AI startups bringing dollars but lean workforces to ailing San Francisco

 AI (Artificial Intelligence) letters and robot hand miniature


By Anna Tong
Thu, July 13, 2023 

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - In a frenzy unseen since the birth of social media in the early 2000s, investors are pouring billions into generative AI and fueling a startup boom in San Francisco.

At the same time, they are fueling hopes that the nascent AI sector will help revive the city's decaying downtown after the pandemic.

But the rapid growth of the artificial-intelligence business may not be a panacea for the city's economic and commercial real-estate woes, according to a dozen tech industry professionals interviewed by Reuters. Unlike past tech booms that have touched San Francisco, the generative AI craze brings fewer jobs, because AI firms excel at staying lean and automating work.

"I think we should curb our optimism that San Francisco commercial real estate will bounce back because of AI," said Silicon Valley investor Jeremiah Owyang. "The mentality of AI startups is AI-first. So you get AI to do the job before humans do it."

Eleven of the country's top 20 AI companies are in San Francisco and have raised $15.7 billion collectively between 2008 and 2023. However, they employ a total of only 3,400 people in the city, according to an analysis from San Francisco Mayor London Breed's office which used data from venture capital firm NFX.

That amount is just 2.3% of the estimated 150,000 daily workers that downtown San Francisco lost during the pandemic. Office workers accounted for nearly three-quarters of the city's gross domestic product before COVID-19 hit.

Generative AI, which learns from past data to create brand new content, is seen as a game-changer for workplace efficiency, especially for software engineers, the bread and butter of San Francisco's tech workforce. AI has already reshaped their work: according to research from popular code hosting platform GitHub, 92% of software developers use AI, and developers that used GitHub's coding assistant were able to complete a coding task 55% faster.

"These (AI) companies almost certainly won't have thousands of employees and corporate cafeterias, like Airbnb or Dropbox," said Erin Price-Wright, a partner at San Francisco-based Index Ventures. Airbnb and Dropbox, both based in San Francisco, employ about 10,000 people combined.

In contrast, Microsoft-backed OpenAI, which developed the smash-hit ChatGPT chatbot, has raised over $11 billion in eight years and has around 500 employees, according to the company. Headquartered in the city's hipster Mission district, the company uses AI to help solve its problems.

For instance, when faced with a deluge of support tickets, OpenAI chose to train its own AI to help its staff answer these tickets more efficiently, according to an OpenAI employee with direct knowledge of the project.

A spokesperson for OpenAI said the company uses its products to help with its work, but is also actively recruiting, including in customer support.

"We are getting to the point where AI can function as a real employee," said Matt Schlicht, CEO of Octane AI, which tailors online shopping to a person's needs. "Within your lifetime, you will likely see a one-person team start a billion-dollar company."

THREE AI EVENTS PER DAY

San Francisco, even as it battles societal issues like drugs, homelessness and unaffordable housing, has gained a reputation as the "AI capital of the world," as the city's mayor recently called it.

For instance, Dubai-based entrepreneur Mike Grabowski told Reuters that in June he saw a tweet from Owyang, the Silicon Valley investor, which said, "In SF, there are 44 AI events in two weeks, about three a day."

Grabowski, who has started a company that uses AI to write content for social media influencers, hopped on a flight to San Francisco on the same day. Two days later, jetlagged but optimistic about meeting prospective investors, he went to an AI event hosted by Owyang, who said he received 560 applications to attend the meetup.

The excitement about AI is palpable at tech events in the city, reminiscent of the decade before the pandemic when companies like Alphabet's Google opened offices and startups colonized more industrial parts of town.

The "City by the Bay" became a tech hub coinciding with an eight-year tax break dubbed the "Twitter tax break" aimed at encouraging tech companies to relocate there.

Recently, though, San Francisco's problems have made headlines.

Office buildings are over 30% vacant, according to real estate firm CBRE, as people continue to work from home, venture capital firms choose calmer parts of town, and many large tech firms have slashed workforces. Ridership on the BART rapid-transit system in downtown San Francisco is still at one-third of pre-pandemic levels, according to city government data.

As the crises of drugs and homelessness have spiraled, tourists and business visitors have stayed away, pushing some hotels to the brink of default. Dismal foot traffic has prompted companies including Nordstrom to shut their downtown stores.

Some tech professionals think that in time, AI will still buoy the city's economy, even if it scripts a different destiny from the previous tech boom.

Since AI makes it easier to run a company, there will be more small firms hiring dozens of people, as opposed to a few big tech companies that previously hired thousands, said Lee Edwards, a technology investor at San Francisco-based Root VC.

Others think it will be more of the same, and that rewards from the technology will go to fewer people, exacerbating the inequality that already plagues California's third-largest city.

"Generative AI is even more concentrated than previous waves of digital technologies, and a handful of companies are going to be at the forefront," said Daron Acemoglu, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who studies how technology affects inequality.

"Top executives and their upper cadre of engineers, programmers, managers are going to benefit a lot more."

(Reporting by Anna Tong in San Francisco; Editing by Sayantani Ghosh, Anna Driver and Matthew Lewis)

GLASS HALF FULL
Fossil-Fuel Demand for Electricity May Have Peaked Globally

Priscila Azevedo Rocha
Thu, July 13, 2023 


(Bloomberg) -- The exponential growth of renewable energy is pushing down global electricity prices and helping remove so much carbon from power systems that fossil fuels are no longer economical, and their use has peaked, according to a report.

From China to Europe, the capacities of solar, battery and wind power are surging, the Rocky Mountain Institute said in an analysis released Thursday in conjunction with the Bezos Earth Fund. That means sending demand for gas, oil and coal linked to electricity generation into a steep decline, a critical step toward curbing emissions linked to climate change.

