Features

There is little doubt that today the connection to the web is the key question. It is consumers’ main concern and what matters most whatever you may be doing with your computer, smartphone or tablet. All other aspects of the technology have been relegated to second place.

The tax authority in Jordan has just announced that “as of 1 January 2018, [it] will not accept any income or sales tax returns manually. All taxpayers should obtain a username and a password for the online portal where all returns should be submitted” says a statement by the PriceWaterhouseCooper office in Jordan.

This is but one more example that illustrates how everything has to be done online. The number of services available this way is flabbergasting and new ones, new ideas emerge every day. GPS navigation used to be a fancy thing in the country. Now it is very common. When someone wants to give you directions to a place to go to for the first time, they just send you the location PIN to your smartphone via one of the countless services or applications available. And of course Uber and Careem taxis would simply not exist without GPS navigation.

Whatsapp started as a nice replacement for personal text chatting and messaging. Today the application is used even by businesses to instantly exchange documents and other critical information. It presents a few advantages over good old e-mail: you have immediate feedback and know if and when your recipient had actually received the message. It is also not prone to spamming and presents a high level of security. Along with Facebook Messenger, it is believed that more than 65 billion messages are exchanged each day on the world this way. This alone shows the importance of the connection to the Internet.

Cloud storage, cloud processing, online shopping (think Ali Baba and Amazon…), music streaming, online banking, airline reservation, social networking, and so forth, what would we do, what can we do without the connection to the network? Schools, universities, they all depend on the network.

The complexity of the gigantic web comes with its load of issues. Hacking, cybercrime of all kinds, disruptions, outages, errors, slowness and the like — we just have to learn to live with them. Not forgetting the constant change, and the fact that those of us who may not be particularly technically-minded suffer more when they have to learn new ways of new online apps. Learning to use an offline programme comes with much less stress than an online one. Pretty soon all offline applications will be a thing of the past.

The load on the big computers servers that run the web is beyond imagination. At this point it is incredible that it is still working at all, that is has not collapsed. The extraordinary achievement is done behind the scenes and remains hidden from the eyes of the public, but scientifically speaking it is as impressive as man landing on distant planets if not more.

The number of consumers in Jordan who have given up watching satellite TV programmes and have turned to on-demand video streaming services via Internet (IP TV), such as Netflix for movies or beIN for sport events, has risen drastically since early 2016. Suffice it to see the number of digital IP set-top boxes sold.

Last week a friend called asking for help with Skype. He was complaining that Microsoft, who bought Skype out from the eponymous Scandinavian company that started it back in 2003, had changed the interface and much of the screens and menus design. He was completely lost: “why do they have to keep changing what we had hard time learning?” Apple and Samsung, for instance, keep releasing new smartphone models faster than the population can cope with.

Until circa 2010 it was still possible to debate over whether to be connected or not, whether it was safe enough. Today the debate, the discussion are over. Whatever issues there may be here we just have to deal with them, to adjust, but we stay connected, all the time, at any price.

Acknowledging the irreversible trend, local Internet service providers are doing one thing right and another wrong. On one hand they are providing the population with constantly faster Internet, and on the other they seem unable to increase the uptime, which is a non-negligible aspect of the technology.

Indeed, if speed matters, uptime is an even more critical factor. Any disconnection is unbearable today, even if a few minutes, even at 4:00am. In the luckiest, well-served areas in Amman, there is still an average one-hour Internet outage per month, whatever the service provider. In other areas of the city or of the country it is worse. This is not good enough and must be improved. Internet connectivity is as crucial as electricity itself, simply.

FRANKFURT AM MAIN, Germany — The frontlines of the battle for smartphone dominance over the coming years have grown clearer after Chinese technology firm Huawei presented an AI-powered phone designed to go head-to-head with Samsung and Apple.

Features needed to propel a device into the top end are growing increasingly complex and expensive to develop, meaning only the companies with the deepest expertise and pockets can hope to compete.

On the outside, the differences between phones from the world’s three biggest smartphone makers are small: they boast a screen stretching from edge to edge, dual cameras for high-quality photos and big batteries.

