A ruinous hailstorm in Spain may have been supercharged by warming seas

Giant hail couldn't have formed without climate change, computer simulations suggest

In August 2022, a storm of giant hail — fueled by a marine heat wave — pelted northeast Spain. One of those hailstones is shown here next to a 1 Euro coin for comparison.
@MORGANA_50/FORALLAC/CATALONIA




By Javier Barbuzano

A torrent of giant hailstones in northeast Spain may have been fueled by climate change.

On August 31, 2022, a brutal hailstorm struck the small Spanish city of La Bisbal d’Empordà. The storm unleashed balls of ice up to 12 centimeters wide, causing widespread damage to property and crops, injuring dozens of people and killing a 20-month-old toddler. Computer simulations now suggest that in a preindustrial climate, the storm could not have generated hailstones this big, researchers report in the March 28 Geophysical Research Letters.  

The study is the first to establish a link between climate change and a specific hailstorm. “In the past, it was thought that climate change could only be associated with large-scale or global phenomena,” says Juan Jesús González-Alemán, an atmospheric scientist at the Spanish State Meteorological Agency in Madrid.

He and his colleagues had suspected that a record-breaking marine heat wave in the western Mediterranean Sea had created the perfect conditions for extreme hailstorms. The heat wave lasted six weeks and pushed seawater temperatures to about 30° Celsius in some areas, or more than 3 degrees above normal, González-Alemán says. This in turn could have supercharged the atmosphere with energy and moisture.

It might be “counterintuitive” to link hail, which in principle requires cold, to a marine heat wave, González-Alemán says. But the extra energy the storm could draw from the hot sea allowed it to produce massive hailstones by staying longer at higher altitudes, where temperatures drop below freezing, he says. “Strong updrafts, fueled by warm sea temperatures and high humidity, can suspend larger hailstones, allowing them to grow for a longer time within the cloud.”

To see how the storm might have behaved in a world with a different climate, the researchers used computer simulations to re-create the storm under different circumstances. In one simulation, for example, the team lowered the sea temperature to the average for that time of the year. In another, they also changed atmospheric parameters to preindustrial levels, tweaking things such as air temperature, relative humidity and wind.

The simulations showed that while the storm would have occurred with or without climate change, it wouldn’t have been able to generate hailstones of the size witnessed in La Bisbal d’Empordà in a preindustrial climate.

The finding suggests a connection between climate change — which is leading to more frequent and more intense marine heat waves — and the formation of larger, more destructive hailstones (SN: 2/1/22). And, the researchers note, historical data on how often giant hail — defined in their study as wider than 5 centimeters — fell in Spain each year bear that out. While storms with giant hail were once rare, occurring on average three days a year in the early 2010s, the past decade or so has seen a small but worrying uptick in their frequency.

Climate scientist Olivia Romppainen-Martius, however, is wary of attributing hail events to climate change based on these kinds of simulations and past meteorological records. “You need multiple lines of evidence that are all robust to really support attribution statements,” says Romppainen-Martius, of the University of Bern in Germany.

One problem, she says, is that the computer simulations used in this study can´t directly compute the hail size produced by a storm. Instead, scientists must estimate a storm’s hail-forming potential based on parameters such as wind speed, atmospheric stability and air temperature. As a result, what researchers can really evaluate is the likelihood of forming a certain hail size under a particular set of conditions.

On top of that, Romppainen-Martius says, the historical databases used to estimate the hail-forming potential of storms could be incomplete, making any long-term trends less reliable. “I would say the jury is still out on whether or not we can attribute individual hail events to climate change.”

González-Alemán argues, however, that the team’s study shows the strong connection between sea temperature and creating the atmospheric conditions that can produce giant hail. The 2022 storm had “the perfect conditions to reach the maximum possible energy, and that is where the climate change comes in, because it makes [these] heat waves increasingly frequent.”

In the future, as extreme marine heat waves become more intense, people should expect more powerful hailstorms with larger hail sizes, he says. Simulations of the same storm in a context of more advanced climate change showed that hailstones could reach up to 20 centimeters across — nearly twice as wide the largest hail that fell on La Bisbal d’Empordà.

“As we learn more about these extreme events it becomes clear that we need to adapt,” González-Alemán says. “At this point, this is more about adaptation thananything else.”

CITATIONS

M.L. Martín et al. Major role of marine heatwave and anthropogenic climate change on a giant hail event in Spain. Geophysical Research Letters. Vol. 51, March 28, 2024, e2023GL107632. doi: 10.1029/2023GL107632.

CLIMATE CRISIS TOO
Kenya floods: Survivors seek loved ones as evacuation ordered

15 hours ago
By Barbara Plett Usher & Ian Wafula ,

BBC News, 

Mai Mahiu

BBCNancy Wanjiku sits on what is left of her parents' home

Kenyans living in areas at risk of flooding or landslides will be asked to evacuate on Wednesday, the country's president has said.

William Ruto was speaking in Mai Mahiu, north of Nairobi, where an overflowing reservoir has wiped out a swathe of houses and swept dozens of people to their death.

This is "not a time for guesswork" he said, noting the forecast for more heavy rain.

"The likelihood of flooding and people losing [their] lives is real", he added.

Although no definitive number was given, an evacuation order of this scale will likely target many thousands of people.


The rainy season has been extra punishing this year, and weeks of flooding have killed at least 170 people.

But the disaster at Mai Mahiu has been the most catastrophic so far.

The reality is still sinking in for those who had hoped their missing loved ones had survived.

"My brother was in his 70s when he died after being washed away," 62-year-old Nancy Wanjiku told the BBC.

She spoke to us sitting on the wreckage of what was once her parents' home.


"My mum and dad are safe but we have lost everything," she added.

Elsewhere, we saw a woman on the side of the road bent over double crying, losing herself in the news that the body of her child had been found.

Rescue workers continued the search for more of the dead.

We followed them down along the blasted banks of the Ngeya River - mostly members of the National Youth Services in bright yellow vests carrying shovels, rakes and sticks to poke through the branches of uprooted trees.

Some stopped at an enormous heap of broken branches that covered a crushed house. A family of six had lived there and the workers suspected they might be buried under the mound.

They called in a bulldozer to clear out the debris, but it did not find evidence of a watery death.

Not far from here we met Stephen Kamau, 31, helping a neighbour to sift through what is left of their home.

Stephen Kamau (R) has been trying to help his neighbour

"I'm trying to salvage things that were carried away by water and look for missing people as well," he explained.