“Fossil-fuel demand in the electricity system, specifically, has clearly peaked in 2022,” Kingsmill Bond, senior principal at RMI, told reporters. Moving forward, it’s “very hard actually for fossil-fuel demand to grow from these levels simply because of the speed of which these alternative technologies grow.”

The shift comes as governments and industries rebuild their energy infrastructure following supply shortages and skyrocketing prices in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The high rates of deployment also are driving down prices for renewables, rendering higher cost hydrocarbons uncompetitive.

Solar Beats Coal in Europe for First Time - But There’s a Glitch

Solar panels and wind turbines will supply more than a third of global electricity by 2030, compared with about 12% today, the RMI forecasts. Those sources should produce as much as 14,000 terawatt-hours, overtaking fossil fuels.

While China and Europe lead the growth in clean energy, deployment is reaching other parts of the globe. Namibia, the Netherlands, Palestine, Jordan and Chile have boosted solar and wind generation at sufficient rates for five years, the report said.

Renewables are already considered a cheaper form of electricity, with costs plummeting during the past decade, according to BloombergNEF. Solar and battery costs declined 80% between 2012 and 2022, offshore wind dropped 73% and onshore wind fell 57%, the data show.

The increasing adaptation of clean-tech is set to halve its prices by 2030 — falling to as low as $20 a megawatt-hour for solar from $40-plus now, RMI said. The shift in capital out of fossil fuels is also set to boost investment in low-carbon forms of energy.

“Change is happening faster than we think,” Christiana Figueres, an architect of the Paris Agreement on climate, said during a roundtable discussion. “The tripling of renewables by 2030 is not guaranteed but is more possible today than it ever was because of the exponential trends that we are seeing.”

FRACK TEK

Here's how geothermal energy heats and cools a home



Groundwater squirts up during drilling for a geothermal heating and cooling system at a home in White Plains, N.Y., Monday, May 8, 2023. A water-filled loop installed several hundred feet deep either carries heat away from, or into the house, depending on the season. Industry experts see the technology becoming increasingly popular in the coming years. 

(AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson)

ISABELLA O'MALLEY
Thu, July 13, 2023

Some homeowners looking to switch out their heating and cooling systems are turning to home geothermal — also known as ground source — heat pumps. It's a technology that relies on a simple physical fact: Dig several feet below Earth's surface, in the coldest winter or the hottest summer, and the temperature will be around 55 degrees.

Geothermal takes advantage of that constant temperature by pushing water with some antifreeze through a loop of flexible pipe that runs deep underground. The water gets circulated by a heat pump system, usually located in the basement.

When the house needs cooling — say on an 85-degree July day — a refrigerant, which is a special fluid, absorbs unwanted heat indoors and transfers it to water in the long piping, circulating it underground, giving it time to cool to the constant mid-50s below. House air blows across the cool fluid. Having dumped its heat, it can absorb more for transfer to the outdoors.

Warming the building works much the same, in reverse. On a sub-freezing January day, the system circulates the water underground, warming it to about 55 degrees. Arriving back at the pump, the water in the loop now heats the refrigerant, making it want to expand. An electric pump then compresses it, which spikes the temperature. The system then pushes air over the hot refrigerant and into the house until the air in the house reaches thermostat temperature.

In apartment buildings, schools or other commercial buildings, the underground loop may be just a few feet deep and extend horizontally over a wide area. For smaller residential lots, the solution is to drill deeper — as much as 300 feet or more — to get a loop that is long enough for the water be in contact with the ground and equalize with its constant temperature.

Geothermal systems cost more up front than typical furnaces, sometimes tends of thousands of dollars. Supporters say lower operating costs eventually make that worthwhile, because the superpower of ground source heat pumps is that they use very little electricity to move heat around. They're designed to last more than 50 years for the underground parts, with the above-ground components expected to last 25 years or more. Gas furnaces typically last 15 to 30 years on average.

Geothermal or ground-source heat pumps are still the exception rather than the rule. Air-source heat pump are far more common and work by extracting energy from outdoor air to both heat and cool the home.

___

Associated Press climate and environmental coverage receives support from several private foundations. See more about AP’s climate initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Doctors reattach boy's head after car accident thanks to 'amazing' surgery

NOT WHAT YOU THINK

Drs. Ohad Einav and Ziv Asa with 12-year-old Suleiman Hassan, center, at Hadassah Medical Center following Hassan's recovery.

Peter Aitken
Thu, July 13, 2023 

Surgeons in Israel performed a miracle surgery and managed to reattach a boy’s head after he was hit by a car while riding his bike, a Jerusalem hospital announced this week.

Suleiman Hassan, a 12-year-old Palestinian from the West Bank, suffered what is known as an internal decapitation, with his skull detached from the top vertebrae of his spine — officially known as a bilateral atlanto occipital joint dislocation, according to The Times of Israel.

Hassan was riding his bike when a car hit him. The boy was rushed to Hadassah Medical Center and immediately put into surgery in the trauma unit. The doctors said his head was "almost completely detached from the base of his neck."

Dr. Ohad Einav, the orthopedic specialist who led the operation, said the procedure took several hours and required the doctors to use "new plates and fixations in the damaged area."

"Our ability to save the child was thanks to our knowledge and the most innovative technology in the operating room," Einav said, adding that the team "fought for the boy’s life."

Einav and his team said that Hassan has a projected survival rate of only 50%, and his recovery is nothing short of a miracle, according to i24 News.

The operation occurred in June, but doctors waited a month to announce the results. The hospital recently discharged Hassan with a cervical splint and will continue to monitor his recovery.

The sun shines on Hadassah Medical Center in Jerusalem.

"The fact that such a child has no neurological deficits or sensory or motor dysfunction and that he is functioning normally and walking without an aid after such a long process is no small thing," Einav said.

According to Israel's TPS news agency, Hassan’s father did not leave his son’s bedside during the recovery process, saying he had nothing but a "big thank you" for the medical staff.