Under the hood, the investments Samsung, Apple and Huawei have made into technology at the heart of the devices is what they hope will set them apart.

Both US giant Apple and Chinese firm Huawei have bet on artificial intelligence capabilities designed to take some of the load off users’ shoulders, showcasing them in their phones’ cameras at glossy launch events.

Announcing its iPhone X last month, Apple showed off unlocking the device by recognising the owner’s face.

Huawei on Monday demonstrated its newest smartphone Mate 10 recognising when it was pointed at a plate of food, a vase of flowers or a family pet and adjusting its camera settings automatically.

Systems like these are based on so-called “machine learning” — meaning that rather than a human programmer working out from scratch how to recognise a face, for example, a piece of software teaches itself to identify patterns by sifting through mountains of data.

Huawei said it had trained its camera on 100 million photos to achieve its speedy image recognition, and also showcased the Mate 10’s power for language translation or housekeeping tasks like organising files.

Both Apple and Huawei have built specialist machine learning capabilities into the processors that power their phones, which could give third-party app developers all over the world the chance to think up new uses for the technique.

“AI is no longer a virtual concept but something that intertwines with our daily life,” Huawei consumer devices chief Richard Yu said Monday, promising “a new era of intelligent smartphones”.

High-stakes game

The latest round of the smartphone wars also showcases just how huge the investments needed to compete for a podium position have become.

“Alongside Samsung and Apple, Huawei’s growing technology capabilities threaten to place market leadership beyond the financial resources” of smaller firms, said Ian Fogg, mobile and telecoms industry expert at research firm IHS Markit.

In 2016, the Chinese group reported 76.4 billion yuan ($11.6 billion; 9.8 billion euros) of spending on research and development, with its massive telecoms infrastructure business helping fuel its drive for handset dominance.

South Korea’s Samsung Electronics reported spending 14.8 trillion won ($13.1 billion), while Apple forked out just over $10 billion.

But however much cash firms fling at flashy features, in the end their success will rest on the devices’ reception by the general public — and the armies of programmers writing the apps that will run on the phones.

‘Open ecosystem’

“Huawei’s challenge is how to maximise the use of its AI chip given it does not develop or control the smartphone operating system its devices use, Android, unlike Apple,” IHS’ Fogg said.

Apple tightly controls its whole devices, from hardware through the operating system to third-party apps, meaning developers know exactly what they can expect when programming for the iPhone.

Google’s Android system is more open, but the operating system is used on thousands of phone models from different manufacturers, all with widely varying specifications.

Android app makers may fear it is not worth their time to write specialist AI-enabled software for Huawei’s device alone, missing out on hundreds of millions of other potential customers in the Android universe.

Huawei is aware of the risk, Yu told AFP.

Seeking to ward off the danger, the Shenzhen-based firm has made its phone compatible with AI toolkits from Facebook and Google, making it easier for programmers to tap into its processor’s special powers.

“Apple, their system is their system. It’s always been like that. We’re trying to do an open eco-system,” Yu said.

NEW YORK — It is 5pm, otherwise known as rush hour in Manhattan. Julia Lyons, 31, finishes work and heads straight for her daily dose of peace and quiet — half an hour at meditation studio “Mndfl”.

Since April 2016, when she discovered the then-brand new studio, the investment bank employee has abandoned yoga and embraced meditation. 

“I have been meditating pretty regularly — probably five times a week, 30-minute sessions,” says Lyons, sipping a cup of tea on the studio’s sofa.

“I just need a moment to chill out. This city — you are always running place to place and there are not a lot of quiet spaces,” she explains. 

“I think it’s made me a lot happier and also just helped me make better decisions, more thoughtful decisions.”

Practiced by millions around the world, meditation promotes mental well-being through concentration, breathing techniques and self-awareness.

For a long time, those singing its praises were intellectuals, celebrities or people dedicated to spirituality. 

Its popularity in the West is owed in part to the Beatles, who promoted the practice on their return from India in the late 1960s.

But these days, meditation can be found in all areas of life — from hospitals exploring its benefits for patients with serious illnesses, to schools who recommend it for children and television shows.

