☕️ ICJ rules that Israel’s presence in occupied Palestinian territory as illegal

1. MARKET SUMMARY 📈

2. NUMBERS AT A GLANCE 🔢

RM6.98 bil — the total amount Employment Provident Fund (EPF) members under the age of 55 withdrew from Account 3 as of June 10, 2024, according to the Ministry of Finance. The amount was withdrawn by 2.93 mil members — one in five members (22.6%) — with an average withdrawal of RM2,382. One in four (26.6%) EPF members have also selected to transfer an initial amount from Account 2 (Account Sejahtera) to Account Flexible, involving RM10.86 bil, while RM4.82 bil had been transferred to Account 1.

The town of Götene in Sweden has gone viral for offering plots of land at less than 10 cents per square meter to attract new residents amidst a national housing crisis and declining birth rates. Mayor Johan Månsson stated the local government is selling 30 long-available plots to boost the town’s population. Thousands of interested would-be residents responded, overwhelming the local authorities. Local authorities ultimately decided to pause the program until early August in order to develop a plan to handle the incoming requests. Götene, with 5,000 residents and located by the EU's largest lake, offers a tranquil rural lifestyle. For perspective, 1 acre = 4,047 sq meter. This works out to a grand total of USD404.7 for an acre of land.

A 44,000-year-old mummified wolf was discovered in Yakutia, Russia, preserved in permafrost. Researchers at North-Eastern Federal University are studying the specimen, which includes intact teeth, fur, and some organs. The wolf, found in 2021, offers a unique glimpse into Pleistocene predators. Robert Losey, an anthropologist not involved in the study, noted its significance as the only complete adult Pleistocene wolf ever found.

3. IN MALAYSIA 🇲🇾

Malaysians in Bangladesh are in safe hands
Wisma Putra has confirmed that all Malaysian students affected by the riots in Bangladesh have been given refuge at the High Commission building. As of last Friday, out of the 95 Malaysian students in Bangladesh, two have been shipped out of the country to Malaysia. The remaining is still in the West Asian country. For the families of the affected students, you can contact the Foreign Ministry’s Operation Room at +603-8887 4570 or via email at [email protected] for any enquiries regarding the situation in Bangladesh.

The riots in Bangladesh were triggered by students demanding an end to a quota that reserved 30% of government jobs for relatives of veterans who fought in Bangladesh's war of independence in 1971. According to multiple sources from the local newspapers, it was reported that over 100 people have been killed. The protests may lead to a light at the end of the tunnel. Due to the protests, recently, Bangladesh’s Supreme Court scrapped most of the quotas, mandating that 93% of government jobs be open to candidates on merit.

New insurance co-payment rule - is it good or bad for the consumers?
Before we start, what is the definition of insurance co-payment (copay)? A copay is a fixed dollar amount a patient must pay upfront for medical services as part of their health insurance coverage. The insurance company only pays the balance claim amount. 

According to the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) medical officer Dr Muhammad Yassin Ikbaal, the move by Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) to introduce copay will impede the accessibility and affordability of healthcare in Malaysia, especially for the lower income group. For example, for a 5% co-payment on an RM50,000 hospital bill, a patient must pay RM2,500. This is a substantial burden for many families. Besides that, Yassin also stated that the copay feature in Malaysia has no caps or maximum limits that can lead to outrageous out-of-pocket expenses.

Take the United States for example, Washington set a maximum limit on insurance plans’ out-of-pocket expenses (which include copay) at a ceiling of USD9,450 for individuals and USD18,900 for a family per annum. The call to set limits on insurance copay is also urged by the Galen Centre for Health and Social Policy. Its CEO Azrul Khalib added that there should also be an option for BNM to revise the co-payment limits periodically.

Another day, another King coronated
As Malaysians like to change PMs, we also like to change our Kings. As the third Yang di-Pertuan Agong in six years, Sultan Ibrahim of Johor is coronated as the 17th King of Malaysia on Saturday, replacing Al-Sultan Abdullah Sultan Ahmad Shah of Pahang. Malaysia is one of the few countries in the world that practices the elective monarchies system, where every five years, the Conference of Rulers, comprising the nine rulers of the Malay states, picks the next King of Malaysia. During the coronation ceremony of Sultan Ibrahim, nearly 700 guests attended the occasion, notably Sultan of Brunei, Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, King of Bahrain Sheikh Hamad and former Singapore PM Lee Hsien Loong.