"Bless you all," the father said. "Thanks to you, he regained his life even when the odds were low and the danger was obvious."

"What saved him were professionalism, technology and quick decision-making by the trauma and orthopedics team," TPS reported the father as saying.

Dr. Marc Siegel, Clinical Professor of Medicine and a practicing internist at NYU Langone Medical Center and Fox News contributor, told Fox News Digital that the "amazing" surgery was only possible if major blood vessels remained intact.

"The key is preserving blood flow to the brain," Siegel said. "It sounds like — from the story — that the major blood vessels were likely not severed and that this involved an orthopedic rebuilding — probably using rods and reattaching ligaments and possibly bone grafts and implants."

Einav stressed that the surgery is "extremely rare," but the large size of a child’s head relative to an adult means they are "more susceptible."

"This is not a common surgery at all, and especially not on children and teens. A surgeon needs knowledge and experience to do this," he said.

ICYMI
Extreme weather is terrorizing the world. It's only just begun.



Li Cohen
Fri, July 14, 2023

Boiling heat and raging floods have taken the world by storm this week, plummeting millions of people across the world into dangerous and deadly conditions. But it's not a temporary trip of bad luck – it is becoming the new norm.

The heat waves causing record temperatures, storms dumping record rain on cities and wildfires raging across thousands of acres of land are all the impact of an undeniable source: climate change.

Just last week, preliminary data showed that the world had its hottest week on record, following the hottest June on record. El Niño is believed to have spawned the latest events as it comes at the onset of warmer sea surface temperatures, but experts have warned that the current situation won't suddenly vanish when El Niño departs.

"We are in uncharted territory and we can expect more records to fall as El Niño develops further and these impacts will extend into 2024," said Christopher Hewitt, head of international climate services for the World Meteorological Organization. "This is worrying news for the planet."

In a news release Thursday, the WMO highlighted issues that included heat waves causing sweltering conditions in areas around the U.S. to North Africa.

"The extreme weather – an increasingly frequent occurrence in our warming climate – is having a major impact on human health, ecosystems, economies, agriculture, energy and water supplies," WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas said in the news release. "This underlines the increasing urgency of cutting greenhouse gas emissions as quickly and as deeply as possible."

Here's what the world has faced in recent days.

Dangerous heat waves across the world

Heataves are one of the deadliest hazards to emerge in extreme weather, and they're occurring on a global scale.

The Southwest U.S. has been battling extreme heat for days, and as of Friday, the National Weather Service predicts that the "dangerous heat wave" will continue. At least 93 million people in the U.S. are under excessive heat warnings and advisories Friday morning as the intense heat continues its stretch from the West Coast to the Gulf Coast, the agency said.

The Southwest will see high temperatures surpassing 120 degrees Fahrenheit in some parts, while Texas and Louisiana could see temperatures up to 115 degrees Fahrenheit, the agency said.

And Death Valley, which holds the world record for the highest air temperature ever measured, is expected to see temperatures near that temperature. The record occurred on July 10, 1913, hitting 134 degrees Fahrenheit. This weekend, it could hit just shy of that at 130 degrees Fahrenheit, The Weather Channel's Stephanie Abrams said on Friday, seeing a low of just around 100 degrees.

"This type of heat is going to continue through at least next week," the meteorologist said. "Preliminary daily data shows that we passed the hottest average global temperature on July 3 and have been above that value every day since, setting a new record on July 6."



Flagstaff, Arizona, is also nearing a record-high, with the NWS expecting it to hit 95 degrees on Sunday – just 2 degrees less than its all-time record hit in 1973.

But the extreme heat isn't constrained to the U.S. – Europe has been facing its own battle.

Records were broken in France, Switzerland, Germany and Spain, the European Union's earth observation service, Copernicus, said earlier this week. On Tuesday, satellite imagery determined that some areas of Spain saw land surface temperatures, which measure the temperature of soil, exceeding 60 degrees Celsius – 140 degrees Fahrenheit.

Extreme land surface temperatures were seen in Spain earlier this week, in some places surpassing 60 degrees Celsius

. / Credit: European Union, Copernicus Sentinel-3 imagery

Spain's State Meteorological Agency shared on Friday that parts of the country could reach 42 degrees Celsius (more than 107 degrees Fahrenheit). On Thursday, it was even warmer, reaching 44.9 degrees Celsius in The Village of San Nicolás.

And it's not over. Over the next two weeks, the WMO said above-normal temperatures are expected across the Mediterranean, with weekly temperatures up to 5 degrees Celsius higher than the long-term average.

Canada's wildfires continue their record season

Only seven months into 2023, Canada has already been faced with more than 4,000 wildfires that have burned up 9.6 million hectares of land, more than 37,000 square miles. As of Thursday, the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre reported 906 active fires across the nation, more than half of which are considered "out of control."

On July 6, the Canadian government said this season "has already been Canada's most severe on record."

An aerial view of wildfire of Tatkin Lake in British Columbia, Canada on July 10, 2023.  Credit: BC Wildfire Service/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

"Current projections indicate that this may continue to be a significantly challenging summer for wildfires in parts of the country," officials said, as projections continue to show "higher-than-normal fire activity" is possible for most of the country. Warm temperatures and ongoing drought are to blame, they said.

Deadly, record-breaking monsoon

India has been inundated with a Southwest monsoon that covered the entire country on July 2, India's Meteorological Department said. Last week, the capital of the country, New Delhi, was hit with the highest-single day of rain in 40 years, getting half a foot of rain in a single day. The flash floods and landslides caused by the rain have killed dozens across the country.

Water from the capital city's Yamuna River spilled over its river banks this week as its water level hit a 45-year high on Thursday at 684 feet. The previous record of 681 feet was hit in 1978. The record rain and water prompted officials to urge the 30 million people who live there to stay inside.