The craze is a result of many factors — waning attendance at places of worship, lives spent submerged in smartphones, not to mention neuroscientists’ confirmation of the benefits.

As a result, demand is spreading across American cities — perhaps a natural continuation of the yoga craze, which firmly embedded the search for nirvana in the health and well-being industry.

$10 for half-an-hour

Lodro Rinzler, Mndfl’s 34-year-old “chief spiritual officer”, opened his first studio in Greenwich Village at the end of 2015, and now owns two others in Manhattan and Brooklyn. Elsewhere in the US, studios can be found in Los Angeles, Miami, Washington and Boston.

Introduced to meditation as a child by his parents, who converted to Buddhism in the 1970s, he says business “is going well”.

“The people who come here are really a cross section of all New Yorkers,” he explains.

“If the common denominator is, ‘I am really stressed out, I need to know how to deal with my mind’ — that’s basically everyone.”

Rinzler refuses to talk money, revealing only that classes are often full — and the 75 numbered pads in his studios have been reserved online 70,000 times in just 18 months.

The reason for success? A model offering a well-rounded introduction to this ancient practice for a reasonable price.

For years, Rinzler explains, Buddhist centres only offered long introductions — sessions of several hours, or even seminars lasting a number of days and costing up to several thousand dollars.

With classes priced at just $10 for half-an-hour, and options for unlimited subscriptions, new studios in New York or Los Angeles hope to capture a wider audience.

Their model is similar to gyms, but with “zen” in abundance — including dimmed lights, plant walls, and unlimited organic tea.

CEOs join,
employees follow

Companies are also reaping meditation’s benefits. More and more organisations in Silicon Valley and other sectors are introducing employees to the practice, convinced of the long-term benefits for the workforce.

Emily Fletcher, an ex-actress who has taught meditation since 2012, launched a special programme for companies 18 months ago.

Starting from 150 students in the first year, she now has over 7,000 — and hopes to reach tens of thousands more with online courses, including in medium-sized cities such as Cleveland, Ohio or Tallahassee, Florida.

“The most common way that I find myself teaching at companies is I teach the CEOs to meditate, and they start to benefit and they bring me on to do a talk with the company,” Fletcher, CEO of Ziva Meditation, says.

Employees take part on a voluntary basis, mostly “for some selfish reasons”, the 38-year-old explains.

“Either they want to speak better, please their boss, want to make more money or have better sex...”

But Fletcher insists she has no issue with people starting out of self-interest.

“If you actually practice you will start enjoying your life more, your brain will function better, your body will feel better, you get sick less often,” she says.

“Those altruistic things will happen as a result of the practice anyway.”

Mobile meditation

Another aspect of the industry gaining traction is meditation apps. 

One of the most popular, Headspace, had already been downloaded more than 11 million times in the spring — and boasts over 400,000 paying users.

But meditation’s newfound popularity is of such high intensity, neither Rinzler nor Fletcher is concerned about competing studios popping up over time.

“I am sure they are going to be exactly like yoga studios, you are going to find them on every block...” Rinzler predicts.

“If you look at it as a business, there is competition,” Fletcher reflects, adding, “if you see it as a mission, there are colleagues”.

“There are not too many teachers when it comes to teaching 4 billion people in my lifetime!”

WASHINGTON — Comedy horror slasher “Happy Death Day” had an excuse to celebrate last weekend as it stormed straight to the top of the North American box office, according to industry figures released on Monday.

With takings of $26 million according to Exhibitor Relations, it comfortably knocked last week’s leader — the long-awaited “Blade Runner” sequel — into second place.

Starring Jessica Rothe, Universal’s “Happy Death Day” follows a college student who repeatedly relives the day she was murdered until she discovers who killed her.

“Blade Runner: 2049” continued what has been seen as a disappointing run — halving last weekend’s earnings with takings of $15.5 million. 

The highly anticipated sci-fi reboot features Ryan Gosling as a new Los Angeles Police Department “blade runner” charged with killing bioengineered androids known as “replicants”.

