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ICJ orders Israel to permit aid for Gaza

The International Court of Justice ordered Israel to allow aid “unhindered” into Gaza and prevent famine. Judges said that Gazans were already starving and that Israel should allow food, water, fuel, and medical supplies in, in cooperation with the United Nations. The ruling is technically binding under international law, although it is mainly of symbolic importance since there is no enforcement mechanism. It is, however, a further sign of Israel’s growing isolation. In further bad news for the Israeli government, the country’s supreme court ordered it to suspend state subsidies for ultra-orthodox Jews who attend religious schools instead of military service: The decision lays bare a split in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s uneasy coalition, which depends on ultra-orthodox politicians.

Dengue cases up threefold in Americas

Dengue cases in the Americas in the first quarter of the year were three times higher than in 2023. The head of the Pan American Health Organization said there have been more than 3.5 million registered cases through March, compared to 4.5 million for the whole of the previous year. El Niño, a warm-weather pattern, along with steadily rising global temperatures, have created the warmer- and wetter-than-average conditions in which dengue-carrying mosquitoes thrive and expanded their range: Last year, the number of mosquitoes in Germany swelled up to ten times usual estimates, according to data from the World Mosquito Program.

US economy concerns wane

Public concern over the state of the U.S. economy dropped this year, polling of U.S.-based respondents by Gallup showed. Although the data provides a reprieve for U.S. President Joe Biden ahead of his reelection bid, a rising share of respondents sees immigration as the most important problem facing the country. The issue’s salience highlights Mexico’s influence in the election: Under U.S. pressure and in exchange for concessions, Mexican authorities recently ramped up enforcement of immigrants to the U.S., leading to a sharp drop in illegal crossings. Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador “finds himself in control of the most powerful political narrative in Washington,” Eduardo Porter wrote in The Washington Post, “one that could determine the presidential election in November.”

AI drives stock market boom

Stock markets saw their best first-quarter performance in five years, driven by growth in artificial intelligence and newfound confidence in the U.S. economy. Nvidia alone added $1 trillion to markets, helping push an index of global stocks up 7.7% since January. AI’s influence on the economy may grow still further: ChatGPT maker OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman has been in Hollywood, showcasing its new video-generating AI Sora, capable of making photorealistic footage from text prompts. An analyst told the Financial Times that “it is going to revolutionize the making of movies” by lowering production costs and reducing demand for computer-generated imagery.

US to reopen old nuclear plant

A nuclear power station in Michigan will be the first in the U.S. to reopen, two years after being decommissioned. The Palisades Nuclear Plant closed in 2022 and was bought by a nuclear equipment manufacturer to be mothballed, but, as the U.S. moves to decarbonize its electricity supply and reduce reliance on overseas oil, the company decided it could profitably be revived. It hopes to get it up and running within two years. Palisades had run for 50 years — the U.S. nuclear fleet, which provides almost 20% of the country’s electricity, is on average 42 years old. The federal government will provide a $1.5 billion loan. It will be just the second or third reactor to restart anywhere in the world, a nuclear scientist said.

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Taiwan warns US over China

The head of Taiwan’s navy will visit the U.S. next week in a bid to boost bilateral cooperation amid rising threats from China, which claims the self-governed island as its territory. The visit is part of a U.S.-led effort to coordinate closer ties between Taiwan, Japan, and others within the “first island chain” that could counter potential future Chinese aggression, Reuters reported. Meanwhile Taipei’s foreign minister said that a halt in U.S. arms shipments to Ukraine would embolden China, as it would fuel propaganda from Beijing that the U.S. is an unreliable ally. “It would be seen as a victory of authoritarian states,” Joseph Wu told The New York Times.

Zuma barred from SA elections

Former South African President Jacob Zuma was barred from running in the country’s general election due in May. Although the South African electoral commission did not provide a reason for the ruling, “his 2021 conviction and jailing for contempt of court would appear to disqualify him,” the BBC reported. Zuma’s bid — under a new party he created — was seen as a threat to the governing African National Congress, which has ruled South Africa since the end of white minority rule in 1994. Millions of South Africans have grown disillusioned with the ANC over its mismanagement of the economy and rampant corruption, with some forecasting the party could receive less than 50% of the vote for the first time.

E-waste on the increase

More of us have “drawers of doom” filled with old electronic goods we don’t know how to dispose of, a recycling campaign group said. The average Briton stockpiles 30 unused electrical items, up from 20 four years ago. Remote controls, phones, and hair dryers are among the most commonly kept goods. One self-proclaimed hoarder told the BBC that “the modern dad has a drawer full of 15 old mobiles,” much as their fathers might have had a shed full of jars of old screws. The problem is worldwide: A 2019 UN report said 50 million tons of “e-waste” is produced each year, a figure it expected to rise to 110 million tons by 2050.

Europe’s ‘Iron Harvest’ of bombs

Unexploded ordnance from the two World Wars is growing increasingly unstable and more likely to detonate. Thousands of bombs and shells are buried all over Europe: 60,000 are found each year in Italy alone, while Belgian farmers find so much that it is called the “Iron Harvest.” Scientists testing old bombs found that as the explosive chemicals in the weapons age, they become more unstable, requiring less of an impact to trigger detonation, WIRED reported. One explosive was found to be four times more sensitive than expected. They are also leaching toxic compounds into soils, so even if they don’t blow you up, they’re not ideal things to have in the garden.

Eggs’ cholesterol impact questioned

A new study suggested that eggs are not bad for your heart. Nutritional science is notoriously tricky — almost all of it is observational, meaning scientists can see that, say, people who eat more asparagus tend to be healthier, but not whether the asparagus makes them healthier, or whether people who are healthier for other reasons also tend to eat asparagus. Unusually this was a randomized controlled trial, with 70 people on an eggy diet, and 70 on a low-egg diet, for four months: It found no difference in cholesterol levels at the end of the experiment. The study was small and short-term, so not conclusive, but it is a rare bit of causal evidence in a field crammed with weak research and overconfident claims.

• The World Cross Country Championship is held in Serbia.
• Sri Lanka’s prime minister visits Beijing.
• Istanbul holds a mayoral election on Sunday.

Pendulo in Mexico City recommends Why Politics Fails by Ben Ansell, an Oxford University professor of political science. It asks why politicians disappoint us, and whether the problem is not politicians but ourselves: “The same pattern always repeats itself: our self-interest harms our ability to achieve collective goals.” Order Why Politics Fails from Pendulo or from your local bookstore.

A British indie film follows a Sierra Leonean Paralympian as he struggles with impending homelessness as well as training for upcoming international events. George Wyndham, who contracted polio aged six which left him unable to walk, played para table tennis at the 2016 and 2021 Paralympics. But the Sierra Leone national stadium where he lives is being rebuilt and he has nowhere to go. George, a cinema verité-style film by directors Tom Young and Charles Browne-Cole, has its first screening on May 1 in Clapham, London: Young said he wanted to show “the humming cities, the hulking architecture, the new roads, the foreign investment” of modern Sierra Leone, as well as telling the story of Wyndham himself.

• The Alabama Democrat who flipped a seat in Trump country.
• The brain-computer interface race is on.
• Why Biden is spending $6 billion on green concrete and whiskey.