On Friday, flash flood threats of varying degrees continued throughout many areas in the country.

A man floats on thermacol through a flooded street after Yamuna River overflowed due to monsoon rains in New Delhi on July 14, 2023. 

/ Credit: ARUN SANKAR/AFP via Getty Images

Record heat in the world's oceans

Copernicus said Friday that it's not just land and air experiencing extreme heat, but the oceans as well. The service found that the northern Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea have both seen record temperatures in recent months.

Citing research institute Mercator Ocean and its own observations, the service said the western Mediterranean is seeing a "moderate" sea heatwave that "appears to be intensifying."

"The Sea Surface Temperature Anomaly along the coasts of Southern Spain and North Africa was approximately +5°C above the reference value for the period, indicative of the escalating heatwave conditions," Copernicus said Friday.

Data shows that the Atlantic and Mediterranean oceans are experiencing record-breaking temperatures. / Credit: European Union, Copernicus Marine Service Data

The data comes just a few months after researchers found that the oceans have been warming so rapidly, that it's an amount equal to the energy of five atomic bombs detonating underwater "every second for 24 hours a day for the entire year." It also comes just days after climate experts issued another warning that ocean temperatures have hit unprecedented levels that are "much higher than anything the models predicted."

By September, NOAA believes that half of the world's oceans could be experiencing heat wave conditions. Normally, only about 10% of oceans experience such conditions, experts said.

The future of extremes is now the present

The future of extreme weather that has the potential to devastate billions of people is no longer a far-off possibility. It's happening here and now.

A wide range of experts – from global agencies to national organizations and individual climate experts – have been warning for decades of the impact that warming global temperatures could have on the state of the planet. As temperatures continue to rise across the world – mostly from the burning of fossil fuels – extreme weather will only intensify.

The impact of such extremes is hard to miss.

Major cities like Chicago are seeing ground temperatures so warm due to the rising air temperatures that it's causing buildings to sink as underground materials shift. The heat also poses deadly consequences, with officials worldwide warning people to avoid extended periods of exposure. Extreme storms that swept through the Northeast last weekend have left cities totally isolated from floodwaters and businesses and homes completely destroyed. The smoke from Canada's wildfires has had harsh ramifications for air quality across the U.S., even going as far as Europe.

"It's getting worse and worse," Hannah Cloke, a climate scientist and professor at Reading University, told Reuters, saying that the way to prevent extreme weather from getting even worse is by drastically – and quickly – reducing greenhouse gases. Greenhouse gases, primarily emitted from the burning of fossil fuels, work to trap heat within the atmosphere, amplifying global temperatures.

But it's important to realize, she added, that doing so will only prevent the absolute worst outcomes.

"We must realize we are locked into some of these changes now and we will continue to see records broken," she said.

GLASS HALF EMPTY

Forecasters see overwhelming chance El Niño will last through early 2024



Nick Robertson
Thu, July 13, 2023 

Forecasters at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) believe the new El Niño water temperature phenomenon has a greater than 90 percent chance of lasting through the winter and into 2024.

El Niño conditions mean that ocean temperatures in the eastern Pacific are higher than normal, which can cause a less severe winter for much of the northern U.S. and more rain for the south, as the jet stream is forced north.

Eastern Pacific waters more than 0.5 degrees Celsius above normal are considered El Niño conditions. Temperatures were 0.8 degrees above average as of June and are anticipated to rise to as much as 1.5 degrees above average in the last few months of the year, when El Niños usually peak.

However, NOAA forecasters said the standard effects of an El Niño — milder winters and fewer hurricanes — may be reduced by a globally warmer ocean.

“One potential outcome is a weaker atmospheric response than we might otherwise expect. The strength of the atmospheric response is related to the pattern of sea surface temperature throughout the tropics,” Emily Becker, a University of Miami climatologist, wrote for NOAA.

“However, when the western Pacific and the rest of the tropics are also warm, the response may be more muddled,” she added.

Earlier this month, hurricane forecasters at Colorado State University (CSU) said that this hurricane season is expected to be above average despite the El Niño, because Atlantic Ocean temperatures are also above average.

“The extreme anomalous warmth in the Atlantic may counteract some of the typical El Niño-driven wind shear,” CSU’s Phil Klotzbach said.

NOAA forecasters said there is an 80 percent chance that the peak of the El Niño this winter will be at least in the normal temperature range, a 50 percent chance that it is at least severe and a 20 percent chance that it will be very severe — or more than 2 degrees Celsius above average.

An El Niño is caused by weaker than normal trade winds in the Pacific, which causes warmer water to stick around in the eastern Pacific instead of being blown west. In years where trade winds are stronger than normal, called La Niñas, the eastern Pacific is colder than normal, usually causing more severe winters in the northern U.S., droughts in the south and more hurricanes than normal.

NO BDS FOR HELEN, JUST BS

Helen Mirren Gives Shoutout To “My Tribe Of Actors’ At Jerusalem Film Festival As SAG-AFTRA Strike Hits: “Actors Are Wonderful People”

Melanie Goodfellow
Thu, July 13, 2023

Helen Mirren dedicated a Jerusalem Film Festival life-time achievement award to actors around the world on Thursday, just an hour before a looming SAG-AFTRA strike was made official.

The actress received the honorary prize ahead of the Israeli premiere of Guy Nattiv’s Golda as the festival’s opening film, in which she stars as iconic late stateswoman Golda Meir.

“I would just like to say, I am a member of a tribe and members of my tribe can be found in Germany, in Belgium, America… they are Palestinians, they are Israelis, they are Africans,” she told the 6,000-strong crowd at the outdoor opening ceremony in the shadow of Jerusalem’s Old City walls.

“They are the tribe to whom I really want to dedicate this award and that is the tribe of actors. Actors are wonderful people.”