Shorts

1. No more foreign cooks for hawker stalls in Selangor?
   The Selangor State Government is mulling to impose a ban on foreign workers from working as main cooks at hawker stalls — meaning locals will have to be the main cooks. According to the Malaysian Federation of Hawkers and Petty Traders Association president Rosli Sulaiman, the proposed move can preserve the reputation of Malaysian cuisine. At the moment, the policy has been adopted in Penang since 2014 for hawker centres and food courts belonging to Penang Island City Council (MBPP).

   View: The 13 types of food foreign cooks are banned from cooking in Penang.

2. ExxonMobil rumoured to be exiting Malaysia
   Petronas Bhd may be at the receiving end of the operations of all assets of two production-sharing contracts in Malaysia owned by ExxonMobil Corporation as the US-based company is rumoured to divert its focus geographically to the Americas instead. ExxonMobil has 35 oil and gas platforms in 12 fields offshore Terengganu and has a working interest in another 10 platforms in five fields in the South China Sea. Cumulatively, ExxonMobil produces about 15% of the country’s crude oil and condensate and more than 50% of peninsular Malaysia’s natural gas production. 

3. Malaysia’s government agencies not impacted by IT outage
   Deputy PM Fadillah Yusof stated that Putrajaya and other government agencies’ operations were not impacted by the global IT disruption triggered by the Microsoft/Crowdstrike outage. He added that only the aviation sector was negatively affected by the disruption. I guess there is an upside in still using Windows XP.

4. AROUND THE WORLD 🌎

ICJ rules that Israel’s presence in Palestine as illegal
Friday marked a watershed moment for Palestine as the International Court of Justice finally ruled that Israel's continued presence in the occupied Palestinian territory is unlawful and should come to an end “as rapidly as possible”.

The nonbinding advisory opinion issued by the 15-judge panel points out that:

• Israel has violated international law in its policies for the building and expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, the use of the area’s natural resources, the annexation and imposition of permanent control over lands and discrimination against Palestinians.

• Israel has no right to sovereignty of the territories and is violating international laws by acquiring territories by force and impeding Palestinians’ right to self-determination.

• Other nations are obliged not to “render aid or assistance in maintaining” Israel’s presence in the territory.

• Israel must end settlement construction immediately and existing settlements must be removed.

The ICJ is also currently considering allegations that Israel is committing genocide in its war on Gaza, under a separate case brought by South Africa, with preliminary rulings already made so far.

Israel is still in a state of delulu, with its Ministry of Foreign Affairs rejecting the ruling as “fundamentally wrong” and one-sided and PM Netanyahu’s office calling the ruling a “decision of lies”.

Crowdstrike causing the widest global tech outage of all time
The Blue Screen of Death caused major disruptions at airports, transportation networks, hospitals, retailers, the banking sector and many other industries all over the world. The culprit was CrowdStrike, a cybersecurity giant used by Microsoft, who apparently pushed a faulty update to its systems. Microsoft said this affected 8.5 mil or less than 1% of all Windows machines globally.

CrowdStrike CEO Geoge Kurtz confirmed that it was not caused by cyberattack, shortly after the issues emerged. The company issued an apology and workaround solution on the same day. Interestingly, this is not the first time Kurtz is in hot water in his tech career. In April 2010, antivirus company McAfee released a buggy update to its corporate customers, where it deleted a key Windows file that sent millions of computers to crash and repeatedly reboot. Kurtz was McAfee’s CTO at the time. 

What actually happened? In another report, security experts have said that CrowdStrike’s routine update apparently did not undergo adequate quality checks before it was deployed. It's unclear how the faulty code got into the update and why it wasn't detected before being released to customers.

It’s pretty scary to realise how heavily dependent we are on technology — from a single party.

