Heat waves in Africa have become significantly hotter, longer and more frequent over the last four decades, according to a new study led by researchers at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC).
The study, which used large-ensemble climate models to examine trends across the continent, links these changes primarily to greenhouse gas and black carbon emissions from fossil fuel use.
The research is published in Communications Earth & Environment.
Gaps in infrastructure and data limit Africa’s climate resilience
The researchers compared heat wave trends between two time periods: 1950–1979 and 1985–2014. The results showed that while the earlier period experienced infrequent and relatively weak heat waves, the later decades saw events occurring up to every two years and lasting three times longer on average.
The study highlights the specific vulnerability of African nations to extreme heat, due in part to limited adaptive infrastructure and insufficient meteorological data. In countries where early-warning systems and cooling infrastructure are often lacking, heat waves pose direct threats to public health, agricultural productivity and energy systems.
“Raising awareness of heat waves is critical to saving human life,” said Akintomide Afolayan Akinsanola, head of the Climate Research Lab and an assistant professor of earth and environmental sciences in the UIC College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. “In a developing continent like Africa, where the capacity for adaptive infrastructure is relatively low, heat waves can have greater consequences.”
During one particularly extreme event in April 2024, the West African city of Kayes recorded temperatures exceeding 119 °F (48 °C). Similar events strain already overburdened power grids and reduce crop yields. Populations such as infants, older adults and those with chronic conditions are especially susceptible to heat-related illness.
“The impacts are wide-ranging, from productivity to food shortage to energy,” said Akinsanola, who is jointly appointed at the Environmental Science Division of Argonne National Laboratory. “Remember that the African population is close to 2 billion. Heat waves can lead to drought, trigger migration and spark conflicts, thereby impacting regional, continental and even global stability.”
Emissions shift the balance from natural to anthropogenic drivers
Using computer model simulations from the Community Earth System Model 2—Large Ensemble, the researchers were able to isolate the factors contributing to daytime, nighttime and compound heat waves, including human-driven influences like greenhouse gas and aerosol emissions as well as natural variability.
In the earlier period, natural variability explained most of the observed activity, but by 1985–2014, only 30% of heat wave events were attributed to natural causes.
The team also notes that sulfate aerosols – a type of airborne particle produced naturally by volcanic activity and through fossil fuel combustion – once played a cooling role in the earlier decades by making clouds reflect more light back into space. However, their relative influence has diminished over time.
In the more recent data, greenhouse gas and black carbon emissions – linked to incomplete combustion of fuels – emerged as a strong contributor to increased heat wave intensity and frequency.
The study also found that rising near-surface air temperatures closely correlate with heat wave frequency, suggesting shared underlying drivers such as changes in air circulation and energy balance at the land surface.
Notably, these trends were not isolated to specific countries or regions. Instead, consistent increases in heat wave activity were observed across North, West, East, Central and Southern Africa.
“I was surprised to see that these changes were consistent across the African subregions, not just a specific isolated area,” said Vishal Bobde, a doctoral student in Akinsanola’s lab and the study’s first author.
Modelling climate futures under global emissions scenarios
Looking ahead, the researchers plan to assess how global mitigation strategies, including those proposed under the Paris Agreement, might influence future heat wave patterns in Africa.
“While Africa contributes a relatively small share of global greenhouse gas emissions, climate change is a global issue that is intensifying heat waves everywhere. Addressing this requires global cooperation to aggressively reduce emissions and build adaptive capacity,” said Kayode Ayegbusi, co-first author and UIC doctoral student in Akinsanola’s lab.
The authors suggest that their work could support more accurate forecasting of extreme heat and inform policy decisions aimed at improving early-warning systems and public health interventions across the continent.
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Craig Mazin will be The Last of Us season three’s lone writer after co-creator Neil Druckmann and co-writer Halley Gross announced they were returning to video game studio Naughty Dog to develop a new title. (Druckmann co-developed the original Last of Us game and directed The Last of Us: Part II, which he co-wrote with Gross.) Emmy-winning writer-director Mazin (Chernobyl), who this year is nominated for outstanding drama series, spoke to THR about how the HBO thriller focusing on the survivors of a mass fungal infection that collapses modern-day society has helped level up the art of game-to-small-screen adaptations and whether he’s already busy writing the third season.
Video game adaptations are nothing new, but a TV spinoff earning Emmys is. Has The Last of Us proved that video game adaptations can hold their own?
Yeah. I think that in the wake of The Last of Us, a ton of video game projects got greenlit. Fallout was already happening, and that was fantastic in its first season, and I’m really looking forward to the second season. There’s just this incredible wave coming. Like anything, when people first said, “Hey, let’s start adapting books into movies or television shows,” some of them are going to be great, some of them will stumble. But the idea that the industry has woken up to how rich some of that storytelling is and how wonderful it is to adapt is fantastic.
Where are you with writing season three?
This is kind of my favorite time. It’s very quiet. It’s just sitting here with my wonderful ergonomic keyboard and clacking away. The pages are happening, and I get to be a monk for a while, which I love, and I just write. It’s the purest form of what I do. And then in just a couple of months or so, that happy time will start to be less quiet because we begin a very long prep period while I’m still writing, and then we begin to shoot while I’m still writing. In seasons one and two, I finished writing about six weeks before we started shooting the last episode. I don’t necessarily recommend this method other than to say this works for me, but it is insane.
Now that Druckmann and Gross are stepping away to focus on Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet, will the writing process change?
I don’t think it is, in the sense that I was pretty much a monk just writing in a room by myself for most of the time regardless. And I’ve gotten so much out of talking with them over the course of seasons one and two. When we made season two, we really were thinking about what comes after because you can’t really tell half of that story without thinking about what the whole story should be. So we really did get that work in. Neil’s always had a full-time job running Naughty Dog, so it’s always been me up in Canada [where the production is], and, ultimately, things are pretty much going to proceed as usual.
Pedro Pascal and Kaitlyn Dever in episode two of the second season.
Courtesy of HBO
What were the most challenging scenes to shoot, logistics- and VFX-wise?
Episode two, the attack on Jackson, Wyoming, was an enormous undertaking for everybody. It was hard to write, it was hard to plan, it was hard to shoot. The prosthetics, the stunts and then the visual effects afterward were just massive. So we had [VFX houses] Weta and DNEG and about five other companies all working together to create all of the moments, and that was insane.
There were nine episodes in the first season but only seven in this one, and yet the pacing feels so different. Despite the fact that everything takes place in a span of three days, the attack on Jackson feels like it was ages ago. How does it compare to the game?
