Top Stories
TOP STORY
TOP STORY
Israel says it killed Hamas leader Sinwar
Israeli forces in Gaza say they killed Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, a chief architect of last year’s attack on Israel that sparked the war.
Troops appeared to have run across him unknowingly in a battle, only to discover afterward that a body in the rubble was Israel’s most wanted man. Israeli leaders presented it as a turning point in the campaign to destroy Hamas, urging the group to surrender and release some 100 hostages still in Gaza.
“Hamas will no longer rule Gaza. This is the start of the day after Hamas,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.
Sinwar’s death is a devastating blow to Hamas, but the group, which receives support from Iran, has proven resilient to past losses of leaders. There was no immediate confirmation from Hamas of Sinwar’s death.
Netanyahu has said Israel will fight until all the hostages are free and that it will keep control over Gaza long enough to ensure Hamas does not rearm — an effective occupation that raises the possibility of months or even years of continued fighting.
President Joe Biden said Sinwar’s death opened the way for “a political settlement that provides a better future for Israelis and Palestinians alike.” He said he would talk with Netanyahu “to discuss the pathway for bringing the hostages home to their families and for ending this war once and for all.”
Running Stories
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HEALTH
Teen tobacco use falls to 25-year low
Officials say that tobacco use among middle and high school students has fallen to a 25-year low.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration found that 2.25 million students reported using any tobacco product in the past 30 days, down from 2.8 million in 2023. E-cigarette use among students dropped to 1.63 million in 2024 from 2.13 million in 2023.
E-cigarettes remain the most used tobacco product among students at 5.9%. Nicotine pouches are the second-most used tobacco product among students at 1.8%, followed by cigarettes at 1.4%.
Zyn is the most popular nicotine pouch brand among students, holding 68.7% of the market share. Its popularity surged on social media, leading to a nationwide shortage and Philip Morris spending $600 million on a production facility.
Female and Hispanic students reported the largest declines in tobacco product use. The National Youth Tobacco Survey collected data from 29,861 students across 283 schools.
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BUSINESS & ECONOMICS
BUSINESS & ECONOMICS
37% of cardholders exceed or near limit
Nearly 2 in 5 credit cardholders — 37% — have maxed out or come close to maxing out a credit card since March 2022.
A report by Bankrate said most over-extended borrowers blame rising prices and a higher cost of living. Other reasons include a job or income loss, an emergency expense, medical costs and too much discretionary spending.
The average balance per consumer now stands at $6,329, up 4.8% yearly, reports TransUnion. The average credit card charges over 20% interest — near an all-time high — and half of cardholders carry debt from month to month, says another report by Bankrate.
Credit experts generally advise borrowers to keep revolving debt below 30% of their available credit to limit the effect that high balances can have.
According to Bankrate's analysis of Equifax data, the aggregate credit card utilization rate was over 21% as of August. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York and TransUnion reported that credit card delinquency rates are already higher across the board.
TECHNOLOGY
TECHNOLOGY
AI-generated child sex abuse images increase
Federal prosecutors are stepping up their pursuit of suspects using AI to manipulate or create child sex abuse images.
The US Justice Department has brought two criminal cases this year against defendants accused of using generative AI systems, which create text or images in response to user prompts, to produce explicit images of children.
James Silver at the Justice Department said: “AI makes it easier to generate these kinds of images, and the more that are out there, the more normalized this becomes. That's something we really want to stymie and get in front of.”
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, a nonprofit group that collects tips about online child exploitation, receives an average of about 450 reports each month related to generative AI, said Yiota Souras, the group's chief legal officer.
That's a fraction of the average of three million monthly reports of overall online child exploitation the group received last year. Legal experts said that while sexually explicit depictions of actual children are covered under child pornography laws, the landscape around obscenity and purely AI-generated imagery is less clear.
Two nonprofit advocacy groups secured commitments in April from Google, Amazon, Facebook, Meta, OpenAI and Stability AI to avoid training their models on child sex abuse imagery and to monitor their platforms to help prevent its creation and spread.
SCIENCE
SCIENCE
Identifying the origins of Earth’s meteorites
Two reports conclude most of Earth’s meteorites can be linked to collisions within the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
The discovery provides researchers with vital context. By knowing the return address of meteorites, scientists can more easily work out how and where the building blocks of planets came together to create the solar system we see today.
The downside is that researchers may have an extremely biased meteorite collection that can tell only a sliver of the story. Most of the meteorites on Earth are stony ones named ordinary chondrites. Two classes of these chondrites, H and L, comprise 70% of all meteorite falls.
Using radioactively decaying elements to determine the age of the L-chondrite meteorites revealed they first emerged from a collision 470 million years ago. The Massalia family in the asteroid belt is identified as the likely source of L chondrites.
H chondrites — 5 million to 8 million years old — are linked to two separate impact events involving the Koronis2 and Karin asteroid families.
The asteroid belt is home to rocks, boulders and even dwarf planets, each revealing something unique about the solar system. Sara Russell, a planetary scientist, commented: “Maybe we’re only just seeing a tiny fraction through our meteorites,” adding that the solution, albeit costly, is investigating the remnants ourselves.
OTHER NEWS
OTHER NEWS
King’s visit rekindles ending ties to monarchy
King Charles III and Queen Camilla's arrival in Sydney today has rekindled debate about the nation’s constitutional links to the UK.
While the welcome will be warm, Australia's national and state leaders want the royals removed from their constitution. The Australian Republic Movement (ARM), which campaigns for an Australian citizen to replace the British monarch as head of state, likens the royal visit to a touring act in the entertainment industry.
“Unfortunately, it is a reminder that Australia’s head of state isn’t full-time or Australian. It’s a part-time person based overseas who’s the head of state of numerous places,” said ARM co-chair Esther Anatolitis.
Philip Benwell, national chair of the Australian Monarchist League, expects the reaction to the royal couple to be overwhelmingly positive. “Something like the royal visit brings the king closer in the minds of people because we have an absent monarchy.”
Benwell is critical of the premiers of all six states, who have declined invitations to attend a reception for Charles in the national capital, Canberra. “To not attend can be considered to be a snub, because this is not a normal visit. This is the first visit of a king ever to Australia.”
Australians decided in a referendum in 1999 to retain Queen Elizabeth II as head of state. That result is widely regarded as a consequence of disagreement about how a president should be chosen rather than majority support for a monarch.
OFFBEAT
OFFBEAT
Steel nut raises concerns at conker event
The World Conker Championships is investigating the men's champion after he was found with a steel chestnut in his pocket.
David Jakins, 82, was the victor — his first win after competing since 1977. The veteran player, “King Conker,” recorded several victories, destroying the other player's conker with one hit at the tournament in Southwick, Northamptonshire, England.
Conkers is played with two players. Each has a conker (the large, hard seed from a chestnut tree) threaded onto a string. Both players take turns striking each other's conker until one breaks.
Jakins’ opponent raised concerns when his conker “disintegrated in one hit.” A fake steel conker, painted brown, was later found in Jakins' pocket. He denied using it. Jakins, who helped prepare other players' conkers selected randomly from a sack, also denied any suggestion he marked the strings to highlight harder nuts.
The organizing committee chairman said the steel conker was indistinguishable from a real one, with its weight the only giveaway.
“We think that the win was fair and that the steel conker was kept in the pocket throughout but just need to complete the last parts of the investigation,” he said.
Jakins won the men's competition but lost in the overall final to women's champion Kelci Banschbach, originally from the US, who took up the game last year when she moved to Suffolk.
Otherweb Editorial Staff
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David WilliamsEditor in Chief
Angela PalmerContent Manager
Dan KriegerTechnical Director