After uncovering a secret that threatens society, he embarks on a search for Harrison Ford’s character, a former blade runner who disappeared 30 years ago.

Sitting in third place was STX Entertainment’s “The Foreigner”, starring Jackie Chan as a Vietnam War special forces operator turned London businessman, who seeks revenge after his daughter is killed in a terrorist attack. 

Based on the 1992 novel “The Chinaman” by Stephen Leather, the action thriller took a modest $13.1 million.

Meanwhile, freaky horror sensation “It” — starring Bill Skarsgard as a creepy clown — slipped into fourth in its sixth week in theaters. 

With receipts dropping by over a third from last weekend to $6 million, the popularity of the box office smash based on a cult Stephen King novel — total earnings $314.9 million — seems to be gradually easing.

After spending its first weekend in second place, Fox’s “The Mountain Between Us” fell to fifth, with $5.8 million.

Starring Kate Winslet and Idris Elba, the feature tells the story of a surgeon (Elba) and a journalist (Winslet), who fall in love as they fight to survive following a plane crash on a snowy Utah mountain range.

Rounding out the top 10 were “American Made” ($5.5 million), “Kingsman: The Golden Circle” ($5.4 million), “The Lego Ninjago Movie” ($4.3 million), “My Little Pony: The Movie” ($4.1 million) and “Victoria and Abdul” ($3 million).

Female adolescent athletes may take more than twice as long to recover from concussions as their male counterparts, a small study suggests. 

Researchers examined data on 110 male and 102 female athletes, ranging in age from 11 to 18 years, who sustained their first concussion while participating in sports. 

Half of the girls reported still having symptoms at least 28 days after sustaining a concussion, while half of the boys no longer had symptoms after 11 days, the study found. 

“We have known for at least the last decade that females who participate in similar sports as males have higher rates of concussion,” said Dr Mark Halstead, director of the Sports Concussion Clinic at St Louis Children’s Hospital. 

“Boys and girls likely have different recovery courses, but we have to treat each concussion individually,” Halstead, who was not involved in the study, said by e-mail. “Adult coaches need to create an environment and culture for their players that stresses that a concussion is an important injury to not downplay and encourage the reporting of symptoms.” 

Concussions represent almost 9 per cent of all injuries in high school athletics, note Dr John Neidecker, a sports concussion specialist in Raleigh, North Carolina, and his colleagues in the Journal of the American Osteopathic Association. 

Emergency room visits for sports concussions have surged in recent years due to both heightened awareness of these injuries and the increased intensity and duration of practices and competitions, they write. 

To assess the duration of symptoms, the researchers examined patient records for young athletes treated for concussions at one medical practice in New Jersey from 2011 to 2013. The athletes were 15 years old on average. 

Injured boys most often participated in football, wrestling, lacrosse and ice hockey. Most of the girls who sustained concussions participated in football, basketball, softball, field hockey or cheerleading. 

Overall, 75 per cent of the boys recovered from their concussions within three weeks, compared to just 42 per cent of girls. 

There was not a statistically meaningful difference in recovery time based on the type of sport played or whether athletes were participating in middle school or high school athletics. 

Beyond its small size and focus on a single medical practice, another limitation of the study is that the medical records rely on teens to accurately recall and report their own symptoms during exams, the authors note. The researchers also did not have a complete picture of the circumstances that caused concussions or the severity of injuries. 

It is also possible that some of the difference in recovery time for boys and girls was due to pre-existing medical conditions, said Dr Monica Vavilala, director of the Harborview Injury Prevention and Research Centre (HIPRC) at the University of Washington in Seattle. 

“More females had pre-existing migraines and mental illness which may be very important and more so than inherent biological differences,” Vavilala, who was not involved in the study, said by e-mail. “Larger studies that specifically examine sex biology are needed to understand the effect of sex on recovery trajectory after concussion.” 

While more severe concussions can produce more serious and lasting impairments, the study also did not detail the extent of cognitive, balance, vision or other symptoms, noted Anthony Kontos, research director of the Sports Medicine Concussion Programme at the University of Pittsburgh. 