The attack on Jackson is not in the video game, so that’s new to our show. It’s one of those surprises that people who played the game would be like, “Oh!” But, yeah, the characters have gone through quite a bit, but the way we use time, it’s almost like so much of season two is really about three days, and I love being able to focus in on a period of time.
The Last of Us subreddit is quite a busy place. How closely do you keep track of the chatter and are there responses that surprise you?
I don’t look at them, so I don’t know. Problem solved! I don’t go on Reddit. I mean, I’m always playing video games; I’m playing The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered right now. Sometimes I’ll go on Reddit when I’m like, “What is the best bow for an archer build?” That’s about as much Redditing as I do.
What lessons did you learn from Chernobyl that you brought with you to The Last of Us?
For starters, I learned how much attention to detail matters. [What] we showed in Chernobyl was really born out of a desire to be as respectful as possible to the culture. We were telling a story that impacted people who are still alive, who lost people.
I just had a sense that stories that have been told in the West about the Soviet Union were not accurate, and why not go for as real, real, real as you can? That approach to being as grounded as we can, especially in a genre story where there are monsters, is something that I brought forward. The style of shooting is something I pulled through — and I say it every time — but everything I ever learned about directing, I learned by watching Johan Renck direct Chernobyl. I really internalized the way that he used multiple cameras as an artistic choice, as opposed to just [shoot] faster.
The other thing that I learned from Chernobyl was how important it was for the people who were at the creative helm to pay as much attention to visual effects as they do to anything else that you don’t. In your mind, you think, “I’ll just send this away, it’ll come back, I’ll put it in the show.” It doesn’t work like that at all. It is almost like doing takes with an actor: “Great, now let’s try this. Great, let’s try this.” And then, “Ah, there it is.” And that process of working through visual effects is exhausting and exhaustive for everybody, but I think what we end up getting is pretty remarkable, and it makes the show better. I just believe that visual effects are beyond integral to the success of a show like ours.
Before Chernobyl, you worked on The Hangover films. How much are you itching to get back to comedy?
Not strong itches. I mean, I spent a long time doing comedy, and even though I’ve been doing drama — it’s been about five, six years. Prior to that, it was like 25 years of comedy. Look, I think I’ve told all the jokes. I think my comedy is used up. I like having moments. I like having moments inside of drama. And I love working with comedic actors in dramatic roles because we can find comedy in there. So you do a scene where you’ve got Catherine O’Hara and she has this very heavy scene with therapy and all the rest, but still we find the funny in it because, of course, we do. But going back to pure comedy, I think probably, no, I don’t think so.
Do you envision directing the first episode of TLOU season three as you’ve done with the first two seasons?
Yeah. Honestly, I’d love to direct more, but the problem is just logistics. I like to direct the first episode because you can prep the whole season. There are a lot of characters that get cast and there are a lot of decisions that get made about environments, so you can sort of prep a lot of the season by prepping and directing the first episode. As we’re going along, you have to prep the other episodes. We have directors alternating, and I’m on set doing — I don’t know what you’d call it — “showrunner QC” sounds insulting to our directors, who are amazing. But [I’m] just making sure everything is fitting together tonally. So it’s hard for me to then go prep something while I’m also still writing, but we’ll see if I can get away with [directing] more than one.
Are more people lining up for roles now that The Last of Us has more Emmy nods?
It’s not quite like people knocking on your door as much as I think after season one. There may have been actors who were unaware of the video game or the show, but what they were aware of was that we were filling up those guest actor Emmy categories pretty extensively. We had fewer actual guest actors in season two, but we’ve still got Jeffrey Wright, Joey Pantoliano, Kaitlyn Dever and Catherine O’Hara, [who] all got nominated [for best guest acting in a drama series]. So when we pull people in, I think at least in the community, there’s an understanding they’re going to get something juicy to do. They’re not glorified day players. We try and create these little tiny, impactful stories with really, really good actors. So as we head into season three, I hope that we’ll see a couple of more fascinating additions like that.
For me, it’s so much fun to [say], “Hey, let’s just get Melanie Lynskey, why don’t we?” And to discover brilliant new talent, Keivonn Montreal Woodard, who had never acted before, and there he is getting an Emmy nomination for season one — that was just incredible. And Storm Reid won — obviously, she wasn’t new, but it was giving actors these interesting things to do that maybe they don’t normally get to do. Nick Offerman, who also won, normally doesn’t get to play that guy. And I love doing that.
Who’s on your wish list for actors to write for?
My wishlist is Meryl Streep. I’ve always had [her] on my wishlist since I started in this business. I’ve never worked with her, but I met her when I was at the Golden Globes and I ran into somebody who was there with her. We were talking, and he was like, “Do you want to meet Meryl? She’s just around the corner. She’s going to walk over.” And I was like, “I would love to meet Meryl Streep. Yes!”
So she comes over and he [introduces us]. And I shook her hand and I went, “Pffff. You know!” [Raises hands] And she was like, “Yeah, I know.” I wanted to say, “Oh my God! I love you in this [and] this!” But I just figured, everyone always says that. I’m just going to package it into just, “Insert here, me just freaking out.” And she was really nice and seemed to accept that I was freaking out. So anyway, I short-handed it to, “You know!”
I have not spoken to Meryl Streep, I have not written anything for her — yet — but one day, one day!
You just announced you and podcast co-host John August are releasing a book based on ScriptNotes. Will Neil and Halley ever join the pod guests?
Neil and I have done at this point, 16 podcasts for the show and Halley’s been on, so that’s sort of that. ScriptNotes, the show has been going on forever. It was just hardcore screenwriting nerds, and it sort of expanded a bit. And we’ll get pitches from publicity people like, “Hey, would you like this person or this person?” But John and I have always felt we will bring guests on the show, but mostly we’re just keeping it a non-guest show so that it doesn’t turn into a talk show.
You got a tattoo of Ellie’s switchblade to commemorate The Last of Us’ success. Any plans to get any more show-inspired ink?
I don’t have a specific plan, but I’m thinking maybe when it’s over. The other possibility is that I go for a tattoo-per-show method, so I only have the one. I may say, “OK, this is my Last of Us tattoo, now let’s see what comes next, and maybe that’ll be the next one,” but no plans yet. “No ragrets!”
Since the second season only covered the first half of the second video game, what will the pacing and episode count be like for this next installment and beyond?
We’re kind of fiddling around with that — it’s a little bit of a trade secret at the moment. But I will say that season three will be longer than season two. Season three will be more on par with season one. More bang for the buck.
This story first appeared in an August stand-alone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.
Now appearing in the role of nasty Bill Sikes in the musical Oliver! — Ron Sexsmith?