"I woke up in a different world. Everything had been swept by water.... We are in fear. My heart is heavy."


Further downstream, a rescue team found the body of a woman tucked away in logs at the top of a bridge. Onlookers recognised her as someone who had worked at a local 24-hour car wash.

Another woman, who did not identify herself, trekked to the site to see if her three missing sisters had washed up there.

Her brother had searched for them in a nearby hospital, but came back empty-handed, she said.

She had stayed awake all night, worried that another tide of water would crash down on her while she was sleeping.

The terror of that flash-flood on Sunday night - triggered when water built up in a gully because a tunnel was blocked - is still vivid.


David Karanja has just returned from the morgue to view the body of his 9-year-old son Paul.

He stands with his eyes downcast and his arm in a sling, next to corrugated-iron roof panels lurching over the shell of his still-standing home, while he and his 17-year-old daughter Veronica told their story.

Veronica Karanja, 17, and her father David told the BBC of their loss

Like others that lived in the river valley, they were awakened by the roar of water at 03:00 local time (00:00 GMT) on Monday.

They rushed to switch off the power to avoid electric shock, but when David opened the door, Veronica was swept away. She says she clung to a tree branch until the water subsided.

When she made it back to the house, she couldn't find her father right away - until she heard people calling her name.

"He was hit by a stone," she told the BBC. "When he was trying to rescue my brother, a stone from the upper side of the wall hit his hand, and he let [Paul] go, and that's why [Paul] drowned."

The family lived off their livestock - all gone now. Their 900 hens perished. And of 21 pigs, only five are left. "We have totally nothing right now," Veronica said.

They are appealing for help, and President Ruto promised government support when he stopped at a local school sheltering survivors.

Those gathered were told they would get help rebuilding their houses, but not next to the river if experts deemed it possible they could once again be in the pathway of such destruction.

Mr Ruto said the authorities had mapped all fragile places in the country prone to floods and landslides, and that the army had been mobilised to help the evacuations.

He did not say where they would go, nor exactly from where the resources would come, although he mentioned working with development partners.

But the plan reflects his view that Kenya - and the region of East Africa - is vulnerable to extreme weather caused by climate change, and suggests he that sees this disastrous rainy season as part of a long-term problem.

CLIMATE CRISIS

Oppressive heat scorches Asia, prompts grim warning from scientists

AFP 

Published May 1, 2024 

BANGKOK: Large swaths of Asia are sweltering through a heatwave that has topped temperature records from Myanmar to the Philippines and forced millions of children to stay home from school.

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Here are some questions and answers about the extreme heat, which scientists warn will become more frequent and intense because of human-induced climate change.

Where is affected?

The heat has hit much of South and Southeast Asia, with record temperatures in Myan­mar’s Chauk and the Philippine capital Manila in recent days. Thai authorities have issued warnings about “severe conditions”, while authorities in Cambodia, Myanmar, Vietnam, India and Bangladesh all forecast temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit).


The Philippines and Bangladesh both suspended in-person classes, while India is reviewing whether heat has affected turnout in national elections. Even northern Japan has been affected: temperatures in Japan’s Sapporo this month passed 25C (77F) at the earliest point of any year on record.

What is causing the heat?

The months preceding the region’s monsoon, or rainy season, are usually hot but temperatures this year are well above average in many countries. Experts say climate change is causing more frequent heatwaves that are more intense and last longer.

Asia is also warming faster than the global average, accor­ding to the World Meteoro­logical Organisation, a UN agency. And the El Nino weather phenomenon is playing a role this year, said Milton Speer, a meteorologist and visiting research fellow at the University of Technology Sydney.

“The lack of cloud in El Ninos means that temperatures are likely to be higher on average,” he said. Sea surface temperatures in the region are currently several degrees Celsius above normal, “which helps keep the temperatures higher than average inland overnight”.

“So daytime temperatures start climbing from a higher base.” There are other factors at play too, including deforestation that reduces shade and increases dry surface area, and the urban heat island effect, where concrete, glass and steel structures absorb rather than reflect heat.

Who is affected?

Extreme heat disproportionately affects children, the elderly and those living in poverty. Children, older people and those with pre-existing conditions or disabilities can overheat more quickly.

Those living in poverty also often lack cooling solutions at home or are forced to work in conditions without adequate heat protection. The UN children’s agency Unicef warned this month that 243 million children across the Pacific and East Asia are at risk from heatwaves.

“Child exposure to heatwaves leads to heat stress,” said Salwa Aleryani, health specialist for Unicef’s regional East Asia and Pacific office. “Severe issues can develop, such as cardiovascular diseases, organ failure, muscle and nerve dysfunction,” she said.

How have countries reacted?

Authorities in several countries asked citizens to stay at home. Hospitals in Nepal were put on standby, while Cambodian officials asked public schools to keep doors and windows open for ventilation. Measures went further in Bangladesh and the Philippines, with schools closed for days.

Published in Dawn, May 1st, 2024

The Asian heatwave is shattering meteorological records

The continent has become increasingly susceptible to climate change, with millions enduring sweltering conditions and heat-related disruptions.

ARTICLE BY
Staff Reporter
PUBLISHED
30 Apr 2024


Photo by Sudarshan Jha

Unprecedented levels of heat are continuing to affect millions of people in South and Southeast Asia, with heat indices exceeding 50ºC in parts of the Philippines, and new temperature records set in three dozen districts across Thailand.

Heat indices reflect so-called “apparent temperature” – what hot weather feels like to the human body when humid conditions prevent the cooling effects of evaporating perspiration.

On Monday, conditions in the Philippines forced authorities to cancel in-person schooling for over 1.3 million students from nearly 4,000 schools. “The pupils can’t cope with this kind of weather,” the principal of one primary school told the Associated Press.

The extreme heat has seen a surge in demand for electricity to power air-conditioners and fans, with the national grid operator warning of insufficient power.

Thailand has meanwhile seen temperatures top 40ºC in 26 of its 77 provinces this month, with the northern province of Lampang wilting under the country’s highest reading of 44.2ºC.

[See more: The number of hot days could more than double by mid-century, SMG says]

Thai authorities have warned of even hotter weather in the coming days and told people to avoid prolonged outdoor activity, while energy use soared to a record 36,699MW yesterday.

State media in Vietnam has meanwhile reported large numbers of people seeking relief from the heat in air-conditioned shopping malls in Ho Chi Minh City, with authorities warning of a higher risk of forest fires. In Malaysia, 16 regions have seen temperatures between 35ºC and 40ºC for three days running.