Mirren gave a special mention to the Israeli cast members on Golda who included Lior Ashkenazi as David ‘Dado’ Elazar and Rami Heuberger as Moshe Dayan.

“I was lucky enough to work with fantastic Israeli actors on Golda. I had the greatest of times with them because immediately I felt I belonged. I was with my tribe, so thank you to my wonderful tribe of actors all over the world, in every language there is.”

Mirren had spent the morning doing promotional duties on Golda with local outlets, but interviews were wrapped by 3pm local time (5am PT).

She did not talk directly about the looming strike at a press conference in the morning or in her comments at the opening ceremony, but her appearance ended an hour before the strike was officially declared.

Other honorees on Thursday included Oliver Stone as well as Belgian directorial duo Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne. Further guests this year include directors Claire Denis and Florian Zeller who are on the jury.

The strike is expected to impact the film festival circuit as actors stop promotional and red carpet events as part of their industrial action.

With Mirren’s attendance done and dusted before the strike kicked off, disruption to the Jerusalem Film Festival will be minimal with few other big U.S. and UK acting names due to attend this year.

Mirren has long-standing ties with Israel having first visited the country in 1967 and spending a month working at the Kibbutz Ha’on at the foot of the Golan Heights.

She recounted how she had begun her stint at the kibbutz combing the grapes on the Golan Heights.

“This was just after the Six Day War so there were a few shells going off… When they realized this was a bit too dangerous for a ‘shiksa’ from London, they yanked me out of the grapevines and put me in the kitchen,” she said.

“Little did I think in that moment that one day I would be standing here in this beautiful, historic magical, difficult complex city of Jerusalem.”

Golda explores Meir’s life and legacy through the then Israeli prime minister’s controversial handling of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, in which Israel was taken by surprise by a combined joint attack by Egypt and Syria to its southern and northern borders.

Mirren’s casting as Meir sparked controversy when UK actress Maureen Lipman publicly criticized the casting of a non-Jewish actress in the role.

Israelis appear to have enthusiastically embraced Mirren in the role, but the topic came up once again in the press conference earlier on Thursday.

Mirren, who deflected a similar question at the Berlinale in February to Nattiv, spoke-up this time.

“I adhere to both camps. At the same time as believing that anyone can play anything, I also believe that sometimes the absolute right person for a role is the very person who can profoundly understand the issues involved,” she said, referring to Troy Kotsur’s performance in Coda as an example of the latter.

“I’m personally ambivalent. I’m incredibly grateful for the opportunity to inhabit Golda because it was just such an amazing place for me to be in this woman’s mind. It was an incredibly profound journey for me, and I’m very, very grateful for it but at the same time, my mind is open.”

The Jerusalem Film Festival runs from July 13 to 23.


Helen Mirren visits Jerusalem for new film 'Golda,' says she is inspired by anti-government protests





 Helen Mirren arrives at the world premiere of "Shazam! Fury of the Gods" on Tuesday, March 14, 2023, at the Regency Village Theatre in Los Angeles. Helen Mirren, who plays Israel’s first female prime minister in her latest film, says she has been inspired by the widespread protests against the country’s current prime minister. Mirren plays the late Golda Meir during the 1973 war between Israel and a coalition of Arab states in “Golda.” 

(Photo by Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP, File)

JULIA FRANKEL
Updated Thu, July 13, 2023 

JERUSALEM (AP) — Helen Mirren, who plays Israel's first female prime minister in her latest film, says she has been inspired by the widespread protests underway against the country's current premier, Benjamin Netanyahu.

Mirren, who portrays the late Golda Meir during the 1973 war between Israel and a coalition of Arab states in “Golda,” is visiting an Israel similarly beset by crisis as mass demonstrations take place against Netanyahu's plan to overhaul the country's judicial system.

Mirren told a news conference before the opening of the Jerusalem Film Festival that she is inspired by the protests.

“I’m personally very moved and excited when you see these huge demonstrations,” she said. “I think it’s a pivotal moment in Israeli history.”

Netanyahu's coalition government, which took office in December, is the most hard-line ultranationalist and ultra-Orthodox in Israel’s 75-year history.

For over six months, hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets to protest the proposed judicial overhaul. Netanyahu's allies say the plan is needed to rein in the powers of an unelected judiciary. His opponents say it is a thinly veiled power grab that will destroy the country's fragile system of checks and balances.

Mirren contrasted the leadership of Meir — who often served coffee to her military advisers as they convened in her kitchen to discuss strategy — with that of Netanyahu, who has a reputation for being aloof and out of touch with everyday Israelis.

“She had immense power, but she was perfectly happy to toddle around in the kitchen, making everyone coffee and being the grandmother,” Mirren said. “It’s a very different attitude toward power — from the male, Netanyahu type of power to the Golda Meir kitchen power.”

Mirren's visit also comes at a time when Netanyahu's government is moving to deepen its hold on the West Bank. His government has approved plans for thousands of homes in West Bank settlements, and tensions with the Palestinians are rising.

Over 150 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire this year in the occupied West Bank, and Palestinian attacks targeting Israelis have killed at least 25 people. Israel says most of the Palestinians who were killed were militants, though stone-throwers and people uninvolved in violence have also been among the dead.

Some of Netanyahu's allies are West Bank settler leaders who have sought to deny the national aspirations of Palestinians, a sentiment which Meir famously expressed in 1969.

“There was no such thing as Palestinians,” Meir said in an interview with the Sunday Times. Israel's far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich echoed Meir recently, stating, “there is no such thing as a Palestinian people."

Lior Ashkenazi, the Israeli actor who plays the head of the Israeli army in the film, said he thought Meir would support efforts to annex the West Bank.

“Even though she was a socialist,” Ashkenazi said, “I think she would definitely support the settlers.”