Well, not exactly. But Sexsmith had the character of Sikes in mind (specifically as played by Oliver Reed in the movie) when he wrote the original version of the song, “Damn Well Please,” a jaunty, pointed highlight of his new album, Hangover Terrace.
The song was initially intended as part of a musical Sexsmith was creating based on Deer Life, a fairytale book he wrote and illustrated, that was published in 2017.
“There’s this villain character that was going to sing that song,” Sexsmith, a great fan of classic musical theater, says on a video chat with BGS from his home in Stratford, Ontario, Canada. “I just remember thinking how Oliver Reed played Bill Sikes. But he didn’t sing, because the director said as soon as the villain starts singing it takes away from his threatening element. And I thought that was smart.”
So, while he is still looking to bring the musical to the stage, he had put this song in a drawer. Eventually, though, he reworked it as a screed against what he sees as oversensitivity endemic to our era, with everyone so easily offended, and set it to perky Baroque-pop music and a tone bearing more than a shadow of classic Ray Davies.
“I refashioned the lyrics to be more about a kind of grumpy, bickering kind of thing,” he says. “Just because sometimes I’ll get mad or because [he and his wife Colleen Hixenbaugh] will bicker sometimes about my wine consumption. And I’ll be like, ‘I can have wine.’ Or whatever. And I just felt that it was fun to sing. We tried it out in a concert recently and it went over really big.”
Now, just in case you’re confused, yes, this is that Ron Sexsmith – Mr. Sensitive himself, Mr. Melancholy, Mr. “Secret Heart” (the first song on his first real album, 1995’s Ron Sexsmith, and arguably his most enduring and much-covered number). All vulnerable and romantic.
Yes, it’s him, the guy known for wearing his heart on his sleeve, weaving his feelings into stunningly indelible melodies sung with engaging understatement, all endearing him to fans throughout North America and Europe, earning him 15 Juno Awards (including eight as Canadian Songwriter of the Year) and a 2010 documentary, Love Shines. The guy who has been lavishly praised by countless fellow artists, notably among them Elvis Costello, Nick Lowe, Steve Earle, Daniel Lanois, and Feist.
That Ron Sexsmith is here, slinging arrows at people he sees as too sensitive. “I’m intent on poking the bear,” he sings.
“It’s just kind of a song about the culture we’re in now, there were a lot of people tip-toeing around and afraid to offend all the time,” he says of “Damn Well Please.” “And I think maybe we’re coming out of that a bit now. When I played it live, there were some people who came up afterwards and told me they found it really empowering.”
He laughs.
“I don’t want to empower the wrong people, though.”
The fact is, he is feeling empowered to show that edgy side a bit more. While there is plenty of the sensitivity, the romance, the explorations of heart on this, his 17th studio album in three decades, there are several songs that show this trait, lashing out some at matters both cultural and personal.
In “Camelot Towers,” another with a clear nod to his Kinks devotion in its sharp view and Baroque-pop tones, he expresses disgust at the proliferation of fancifully named housing projects that in reality are blights. In “Outside Looking In,” with Hixenbaugh chiming in as something of a Greek chorus, he suggests that “some friends should come with expiry dates.”
Mr. Costello, one of his biggest heroes and biggest fans (as a songwriter he has ranked Sexsmith with Paul McCartney and Tim Hardin), famously arrived in the punk era bearing the tag of “angry young man” before later evolving with great emotional nuance. Has Sexsmith gone the other way, from genteel young balladeer to, at 61, an angry, uh… mature man?
“I guess it’s better late than never,” he says, a wry smile and shrug tilting his country-gentleman hat and large wire-rim glasses.
“I mean, my earlier albums were more melancholy and kind of sad, just based on what was happening. But I had a song on [2004’s] Retriever called ‘Wishing Wells’ that was kind of angry. And I’m sure I could go and find those songs throughout my career. They exist before this. Maybe they don’t all exist in one place like on this album.”
Make no mistake: He still wears his heart on his sleeve. In fact, the opening line of “Easy For You to Say” is “I wear my heart is on my sleeve.” And the very first words of the album’s first song, “Don’t Lose Sight,” are “Hearts get broken,” sung with great vulnerability.
In other places there’s the romance of wistful, poignant nostalgia, as in, “Cigarette and Cocktail,” a colorful portrait of the seemingly carefree life of earlier generations with “a cigarette in one hand and a cocktail in the other.”
“I wanted to express the full range of emotions, human emotions. I don’t want to be the master of one emotion, like some people do these days. ‘That’s the guy who writes all the sad songs,’ or ‘that’s the guy who writes all the ironic songs,’ you know. I want to be an actual human being.”
Hence Hangover Terrace spans from pastoral (“House of Love,” a lovely ballad with brass that’s an ode to “a dirty happy home” filled with play and laughter) to perky pop (“It’s Been a While,” his account of a reunion with his old bandmates, with “shades of our yesterdays” and ‘80s-ish Casio-like keyboard lines) to pumping power-chords (“Burgoyne Woods,” with a little spirit of the Who). Produced by Martin Terefe – who has worked with artists from James Blunt to Engelbert Humperdinck and produced three Sexsmith albums in the 2000s – at his bustling London studio complex, it features among its musicians former Pretenders/Paul McCartney guitarist Robbie McIntosh (he provided the Townshend-esque licks to “Burgoyne”) and keyboardist Ed Harcourt (a fine singer-songwriter in his own right). But for the variety, or because of it, there’s a flow, an arc – it’s not a big leap to imagine the album as being the tuneful bones of a musical or narrative song cycle.
“I think I could probably write a story where these songs would fit,” he says, noting that no one had mentioned that before. “In all my albums there is a document of a particular time or phase that I was going through. So definitely with this record it was coming off the heels of the pandemic and all that stuff. You could probably write a story. I don’t know if I’m the guy to do it. But yeah, I’m going to think about that.”
Much of this, he says, reflects the life he and Hixenbaugh have led since moving from Toronto to Stratford seven years ago. Especially the theater orientation.
“Stratford, where I live now, is an internationally renowned theater town,” he says. “People come here from all over to see the plays and musicals. Maggie Smith worked here, and Christopher Plummer. I really love the theater and feel we’ve landed in a kind of oasis. The world is going crazy and we’re going to plays and all. I can’t believe our luck that we ended up here.”
Even outside the theaters, in this Stratford, as that bard from the other Stratford put it, all the world’s a stage. The players there? Superb. And for this Canadian bard?
“It’s been inspiring,” he says. “We have a yard with all these critters running around, like rabbits and things. We had an owl. Didn’t have that in Toronto. I feel like Beatrix Potter or Huckleberry Finn. It’s a whole different way to live.”