Temperatures rose to 43ºC in Bangladesh yesterday, with authorities ordering schools to close. In India, the heat was even more severe, reaching 45.6ºC in parts of the country and exceeding climatological norms by as much as 8ºC.

Even in northerly Japan, the heat has been unprecedented for this time of year, with many places across the country registering temperatures in excess of 30ºC last weekend.

The World Meteorological Organisation warned last month of “severe heat conditions” in Asia, which scientists are attributing to climate change exacerbated by the El Niño weather phenomenon – a warming of the ocean surface in parts of the tropical Pacific that creates hotter conditions.

PAKISTAN

Scores held in Punjab for protesting govt’s ‘unfair’ wheat policy

Amjad Mahmood 

DAWN

Published April 30, 2024 

• Farmers claim hundreds detained across Punjab, police say 46 people in custody

• Kissan Ittehad leader announces plans to block highways across province; PTI lends support

• Punjab likely to unveil wheat policy in assembly today

LAHORE: As farmers from across the province thronged The Mall to record their protest against what they believe to be an unfair wheat procurement policy, a heavy contingent of Punjab police in anti-riot gear rounded up scores of their number, on Monday.

The farmers had taken to the streets against an inordinate delay in the purchase of grain and the decision to reduce the provincial procurement quota from over 4 million tonnes to 2.3m tonnes.

Lahore: A protesting farmer is bundled into a prison van by police, on Monday night. —Murtaza Ali / White Star

The protesters, led by Kissan Ittehad Pakistan, managed to assemble at the GPO Chowk on The Mall and attempted to march towards the Punjab Assembly, where a heavy contingent of police intercepted them. Police not only blocked the road by placing containers, but also arrested several protesters.

Kissan Ittehad Pakistan General Secretary Mian Umair Masood, who led the demonstration, told Dawn that more than 250 farmers were arrested by police in Lahore. He, however, managed to evade arrest himself.

There were reports that arrests were also made in Rahim Yar Khan, Khanewal, Vehari, Kasur, Multan, Sadiqabad, Pakpattan, Muzaffargarh, and Sahiwal districts. Police sources, however, claimed 46 protesters were taken into custody: 30 from The Mall and 16 from Manga Mandi.

‘Province-wide protests’

Mian Umair said they were planning to block highways across the province with the help of their families and livestock, which would be brought to roads. The protesting farmers have also found their allies in the opposition, particularly the PTI and the Jammat-i-Islami, as well as in lawmakers from the treasury benches who are apprehensive about the procurement policy.

The farming community has found allies in the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf and Jamaat-i-Islami, whose farmer wing Kisan Board is scheduled to hold protests on Tuesday (today), while those ruling PML-N MPAs belonging to the countryside have also expressed their concerns at the present procurement policy.

The government, however, continued to play down the issue, with its spokesperson Azma Bukhari claiming that the police had not taken any protest leader into custody from anywhere. She said that the government was in contact with “real representative bodies” of the farmers and accused the workers of a political party of launching the protest for “political purposes”.

Procurement policy faults

Punjab — the bread basket of the country — procured over 4 million tonnes of wheat every season to meet its yearly requirements. But, this year the authorities decided to slash the procurement target by half, claiming that there was a carryover stock of 2.3m tonnes already available.

The caretaker government — tasked with the day-to-day affairs and overseeing the elections — imported around 3m tonnes of wheat, which was more than the province’s needs and led to a huge carryover stock leaving little storage capacity.

Likewise, the government had also changed the procedure for applying to sell wheat to the food department. Unlike in the past when the growers were required to submit written applications to procure gunny bags used to pack and transport wheat to procurement centres, the government launched a mobile application for the purpose, conveniently ignoring the fact that a majority of the rural population is not well-versed in technology.

Even then, over 400,000 growers applied for gunny bags; but the government said it would issue six bags per acre and only to those who owned up to six acres of land.

Mian Umair said the government’s decision was mala fide. “Owners of up to six acres of land rarely sell their wheat to the government because they retain almost half of the produce for domestic use and the rest is meant for the aarti (middlemen), fertiliser, and pesticides dealers from whom they had made purchases for their fields on credit.

Similarly, the procurement campaign has also been unusually delayed this year, crashing the local wheat market with middlemen exploiting the situation by buying wheat from the growers at much less than the officially fixed minimum support price of Rs3,900 per 40kg.

These steps raised many an eyebrow even among the ruling party’s elected representatives. The issue also resonated multiple times in the Punjab Assembly and a general discussion was also held.

‘Above normal moisture’

Without clearly committing when to start the procurement drive, Food Minister Bilal Yasin defended the delay saying due to rains the grain carried above normal moisture up to 18 percent. “After drying up this produce will lose weight causing financial loss to the provincial kitty,” he claimed.

Meanwhile, the government is trying to appease the farming community by feeding information that it is considering a Rs130 billion package and also planning to give a subsidy between Rs400 and Rs600 per 40kg instead of increasing the procurement target.

But Kissan Ittehad leader Khalid Batth voiced his suspicion, saying the government would use this policy “as a ploy to relieve pressure” from the farming community for the time being.

Such dilly-dallying measures are disturbing even for the ruling party members, who are under pressure from their rural electorate. Punjab Assembly speaker Malik Muhammad Ahmed Khan refused to prorogue the ongoing assembly session, which was to be put off sine die on Monday, when the finance and food ministers said the government would give a wheat policy on Tuesday (today). The speaker suspended the proceedings till Tuesday morning, as some MPAs suggested that the government should pay for wheat in phases if funds were unavailable.

Asif Chaudhry in Lahore also contributed to this report

Published in Dawn, April 30th, 2024

Wheat protests

Editorial 

DAWN

Published May 1, 2024 

THE crackdown on farmers protesting in Lahore and several other cities against the government’s ‘flawed’ wheat procurement policy and delays in the commencement of the grain’s official purchases in Punjab is deplorable.

Scores of farmers were manhandled and detained by police across the province on Monday, particularly in Lahore and south Punjab. The protesters appeared to have taken to the streets as a last resort after the authorities ignored their calls for help. Wheat rates have plummeted in the market, and are much below the support price of Rs3,900 per 40kg. The recent rains have added to the farmers’ woes.

And yet, the government continues to play down the problem, with its spokesperson dismissing the protests as politically motivated. This is not how governments treat those who grow food for the entire country, and the ruling PML-N may, sooner or later, have to pay a big political price for neglecting the plight of farmers, especially smallholders, who have already announced plans to block highways with the opposition’s support.

