June 21, 2023 
By Patrick Wingrove

NEW YORK, June 21 (Reuters) - The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), the leading industry lobby group, and two other organizations on Wednesday said they were suing the U.S. government to block enforcement of a program that gives Medicare the power to negotiate drug prices.

In a complaint filed in a federal court in Texas, PhRMA along with the National Infusion Center Association and the Global Colon Cancer Association, which counts PhRMA and some drug companies as members, said the drug price negotiation program was unconstitutional.

This marks the fourth lawsuit challenging the law, which is part of President Joe Biden’s signature Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), after separate legal challenges by Merck & Co, Bristol Myers Squibb, and the influential business group the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The pharmaceutical industry claims negotiating prices of its products with the government health plan for Americans age 65 and older will curtail profits and compel them to pull back on developing groundbreaking new treatments.

PhRMA represents many of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world, including Merck and Bristol Myers.

Americans pay more for prescription medicines than any other country. The Biden administration's drug pricing reform aims to save $25 billion annually by 2031 through price negotiations for the drugs most costly to Medicare.

The latest lawsuit argues that the "unrestrained authority" given to the Department for Health and Human Services (HHS) by Congress conflicts with the United States' separation-of-power principle.

"Congress took a series of unconstitutional shortcuts, giving the executive branch the open ended task of replacing market based prices in Medicare with an entirely new set of prices at the (Medicare) agency's own choosing," PhRMA general counsel James Stansel said at a press conference.

The lawsuit also contends that the price negotiation program violates the U.S. Constitution's Eight Amendment, which protects against excessive fines, and Fifth Amendment by exempting key decisions from public input.

PhRMA and the other two groups are seeking an injunction against the price caps and a declaration that the IRA's price negotiation is unconstitutional.

The negotiations are scheduled to start in September after the agency that runs Medicare and Medicaid releases its list of 10 costly drugs initially selected for the process, with the agreed prices taking effect in 2026.

The suits challenging the plan have been filed in four different federal courts, with Merck's in Washington, D.C., the Chamber of Commerce in Ohio and Bristol Myers' in New Jersey.

In response to the previous lawsuits, the White House said there is nothing in the U.S. Constitution that prevents Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices.

A spokesperson for HHS on Wednesday said the law is on its side.

“As the (HHS) secretary has already made clear, we will vigorously defend the president’s drug price negotiation law, which is already helping to lower healthcare costs for seniors and people with disabilities." (Reporting by Patrick Wingrove and Michael Erman; Editing by Mark Porter and Bill Berkrot)

"Women bear the biggest brunt of climate change,’ says climate scientist Susan Chomba


Neha Wadekar in Baringo county, Kenya

THE GUARDIAN
Wed, June 21, 2023 

Susan Chomba glares out the window of the Prado Land Cruiser at dozens of motorcycles speeding in the opposite direction. Each motorcycle carries at least five bags of charcoal and for every bag, at least three medium-sized acacia trees must be chopped down and burned. Charcoal production is banned in Kenya, but is still widely used for domestic heat and cooking.

Chomba loves trees. She can rattle off the scientific and local names of countless species and detail their ideal growing conditions. She holds a PhD in forest governance and master’s degrees in agriculture development and agroforestry. She is director of food, land and water programs, continent-wide, at the World Resources Institute (WRI), a global environmental research non-profit. She manages a portfolio of $20m and a staff of 100.

She is a rarity.

Roughly 12% of the world’s top climate scientists are women and fewer than one percent are from Africa – a continent hard hit by climate change. “If you look at the way the world operates, it’s almost blind to the fact that women bear the biggest burden and brunt of climate change,” Chomba says. That Chomba is an African woman in such a key role is potentially revolutionary, especially because she goes out of her way to solicit the views of those most affected and often most unheard – local farmers, community elders and, notably, women.

“The way climate is seen in the world, it’s seen very much from a masculine perspective,” Chomba says. For example, while male climate scientists focus heavily on developing renewable sources of energy to replace fossil fuels like oil and gas, Chomba believes they pay far less attention to the hundreds of millions of women worldwide who are burning wood for tasks like cooking. Incorporating the perspectives of women – particularly poor, rural women – would better ensure comprehensive solutions, she says.

Chomba is 40 years old but still remembers the hunger pangs she suffered as a child when the land failed to yield enough food for her family. More people, most likely women and children, will suffer the same fate, or worse, if wise and profound changes aren’t made soon.

Today, she is traveling with a team of WRI experts from Nairobi to Baringo county in Kenya’s Great Rift Valley, home to mountainous forests that supply 75% of Kenya’s water. But the expansion of agriculture into previously natural environments, deforestation for charcoal and logging, urbanization and climate change have ravaged the land, leaving it thirsty and bare. Locals say they haven’t had a yield of maize or beans, their staple crops, in three years.

Chomba and her team visit a giant gully that has split the ground into two in the middle of the farmland. The area has been overharvested and overgrazed, with few natural grasses or indigenous trees left to hold the soil together. That, combined with climate change and an intense dry season, has left the earth looking like parched, cracked skin.

An elderly farmer points to a tree and says cooking oil can be extracted from the native species.

“How can we do this through the Terrafund?” Chomba asks her team, referring to the WRI’s lending program to support businesses addressing land degradation and restoration. “We have a muze [an elder] with knowledge, a fund that wants to invest and a place that needs seedlings.”