The film, directed by Guy Nattiv and written by Nicholas Martin, focuses on Meir’s leadership during the 1973 Mideast war, when a coalition of Arab states led by Egypt and Syria launched an attack on Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.

Under the leadership of Meir and Israeli military officials, Israel emerged victorious from the war, its forces standing within 70 miles (120 kilometers) of the Egyptian capital of Cairo. The war’s outcome laid the groundwork for a peace agreement between Israel and Egypt.

But Israel suffered heavy losses during the war, and Meir was criticized for the government's lack of preparation and refusing to act on intelligence indicating an attack was imminent. Meir resigned the following year, and the national trauma in the wake of the war set off a process that would bring the right-wing Likud party, which Netanyahu currently leads, to power in 1977.

Mirren, a British-born actor, has won both Oscar and Emmy awards for performances ranging from Queen Elizabeth II in “The Queen,” and Sofia Tolstoy in “The Last Station."

ZIONIST ILLEGAL OCCUPATION

Israel advances peak number of West Bank settlement plans in 2023 -watchdog

Ozzy Jackson, an 18-year-old settler carries buckets at Kedar Sheep Farm near the Jewish settlement of Kedar

Reuters
Thu, July 13, 2023 

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's religious-nationalist government has promoted a record number of housing units in settlements in the occupied West Bank in its first six months, Israeli anti-settlement watchdog Peace Now said on Thursday.

Most countries deem Jewish settlements built on land Israel occupied in a 1967 Middle East war as illegal, and their continued expansion has for decades been among the most contentious issues between Israel, the Palestinians and the international community.

Since January, Israel has advanced 12,855 settler housing units across the West Bank, said Peace Now - the highest number the group has recorded since it started tracking such activity in 2012.

"In the past six months, the only sector that Israel has vigorously promoted is the settlement enterprise," it said in a statement.

Palestinian leaders have sought to establish an independent state in the West Bank and Gaza with East Jerusalem as its capital. They say settlements cut Palestinian communities from each other and undermine hopes of a viable state.

The United States, Israel's key ally and a broker of statehood negotiations that have stalled since 2014, has repeatedly expressed its objection to Israel's ongoing settlement expansion.

According to the United Nations, some 700,000 settlers live in 279 settlements across the West Bank and East Jerusalem, up from 520,000 in 2012. More than 3 million Palestinians who live in the same area are subjected to Israeli military rule that some rights groups say amounts to apartheid.

Israel cites biblical and historical ties to the area and denies it maintains an apartheid policy against Palestinians. Netanyahu, whose coalition includes far-right ministers who oppose Palestinian statehood, has recently said Israeli settlements were not an obstacle to peace with the Palestinians.

(Reporting by Henriette Chacar; Editing by Alistair Bell)

Palestinian leader calls on world to ‘protect us,’ and his people respond with bitter laughter

THE BITTERNESS OF WORMWOOD


Issam Rimawi/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images


Abeer Salman

CNN
Fri, July 14, 2023 

President Mahmoud Abbas, the 87-year-old veteran who has led the Palestinian Authority for nearly two decades, is trending on Palestinian social media – but not in the way he might like.

When he made a rare flying visit to Jenin this week, eight days after the largest Israeli incursion into the city’s refugee camp in decades, many comments in the Facebook live feed of Palestine TV were harsh.

“Most of those cheering are his security forces. Where are the injured people?” one viewer asked.

“Good morning, you can wait for a week more, no harm,” another said, in reference to the time that had passed between the Israeli pullout and Abbas’s arrival.

“Those helicopters were rented,” another said of the two Jordanian aircraft that brought the leader and his entourage to Jenin.

The Facebook feed recorded more laughing emojis in response to viewer comments than hearts during the visit.

And that’s not the worst of it.

Abbas’s speech to the United Nations on May 15 commemorating the displacement of Palestinians at the founding of Israel, known in Arabic as the Nakba, or catastrophe, triggered a wave of cynical and darkly comic social media memes and videos.

Abbas called on the international community to provide protection for the Palestinian people. In an emotional plea, he said: “We are getting beaten every day, we scream every day. People of the world, protect us! Aren’t we human beings? Even animals should be protected. If you have an animal, won’t you protect it? Protect us…”

His words struck a chord with many Palestinians – a deeply negative one.

For some, Abbas’s comparison of their suffering to that of animals was deeply insulting, while for others, it was seen as darkly comic. His phrase “Protect us” – “Ehmouna” in Arabic – quickly became a trending topic on social media.

Videos began circulating mocking Abbas’s words.

In one, a child is asked by his father what Abbas said at the UN. The boy, wriggling in the backseat of a car, childishly says “Ehmouna, ehmouna for Allah’s sake” as other people in the car laugh.

A harsher video features an elderly woman cursing Abbas sarcastically and viciously, repeatedly saying “Ehmouna.” She demands that he use his police and security forces to provide protection for his people instead of making a desperate plea to the international community.

Meanwhile, one of the simplest but funniest videos on TikTok, just features a man lip syncing the sound of Abbas saying “Ehmouna,” exaggerating his expressions just enough to make the mockery plain.

Ultimately, these viral moments shed light on the frustrations and aspirations of the Palestinian people, caught between the conflict with Israel on the one hand and their own unpopular leadership on the other.

The Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research in Ramallah found last September that 26% of respondents were satisfied with Abbas as president, while 71% were dissatisfied; 74% demanded that he resign. The Center interviewed 1,270 adults face to face September 13-17, 2022, and the poll had a margin of error of three points.

The Palestinian Authority has not held presidential elections since May 2006 – repeatedly postponing votes – leaving the Palestinian people with few ways other than social media to make their voices heard.

“Protect us” was not the first time Palestinians have picked up on a hashtag related to Abbas. Another trend emerged around his calls for peaceful resistance, which many Palestinians view as disconnected from the harsh realities of increasing Israeli settler violence and frequent, deadly Israeli military incursions in the occupied West Bank.