Indeed, the provincial administration has valid reasons for streamlining its wheat purchases through digitising the process, slashing the procurement target for the current harvest, and delaying official purchases far beyond the date announced earlier.

There are also no two opinions that the existing policy of excessive government intervention in the wheat market by fixing a minimum support price and procuring a larger portion of tradable surplus brought to the market by farmers each year has run its course and become a burden on the government budget. These interventions are ostensibly to support growers, and ensure price stability and food security.

In fact, they benefit only the middlemen, and flour millers, especially those who operate only for a few months, and that too on subsidised wheat quotas from official stocks. This policy must end.

However, a sudden curtailment of the government’s role will prove harmful for farmers amid collapsing wheat prices resulting from record production and unseasonal rains that are threatening the crop. The government should withdraw from the wheat trade gradually, replacing the existing market support mechanism with an effective new one over the next several years.

Many believe that the previous caretaker set-up’s reckless decision to import over 3.2Mt of grain when the harvest was approaching is responsible for the restricted official purchase target. This is largely true.

If the Punjab government did not have stocks of over 2Mt, it might have raised its procurement target for the ongoing harvest without much fuss to avoid protests. Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal also blames unnecessary wheat imports for the present market volatility. The authorities, therefore, must investigate the motives behind this reckless decision and fix responsibility.

Published in Dawn, May 1st, 2024

Australia tiptoes around Indian spy scandal

AFP 

Published May 1, 2024 

Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese speaks during a National Cabinet meeting at the Commonwealth Parliamentary Offices in Sydney on May 1. — AFP

A string of senior Australian ministers on Wednesday refused to confirm reports that a “nest” of Indian spies had been uncovered in the country and expelled — allegations that threaten to damage a burgeoning alliance.

Australia’s prime minister and foreign, defence and treasury ministers all dodged questions about allegations that Indian spooks tried to steal defence secrets and monitor expatriate communities in 2020.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he would not comment on intelligence matters, after public broadcaster ABC broke the news citing unnamed “national security and government figures”.

Intelligence bosses revealed in 2021 that they had rumbled a “nest of spies” sent to Australia to steal defence secrets and monitor their country’s expats. Although the foreign spies were expelled from the country at the time, Australian officials have long refused to say who they were working for.

Local media now claim to have solved the mystery, with ABC alleging they were intelligence operatives dispatched from India.

The revelations are politically awkward for Canberra, given the growing security relationship between India and Australia. Alongside the United States and Japan, they are members of the Quad security partnership.

Albanese wooed Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a visit to Australia last year, referring to him as the “boss” during a massive rally of Indian-Australians.

Like many Western capitals, Canberra has chosen to play down concerns about the sectarian policies and democratic backsliding of Modi’s Hindu-nationalist government, in favour of developing trade and defence ties.

Relations between India and Canada cratered after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau publicly linked Indian intelligence to the killing of a Canadian citizen, a Sikh separatist, on Canadian soil. New Delhi called the allegations “absurd”.

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong refused to comment on “intelligence matters”, although she said it was crucial to “assert the importance of our democratic principles”.

Wong said Australia would “maintain the resilience of our democracy, including in the face of any suggestion of foreign interference”. “And we have laws to deal with that,” she added.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers said it was “not something I’m prepared to go into” — but stressed Australia had a “good relationship with India”.

Top spymaster Mike Burgess has previously accused the spies of trying to cultivate politicians, police and embassy staff.

“They tried to obtain classified information about Australia’s trade relationships,” he said in 2021, without naming their nationality.

“They asked a public servant to provide information on security protocols at a major airport.” The Indian High Commission did not respond to a request for comment.

US ‘expects accountability’ from India, says State Dept

Anwar Iqbal 

Published May 1, 2024


WASHINGTON: The US State Department stated on Tuesday that it expects India to address the alleged involvement of senior Indian officials in assassination attempts within the United States.

“We continue to expect accountability from the government of India based on the results of the Indian inquiry committee’s work, and we are regularly working with them and inquiring for additional updates,” said the department’s principal deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel during a news briefing in Washington.

Patel also emphasised that the United States continues to “raise our concerns directly with the Indian government at senior levels”. However, he declined to “parse into this further” from a public podium and deferred further inquiries to the Department of Justice.

A Washington Post report on Monday presented the clearest link yet between India’s government and a thwarted assassination attempt targeting a Sikh activist in the US last year. The report also outlined the involvement of Indian intelligence officials in other assassinations in Canada and Pakistan.

Responding to another question about defence cooperation between the United States and Pakistan, Patel stated that the two allies shared a common interest in addressing threats to regional security.

“We support Pakistan’s efforts to combat terrorism and ensure the safety and security of its citizens in a manner that promotes the rule of law and protection of human rights,” he added.

The US official underscored that Washington’s partnership with Islamabad on security matters involves a high-level counter-terrorism dialogue, robust funding for counter-terrorism capacity-building programmes, and support for a series of US-Pakistan military engagements.

Published in Dawn, May 1st, 2024

Toronto’s Khalsa Day festivities marked by Khalistan slogans during Trudeau speech

Dawn.com 

Published April 29, 2024 

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau addresses a Khalsa Day celebration in Toronto, Ontario, Canada on Sunday. — CPAC

Khalsa Day festivities in Canada’s Toronto were marked by slogans raised in favour of the Khalistan movement during a speech by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Indian media outlets reported on Monday.

The festival of Vaisakhi — also known as Baisakhi — honours the founding of the Sikh community known as the Khalsa in 1699. It also marks the beginning of a new solar year and the harvesting season.

India’s New Delhi Television Ltd reported that “loud chants” were raised in Sunday’s celebrations attended by “thousands” amid the presence of the Canadian premier, opposition leader Pierre Poilievre, Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow and prominent Canadian Sikh leader Jagmeet Singh, chief of the New Democratic Party.

“Trudeau, in a staunch assurance to the Sikh Community in the country, has said that the government is always there to protect their rights and freedoms at all costs,” the report said.

“To the nearly, 800,000 Canadians of Sikh heritage across this country, … we will always defend your community against hatred and discrimination,” he was quoted as saying in the report.

“The Canadian prime minister mentioned that they’re improving security and infrastructure by adding more security to community centres and places of worship, like gurdwaras,” reported IndiaToday.

Meanwhile, India summoned the Canadian deputy high commissioner and expressed “deep concern and strong protest” after the separatist slogans were raised.