That has also brought out a wistfulness that counters, or at least complements, some of the hotter feelings expressed. Take “Burgoyne Woods,” a look back to a time in his life when the world was open and the radio rocked.
“It’s a very nostalgic song for me,” he says. “Every song on this album has its own character and personality. Here, I like rock. I love The Who and all that stuff. I was trying to write that kind of thing they do. It’s about a time in my life with my high school friends and we’d just go on trips through the woods near our house.”
That was his hometown of St. Catherines, down near the Niagara Falls/Buffalo area.
“It was that free-range period where your parents don’t know what you’re doing,” he says. “You’re just out there and just, you know, doing things you shouldn’t do. And drinking.”
So sort of his “Cigarette and Cocktail.”
“Yes,” he says. “Exactly.”
Even in “Camelot Towers” Sexsmith has found himself considering the humanity within the walls of the eyesores. “I’m just noticing, I mean, obviously people live there and they make the most of it,” he says. “And my son [one of two adult children from a previous marriage] lives in a place like that. You walk the halls and you can hear the people or you smell the different foods that everyone’s cooking. I kind of get into that in the last verse. Everybody needs a home and a home is what you make it.”
So yeah. Mr. Sensitive hasn’t gone anywhere.
And how does he bring the curtain down on Hangover Terrace? Well, he’s sensitive there too. Several songs before the album’s close, in “Please Don’t Tell Me Why,” a buoyant folk-rocker reminiscent perhaps of the Beatles’ “I Will,” he lets us know what to expect, or not to expect. He’s all about cherishing the moment, relishing the life and love he’s built with Hixenbaugh, savoring the theater and the wildlife around their home, without looking down the road:
I don’t want to hear Don’t want to know The trouble that surrounds The happiness we’ve found Don’t want to see The way our story ends
That might even bring a tear to Bill Sikes’ cold eyes.
CBS and the American Music Awards will stay together for a longer term.
Dick Clark Productions, which produces the awards, and CBS have signed a five-year deal to continue airing the AMAs on the broadcast network, with a simultaneous stream on Paramount+. The deal comes after the 2025 awards, which aired in late May, averaged 4.86 million viewers — the highest total for the awards since 2019. The audience was up about 38 percent from its last telecast on ABC in 2022. Replays on other Paramount channels and delayed viewing brought the audience to more than 10 million.
CBS and Dick Clark Productions first collaborated on the AMAs in 2024 for a special celebrating 50 years of the awards (though no awards were given out) that drew some 6 million viewers. The new deal will kick in with the 2026 awards and run through 2030.
The agreement will also help soften the blow of CBS losing the Grammy Awards to Disney beginning in 2027. The Grammys are easily the most watched music awards show, but the AMAs have been a solid draw over the years as well.
Dick Clark Productions is owned by Penske Media Corporation, The Hollywood Reporter‘s parent company, in a subsidiary joint venture between Penske Media and Eldridge.
CeTu reduces SIEM ingestion costs by up to 80% while actively strengthening threat response and mitigating risk
BOSTON, Aug. 19, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — CeTu, the company reimagining SecOps data management, today announced that its agentless no-code platform is now available on the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Marketplace, enabling teams to seamlessly access pre-approved IT budgets and simplify procurement.
Recognized in the Gartner® Hype Cycle™ for Security Operations, 2025, CeTu helps enterprises intelligently ingest data at scale — dramatically lowering SIEM costs, reducing operational overhead, and improving visibility, detection, and response.
CeTu SecOps Data Management Now Available on AWS Marketplace
According to Gartner, telemetry pipelines are now entering the “Early Mainstream” phase of adoption. Gartner notes: “Modern workloads generate significant amounts of telemetry, which can take many forms and may originate in many locations. Telemetry pipelines provide a mechanism to unify them.”
Cybersecurity as a Large-Scale Data Management Problem Today’s SOCs are struggling to intelligently manage petabytes of security-relevant data, fueled by the continuous expansion of attack surfaces (AI, cloud, identity, SaaS, on-prem, and more).
More data means greater complexity and quality issues — along with higher SIEM ingestion costs. Due to budget constraints, many organizations now avoid ingesting critical logs such as AWS CloudTrail and VPC Flow Logs, which would otherwise provide advance warning about potential attacks.
Onboarding new AI applications presents an additional challenge, requiring scarce in-house expertise to decipher non-standard log formats and normalize them for efficient search, correlation, and analysis by SOC tools and analysts.
CeTu Reduces Both Cost and Risk CeTu on the AWS Marketplace delivers:
Automation for the Modern SOC: SOCs are evolving. Instead of dumping all security data into a single SIEM, organizations are cutting costs by strategically distributing ingestion across SIEMs, data lakes like Amazon Security Lake, and low-cost object storage such as Amazon S3. CeTu powers this federated approach at scale with dynamic pipelines that automatically normalize, filter, enrich, and route data to its optimum destination.
Security-aware AI: Unlike first-generation pipeline tools that focus solely on cost reduction, CeTu’s security-aware AI accelerates incident response by continuously monitoring SIEMs for blind spots and data quality issues that can conceal threats and slow investigations.
Rapid time-to-value: CeTu is intuitive enough for everyday engineers to use without specialized coding or data science expertise, delivering time-to-value in days rather than months or years.
Simplified procurement: Maximize your AWS investment, streamline procurement, and consolidate billing by purchasing CeTu directly through the AWS Marketplace. Leverage unspent AWS credits to fund CeTu purchases, and reduce onboarding efforts for new vendors by up to 75%
“The SOC is evolving, and CeTu is accelerating that transformation,” said Omer Schneider, CEO & Co-Founder, CeTu. “Security teams shouldn’t have to choose between cutting costs and strengthening defenses. CeTu changes that equation. Our security-aware AI turns the flood of data from a costly burden into a strategic advantage — slashing SIEM costs by up to 80% while improving detection and response. And with CeTu now on AWS Marketplace, we’re making it effortless for enterprises to modernize their SecOps data management at scale.”
To learn more, visit CeTu.io or chat with us at upcoming conferences: CrowdStrike FalCon (Sept. 15-18); InnovateCybersecurity Summit (Oct. 5-7); FS-ISAC Fall Summit (Oct. 5-8); and regional GuidePoint events.
Gartner, Hype Cycle for Security Operations, 2025, Jonathan Nunez, Darren Livingstone, 23 June 2025
GARTNER and HYPE CYCLE are registered trademarks of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and are used herein with permission. All rights reserved.
Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product, or service depicted in its research publications and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or designations. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.
