Good morning.
Many of the gravest threats to humanity are drawing closer, as carbon pollution heats the planet to ever more dangerous levels, scientists have warned.
Five important natural thresholds already risk being crossed, according to the Global Tipping Points report, and three more may be reached in the next decade if the world heats 1.5C (2.7F) above pre-industrial levels.
Triggering these planetary shifts will not cause temperatures to spiral out of control in the coming centuries but will unleash dangerous and sweeping damage to people and nature that cannot be undone.
“Tipping points in the Earth system pose threats of a magnitude never faced by humanity,” said Prof Tim Lenton, from the University of Exeter’s Global Systems Institute. “They can trigger devastating domino effects, including the loss of whole ecosystems and capacity to grow staple crops, with societal impacts including mass displacement, political instability and financial collapse.”
What are the tipping points? At risk are the collapse of big ice sheets in Greenland and West Antarctic; the widespread thawing of permafrost; the death of coral reefs in warm waters; and the collapse of one atmospheric current in the North Atlantic.
Fuel and medical supplies running out at al-Aqsa hospital in Gaza as UN warns of ‘apocalyptic’ conditions in south
Fuel and medical supplies are at critically low levels at al-Aqsa hospital in central Gaza because of road closures, as hundreds of patients are being admitted every day, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) has said.
The UN’s top aid official has said the Israeli military campaign in southern Gaza has been just as devastating as the one in the north, creating “apocalyptic” conditions and ending any possibility of meaningful humanitarian operations.
Martin Griffiths, the UN emergency relief coordinator, said he was speaking on behalf of the entire international aid community in saying the continuing offensive had robbed aid workers of any significant means of helping the 2.3 million people of Gaza.
Meanwhile, Israeli forces have expanded their ground offensive inside Gaza to include its second-largest city, further shrinking the area in which Palestinians can seek safety and halting the distribution of vital aid across most of the territory.
Hamas and Islamic Jihad have told Agence France-Press their fighters were battling Israeli troops early on Wednesday in an effort to prevent them from breaking into Khan Younis, which local media reported was under heavy bombardment, with Israeli tanks approaching from the east.
What else is happening? The United Nations has heard accounts of sexual violence during the 7 October attacks by Hamas, in a meeting where speakers also accused women’s rights activists and UN officials of not doing more to investigate or condemn these crimes.
What has Joe Biden said? The president has denounced the reported rape and sexual violence committed against Israeli girls and women by Hamas militants, calling on the world to condemn such conduct “without equivocation” and “without exception.”
Trump tells Hannity he will be a dictator only on ‘day one’
The former president Donald Trump declined to rule out abusing power if he returns to the White House after the Fox News host Sean Hannity asked the Republican presidential frontrunner to respond to growing Democratic criticism of his rhetoric.
Trump has talked about targeting his rivals – referring to them as “vermin” – and vowed to seek retribution if he wins a second term for what he argues are politically motivated prosecutions against him.
He had to be asked twice during the televised town-hall event in Iowa to deny he would abuse power to seek revenge on political opponents if re-elected to the White House.
“Under no circumstances, you are promising America tonight, you would never abuse power as retribution against anybody?” Hannity asked Trump in the interview recorded in Davenport, Iowa, on Tuesday.
“Except for day one,” Trump responded, adding that on the “day one” he was referring to, he would use his presidential powers to close the southern border with Mexico and expand oil drilling.
Trump then repeated his assertion. “I love this guy,” he said of the Fox News host. “He says, ‘You’re not going to be a dictator, are you?’ I said: ‘No, no, no, other than day one. We’re closing the border and we’re drilling, drilling, drilling. After that, I’m not a dictator.’”
What has Biden been saying? As Trump has dominated the Republican presidential primary, Biden has stepped up his own warnings, claiming the former president is “determined to destroy American democracy”. Biden said yesterday that he was not sure he would be seeking re-election if he were not likely to be facing Trump in next year’s election. “If Trump wasn’t running, I’m not sure I’d be running,” Biden said at a fundraising event for his 2024 campaign.
In other news …
Eric Trump is to testify again in the fraud trial against the Trump Organization, which is accused of illegally inflating the value of assets on state financial documents. He last took the witness stand in early November when he denied involvement with various financial documents and appraisals, including ones he had signed off on or was consulted about.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy will join a video summit of G7 leaders on Wednesday, the host, Japan, said, hours after the Ukrainian president unexpectedly skipped a virtual meeting with US senators at the last minute. The news came a day after the White House sent an urgent warning that Kyiv’s war efforts against the Russian invasion may grind to a halt without more assistance.
The Sag-Aftra union has ratified its contract with Hollywood studios, nearly a month after the parties reached an agreement that put an end to the historic strike that had upended the film and television industry. Actors won pay increases, protections around the use of artificial intelligence, and streaming-based bonuses.
Babies really do see the world differently, researchers have found, after revealing that infants under six months old do not fall for a visual illusion that can trick older children and adults. Experts say that is because information processing in the tots’ brains is not yet fully developed.
Pregnant women living near farm fields show “significantly” increased concentrations of glyphosate weedkiller in their urine during periods when farmers are spraying their fields with the herbicide, according to a scientific paper published today.
Stat of the day: Elon Musk’s AI startup seeks to raise $1bn in equity
Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence startup, xAI, is seeking to raise $1bn (£790m) as the world’s richest person tries to keep pace with rivals including OpenAI, Microsoft and Google in the race to dominate the field. His startup has already raised $135m from investors and is seeking a total of $1bn in equity financing, according to a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. The race to develop generative AI – products that generate convincing text, image and audio from simple prompts – has intensified as Silicon Valley’s biggest companies battle for supremacy after the release of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in November last year.
Don’t miss this: Teens need malls. Malls need crowds. Why are they pushing kids away?
Westfield Garden State Plaza is one of dozens US malls that have introduced or expanded curfews or parental escort policies since 2021. Mall managers say these curfews are introduced with good reason: an increase in rowdiness among young people, often blamed on social media, with online invitations leading to large crowds and fights posted on TikTok. In truth, there are no figures to confirm whether there has been an increase in mall violence, and whether teenagers are specifically to blame in all cases. The digital connection is unclear, too.
The problem, for teenagers and shopping mall managers alike, is not TikTok: it is the lack of physical spaces where young people can be together, blow off steam and learn the rules of engagement – a problem that is perhaps worse than ever.
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Last Thing: Tokyo taxi driver arrested, accused of running over pigeon
To some, they are another species of feathered friend; to others, they are rats with wings whose droppings deface historical buildings. But in Japan, pigeons may have become the victims of crime, after police arrested a taxi driver in Tokyo on suspicion of deliberately driving into a flock of the birds, killing one of them. Atsushi Ozawa, 50, is accused of using “his car to kill a common pigeon, which is not a game animal”, last month, and was arrested on Sunday for violating wildlife protection laws, a Tokyo police spokesperson told AFP. Ozawa told police he had driven into the birds because roads were “for people” and that it was “up to the pigeons to avoid cars”, according to local media.
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