Bilateral diplomatic relations soured last year after Trudeau said Canada was “actively pursuing credible allegations” that Indian agents were potentially linked to the June 2023 murder of a Canadian citizen.

India’s foreign affairs ministry said it had conveyed “deep concern and strong protest” at such actions “being allowed to continue unchecked at the event”.

The Canadian foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

What is the Khalistan movement and why is it fuelling India-Canada rift?

What is the Khalistan Movement?

The movement wants an independent Sikh state carved out of India and dates back to India and Pakistan’s independence in 1947 when the idea was pushed forward in negotiations preceding the partition of the Punjab region between the two new countries.

The Sikh religion was founded in Punjab in the late 15th century and currently has about 25 million followers worldwide. Sikhs form a majority of Punjab’s population but are a minority in India, comprising two per cent of its population of 1.4 billion.

Sikh separatists demand that their homeland “Khalistan”, meaning “the land of the pure”, be created out of Punjab.

The demand has resurfaced many times, most prominently during an insurgency in the 1970s and 1980s which paralysed the Indian Punjab for over a decade.

The Khalistan movement is considered a security threat by the Indian government. The bloodiest episode in the conflict between the government and Sikh separatists occurred in 1984.

Then-prime minister Indira Gandhi sent the military into the Golden Temple, the holiest shrine for Sikhs, to evict separatist leader Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and his supporters, which infuriated Sikhs around the world.

A few months later, Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards at her home in New Delhi. The army launched operations in 1986 and 1988 to flush out Sikh militants from Punjab.

Sikh militants were also blamed for the 1985 bombing of an Air India Boeing 747 flying from Canada to India in which all 329 people on board were killed off the Irish coast.

The insurgency killed tens of thousands of people and Punjab still bears the scars of that violence.

Although the Khalistan movement has little support now in India, it has small pockets of backing among sections of the Sikh diaspora in Canada, which has the largest population of Sikhs outside Punjab, and in Britain, Australia and the US.

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

Razer ordered to pay $1.1 million in refunds over its Zephyr RGB mask N95 claims

Not as advertised, according to the FTC

(Image credit: Razer)

The FTC has ordered Razer to pay over $1.1 million in refunds to those who purchased the Razer Zephyr RGB mask which was supposedly "N95-grade". It wasn't.

First reported by IGN, The Federal Trade Commission has said that the $1.1 million total must be returned to users due to its misrepresentation of the Razer Zephyr mask. The company claimed its face masks were N95-grade (which are commonly found in surgical applications) but no such official certification was ever passed, and the company changed the fine print on its website to reflect that back in 2022.

FTC Director of Bureau of Consumer Protection Sam Levine said: "These businesses falsely claimed, in the midst of a global pandemic, that their face mask was the equivalent of an N95 certified respirator" and that Razer only "stopped the false advertising following negative press coverage and consumer outrage at the deceptive claims". Scathing words indeed.

The Razer Zephyr was available for $100, which means that roughly 11,000 consumers are owed their money back for the purchase of the ill-fated COVID-era face mask. It was available in the US online and through its three physical stores as well as the country's native Singapore while supposedly selling out almost instantly.

While the filters were not the grade promised, you did get a fair amount of them in the box. The starter pack included 30 filters which would last you around three days apiece, so you would be covered for 90 days before needing to invest in filter packs for $10 a pop, but by that point, the product was quietly pulled from stores. Any mention of the Razer Zephyr has been scrubbed on its website.

When contacted by TechRadar for comment, Razer told us: "We disagree with the FTC’s allegations and did not admit to any wrongdoing as part of the settlement. It was never our intention to mislead anyone, and we chose to settle this matter to avoid the distraction and disruption of litigation and continue our focus on creating great products for gamers. Razer cares deeply about our community and is always looking to deliver technology in new and relevant ways."

"The Razer Zephyr was conceived to offer a different and innovative face-covering option for the community," the Razer spokesperson continued. "The FTC’s claims against Razer concerned limited portions of some of the statements relating to the Zephyr. More than two years ago, Razer proactively notified customers that the Zephyr was not an N95 mask, stopped sales, and refunded customers."

The mask was originally announced at CES 2021 as a proof of concept known as Project Hazel before it was made official to the world to purchase later that year. While it didn't feature an N95 respiration system, it did have RGB lighting and swappable filters. A Zephyr Pro, complete with voice modulation, was announced a year later but never materialized.

Aleksha McLoughlin  is an experienced hardware writer. She was previously the Hardware Editor for TechRadar Gaming until September 2023. During this time, she looked after buying guides and wrote hardware reviews, news, and features. She has also contributed hardware content to the likes of PC Gamer, Trusted Reviews, Dexerto, Expert Reviews, and Android Central. When she isn't working, you'll often find her in mosh pits at metal gigs and festivals or listening to whatever new black and death metal has debuted that week.

U.S Court Jails Former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao For Four Months

 TWO TIERED JUSTICE SYTEM: WHITE COLLAR CRIME

By

 Brenda Ngari

 -

April 30, 2024

Binance founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao was sentenced to four months in prison on Tuesday after pleading guilty to anti-money laundering violations last year.

CZ “had the personnel, resources, and wherewithal to comply with U.S. regulations,” U.S. District Judge Richard Jones said in a Seattle courtroom while delivering Zhao’s sentence. “But failed at that opportunity.”

CZ Gets Four-Month Sentence

The ex-Binance CEO apologized during the April 30 sentencing hearing and said he wanted to take responsibility for his “mistakes”. Zhao also revealed that Binance has implemented a Know Your Customer and anti-money laundering program and is cooperating with U.S. authorities.

“The court finds the defendant has accepted responsibility. “Everything I see about your history and characteristics are of a mitigating nature and a positive nature,” said Judge Richard. The judge further pushed back against prosecutors’ recommendation for a three-year prison term.

Nonetheless, Zhao’s remorse wasn’t enough, as he will serve four months in a U.S. federal prison. Specifically, the judge indicated that he was “deeply troubled” by a statement from CZ that said, “It was better to ask for forgiveness than permission.”

Zhao launched Binance in 2017, and under his leadership, the firm grew into the world’s largest crypto exchange by trading volume. But in November, Zhao pleaded guilty to one count of violating the Bank Secrecy Act and agreed to pay a $50 million fine, while Binance was slapped with a $4.3 billion fine — one of the largest corporate settlements in American history. Additionally, Zhao was forced to step down from Binance as part of the plea agreement and was replaced by Richard Teng.

