Flagship

Gaza blast ends diplomatic hopes

A devastating explosion at a Gaza hospital upended hopes of a diplomatic breakthrough over the Israel-Hamas conflict as U.S. President Joe Biden arrived in Tel Aviv. Hamas attributed the blast — which left huge numbers of Palestinians dead — to an Israeli airstrike, while Israel said a misfire by Palestinian Islamic Jihad, another militant group in Gaza, was responsible. Defense experts suggested the latter explanation appeared more likely. Speaking alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Biden sided with Israel’s account of the explosion. Jordan, however, canceled a planned summit between Biden and several Arab leaders in Amman, threatening a diplomatic fracturing. The hospital blast exacerbated a spiraling humanitarian crisis in Gaza, where health care resources, as well as food and water, are in short supply.

Biden’s tight embrace of Israel “poses a deepening dilemma” for his administration, The Washington Post reported, particularly if an anticipated Israeli ground operation in Gaza leads to mass civilian casualties. “The Biden administration is correct in supporting Israel’s right to retaliate, but it must still try to shape how that retaliation unfolds,” Richard Haass, the president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote in Foreign Affairs. Even in Israel, the response against Hamas and its consequences triggered complex emotions: “As a people, we must not be indifferent to the anguish of Gaza,” an expert wrote in The Times of Israel, “And we must not allow that anguish to undermine our resolve to destroy Hamas.”

China and Russia’s ‘deepening’ ties

China’s and Russia’s leaders hailed their “deepening” relationship during talks in Beijing, the latest sign of strengthening ties between the two. The meeting came as Washington tightened restrictions on Beijing’s access to artificial-intelligence chips, though analysts noted a loophole allowing Chinese firms to use advanced chip technology by renting cloud-computing capacity remained open. China and Russia, meanwhile, have their own share of disagreements: The Ukraine invasion has left Moscow weaker and more dependent on Beijing, and China has not offered large-scale military aid to Russia, while the war has also illustrated the two countries’ differing strategic styles. But these fissures are “more likely to bring the two sides closer than to drive them apart,” the China expert Minxin Pei argued.

Five Eyes chiefs warn of China threat

Spy chiefs from the “Five Eyes” intelligence-sharing group — Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the U.K., and U.S. — urged the world to take steps to protect tech industries from Chinese espionage. It’s the first time they have appeared together: The FBI director called it “an unprecedented event to confront an unprecedented threat.” The Australian security service head said “all nations spy” but that China is engaged in “the most sustained, scaled, and sophisticated theft of intellectual property” in history. Meanwhile, the former head of the U.S. National Security Agency told Semafor that it is “only a matter of time” before cyber attacks on infrastructure and military installations are treated as an act of war.

ATACMS strike Russian targets

Ukrainian forces deployed U.S.-made long-range ATACMS rocket artillery for the first time, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. The weapons were supplied without fanfare in order to take Moscow by surprise, and were reported to have destroyed several Russian helicopters at air bases in occupied eastern Ukraine, although Zelenskyy did not confirm the reports. The Biden administration had previously refused to provide Kyiv with ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System), for fear of escalating the conflict, a concern that had previously held back supplies of tanks and fighter jets, both of which were also ultimately approved. A Russian milblogger said the strike on the airfields was a “serious blow.”

New obesity drug outperforms rivals

Eli Lilly’s new obesity drug outperforms existing treatments like semaglutide, with patients losing on average 25% of their body weight, a new study found. Tirzepatide, brand name Mounjaro, was approved in the U.S. last year to treat diabetes and is expected to be licensed for use on obesity soon. The study looked at patients who had already lost weight and found that those on tirzepatide lost more while those on placebo put some back on. The new treatments are reshaping obesity treatment: Novo Nordisk, maker of semaglutide, is Denmark’s biggest company, and in India, where obesity is a growing problem, patients are demanding the drugs instead of traditional remedies.

Venezuela factions agree election deal

Venezuela’s government promised to allow international observers for elections next year as part of a deal with opposition politicians, in a move that could offer the country much-needed relief from U.S. sanctions. Washington imposed the measures in response to a crackdown on democracy by Caracas, but is reportedly prepared to ease the sanctions in return for progress on freedoms. Still, the deal falls short in several ways, failing, for example, to lift bans on opposition candidates barred from holding public office. Even if it does go ahead, Venezuela’s opposition parties are struggling to come together ahead of primaries on Sunday to nominate a challenger to President Nicolás Maduro, and face a number of procedural and political challenges, El País reported.