Scientists discover autism can be reversed
A case study published in the Journal of Personalized Medicine has shown that severe autism can be reversed, with symptoms reduced to an indistinguishable level. 

The discovery was made by scientists who conducted a groundbreaking trial on 2 non-identical twin girls in the US, both found to have autism at 20 months old and requiring substantial support. They went through a customised 2-year programme of interventions, in which the outcomes showed dramatic improvements in terms of severity of symptoms in both girls. One of the paediatricians considered it a “kind of a miracle” and the study author also reported that one of the twin’s symptoms was reversed to the point of being indistinguishable from children who had never had a history of autism symptoms.

The scientists are confident that because autism is a developmental condition, the developmental symptoms are very unlikely to come back over time. However, symptoms that could return might be in the line of anxiety, gastrointestinal and sensory issues. View the research report here.

Loosen sanctions to better punish Russia, says think tank
Quoting Steve Jobs: Here’s to the crazy ones. The Brookings Institution, a non-profit public policy think tank, suggested that loosening sanctions could be a better way to pressure Russia and punish its economy, doing the complete opposite of what the West is doing so far to deal with Russia. As is, sanctions of many forms aren’t slowing down the Russian economic engine.. Policy brief author Sergey Aleksashenko, who is also the former deputy governor of the Bank of Russia, stated that easing restrictions on Russian capital outflows would cause the ruble to depreciate, which would raise inflation. He also noted that Russia has a strong reliance on imports, and pointed out that import costs rise if a currency is devalued, leading to Russians having to pay more for goods. Around 60% of non-food consumer goods and about 25% of food products in Russia come from foreign markets.

Shorts

1. US President Joe Biden ended his re-election campaign
   US President Joe Biden has ended his re-election campaign and endorsed Vice-President Kamala Harris to succeed him as the Democratic presidential candidate after facing immense pressure to step down over concerns about his age and mental fitness. Other than Kamala Harris, several other senior Democrats are also being touted as replacements and a choice must be made at the party's national convention in Chicago in August. Read Joe Biden’s withdrawal statement here.

2. South Korea makes North Korean defector minister

   A former North Korean diplomat and defector of the country, Tae Yong-ho, has been chosen as the new leader of South Korea’s presidential advisory council on unification. Tae defected from North Korea in 2016 and became the first former North Korean to win a seat in South Korea’s 2020 National Assembly. He entered the North Korean foreign service at the age of 27 and spent almost 30 years working under three generations of the ruling Kim dynasty, before eventually defecting to South Korea for a better life for his children and due to his disgust with Kim Jong Un’s regime.

3. Byju risks total shut down if insolvency case proceeds

   Another decacorn falls from grace. India’s ed-tech giant Byju, a company offering online courses and in-person coaching classes will likely suffer from a total shutdown following an upcoming insolvency proceeding. The company was once India’s biggest startup valued at USD 22 bil, but it now faces numerous setbacks including job cuts, a collapse in its valuation and a tussle with investors. The insolvency proceeding was triggered by a complaint from the India’s cricket board over an outstanding payment of USD19 mil related to a sponsorship deal. Byju operates in more than 21 countries and has around 27,000 employees including 16,000 teachers. The company is also embroiled in a USD533 ‘missing’ loan scandal.

4. X charged with deceiving users via blue checkmark

   The European Commission has charged X for breaching online content rules and deceiving its users with its blue checkmark, leading to a hefty fine and significant changes in its operations. Elon Musk has altered the use of the blue checkmark after buying the platform in 2022, where it now indicates that an account belongs to a paid subscriber instead of a verified public figure. The EU Commission deems that this does not correspond to industry practice and negatively affects users' ability to make free and informed decisions about the authenticity of the accounts they interact with.

5. FOR YOUR EYES 📺

1. We are closer to the end of the year than the beginning of the year. There is still hope to make 2024 a great one. If your New Year resolution was to learn something substantial this year, here are some resources for you to consider!

2. Deadpool & Wolverine will be out this week in cinemas! This is the final trailer, and in fact, the more touching trailer, giving more context of the movie’s plot.

3. A war crime investigator from Israel investigating war crimes in Ukraine attending a standup comedy show. Can’t make this ____ up.