Since flying from his home in UAE to Seattle to enter that plea, CZ has been restricted from leaving the U.S. as travel limitations were imposed on him by Judge Jones, despite being free on a $175 million bond. This was after prosecutors warned that the Binance founder was a flight risk.

In March, Zhao launched Giggle Academy — an educational project devoted to crypto and blockchain for young people.

Meanwhile, Binance remains mired in a lawsuit with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The top Wall Street watchdog sued Binance Holdings in June 2023 for operating as an unregistered exchange and for failing to restrict American investors from accessing Binance.com.

Georgia pro-EU protesters erect barricades outside parliament after crackdown

AFP
April 30, 2024

The Black Sea Caucasus nation has been gripped by mass anti-government protests since April 9 - Copyright AFP Giorgi ARJEVANIDZE
Irakli METREVELI

Pro-EU demonstrators in Georgia built barricades outside parliament on Wednesday after police used tear gas and rubber bullets against thousands of protesters rallying for a third week against a controversial “foreign influence” bill, an AFP reporter saw.

The Black Sea Caucasus nation has been gripped by mass anti-government protests since April 9, after the ruling Georgian Dream party reintroduced plans to pass a law, which Brussels has denounced as undermining Tbilisi’s EU aspirations.

On Tuesday evening, masked riot police violently rushed the peaceful rally, using tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannon, while beating and arresting scores of people protesting against the bill, which critics say resembles Russian legislation used to silence dissent.

Several journalists were attacked, including an AFP photographer who was beaten with a rubber baton, despite being clearly identified as a member of the press.

Lawmaker Levan Khabeishvili — the chairman of the main opposition United National Movement of jailed ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili — was badly beaten and had to seek medical help.

Local TV stations aired footage showing his face disfigured with missing teeth.

Another Saakashvili ally, Sophia Japaridze, said she was “cruelly beaten by police.”

“I call on the interior minister to immediately stop the crackdown on the peaceful rally, the use of disproportionate force, the violence against barehanded youth,” Georgia’s President Salome Zurabishvili — who is at loggerheads with the ruling party — said in a statement.

The rally continued past midnight, with defiant protesters braving water cannon jets and tear gas.

Demonstrators blocked traffic outside parliament on Rustaveli Avenue, Tbilisi’s main thoroughfare and several other key transport arteries across the city.

In the early hours of Wednesday, protesters erected barricades outside parliament building after riot police left the area.

– ‘Russian law’ –

Georgia’s rights ombudsman, Levan Ioseliani, called for an investigation into the use of “disproportionate force” against protesters and journalists.

Interior ministry said police intervened with the protests only after it “turned violent and demonstrators entered in a verbal and physical confrontation with law enforcement.

Tuesday’s demonstration marked three weeks of daily youth-dominated rallies against the measure.

“They are scared because they see our resolve,” one of the protesters, 21-year-old Natia Gabisonia, told AFP. “We will not let them pass this Russian law and bury our European future.”

MPs were debating the draft law’s second reading on Tuesday, with the ruling party aiming to adopt it in mid-May.

The bill needs to pass three readings in parliament and a presidential signature to become law. Georgia’s president is widely expected to veto the measure, but the ruling party has enough seats to override the veto in parliament.

If adopted, the law would require any independent NGO and media organisation receiving more than 20 percent of its funding from abroad to register as an “organisation pursuing the interests of a foreign power”.

– EU criticism –

EU chief Charles Michel has said the bill “is not consistent with Georgia’s bid for EU membership” and that it “will bring Georgia further away from the EU and not closer.”

On Monday, Georgian Dream bussed thousands of people to the capital for a counter rally held amid widespread reports that government employees were being forced to attend.

In a rare public appearance, powerful billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili — the ruling party chairman who is widely believed to be calling the shots in Georgia — addressed the crowd.

He defended the bill as aiming to boost transparency of the foreign funding of civil groups, saying that “non-transparent funding of NGOs is the main instrument for the appointment of a Georgian government from abroad”.

On Sunday, some 20,000 demonstrators staged a kilometre-long “March for Europe” in the capital Tbilisi.

Similar rallies were held across the country, including in Georgia’s second-largest city of Batumi and the main city of the western Imereti region, Kutaisi.

Last year, Georgian Dream was forced to drop the measure following mass street protests that saw police use tear gas and water cannon against demonstrators.

Georgia has sought for years to deepen relations with the West, but the current ruling party has been accused of attempting to steer the former Soviet republic closer to Russia.

In December, the EU granted Georgia official candidate status but said Tbilisi would have to reform its judicial and electoral systems, reduce political polarisation, improve press freedom and curtail the power of oligarchs before membership talks are formally launched.

Georgia’s bid for membership of the EU and NATO is enshrined in its constitution and — according to opinion polls — supported by more than 80 percent of the population.

Police clear pro-Palestinian protesters from Columbia University building as dozens arrested

The pro-Palestinian demonstration that paralyzed Columbia University ended in dramatic fashion late Tuesday, with police carrying riot shields swarming the Ivy League campus, bursting into an administration building protesters took over the previous night and making dozens of arrests.


Issued on: 01/05/2024 -

New York police officers in riot gear enter Columbia University's encampment as they evict a building that had been barricaded by pro-Palestinian student protesters in New York City on April 30, 2024. © Emily Byrski, AFP

A statement released by a Columbia spokesperson said New York City officers entered the campus after the university requested help. A tent encampment on the school's grounds to protest the Israel-Hamas war was cleared, along with Hamilton Hall where a stream of officers used a ladder to climb through a second-floor window. Protesters seized the hall about 20 hours earlier.

“After the University learned overnight that Hamilton Hall had been occupied, vandalized, and blockaded, we were left with no choice,” the school said. “The decision to reach out to the NYPD was in response to the actions of the protesters, not the cause they are championing. We have made it clear that the life of campus cannot be endlessly interrupted by protesters who violate the rules and the law.”

NYPD spokesman Carlos Nieves said he had no immediate reports of any injuries. The arrests occurred after protesters had shrugged off an earlier ultimatum to abandon the encampment Monday or be suspended and unfolded as other universities stepped up efforts to end demonstrations against the Israel-Hamas war that were inspired by Columbia.

Just blocks away at The City College of New York, demonstrators were in a standoff with police outside the public college’s main gate. Video posted on social media by news reporters on the scene late Tuesday showed officers putting some people to the ground and shoving others as they cleared people from the street and sidewalks. Many detained protesters were driven away on city buses.

 

An encampment at the college, part of the City University of New York system, has been up since Thursday. After police arrived on campus Tuesday, NYPD officers lowered a Palestinian flag atop the City College flagpole, balled it up and tossed it to the ground before raising an American flag.