Two Palestinians sarcastically attempt to “act as President Abbas requested” in one video. They pretend to protest against an Israeli military base built on their land, gently urging: “Go away and leave us alone.”

Laughing, they conclude: “They’ll be gone by noon.”

CNN.com

New report estimates 89,000 lives could be saved if Americans make one simple lifestyle change: ‘A significant health benefit’



Roberto Guerra
Thu, July 13, 2023

A new report has highlighted the health benefits of shifting to electric vehicles (EVs) as efficiently as possible, as long as the energy comes from renewable sources.

The American Lung Association released a new report explaining how if drivers stop using conventional air-polluting vehicles and the U.S. cleans up its power grid, 89,000 lives and nearly $1 trillion in health costs could be saved by the middle of the century, as reported by Grist.

According to William Barrett, who authored the report and works on clean air and climate policy at the American Lung Association, “There’s a real significant health benefit to be achieved and significant suffering to be avoided — premature deaths to be avoided, children having asthma attacks avoided — by making this transition to technology that exists today.”

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), almost all of the global population (99%) breathes air that exceeds WHO guideline limits and contains high levels of pollutants.

Conventional motor vehicles emit pollution that contains particulate matter, which penetrates the lungs and enters the bloodstream, resulting in various impacts on cardiovascular health (such as ischaemic heart disease), cerebrovascular health (such as stroke), and respiratory well-being, the WHO reports.

The organization also states that short-term and long-term exposure to particulate matter is associated with increased mortality rates related to cardiovascular and respiratory diseases.

Long-term exposure has also been linked to negative perinatal outcomes and lung cancer. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) of the WHO classified particulate matter as a cause of lung cancer in 2013.

States such as California and Oregon have established goals to achieve “zero-emissions” for all passenger vehicle sales by 2035.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently introduced tailpipe emissions standards that could result in EVs making up around two-thirds of all new car sales by 2032.

However, the American Lung Association’s report also specifies the need for EVs to be powered by clean energy sources, like solar or wind.

Sara Adar, an epidemiologist at the University of Michigan who specializes in studying environmental health, particularly traffic pollution, admitted, “If we fail in our attempt to clean the grid and we are still generating electricity based on coal, I think those estimates will no longer be accurate,” Grist reported.

'It's our duty': Hundreds gather to remember Newark firefighters killed in ship fire


Mike Kelly, NorthJersey.com
Updated Fri, July 14, 2023 

NEWARK, N.J. — Firefighters are helpers by nature. It prompts them to run into danger. It’s also the glue that holds them together in tough times.

And so, on a hot, windy Thursday in Newark, New Jersey, hundreds of firefighters — some traveling from as far away as California — gathered to help one another get through the first of two long goodbyes to two Newark firefighters who perished last week after they were trapped aboard a burning ship loaded with used cars bound for Africa.

“This is what it’s all about,” said Tim McGovern, a retired Newark battalion chief who drove from Toms River to pay tribute to firefighter Augusto “Augie” Acabou, 45, who was overcome by smoke along with his colleague, firefighter Wayne “Bear” Brooks Jr., while battling flames aboard the Grande Costa D'Avorio, a 692-foot cargo ship, on July 5.

“When something like that happens, you show up,” McGovern said. “It’s part of the job.”

Augusto’s nearly three-hour funeral at Newark’s Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart on Thursday morning ended only a few hours before a wake for Brooks, whose funeral took place at the same church on Friday morning.

Timeline: Chief breaks down department's response to fatal Newark ship fire

Profound anguish

For firefighters, the loss of just one of their breed in the line of duty often sets off deep emotions about the ever-present dangers of the job that requires them to run into a fire instead of from it. But the loss of two firefighters in Newark seemed to set off especially widespread sorrow.

The anguish was even more profound because Acabou, 45, a 10-year veteran of the Newark Fire Department, and Brooks, 49, who served 16 years, were not rescuing people. They died trying to extinguish a blaze that broke out amid nearly 1,200 cars parked tightly together aboard a 12-story cargo ship that is nearly as long as two football fields.

Firefighter Augusto Acabou's Funeral at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark on Thursday, July 13, 2023.

“That’s what brings us together,” said Lt. Joseph Hoyle Sr., a 31-year veteran of the Englewood, New Jersey, fire department. “We understand our profession, and we understand the extreme risks. But to lose two firefighters to a car fire is especially difficult to live with.”

Hoyle said he hopes that the questions raised about the ship fire would result in some changes in how to battle shipboard fires, just as criticism of the firefighters’ response to a blaze in a truss roof at a car dealership in Hackensack, New Jersey, in July 1988 resulted in new firefighting standards across America.

One recommendation that Hoyle said he and other fire fighters would wholeheartedly support would be the establishment of specially trained fire brigades at America’s shipping ports.

“This will, without a doubt, cause a renewed focus on having a fire service especially at our ports,” Hoyle said of the fire.

In the wake of the deaths of Acabou and Brooks, firefighters have voiced criticism of Newark’s fire department for what they described as insufficient training and equipment to fight ship fires. Some of Newark's fire engines are staffed by only one officer and just two fire fighters. The optimum staffing of fire engines is one officer and four or five fire fighters. But many municipalities cuts budgets by trimming staffing levels.

In a larger sense, firefighters from across the region also questioned why nozzles on the cargo ship’s firefighting system were only one inch wide while the firefighters arrived with hoses with nozzles that were 2.5 inches wide.

Firefighter Augusto Acabou's funeral at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark on Thursday, July 13, 2023.