“First and foremost, the current findings highlight the importance of seeking proper care following a concussion,” Kontos, who was not involved in the study, said by e-mail. 

“There are a lot of treatment interventions from behavioural management to vestibular and vision therapy that help athletes recover from concussions,” Kontos added. “However, a large number — estimates are as high as 55 to 60 per cent — of young athletes with concussions do not receive clinical care beyond the initial diagnosis.” 

Arriving to global markets late last year and in Middle East markets in recent months, the second generation Peugeot 3008 has already won European plaudits and is now nominated for the region’s own UAE-based 2018 Middle East Car of the Year awards. 

A stylish and seemingly upmarket — yet attainable — take on the compact crossover segment, the 3008 is a strikingly futuristic French take on an ever-popular segment, with a number of distinctive features and almost hatchback-like driving sensibility and agility. 

Distinctive and dynamic

A bolder, more dynamic and vibrant design than most rivals and its own MPV-like predecessor, the new 3008 is a compact and car-like drive but with distinctly sharp SUV-like styling. Fresh and feisty in aesthetic, the concept car-like 3008’s lines and surfaces are complex yet uncomplicated, and is chunky, sharp, defined and jutting in execution. 

Seemingly ready to pounce, the 3008 has a sense of forward motion about it, with pert rear, blacked out floating roofline design and tailgate-top spoiler.

Sporty and urgent in demeanour, the 3008 features scalloped wings, clamshell bonnet and pinched flanks. Meanwhile its fascia features a weaving chequered grille and claw like motifs for the front and rear lights, in reference to Peugeot’s lion emblem. SUV-like in design, the 3008’s 219mm ground clearance is generous for mild off-road driving. 

And while offered only with front — rather than four-wheel drive, the 3008 does, however, feature an Advanced Grip Control system, which leverages electronic traction control to maintain limited wheelspin to maintain momentum and traction over loose surfaces.

Confident efficiency

The most fuel efficient of the 3008 model all turbocharged model range consisting of two diesel and two petrol model, the 1.6 BlueHDI 120 S&S version — with stop/start function — is the sort economical vehicle that Jordanians can look forward to only if restrictions on diesel passenger cars are removed. 

Driven during the global launch event in Italy, the BlueHDI 120 is not quite as muscular as the range-topping 2-litre diesel-powered 3008 GT or the petrol THP165, but burning just 4l/100km combined, is even more economical than the 1.2-litre three-cylinder petrol THP130.

Developing 118BHP at 3500rpm and a hefty 221lb/ft torque at 1750rpm, the BluHDI 120 isn’t as responsive off the line as other 3008s or as zippy at top-end as the petrol models. However, with one light-handedly working its six-speed manual gearbox and intuitive clutch pedal to keep it within its high torque mid-range sweet spot, the BlueHDI drives with confident, muscular and thrusting flexibility. With little by way of diesel clatter at low revs and smooth in mid-range, the BlueHDI 120 accelerates through 0-100km/h in 11.2-seconds and is capable of 189km/h.

Comfort and composure

Charging up a narrow, long and roughly paved route with flexible consistency and confidence during test drive, the BlueHDI 120 maintained its composure and verve even when driving over a sudden crest followed by a dip in the road imperceptible from the angle of incline. With its long wheel travel ensuring traction remained consistent, the BlueHDI’s supple springing allowed it to settle back down comfortably, while taut damping provided buttoned down reaction on rebound control, and altogether demonstrated poised vertical control.

Comfortable, forgiving and fluent over imperfections and even unpaved roads, the 3008 meanwhile demonstrates good body control, with slight yet progressive lateral weight shift well controlled with little lean for its segment.

Seemingly lighter on its feet, more eager and intuitive with front-wheel-drive and subsequently restrained 1304kg weight, quick and direct steering and comparatively narrow yet 205/55R19 tyres, the 3008 felt nimble, eager and tidy into corners and through narrow switchbacks. At cruising and highway speed, it was refined and stable, while brakes were reassuring and effective.