Police have swept through other campuses across the U.S. over the last two weeks, leading to confrontations and more than 1,000 arrests. In rarer instances, university officials and protest leaders struck agreements to restrict the disruption to campus life and upcoming commencement ceremonies.

Brown University, another member of the Ivy League, reached an agreement Tuesday with protesters on its Rhode Island campus. Demonstrators said they would close their encampment in exchange for administrators taking a vote to consider divestment in October. The compromise appeared to mark the first time a U.S. college has agreed to vote on divestment in the wake of the protests.

Columbia's police action happened on the 56th anniversary of a similar move to quash an occupation of Hamilton Hall by students protesting racism and the Vietnam War.

The police department earlier Tuesday said officers wouldn't enter the grounds without the college administration’s request or an imminent emergency. Now, law enforcement will be there through May 17, the end of the university's commencement events.

Fabien Lugo, a first-year accounting student who said he was not involved in the protests, said he opposed the university’s decision to call in police.

“This is too intense,” he said. “It feels like more of an escalation than a de-escalation.”

In a letter to senior NYPD officials, Columbia President Minouche Shafik said the administration was making the request that police remove protesters from the occupied building and a nearby tent encampment “with the utmost regret.”

Shafik also leaned into the idea, first put forward by New York City Mayor Eric Adams earlier in the day, that the group that occupied Hamilton was “led by individuals who are not affiliated with the university.”

Neither provided specific evidence to back up that contention, which was disputed by protest organizers and participants.

NYPD officials made similar claims about “outside agitators” during the huge, grassroots demonstrations against racial injustice that erupted across the city after the death of George Floyd in 2020. In some instances, top police officials falsely labeled peaceful marches organized by well-known neighborhood activists as the work of violent extremists.

Before officers arrived at Columbia, the White House condemned the standoffs there and at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, where protesters had occupied two buildings for more than a week until officers with batons intervened early Tuesday and arrested 25 people.

President Joe Biden believes students occupying an academic building is “absolutely the wrong approach,” and “not an example of peaceful protest,” said National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby.

Later, former President Donald Trump called into Sean Hannity’s show on Fox News Channel to comment on Columbia’s turmoil as live footage of police clearing Hamilton Hall aired. Trump praised the officers.

“But it should never have gotten to this,” he told Hannity. “And they should have done it a lot sooner than before they took over the building because it would have been a lot easier if they were in tents rather than a building. And tremendous damage done, too.”

The nationwide campus protests began at Columbia in response to Israel’s offensive in Gaza after Hamas launched a deadly attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7. Militants killed about 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and took roughly 250 hostages. Vowing to stamp out Hamas, Israel has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, according to the local health ministry.

As cease-fire negotiations appeared to gain steam, it wasn’t clear whether those talks would inspire an easing of protests.

Israel and its supporters have branded the university protests as antisemitic, while Israel’s critics say it uses those allegations to silence opposition. Although some protesters have been caught on camera making antisemitic remarks or violent threats, organizers of the protests, some of whom are Jewish, say it is a peaceful movement aimed at defending Palestinian rights and protesting the war.

On Columbia’s campus, protesters first set up a tent encampment almost two weeks ago. The school sent in police to clear the tents the following day, arresting more than 100 people, only for the students to return – and inspire a wave of similar encampments at campuses across the country.

Negotiations between the protesters and the college came to a standstill in recent days, and the school set a deadline for the activists to abandon the tent encampment Monday afternoon or be suspended.

Instead, protesters defied the ultimatum and took over Hamilton Hall early Tuesday, carrying in furniture and metal barricades. The demonstrators dubbed the building Hind’s Hall, honoring a young girl who was killed in Gaza under Israeli fire, and issued demands for divestment, financial transparency and amnesty.

Columbia's chapter of the American Association of University Professors said faculty’s efforts to help defuse the situation have been repeatedly ignored by the university’s administration despite school statutes that require consultation.

Ilana Lewkovitch, a self-described “leftist Zionist” student at Columbia, said it’s been hard to concentrate on school for weeks. Her exams have been disrupted with chants of “say it loud, say it clear, we want Zionists out of here.”

Lewkovitch, who identifies as Jewish, said she wished the current pro-Palestinian protests were more open to people like her who criticize Israel’s war policies but believe there should be an Israeli state.

(AP)

Roll on, Columbia

Mahir Ali 

DAWN

Published May 1, 2024 

MUCH to the consternation of the pat­h­e­tically insipid Biden administration as well as its rabidly right-wing Republican opposition, student protests over the unfolding genocide in Gaza have been spreading throughout the US. They offer hope, which has been in short supply. At the same time, for the Zionist right they unintentionally serve as a distraction from the very atrocities that enrage most of the protesters. The main story is still unfolding in a starving Gaza, just as it was five or six decades ago in a beleaguered but unbending Vietnam.

That does not, of course, render it irrelevant or even peripheral. The vast demonstrations demanding an end to American apartheid in the 1960s and the subsequent mobilisations against the Vietnam War challenged both state and federal administrations, and contributed to the end of that horrific conflict in 1975.

In the preceding years, it wasn’t uncommon for those involved in the resistance to be derided as pinkos, reds or communist dupes, in a reflection of the recent McCarthyist era. These days the charge is antisemitism. That weapon, too, is hardly new. It has been deployed over the decades against anyone who questioned Israel’s predilection for ethnic supremacism. What’s relatively unusual is the extent to which young Jewish Americans are revolting against their nation’s attachment to the Zionist state that most of their parents’ generation embraced.

To some extent, residual right-wing antipathy towards Jews springs from the left-wing inclinations of many of their intellectuals. American science and culture would have considerably been diminished without the input of Jewish immigrants from Europe. They also enriched America’s political landscape, reflected lately in both Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and independent senator Bernie Sanders.

The past is prelude on US campuses today.

Schumer attracted the headlines when, as the highest-ranking Jew in American politics, he mildly denounced the inclinations of the Likud-led regime in Israel and called for an election to replace Benjamin Netanyahu. That contributed to the Demo­c­ra­tic effort to focus resentment on the current Israeli PM and his despicable regime, instead of accurately recognising Israel’s consistent drift towards dispossession and potential genocide ever since the Nakba.