About CeTu Smarter data management. Stronger security. Based on a deep contextual understanding of your security infrastructure, CeTu’s agentless, no-code platform enables SecOps teams to scale data pipelines effortlessly, boost visibility and response, and optimize costs.
Founded by security experts from industry leaders such as Microsoft and Zerto, with backing from early-stage investors in security leaders such as Palo Alto, Zscaler, and Armis, CeTu is deployed today in some of the world’s largest and most complex SOC environments. C’est tout! Learn more at CeTu.io.
Contact: Phil Neray, VP of Cyber Defense Strategy 781-330-3832 [email protected]
On august 16th, a day after his summit with Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin summoned Russia’s grandees to the Kremlin’s Hall of the Order of St Catherine. Built in tsarist times to show off the glory of the Russian empire, the hall was the setting for Mr Putin’s account of his achievements during the visit to Alaska, a former imperial possession. He praised Mr Trump’s “sincerity” and efforts to end the war. “It moves us closer to making necessary decisions,” he said.
Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) represents a major global health challenge characterized by persistent airflow limitation and progressive respiratory symptoms.1 COPD manifests through a spectrum of respiratory symptoms including dyspnea, chronic cough, and sputum production.2 Its severity ranges from mild symptoms to respiratory failure.3 Progressing symptoms results in increase air trapping and inflammation which can result in acute exacerbation of COPD (AECOPD).4 AECOPD is defined as a deterioration of the patient’s respiratory symptoms that plays a crucial role in managing the disease, exacerbates patient health, accelerates progression of the disease, and increases hospital admission and re-admission.5 The global burden of COPD is currently ranking as the third leading cause of mortality worldwide, COPD affected approximately 380–455 million individuals and caused 3.23 million deaths in 2019.6 In the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), the age-standardized prevalence of COPD increased by 49% between 1990 and 2019, with mortality rates rising by 47.9% during the same period.7 While Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) emphasizes that early and accurate diagnosis significantly impacts public health outcomes,8 COPD remains widely underdiagnosed or misdiagnosed until reaching advanced stages when treatment options become limited and less effective.9
Early identification of individuals at risk for COPD presents a critical opportunity to modify disease trajectory through timely interventions. However, screening tools suitable for non-clinical settings remain limited as mostly.10 Self-administered screening instruments offer several advantages: they raise awareness about respiratory symptoms, encourage earlier medical consultation, and facilitate identification of at-risk individuals who require further clinical assessment.11 Among available screening tools, the COPD Population Screener (COPD-PS) has demonstrated utility in identifying individuals likely to have an airflow obstruction.12 In addition to screening tools, comprehensive assessment remains challenging due to the complex clinical nature of COPD. The COPD Assessment Test (CAT), one of the instruments created by the American Thoracic Society (ATS), assesses how the illness affects symptoms, including coughing, dyspnea, and sputum production. Additionally, the ATS Clinical Practice Guidelines emphasize the importance of spirometry, physical examination, and patient history in providing recommendations based on evidence for diagnosis and treatment. Although these instruments improve clinical assessment and treatment, further development is necessary to promote early identification and improve long-term outcomes in COPD patients.13
This descriptive study aims to assess the risk level of COPD in Saudi Arabia regions using the Arabic-translated COPD-PS screening questionnaire. We hypothesized that COPD risk levels would differ across various regions of Saudi Arabia. We further hypothesized that the risk level of COPD would be higher among smokers. We seek to bridge the gap in COPD underdiagnosis by identifying the most effective and cost-efficient tool for primary diagnosis.
Methods
Study Design and Participants
This is a cross-sectional study that included a self-administered questionnaire-based cross-sectional survey. It was conducted over a one-year and 17days period from October 12, 2023, to October 29, 2024, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The study included a total of 2002 participants who aged 18 years and older. Exclusion criteria included individuals diagnosed with any chronic illness, such as asthma, COPD, or those currently seeking medical care for acute respiratory problems. However, Participants with Diabetes or Hypertension were not excluded, as these do not impact the evaluation of the risk level of COPD using the COPD-PS. A convenience sampling technique was employed to recruit participants. Eligible participants were enrolled in the study during their visits to pulmonology departments in various healthcare centers across KSA. Respiratory therapists informed eligible individuals about the study and encouraged them to participate by completing the online electronic survey via a Google Forms link. Additionally, study invitations were disseminated through social media platforms, including LinkedIn, Twitter, and professional Facebook groups. Study invitations included an informed consent form for all participants prior to data collection, assuring confidentiality, and a link to the electronic survey. Incomplete surveys were excluded from the analysis.
Study Tool
The Arabic-translated version of the COPD Population Screener (COPD-PS) was utilized for data collection. The COPD-PS questionnaire specifically evaluates risk based on key factors including respiratory symptoms, smoking history, age, and impact on daily activities, rendering it particularly suitable for community-based screening initiatives.14 This clinically validated tool assesses multiple domains relevant to COPD and is suitable for use with or without pulmonary function tests. The questionnaire comprises five items evaluating respiratory symptoms, including dyspnea, cough, and breathing difficulties. In addition, it collects demographic data such as age and smoking status. The COPD-PS scores range from 0 to 10, with scores between 0 and 4 indicating a low risk of COPD and scores between 5 and 10 suggesting a high risk.
A priori sample size calculation was conducted based on the formula estimation of proportion, n = Z2× p× (1 − p)/d2. The estimated COPD prevalence of 2.4% in Saudi Arabia, with a 95% confidence level and a margin of error of ±1%.15,16 Using this approach, the minimum required sample size was calculated to be approximately 900 participants.
Statistical Methods
The data collected for each participant was analyzed using the latest version of the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) program (version 28). Descriptive statistics, including frequency and percentage, were performed to evaluate and identify differences among participants’ demographic data. Chi square test was performed to assess the categorical associations between the risk level of COPD and the sociodemographic characteristics, with a significance level set at p < 0.05.
Ethical Considerations
All participants provided informed written consent electronically prior to participation. Ethical approval was obtained from the Institutional Ethical Committee of Batterjee Medical College (RES-2022-0043). This study was conducted in accordance with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki.
Results
A total of 2015 participants attended the survey, out of the total participants, 13 did not complete the survey, 10 participants lost interest during the process, and 3 experienced technical difficulties. We included 2002 participants in the analysis, majority of participants were from Western region of KSA 74.4% (n = 1494), aged below 35 years old 76.7% (n = 1536) and non-smokers 57.4% (n = 1149) (Table 1).