Well equipped and packaged

Stylishly designed, economical, reassuring and pleasant to drive, the 3008 is also well-equipped with a long list of standard and optional features including distance alert and brake assistance, dynamic cruise control, lane departure warning and blind spot warning systems. 

For off-road driving, its generous 207mm ground clearance is helped by electronic assistance systems that include hill descent control. Inside, and for higher specification models, the 3008 can be optioned with scented air circulation, high quality sound system, massaging seats and an electric-assisted scooter stowed in the boot for use in urban areas after parking. 

Spacious and distinctly stylish inside, the lower spec BlueHDI 120 version driven featured good quality fabric upholstery and soft textured trim and tablet-style infotainment screen, but more generously specified models can even be had with real oak trim and leather seats. Uniquely designed, the 3008’s futuristic cabin features a small chunky steering wheel that one peers over to view the advanced and configurable digital i-Cockpit instrument panel. 

This layout, along with a high and well-adjustable driving position also provides better road visibility. Well packaged, the 3008 also provides good passenger and cargo space, including good rear headroom for tall passengers. 

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Engine: 1.6-litre, turbodiesel, transverse 4-cylinders

Valve-train: 16-valve, DOHC, common-rail direct injection

Gearbox: 6-speed manual, front-wheel-drive

0-100km/h: 11.2-seconds

Maximum speed: 189km/h

Power, BHP (PS) [kW]: 118 (120) [88] @3500rpm

Specific power: 75.6BHP/litre

Power-to-weight: 90.7BHP/tonne

Torque, lb/ft (Nm): 221 (300) @1750rpm

Specific torque: 192.3Nm/litre

Torque-to-weight: 230.7Nm/tonne

Fuel consumption, urban/extra-urban/combined: 4.7-/3.5-/4-litres/100km

CO2 emissions, combined: 104g/km

Fuel tank: 53-litres

Length: 4447mm

Width: 1841mm

Height: 1615mm

Wheelbase: 2675mm

Track, F/R: 1601/1610mm

Overhang, F/R: 923/849mm

Ground clearance: 219mm

Approach/departure angles: 20°/29°

Boot capacity, min/max: 591-/1580-litres

Headroom, F/R: 915/912mm

Shoulder room, F/R: 1493/1484mm

Kerb weight: 1304kg

Tyres, F/R: 205/55R19

On the Arab-Jew, Palestine, and Other Displacements

Ella Shohat

London: Pluto Press, 2017

Pp. 464

This book contains a selection of the writings of Ella Shohat, Professor of Cultural Studies and Middle East Studies at New York University: “texts that critique the intellectual and methodological ‘separation fence’ that has segregated struggles, stories, and possibilities”. (p. 18)

While her research springs from her own background, these texts, written over a period of 35 years, show how she developed and expanded her ideas on displacement and the political/cultural silencing of marginalised populations into an inclusive global perspective. 

Born into an Iraqi-Jewish family that was forcibly transplanted to Israel in the early 1950s, Shohat’s original focus was on the precarious position of Arab Jews (Mizrahim) in the new state. She chronicles the abuses they suffered, including the kidnapping of their babies to be adopted by Ashkenazim (European Jews), a scandal that is finally being investigated by the Israeli government over half a century later. Overall, the Mizrahim were considered backward or worse by the Ashkenazi leadership, and Shohat zooms in on their cultural suppression. In fact, they had no voice, no real place in the official Israeli narrative, for they could not be both Jews and Arabs, the latter being designated as “the enemy”. “If Palestinians paid the price of Europe’s industrialised slaughter of Jews, Arab Jews woke up to a new world order that could not accommodate their simultaneous Jewishness and Arabness.” (p. 3)

Refreshingly, Shohat does not engage in competition about who has suffered most; nor does she equate the displacement of Arab Jews with the Palestinians’ dispossession, but contends that the two displacements are connected. “What is desperately needed for critical scholars is a de-Zionised decoding of the peculiar history of the Mizrahim, one closely articulated with Palestinian history.” (p. 121)