There’s an urgent need for community-driven ideas, but hasty, half-baked “solutions” can exacerbate harm, Chomba argues on the drive to Baringo county. At the end of last year, for example, Kenya’s newly-elected president, William Ruto, announced his intention to plant 15bn trees in Kenya by 2032. But Chomba says the plan fails to specify which species will be planted (native or foreign), where they will be planted (forest reserves or communal farms), why they will be planted (for timber, carbon, fruit, or soil fertility), and who will actually grow them.

“The devil is in the details, and that’s lacking,” Chomba says. “If you don’t address deforestation causes, forget about your tree planting. It’s useless.”

***

Chomba grew up in Kirinyaga county in central Kenya, where her mother cultivated a small plot of land owned by a step-uncle. Chomba’s mother grew capsicum and french beans and formed cooperatives with other farmers so they could pool their products for export. Because her mother was a single parent and was always working, Chomba was largely raised by her grandmother.

“She used to tell me that if she could have gone to school, she would have studied so much that knowledge would be smoking out of her nostrils,” Chomba says. “She made sure that I knew that education was my only path out of poverty, out of the life we had back then.”

When Chomba was nine, her mother wanted to send her to a local boarding school, but the admissions staff in Kirinyaga took one look at her shabby clothes and turned her down.

“I’m not ashamed of my childhood poverty,” Chomba says today. “It’s what propelled me back then and what makes me sensitive to-date.”

Instead, Chomba traveled alone on a bus to a different boarding school in Western Kenya. A few years later, when Chomba’s mother ran out of money, Chomba returned to the provincial high school in Kirinyaga. Each student was given their own small patch of land to farm, and Chomba grew cabbage because they thrived in Kirinyaga’s cold climate. She experimented with organic farming, opting to use garlic and blackjack instead of chemical pesticides.

Chomba flashes a broad smile: “My cabbages were absolutely massive.”

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, when Kenyans were pushing back against the dictator Daniel Arap Moi, Wangari Maathai was pressing for forest conservation and fighting for multiparty democracy. Maathai, the first African woman to win a Nobel peace prize, inspired a generation of young, female Kenyan environmentalists.

“We just admired Professor Wangari,” Chomba says. “She taught us that nature belongs to all of us.”

Chomba wanted to study law, but she missed the university cut off by a single point. Her second choice was agricultural economics, but by a strange twist of fate, she was placed in a forestry course. It wasn’t until her third year, when Chomba took an agroforestry class, that she realized she had found her calling.

“The gods chose my life for me,” she says.

While Maathai was protesting in the streets, Chomba chose another path more aligned to her strengths – research.

“I have a lot of respect for activism, I think we need activism,” Chomba says. But she opted instead for a job that relies on evidence-based data as the basis to change systemic structures.

Chomba joined the International Centre for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF) and led an eight-country land restoration program, called “Regreening Africa,” which restored one million hectares of Africa’s degraded lands. By now a single parent, Chomba had to leave her son at home with her mother to pursue dual master’s degrees in Europe.

“[S]he had to really fight,” says Tom Vandenbosch, one of Chomba’s first mentors at ICRAF. “Her having a young son when she had to move to Europe to finish her studies – that’s not something which is so easy to do.”

Chomba returned to ICRAF as a climate change researcher advising some of the brightest diplomatic minds in Africa convened to tackle climate change at the Conference of Peoples (COP). Chomba called it “the most humbling space I ever occupied as a young researcher,” and says the job “touched the social justice part of my soul.”

This experience convinced Chomba to get her PhD at the University of Copenhagen.

Chomba married her husband in 2009 and gave birth to their son in 2010. Both her sons seem interested in the environment, but “kids never do what their parents want them to do”, Chomba admits.

***

Chomba’s team pulls up to the Baringo county government offices after a five-hour drive, enters a tiny office and crams around a table occupied by local officials. She will need their staff, resources and approval to operate in the county.

She strategically mentions budget numbers for Terrafund and as she utters the amount set aside for the Greater Rift Valley region – $6m – the officials straighten up, their interest piqued.

But challenges remain. Chomba broaches the issue of illegal charcoal production. One government official waives aside her concerns, citing Kenya’s struggling economy. “They are selling charcoal because they have no other option,” he says.

Chomba rolls her eyes.

***

The following morning, Chomba spends hours in the stifling heat speaking with women who are part of a grassroots gender-empowerment cooperative. Florence Lomariwo fled her home as a child to escape female genital cutting and child marriage and became a college-educated teacher. She describes how the drought is causing armed clashes between male herders, who are ranging farther from home to graze and water their livestock. Left alone, women are bearing the brunt of this.

“Most of the women are suffering deaths because of lack of water,” Lomariwo says. “For our family to survive, a woman [must] travel, even if it is 100km.”

Monicah Aluku, a 37-year-old widow, speaks up.

“Feel our pain,” she says. “There is no water. Women are walking so far to get water that they are miscarrying. There is no healthcare system. Kids are drinking dirty water and getting typhoid. We are really suffering.”

Chomba leans forward. She nods intently with a serious, steady gaze. Chomba and her team were scheduled to head back to Nairobi around 1pm, but they don’t leave until hours later. And only after Chomba has heard from every woman in the room.

This story was produced by the Fuller Project, a global newsroom dedicated to groundbreaking reporting that catalyzes positive change for women