Table 1 Demographic Data of Study Participants (n = 2002)
COPD-PS scoring showed 88.8% (n = 1777) of participants indicated low risk of COPD and 11.2% (n = 225) high risk of COPD, respectively. (Figure 1) presents the distribution of COPD risk across different regions in Saudi Arabia. The Northern region has 6.5% (n = 130) low-risk cases and no high-risk cases. The Southern region reports 80% (n = 55) low-risk and 20% (n = 14) high-risk cases. In the Eastern region, there are 84% (n = 111) low-risk and 16% (n = 21) high-risk cases. The Western region has the highest number of participants, with 92% (n = 1363) low-risk and 8% (n = 131) high-risk individuals. The Central region shows 68% (n = 124) low-risk and 32% (n = 58) high-risk cases. Chi-square test revealed a statistically significant difference in COPD risk among the regions χ² = 419.48, df = 4, p = 0.0001.
Figure 1 COPD risk distribution across regions in Saudi Arabia, based on COPD-PS scores.
Further analysis of smoking status and COPD risk level showed a statistically significant difference χ² = 500.04, df = 4, p ≤ 0.0001. Post hoc analysis with Bonferroni adjustment indicated that cigarette smoking (p = 0.001) and the combined use of cigarette and hookah (p = 0.001) were significantly associated with a higher risk of COPD compared to non-smokers and e-cigarette use. Additionally, the presence of Hypertension/Diabetes showed an association with COPD risk χ² = 0.015, df = 1, p = 0.0013 (Table 2).
Table 2 Association Between COPD Risk Levels, Smoking Status, and the Presence of Hypertension and Diabetes
Discussion
This study assessed COPD risk among 2002 participants across Saudi Arabia using the COPD-PS screening questionnaire focusing on symptoms such as shortness of breath, mucus expectoration, daily activity limitations, smoking history, and age. Overall, 11.24% of participants were categorized as high-risk for COPD. Cigarette smoking and use of both cigarette and hookah along with the presence of Hypertension/Diabetes showed an association with COPD risk. Our findings provide important insights into the distribution and determinants of COPD risk in Saudi Arabia.
Regional variations in COPD risk were noted with differences in risk distribution. The Western region, comprising majority of participants, showed a high-risk prevalence. More concerning was the Central region, reported the highest risk of COPD compared to all other regions. Conversely, the Northern region reported no high-risk cases. These geographical disparities may reflect differences in urbanization, industrialization, environmental exposures, and healthcare accessibility. The regional findings of high COPD risk across various parts of Saudi Arabia align closely with established research in the MENA region. According to the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study, Saudi Arabia experienced the largest increase in COPD prevalence among MENA countries between 1990 and 2019 (+48.6%), with key risk factors including smoking accounting for 44% of COPD-related DALYs, ambient particulate pollution 23%, and occupational exposures 11%.17 These findings are consistent with Mahboub et al which highlights the impact of urbanization, industrial emissions, construction-related dust, and indoor pollutants such as tobacco smoke, biomass fuel, and incense use (bakhoor).18 The observed regional variations in COPD risk within KSA, particularly in areas with heavy traffic, industrial activity, and high smoking prevalence reinforce these associations. These parallels suggest that both environmental and behavioral factors significantly contribute to COPD distribution in Saudi Arabia, warranting targeted regional interventions. Similar regional variations have been documented in previous studies, with urban areas often showing higher COPD prevalence due to greater air pollution exposure and smoking rates.19
Smoking status emerged as a critical determinant of COPD risk (p ≤ 0.0001). Notably, conventional cigarette smokers demonstrated the highest proportion of high-risk individuals followed by users of both cigarettes and hookah. This finding aligns with established evidence identifying tobacco smoking as the primary risk factor for COPD development.8 The substantial risk observed among hookah users warrants attention, as it challenges the common misconception that water pipe smoking is less harmful than cigarette smoking. Similar findings were reported by Waked, who found significant associations between water pipe smoking and chronic respiratory symptoms.20 Interestingly, e-cigarette users showed a relatively lower risk profile compared to conventional tobacco products, though this should not be interpreted as evidence of their safety, particularly given emerging evidence of respiratory effects associated with vaping.21
The association between cardiometabolic comorbidities and COPD risk was significant (p = 0.001), with of participants with hypertension/diabetes exhibiting high COPD risk, compared to among those without these conditions. This finding supports the growing recognition of COPD as a component of multimorbidity rather than an isolated respiratory condition. Systemic inflammation may represent a common pathway linking these conditions, as suggested by Chen, who documented increased COPD prevalence among patients with metabolic syndrome.22 Our results emphasize the importance of comprehensive assessment of patients with cardiometabolic disorders for respiratory symptoms.
The predominance of younger participants in our sample likely contributed to the overall low prevalence of high-risk cases, as COPD risk typically increases with age. Nevertheless, the identification of high-risk cases within this younger demographic is concerning and suggests potential early-onset disease. Early-onset COPD may indicate heightened susceptibility due to genetic factors, severe environmental exposures, or aggressive disease progression.11 The substantial representation of younger individuals in our sample reflects the demographic profile of Saudi Arabia, where approximately 70% of the participants is under 35 years of age.23
Despite the lower prevalence of high-risk cases in our overall sample, the concerning rates among specific subgroups—particularly cigarette smokers and the use of both cigarettes and hookah highlight the need for targeted screening and prevention strategies. These findings underscore the potential value of risk-stratified approaches to COPD screening, focusing resources on high-risk group while implementing broader preventive measures at the community level.
The limitation of this study is reducing the generalizability of the findings and introducing selection bias due to the use of convenience sampling methods. Furthermore, the accuracy of the diagnosis is limited because of the absence of spirometry confirmation, as the COPD-PS is a Screening tool and not a diagnostic measure. The predominance of younger participants may have led to underestimation of overall COPD risk in the general population. Moreover, the categorical nature of the data, which prevented calculation of mean values and restricted more detailed descriptive analysis. Additionally, the data did not meet the assumptions required for multivariable regression, limiting our ability to adjust for potential confounders. Lastly, potential recall bias may have affected responses regarding symptom frequency, smoking history, and urban vs rural participants.
Despite these limitations, the current study includes multiple strengths, including the use of the validated Arabic version of the COPD-PS, a larger sample size, and participants from all regions of Saudi Arabia, which improve the reliability and generalizability of the results. Moreover, our findings provide valuable baseline data for future longitudinal studies and targeted interventions.
Conclusion
In conclusion, our findings demonstrate significant associations between smoking behaviors, cardiometabolic comorbidities, regional factors, and COPD risk among Saudi participants. The alarming rates of high COPD risk among cigarette smokers and the use of both cigarettes and hookah highlight the critical need for enhanced tobacco control efforts. Regional variations in risk distribution warrant further investigation to identify underlying environmental and healthcare factors. In order to improve disease outcomes and lessen the burden of COPD in Saudi Arabia, these findings emphasize the significance of focused screening and early management, especially among high-risk statuses.