Thus, the status of Mizrahi Jews is not only an internal Israeli matter, but should be part of seeking a solution to the conflict. “Like the shared plural space that was Palestine, the Arab-Jew is a reminder/remainder of the plurality in the Arab world more generally. Both ‘Palestine’ and ‘the Arab-Jew’ in this sense are not only tropes of loss and mourning but also figures of inclusivity… the concepts evoke a memory of a shared past while also pointing to a likely future of re/conciliation.” (p. 10)

In 1981, when Shohat relocated from Israel to the US, she felt more at home in New York, which was filled with multicultural persons like herself, and she became part of the progressive academic community there. Shohat’s perspective in many ways overlaps with that of Edward Said, and she pays tribute to his great contributions to scholarship on the Middle East with his seminal work, “Orientalism”. It is not by accident that the title of her groundbreaking essay, “Sephardim in Israel: Zionism from the Standpoint of its Jewish Victims” (1988), was patterned on the title of one of Said’s early expositions of the Palestinian cause. Like for Said, breaking down false dualities is not only an academic exercise for her: “It is about rewriting our history and writing a new pathway for the future”. (p. 424)

Well before multiculturalism and postcolonialism were common approaches in western academia, Shohat established her reputation as a cultural critic — and drew much criticism in Israel — with her book, “Israeli Cinema: East/West and the Politics of Representation” (1989), which expanded her critique of Zionism to include its (mis)representation not only of Arab Jews, but of Palestine and the Palestinians. Besides introducing Shohat’s ideas, the book serves as a review of milestones in the progressive organising and cultural politics in which she participated. In 1989, she attended the Toledo meeting between Sephardi Mizrahi Jews and PLO-linked Palestinians, including Mahmoud Darwish, later writing: “we insisted that a comprehensive peace would mean more than settling political borders, and would require the erasure of the artificial East/West cultural borders between Israel and Palestine, and thus the remapping of national and ethnic-racial identities…” (p. 177)

In 1996, Shohat was among the women who split from the Israeli Women’s Movement to form the Mizrahi Feminist Forum to go beyond “the simplistic Euro-Israeli analysis which reduces everything into a dichotomy of man-versus-woman”. (p. 98) Instead, they aspired to link Mizrahi, Palestinian and feminist concerns, and situate themselves in a multicultural struggle against racism and colonialism. 

Shohat also writes about Mordechai Vanunu, Palestinian and Egyptian cinema, how the media presented the US invasion of Iraq, the continuing relevance of Franz Fanon and many other topics. In all her writing, there is constant examination of concepts one often takes for granted such as nationalism, universalism and humanism. Shohat cherishes hybrid identities and cultural differences, but in a way that encourages the discovery of new-found commonalities. Reading this book will sharpen one’s critical skills, helping to sort out the truth in the avalanche of media to which all are exposed in today’s world.

Always on the cutting edge, Shohat’s ideas are doubly relevant today as efforts to find a democratic, peaceful solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict are at an all-time low, and massive population dislocations have reached an all-time high.

PARIS — A large-scale switch from tobacco to e-cigarettes would cut smoking-related deaths by a quarter in the United States by 2100, even assuming the gadgets are themselves not risk-free, researchers recently said.

Scientists are still unsure about the potential harms of “vaping” as an alternative to traditional cigarettes, though most seem convinced it is at least safer.

Hypothesising that an e-cigarette carries only 5 per cent of the health risk of the real McCoy, and that only a handful of people will still smoke tobacco by 2026, the researchers said 6.6 million premature deaths could be prevented by 2100.

This represented a 25 per cent drop from the 26.1 million premature deaths projected under the status quo, with 19.3 per cent of American men and 14.1 per cent of women smoking in 2016, the study showed.

Per smoker, this amounted to an average gain in life expectancy of about four months, according to findings published in the journal Tobacco Control.

In a more pessimistic scenario which assumes that e-cigarettes come with about 40 per cent of the risk of traditional smokes, some 1.6 million premature deaths are avoided, said the research team.

This works out to an average life expectancy gain of just under a month per person.

A death is notched up as premature when a person departs before their expected age — say 75 or 80 depending on the country — and is usually preventable through a healthier lifestyle. 