The criticism also raised concerns about whether the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey should establish its own specially trained fire department for its 272-acre docking facility in Newark, the nation’s third-largest port. For decades, the Port Authority, which has specially trained fire fighting teams at its airports, has relied on Newark’s fire department, which is trained mainly to fight fires in home and offices, to respond to fires at its shipping ports.

Before Acabou’s funeral began, Sean DeCrane, director of health and safety operational services for the International Association of Firefighters, the nation’s largest firefighting union, said federal safety officials planned to examine the Newark port fire with an eye toward improving firefighting techniques. But DeCrane said in an interview with NorthJersey.com and The Record outside the cathedral basilica that the federal study could not begin until Newark’s fire department officially requested it.

On Thursday, Newark fire officials were unavailable for comment on this issue.

Mike Kelly: As Newark firefighters are laid to rest, these are the questions we must answer

More: Newark firefighters union blasts 'neglect' by city in wake of two deaths
A final farewell

Acabou’s funeral was a mix of tradition and heartfelt family memories.

In addition to English, scripture readings were recited in Acabou’s native language, Portuguese.

A large American flag hung from ladders between two firetrucks as Acabou’s coffin was brought to the cathedral basilica in an antique fire engine. A pipe band played the Irish funeral tune “Going Home” — a tradition at many fire department funerals across America. As a farewell, three fire chiefs rang a bell and a Newark fire dispatcher sent a final radio message to city fire fighters that Acabou had answered his last call.

Police on horses stood by. Hundreds of firefighters, clad in blue uniforms and white gloves, saluted. Color guards from fire brigades from across the region lowered their flags as Acabou's coffin, draped in an American flag, was carried into the cathedral basilica.

Inside, the ancient Roman Catholic hymn “Ave Maria” was sung. So was Leonard Cohen’s more modern pop classic, “Hallelujah.” And Acabou’s former football coach at Newark’s Eastside High School, Kevin Bullock, presented his jersey inscribed with the number 85 to his family. Bullock also said that Acabou devoted hours driving his former coach to doctors' appointments or just picking up groceries when he battled cancer.

"Augie would give his heart to anyone," Bullock said. "I said, 'Augie, you don't have to do this.' But that's what Augie did."

“To say that Augie Acabou was brave is an understatement,” Newark Mayor Ras Baraka said in one of six eulogies that included an announcement by the city that Acabou would be promoted posthumously to the rank of captain.

Earlier: Newark firefighters killed in cargo ship fire remembered for dedication, selflessness

The same honor was bestowed Friday on Brooks during his funeral in a proclamation read by Newark Public afety Director Fritz Frage. And just as many who came to Acabou’s funeral had personal memories of him, the same was true of Brooks.

Bob LaCour, a retired Edison firefighter who worked with Brooks on an extra job on the runways at Newark Liberty International Airport, said in an interview that Brooks deeply wanted to help people in need.

“He was a friendly, helpful, jolly person,” LaCour said. “And he really wanted a career in the fire service. Firefighters are just helpful people by nature.”

LaCour said he was especially impressed by Brooks' desire to assist almost anyone. "There are people who take a job for benefits and people who aspire to help people," LaCour said. "Wayne wanted to help people."

Like the service for Acabou, Brooks' funeral brought together hundreds of fire fighters from across New Jersey, with some coming from as far away as Chicago. Brooks' memorial also included a stream of eulogies that praised him as a devoted father and friend. Many mourners wore blue to honor Brooks -- blue dresses for women and blue ties for men.

Jason Brooks spoke of his older brother as a "super hero" who loved to brag about his family's achievements, from graduating from college to the birth of a new baby.

"Let's brag about him even more than he would brag about us," said Jason Brooks, adding that "Wayne was always the type of person who takes the lead in solving a problem. He never complains. He just got things done. Nothing I could say could describe the void left by Wayne because he’s a connector.

"It may be a stretch to call Wayne a 'super hero,' but it's not a stretch to call him a super servant," said the Rev. DeForest "Buster" Soaries, a Baptist minister and noted civil rights leader in New Jersey.

Soaries said that Brooks "had the intellect" to take on any job he wanted but "he chose to become a super servant and now he's a super hero."

Brooks' wife, Michele, did not speak at the service. But a friend read an emotional letter from her.

"Wayne 'Bear' Brooks Jr., loved me in a way I always dreamed for," Michelle Brooks wrote. "You believed and saw the brighter side of things, always."

Captain Brett Hendrie of the New Rochelle, New York, fire department agreed that the instinct to be helpful also creates a unique bond of friendship and loyalty among firefighters. He said that’s why he drove from New Rochelle to Newark to attend the funeral of a man he did not know.

“When they talk about the brotherhood, it’s truly a real thing,” Hendrie said. “What Acabou and Brooks went through could happen to any firefighters. When one of us dies, it’s like a member of the family died.”

Firefighter Augusto Acabou's funeral at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark on Thursday, July 13, 2023.

As a final eulogy, Acabou’s close friend and fellow Newark firefighter Eddie Paulo drew laughs when he mentioned that Acabou quit his amateur boxing career because “he felt bad for the guys he was hurting.”

“It’s a cliché to say that someone is the nicest guy in the world,” Paolo said. “But in Augie Acabou’s case, it was true.”

As he waited outside the cathedral basilica, Englewood firefighter Chandy Campbell, a 28-year veteran, drew quiet as he reflected on the possibility that every firefighter might someday face the same fate as Acabou and Brooks.

“Is it fair?” Campbell said. “No. But it’s our duty.”

As the funeral ended, Acabou’s coffin was driven away in the antique firetruck. The band played “America the Beautiful.”

Mike Kelly is an award-winning columnist for NorthJersey.com, part of the USA TODAY Network, as well as the author of three critically acclaimed non-fiction books and a podcast and documentary film producer. To get unlimited access to his insightful thoughts on how we live life in the Northeast, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Port Newark fire: Hundreds honor Augie Acabou, Wayne Brooks