This study highlights the importance of implementing targeted screening for COPD in primary care settings to improve early detection, particularly among high-risk group. By identifying individuals with risk factors such as smoking and comorbid conditions like hypertension and diabetes, healthcare providers can intervene earlier and manage the disease more effectively. Additionally, the findings underscore the need for public health campaigns addressing all forms of tobacco use, with a specific focus on hookah smoking, which is often underestimated in terms of its health risks. These efforts could significantly reduce the burden of COPD and enhance overall community health outcomes. Future research should incorporate spirometry assessment to validate screening results and explore additional determinants of COPD risk in this population. Additionally, further research might include a larger sample size and more diverse populations to improve the results’ applicability.
Acknowledgments
The authors gratefully acknowledge the support of the Ongoing Research Funding Program (ORF-2025-1377), King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, for funding this research.
Disclosure
The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.
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Aug. 19 (UPI) — A Colombian family named their newborn daughter “Chat Yipiti” after the AI program ChatGPT. Despite the unusual name, the child was registered without objection at the National Registry office in the town of Cereté.
According to local media, the parents of Chat Yipiti Bastidas Guerra said they chose the name as a “tribute” to the era of artificial intelligence.
This has sparked all kinds of reactions among social media users, as many disagree with the parents’ decision, not knowing what consequences it might have in the future.
The case is not unique. Colombia has a history of officially registering unconventional names, from those inspired by sports, movie and music stars such as “Maicol Yordan” and “Brayan Spears” that have stirred controversy.
The National Registry has intervened in the past to prohibit names such as “Miperro” (My Dog) or “Satanás” (Satan), which it said clearly violated a person’s dignity.
In Colombia, while the law does not specify a list of prohibited names, it gives officials at the National Civil Registry the authority to deny registration if they believe a name could harm a child’s dignity or reputation.
“Legal precedent has established that a registrar may refuse to record names that result from phonetic or grammatical combinations suggesting obscene words, that clearly show an intent to mock the child, or that are so extravagant they could expose the child to discriminatory or degrading treatment,” Bogotá attorney José Francisco Guerra said.
Across Latin America, it is common to find variations on the names of Hollywood stars or cult film characters. Names such as “Yeison” (Jason) and even “Stallone,” in honor of Sylvester Stallone, have been registered.
Spanish phonetics often alter the spelling of foreign names, creating unique combinations. In Brazil, names from soap opera characters are common, often as inventive as the dramas that inspire them.
In the past, children have been registered with names such as “Mozart” and “Facebook” and even those of singers, products, musical groups or historical figures.
However, experts in child psychology and sociology have voiced concern. An unusual name, or one that invites jokes, can expose a child to ridicule and affect self-esteem and emotional well-being.
Just one week after October 7, 2023, more than 800 scholars and practitioners of international law, conflict studies, and genocide studies signed a public statement “to sound the alarm about the possibility of the crime of genocide being perpetrated by Israeli forces against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.” On November 2, 2023, a group of United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteurs said that they remained “convinced that the Palestinian people [were] at grave risk of genocide.”
In the almost two years since these statements of concern, a growing consensus among experts and human rights organizations holds that genocide in Gaza is not a risk but a reality. They argue that Israel’s aerial bombing campaign and siege tactics have been accompanied by explicitly genocidal statements from Israeli politicians, including the prime minister and defense minister. Public opinion is shifting as well: August 2025 polling shows that 47 percent of adults in the US now recognize Israel’s action in Gaza as genocide, up from 39 percent in April 2024.
Despite growing recognition that Israel’s current campaign meets the legal definition of genocide, there is also an emerging agreement that the Palestinian people have in fact been suffering a protracted genocide for decades. Legal and academic definitions of genocide, after all, recognize that it is not a one-off event, but a much longer process of human rights violations. Although the conversation about genocide in Palestine has accelerated since the start of current assault on the Gaza Strip, it is by no means new. Unfortunately, history suggests that the growing consensus on genocide recognition will mean little for Palestinians if it is not accompanied by meaningful political action.
The Crime of Crimes
Genocide occurred for many centuries before it was given a name. Rome’s destruction and siege of Carthage during the Third Punic War (146-149 BCE) was among the first known genocides, though it was not until the atrocities of World War II that the crime of genocide was defined. The term itself was coined by Jewish-Polish lawyer Raphael Lemkin in 1942 and first published in his 1944 book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe by combining the Greek word genos (meaning a group or people with a common descent) with the Latin -cide (killing). Lemkin analyzed hundreds of pages of Nazi documents to reconstruct the various “techniques of genocide” that they employed: annexation and settlement; social and cultural destruction; economic destruction; and physical harm. Lemkin observed how mass killing was the last technique used by the Nazis, who preceded it with earlier techniques such as causing hunger and spreading disease among the Jews whom they forced into squalid, crowded ghettos. Lemkin’s analysis drove him to lead the charge to have genocide recognized as a crime under international law.
The UN General Assembly first recognized the crime of genocide in 1946, and it was prohibited by parties to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in 1948. The Genocide Convention defines the crime as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group,” including killing or causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group, and deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part. Importantly, the Convention outlaws not only these specific acts of genocide, but also the crimes of incitement to commit genocide, attempt to commit genocide, and complicity in genocide.
Although genocide has been described as “the crime of crimes” because it is tantamount to an attack on humanity itself, this ultimate crime has been difficult to prosecute in practice. Some argue that the definitions of protected groups are too narrow and that the need to provide evidence of ‘intent’ sets the bar high for legal action. Although the International Court of Justice (ICJ) was established in 1945, it did not find a state to be in breach of the Genocide Convention until 2007, in the case of Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro for crimes during the Bosnian War, including the 1995 massacre in Srebrenica. The unwillingness of states to pursue or support investigations at the ICJ, and their willingness to retaliate against parties who do so, suggests these systems are simply political tools, not mechanisms of justice.
Lemkin’s concept of genocide as a process, not as a singular event, sheds light on the situation in occupied Palestine, where over the past 77 years many have argued that Israel has engaged in various forms of “structural genocide” or “incremental genocide.” Given that Palestinians have used the word for events as far back as the Nakba of 1948, it is unsurprising that Palestinian organizations, unlike their international counterparts, did not make formal announcements describing Israel’s post-October 7 campaign as genocide. Where others saw new evidence of a war crime, they saw continuity.