Research is continuing into the risks and benefits of e-cigarettes, with critics fearful the gadget’s “safer” image will create a new generation of nicotine addicts and act as a gateway to traditional smoking.

But even under the researchers’ pessimistic scenario, there were “gains to a strategy that used e-cigarettes to reduce cigarette smoking”، study co-author David Levy of the Georgetown University Medical Centre in Washington told AFP.

The benefits were “massive”, commented John Britton of the UK Centre for Tobacco & Alcohol Studies.

The findings, he said via the Science Media Centre, “demonstrate the importance of embracing, rather than rejecting, the potential of this new generation of nicotine products”.

E-cigarettes, devices that seek to recreate the experience of tobacco smoking by heating a liquid to release a vapour that is inhaled like smoke, have exploded onto the market in recent years.

An estimated seven million people in Europe alone have taken up “vaping”.

According to the World Health Organisation, tobacco kills up to half of its users — more than seven million people per year.

Of these, nearly a million are people exposed to second-hand smoke.

When medical errors lead to serious injuries, patients and families may feel better when doctors take the time to listen to their feelings about the mistake and explain what can be done to prevent it from happening again, a small study suggests. 

The research team interviewed 27 patients, 3 family members and 10 staff members at three US hospitals that have established programmes to communicate with patients about medical errors and efforts to improve safety — and offer compensation when substandard care causes harm. In every case, patients had either accepted a malpractice settlement or been injured too long ago to file a lawsuit. 

Overall, 27 of the 30 patients and family members had received compensation, and 18 patients continued to receive care at the hospital where the mistake occurred, the study found. 

After mistakes, patient satisfaction was highest when communications were not adversarial and included compensation. Patients and families also expressed a strong need to be heard and expected the physician involved in the case to listen to their feelings about the mistake, researchers report in JAMA Internal Medicine. 

“When things go wrong in the hospital, doctors tend to be focused on doing what they do best: conveying medical information and treating the patient,” said senior study author Michelle Mello, a law professor at Stanford University in California. 

“They may not realise that what many patients and families need is for them to stop talking and listen attentively to what families have to say about how the adverse event affected them, without redirecting the conversation to clinical issues,” Mello said by e-mail. 

Patients and families had some surprising advice for doctors and hospitals, Mello said. 

“Things like, don’t send a social worker to disclose the adverse event, because families see her coming and think their loved one has died,” Mello said. “Or, even if our doctor isn’t ‘a people person’ and is terrible at breaking bad news, we want to talk to him, because he’s the one accountable for what happened.” 

Another surprise was that both victims and clinicians said it was helpful to have plaintiffs’ attorneys join these conversations, said lead study author Jennifer Moore, of the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. 

Overall, 35 of 40 respondents thought lawyers could help, the study found. 

“Some patients reported that their attorneys helped to heal the broken trust between them and their health provider,” Moore said by e-mail. “Several patients and families even described their attorneys as ‘angels’ because they were so pleased with the process and result.” 

Although patients and families expressed a strong desire to know what would be done to prevent errors in the future, 24 of the 30 participants said they did not get information about safety improvements, the study also found. 

“I suspect that hospitals simply underestimated the importance of providing this information back to patients,” said Dr Anupam Jena of Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. 

“There is a strong incentive for hospitals to make changes to improve quality of care after an adverse event, not only to prevent future similar events from occurring but also because hospitals would look unfavourable if a second adverse outcome occurred and no steps were initially taken to prevent that second event,” Jena, who was not involved in the study, said by e-mail. 

Being open after errors may also help avoid litigation, noted Dr Gary Noskin, senior vice president and chief medical officer of Northwestern Memorial Hospital and a researcher at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago. 

“Traditionally, hospitals follow a ‘deny and defend’ strategy providing a paucity of information to patients,” Noskin, who was not involved in the study, said by e-mail. 

At the end of the day, the study, while small, still highlights what may be a fairly universal need patients have after medical mistakes, said Dr William Sage, a professor of law and medicine at the University of Texas at Austin who was not involved in the study. 

“The importance of individualised engagement and empathy is really the take-home lesson from the study,” Sage said by e-mail.