There is evidence that many young Jews won’t be fooled by the ‘hasbara’ narratives that entrapped their elders or the fantasy that Zionism is an essential component of Jewish identity. As many of them have recognised, after their exposure to anti-Zionist Jews and Palestinians at university, the essence of Jewish experience embodies a concept of humanity that Netanyahu and his acolytes fail to recognise. That poses a problem for Zionism’s biggest assets — its useful idiots in the US, a category that ranges from the president to most legislators and much of the bureaucracy.

Something has changed, though, in the past couple of decades in the US and Israel. No US president has been unfriendly towards Israel, but some have challenged its excesses. All of them have known that Israeli militarism relies on US beneficence. That remains intact even as Biden administration pretends to challenge Israeli excesses while supplying the weapons required to perpetrate the atrocities.

Almost a century ago, Americans who militated against the death of democracy in Spain in the 1930s were categorised as ‘premature anti-fascists’. They were rarely accepted into mainstream politics even during the Soviet alliance during World War II. The McCarthyism that descended after that war, disproportionately targeting Jews, violated every principle that the US purports to worship. Since then at least, free speech has been a right reserved for adherents to the officially sanctioned mainstream.

That has occasionally been disrupted in decades gone by. But perhaps never so potently as in recent months. Despite Netanyahu and Biden’s best efforts, the frequently nonsensical claim of antisemitism no longer carries much weight.

Woody Guthrie had the river, rather than the university, in mind when he wrote more than 80 years ago, “Roll on, Columbia, roll on/ Your power is turning our darkness to dawn”. Some 20 years later, his spiritual descendant Bob Dylan reminded “mothers and fathers throughout the land” not to “criticise what you can’t understand” because “your sons and your daughters are beyond your command”. That echoes, in a way, the early 20th-century Lebanese poet Kahlil Gibran’s well-known warning: “Your children are not your children./ They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.”

When “Life’s longing for itself” is being strangled in Gaza or anywhere else, surely it is incumbent upon anyone with a humanitarian impulse to resist it. Whether or not the rebellion across US campuses achieves its aims, gratitude is owed to those who tried.

mahir.dawn@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, May 1st, 2024

New era of realisation

Rafia Zakaria 

DAWN

Published May 1, 2024

IT was about two weeks ago that students at Columbia University in New York City set up an encampment on the campus’s South Lawn. Students for Justice in Palestine, along with other affiliated groups, said that it was establishing a ‘liberated zone’ and a ‘People’s University’ in protest against the fact that all universities in Gaza have now been destroyed. Everybody knows what happened in the days that followed: Columbia’s president, the Egyptian-born Manouche Shafik, sent in the New York police to clear the encampment.

It was a move that backfired, mostly because the subsequent images showed heavily armed police officers in kevlar vests dragging teenage girls in keffiyas. The youngsters had been peacefully protesting. Since then, the encampments have spread like wildfire across the US. Over the weekend, hundreds of people were arrested at campuses all across the country.

The obvious discussions around the protests have centred on how they show a groundswell of support among young Americans for those suffering in Gaza. However, the protests represent something more than just that in terms of what they say about the American political system and the place of young people in it.

In a superficial sense, the tenacity of the protesters and the fact that they are so many of them present a conundrum for both the Republican and the Democratic parties. In the case of the former, right-wing politicians from Senator Lindsey Graham to ex-Trump adviser Steve Bannon have made elite universities, in fact universities in general, a target of their criticism. To enhance the Republican appeal to a rural population, a large section of which does not attend university, they have criticised the institutes for promoting socially liberal ideas and suppressing conservative speech. Ironically, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson, who visited Columbia last week and demanded that pro-Palestinian speech be suppressed, is one of the people to have criticised the lack of free speech at universities.

The Democrats do not know what to do with the pro-Palestinian protesters either. This is because both party politicians have long taken huge caches of cash from Jewish lobbyist organisations such as the AIPAC to run their campaigns. However, to come to power, many Democratic politicians, President Joe Biden chief among them, have relied on young voters. So while they would like to ignore the protesters and young people in general, the fact that two-thirds of the 18-29-year age group, polled by the New York Times in 2023, said that Israel should stop its killing of Palestinians, is threatening their hopes of staying in power. Forty eight per cent of the same age group said that Israel was intentionally killing civilians.

The fear in the American political system is indicative of the shifting demographics of leadership, for which Washington is largely unprepared.

Neither party has a plan as to what to do about it and it is reflected in their hand-wringing over the protests.

The fear in the American political system is also indicative of the shifting demographics of leadership, for which Washington, D.C., is largely unprepared. The students who are protesting at the campuses reveal the racial and intellectual demographics of the future. They are a mix of Asian, South Asian, Middle Eastern, African American and other minority groups, who are inching out white students with lower test scores and less dazzling resumés.

Generationally, they could not be farther from the make-up of the current politicians in Washington, who are on average over 60 years old and have little idea of the inclusive worldview that these students have. The fear of both Democratic and Republican politicians relates to what to do about Gaza on one level, but on another level, it is about what will happen when this generation, graduating from the world’s top universities and expected to lead both politics and business, is in power.

In this sense, the student protests and the politics they reveal are indicative of the end of an era. For a long time, US foreign policy prided itself on its ruthless realpolitik whose architect Henry Kissinger died last November. Now a younger generation is calling into question the blatant hypocrisy that has been visible to the rest of the world for decades. What is the logic of saying we should support Ukraine where an indigenous population is fighting against Russia, but not Gaza whose native population is being bombed and starved asked one student protester on TikTok. As a new era of realisation dawns, it is clear that it will become increasingly difficult for America to maintain its nonchalant attitude towards international law.

As for those who say that the students’ demand that their respective universities divest from businesses that support Israel and its war on and occupation of Arab land will never prevail, there is the case of Portland State University. The university has decided to pause donations from military contractor Boeing in line with students’ demands. Israel has reportedly bought arms from Boeing. While such successes are unlikely to be frequent, it does reflect that at least in some cases the encampments may force universities to, in the words of the protesters, “divest and disclose” their ties.

The protests, and the fact that so many minority students at elite American universities are pro-Palestine and willing to risk arrests and suspensions for the cause, reveal that a shrinking number of white Americans will make up the leadership of the future. Not only will the American future be more racially diverse, it is also likely that it will have a politics that will be remarkably different from the worldview that currently prevails in Washington. The furore on campuses is likely to spread in the next few weeks leading up to college graduations, which will likely be disrupted as well. Generation Z it appears, has had it with the aging remnants of realpolitik and may succeed in ushering in a new era in US foreign policy.

The writer is an attorney teaching constitutional law and political philosophy.
rafia.zakaria@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, May 1st, 2024