Growing Recognition of Genocide in Palestine
Human rights organizations have been relatively outspoken in recognizing the current situation in Gaza as genocide. Just days after the October 7 attacks, the Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention called for “Western leaders to pull back from the endorsement they have given Israel to effectively commit genocide against Palestinians.” In June 2024, the University Network for Human Rights issued a report concluding that “Israel’s actions in and regarding Gaza since October 7, 2023, violate the Genocide Convention.” In December 2024, Amnesty International concluded that “Israel has carried out acts prohibited under the Genocide Convention, with the specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza.” The same month, Human Rights Watch said that “Israeli authorities [were] responsible for the crime against humanity of extermination and for acts of genocide” and highlighted that Israel was “intentionally depriving Palestinian civilians [in Gaza] of adequate access to water.”
Two influential Israeli NGOs recognized the genocide in Gaza in July 2025. In a report titled “Our Genocide,” human rights organization B’Tselem detailed the unlivable conditions, attacks on educational and cultural institutions, arrests, and mass killings in Gaza; they warned that the genocide “may expand to other areas where Palestinians live under Israeli rule.” A report by Physicians for Human Rights-Israel described “the deliberate, cumulative dismantling of Gaza’s health system, and with it, its people’s ability to survive” as an act of genocide.
Several Israeli scholars have reached the same conclusion. As early as October 13, 2023, Raz Segal, a scholar of Holocaust and genocide studies, called the assault on Gaza “a textbook case of genocide unfolding in front of our eyes”. Omer Bartov, a professor of Holocaust and genocide studies who had previously served in the Israeli Defense Forces, first acknowledged war crimes and crimes against humanity in November 2023 before reaching the “inescapable conclusion” in July 2025 that Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people.
Albeit a small number, several former Israeli politicians have joined the emerging consensus that the country is engaged in violations of international law. In December 2024, former Israeli minister of defense Moshe Yaalon admitted “war crimes are being committed” , while former prime minister Ehud Olmert conceded that Israel was “committing war crimes” in May 2025.
Denial of the genocide in Gaza, or even of the ability to discuss the risk, has itself been criticized by several prominent academics. Martin Shaw, one of the world’s foremost genocide scholars, has attacked the inclination of Western leaders and journalists “to avoid, at all costs, the ‘G-word’ in evaluating Israel’s actions,” while Dirk Moses, editor of the Journal of Genocide Research, asked his fellow scholars, “What’s the point of this field? Is it, in fact, enabling the mass killing of Palestinians in the name of self-defense and genocide prevention? If that’s the case, then the field is dead—not only incoherent, but complicit in mass killing.” Omer Bartov argued that denial of the genocide in Gaza “threaten[s] to undermine everything that Holocaust scholarship and commemoration have stood for in the past several decades.”
In early August 2025, as the famine in Gaza reached a new intensity, president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, Melanie O’Brien again underlined that genocide is a process, not an event. Discussing the evidence relevant to the terms of the Genocide Convention, O’Brien argued that “it is without a doubt that we are witnessing a genocide now in Gaza,” while noting that “the genocide process did not begin on 8 October 2023. It was prefaced by decades of human rights abuses against the Palestinian people; extensive violations of international law involving discrimination, persecution, apartheid and more.”
The list of other notable assessments goes on and on and on and on. While only a very small group of American politicians have joined the consensus, including Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), other politicians from around the world have done so, as have at least three dozen governments. The list continues to grow.
The ICJ Case Against Israel
While the case for genocide is being heard in the court of public opinion, the issue will be considered by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in a case for the crime of genocide lodged against Israel by South Africa in December 2023. There has been little progress in the case since the court’s interim judgement in January 2024, which included “provisional measures” that bound Israel to certain actions, including preventing genocide, preventing and punishing incitement to genocide, and enabling the provision of basic services and humanitarian assistance. In March 2024, the ICJ added further measures concerning humanitarian aid; in May 2024, it ordered Israel to stop the invasion of Rafah and to reopen the Rafah crossing to humanitarian aid deliveries. Israel has so far ignored all these provisional measures.
Israel’s rebuttal of the case has been postponed until January 2026; experts don’t expect a judgement from the court until 2027 or even 2028. With the Israeli Prime Minister and Knesset pushing for a full occupation of Gaza and seizure of Gaza City in August 2025, it is unclear what may be left of Gaza—and the people living there—by the time the court delivers its verdict.
What Does This Mean for Palestinians?
No ruling from the ICJ can bring back the more than 60,000 people who have been killed in Gaza or rebuild the 70 percent of structures that have been damaged or destroyed. A ruling will neither bring back the parents of tens of thousands of orphaned children nor restore limbs torn apart by bombs. It is not clear how the punitive and reparative measures that would come with such a judgment would be handled, nor how Israel and its allies, especially the United States, might respond to an affirmative ICJ judgement in light of Israel’s argument that the fact that the ICJ was even willing to consider the case demonstrated “antisemitic bias.”
Besides the specific crime of genocide, there are a host of other Israeli war crimes and crimes against humanity that should be investigated and prosecuted but never have been. It took Palestinians and their allies decades of advocacy before major human rights organizations concluded that Israel was committing the crime of apartheid, for example, and no meaningful action has been taken then, either. Although recognizing the crime of genocide is important for many reasons, will it have tangible outcomes for Palestinians who are actively facing multiple, escalating existential crises?
Importantly, the purpose of acknowledging the crime of genocide was not simply to have a name for an event after it has already happened. States have a legal obligation to prevent genocide. As the Bosnia v. Serbia judgement noted, states must “employ all means reasonably available to them, so as to prevent genocide so far as possible,” especially those with “the capacity to influence effectively the action of persons likely to commit, or already committing, genocide.” So far, there has been no meaningful action by any third state to intervene either in the mass killing, maiming, deprivation, and displacement of Palestinians in Gaza, or in the escalating settler and military violence and land seizure in the West Bank. What can acceptance of such atrocities mean in the aftermath of the supposed lessons learned after World War Two? As Noura Erakat argued before the UN at the Commemoration of the 77th Anniversary of the Nakba, “If you normalize genocide, you will have nothing left.”
While Australia, Canada, France, and the United Kingdom have recently offered to recognize a Palestinian state, recognizing Palestinian statehood changes nothing on the ground today, where it is urgently needed. Even as global understanding of what is being done to the Palestinians—and why—continues to grow, Palestinians are continuing to lose their land, their livelihoods, and their lives. Palestinians do not need merely to be remembered fondly when the events of today are lamented in 50- or 100-years’ time. They need intervention—now.
The views expressed in this publication are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the position of Arab Center Washington DC, its staff, or its Board of Directors.