SAfrica rail network on edge of collapse

Cargo carried on South Africa’s state rail service Transnet collapsed by a third in five years, beset by corruption, vandalism, and theft. Its chief executive and its head of freight both resigned, and the company is $6.9 billion in debt. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said the rail network faced a disaster of “catastrophic proportions” and is putting together a plan to gain more private investment for the service, the Financial Times reported. Pretoria faces a series of crises: Its state-owned energy company Eskom is also collapsing, and the exchequer is losing $50 million a day as its budget deficit grows, partly due to falling revenues from its mining industry as Transnet’s failures throttle exports.

US trials free online tax payment system

The U.S. Internal Revenue Service will pilot a program allowing taxpayers to file tax returns digitally for free. At present, Americans often pay accountants or use third-party tax systems because their only alternative is a complicated paper form. The companies involved have long lobbied against the IRS introducing a direct-pay system, and in 2006 agreed a deal that they would provide free services for lower-paid customers as long as the IRS was barred from creating its own online form. But starting next year, customers in several states will be offered a chance to test a new system. Other countries, such as the U.K., have had free, and relatively easy to navigate, online tax systems for years.

Lego’s aim for world domination

Lego wants to become an entertainment brand to compete with Disney after having pulled far ahead of its traditional rivals. At the turn of the century Lego was struggling, with sales of about $1.3 billion, a fraction of toymakers Hasbro and Mattel. But the 90-year-old Danish firm turned things around in the 2010s, expanding its range to include tie-ins such as Harry Potter and Star Wars sets and homegrown franchises like Ninjago, as well as a series of movies. Its $9 billion revenues are nearly double those of its erstwhile rivals, and profits are similarly buoyant. Now it looks to the far larger Disney for the next battle: “The brand strengths are much more like Disney than any more traditional toy competitor,” its CEO told the Financial Times.

EU glitter ban comes into force

The European Union banned the sale of loose plastic glitter in its push to crack down on microplastic pollution. Microplastics are usually defined as small plastic pieces less than 5 millimeters (0.2 inches) in length: They pass through filtration systems and can end up in oceans and lakes, harming aquatic life. Glitter, usually made from plastic and aluminum, fits the definition, as do some cosmetics and other products. The ban will not affect glitter products already on shelves, and some people are stockpiling: One German Celebrity Big Brother contestant bought 82 packets, saying “In my world, everything has to glitter.” As parents know, glitter will continue to turn up everywhere for years, because the stuff is harder to get rid of than Japanese knotweed.

The Global State of Wellbeing: A Semafor Summit
October 24 | Washington D.C. | RSVP

Wellbeing is complicated in the year 2023. As we emerge from a shared isolation imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, there is renewed urgency to thoughtfully examine barriers to our wellbeing in the United States and around the world.

Join us in Washington D.C. for a conversation on the global state of wellbeing. Led by Semafor’s expert editors and guided by Gallup data, we’ll explore global emotional trends, social connectedness, mental health, and what it means, ultimately, to be well.

• French President Emmanuel Macron meets Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas at the Elysee Palace in Paris.
• Austria’s conservative former Chancellor Sebastian Kurz goes on trial for perjury.
• Musicians including Public Enemy and Ja Rule will perform at the annual Spirit of Life Gala in Los Angeles to raise money for cancer research and treatment.

The time in minutes United Airlines expects to save per flight with a new boarding procedure in which passengers with window seats will board before middle- and aisle-seat passengers. From Oct. 26, the airline will still prioritize certain groups such as first and business class, and those with disabilities. But domestic flight passengers will then be ordered in part by a WILMA process — window, middle, aisle — in order to speed up boarding. The two minutes saved may not seem like a lot, but, “over the days, weeks, months, and years, potentially where they can really make money is if they save enough boarding time that they can actually have an extra flight during the day,” one expert told The New York Times.

Salman Rushdie’s new memoir about the brutal attack that left him blind in his right eye will be published in April. “This was a necessary book for me to write,” said Rushdie, “a way to take charge of what happened, and to answer violence with art.” The 76-year-old author of novels including the Booker Prize-winning Midnight’s Children, Haroun and the Sea of Stories, and The Ground Beneath Her Feet, was stabbed onstage during a literary festival in New York last year. Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder is “a reminder of the power of words to make sense of the unthinkable,” said his publisher.

• A high-profile memestock CEO sent sexually explicit images and messages in a weeks-long text exchange with a woman who tried to extort hundreds of thousands of dollars from him using fake identities.
• OpenAI has quietly changed its “core values.” The AI startup now says its singular goal is to build “safe, beneficial” artificial general intelligence, noting that anything else is “out of scope.”
• In the era of the “buff business leader,” some tech workers have turned to a broad class of oral and injectable drugs, treatments, and supplements to improve their health and appearance.