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UN cease-fire push, judging Hunter Biden and Apple hugs AI

 
Today's INTERNATIONAL story

UN vote ups pressure on Israel, Hamas for Gaza deal

What happened
The United Nations Security Council voted 14-0 on Monday to endorse a U.S.-backed cease-fire deal for Gaza, increasing pressure on Israel and Hamas to bring an end to the conflict. Russia abstained. The three-stage plan, approved by Israel's war cabinet, was unveiled 10 days ago by President Joe Biden.

Who said what
The Security Council vote "sent a clear message to Hamas to accept the cease-fire deal on the table," said U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield. Israel has already approved the plan, and "the fighting could stop today if Hamas would do the same."

But Israel's U.N. representative "did not say that Israel has accepted the terms of the cease-fire plan," and while Hamas welcomed the resolution and indicated it would "engage in indirect negotiations" to implement the deal, it also "did not endorse the plan as a whole," The New York Times said. The "central sticking point," The Washington Post said, is that Hamas wants a "permanent cease-fire" while Israel is vowing to "continue fighting to achieve total military victory, a goal U.S. officials say is unattainable."

What next?
The "unusual show of relative unity by a deeply divided Security Council" puts pressure on Israel and Hamas to reach an agreement, said The Guardian. But both sides have so far shown themselves "far more influenced by local constituencies and the personal interests of leaders" than by "international public opinion."

 
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Today's Legal story

Hunter Biden gun case goes to jury as defense rests

What happened
Federal prosecutors and Hunter Biden's lawyer made their closing arguments Monday in the first criminal trial of a sitting president's child. The jury then began deliberating whether special counsel David Weiss had proved his case that Biden knowingly lied about being addicted to crack cocaine when he purchased a handgun in 2018.

Who said what
The trial has "laid bare some of the darkest moments" of Hunter Biden's "drug-fueled past," The Associated Press said. Prosecutors used testimony from former romantic partners, personal text messages, half-naked photos with drug paraphernalia and audio excerpts of Biden's 2021 memoir about addiction and recovery.

The evidence was "personal, it was ugly, it was overwhelming," prosecutor Leo Wise told jurors. "It was also absolutely necessary." Biden's attorney Abbe Lowell said prosecutors had no hard evidence Biden was using drugs at the time and accused them of "peddling 'suspicion' and 'conjecture,'" insinuating their case had "less to do with justice than punishing a remorseful and sober man for the crime of drug addiction," The New York Times said. 

What next?
The jurors continue their deliberations Tuesday.

 
 
Today's Tech Story

Apple unveils AI integration, ChatGPT partnership

What happened
Apple unveiled upcoming software changes at its Worldwide Developers Conference on Monday, including the ability to schedule text messages, send texts via satellite when necessary, and record and transcribe calls from the phone app. Most notably, Apple is adding AI capabilities to a bulked-up Siri and other apps, in partnership with OpenAI's ChatGPT. It is dubbing its version of generative AI "Apple Intelligence."

Who said what
"We think Apple Intelligence is going to be indispensable to the products that already play such an integral role in our lives,” Apple CEO Tim Cook said. To meet Apple's "core" principles, "it has to be intuitive and easy to use," deeply integrated into apps you use and "built with privacy from the ground up."

"My big thought" sitting through Apple's presentation was: "Are these really cutting-edge, useful tools?" Joanna Stern said in The Wall Street Journal. "Or is Apple just stuffing in AI to catch up to current front-runners Microsoft and Google, and sell us more iPhones to boot? Spoiler: It's a bit of both."

What next?
Apple Intelligence will start appearing in updates this fall: iOS 18, iPadOS 18 and MacOS Sequoia.

 
 

It's not all bad

To make mental health tools more accessible to kids, Scholastic launched an online hub providing free print, video and audio resources for students, their families and teachers. The company worked with child development experts to fill the Scholastic Mental Health Resource with assets to boost emotional well-being, help kids learn how to express themselves and get them pumped about reading. Research has shown that children who read often are more likely than infrequent readers to report feeling proud and excited.

 
 
Under the radar

Five years after the world watched Beijing and its allies harshly crack down on pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong, authorities in the territory think they have worked out how to get tourists back: Everyone needs to smile more. "Unfriendly" staff at restaurants were "once viewed as a charming hallmark" of Hong Kong, said Time, but the glowering is now seen as a "turnoff" for tourists. 

The Hong Kong tourist board will deploy actors to show "how we can all better demonstrate hospitality by going the extra mile with small gestures," said the Hong Kong Free Press. Culture Secretary Kevin Yeung announced a three-pronged approach: teach courtesy in schools, encourage friendliness with community activities and incentivize "good performance" with rewards. 

But the timing of the campaign launch — the fifth anniversary of a huge protest against a security bill that allowed Hong Kong residents to be extradited for trial in mainland China — has raised eyebrows.

Part of the reason for the decline in visitor numbers, from 6.7 million in January 2019 to less than half that this April, is China's slow recovery from the pandemic. But Beijing's draconian security legislation has also had a negative impact. The U.S., Canada and Australia have issued travel advisory warnings for Hong Kong, citing "arbitrary" laws. 

The tourism board has a "tough job of restoring Hong Kong's allure as a tourist destination," said Annika Park at the South China Morning Post. But "rallying a cavalcade of picture-perfect celebrities to wag fingers at front-line service staff" is "not the right answer."

 
 
On this day

June 11, 1963

Vietnamese monk Thich Quang Duc burned himself alive on a Saigon street in an act of protest against South Vietnam. Duc's self-immolation was an effort to shine a light on the treatment of Buddhists by the South Vietnamese government. A photo of his death remains one of the most iconic images of the 20th century.

 
 
TODAY’S newspaperS

Tuesday's front pages note the U.N. Security Council and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken pressuring Hamas to accept a Gaza peace deal, Hunter Biden's gun application trial going to the jury, and French President Emmanuel Macron's "huge gamble" on snap elections after his "setback" in European Parliament elections, as The New York Times reports. The Wall Street Journal tucks in a story about the "rare convergence" of two cicada broods into a "swarm" that "has Illinois bugged out." Said one resident: "It's really loud." 

► See the newspaper front pages

 
 
Tall tale

Squeaky wheel

Of the 51,589 aircraft noise complaints recorded in Australia in 2023, almost half were made by one person in Perth. The unidentified resident, who lives under a flight path, filed 20,716 grievances, Airservices Australia said. An individual near Brisbane came in a distant second place, lodging 4,071 complaints over the year. The data was shared with the Australian Senate as part of an investigation into how aircraft noise affects cities.

 
 

Morning Report was written and edited by Theara Coleman, Nadia Croes, Catherine Garcia, Scott Hocker, Anya Jaremko-Greenwold, Justin Klawans, Harold Maass, Chas Newkey-Burden, Devika Rao, Rafi Schwartz and Peter Weber, with illustrations by Stephen Kelly and Julia Wytrazek.

Image credits, from top: Selcuk Acar / Anadolu via Getty Images; Joe Lamberti for The Washington Post via Getty Images; Justin Sullivan / Getty Images; Illustration by Julia Wytrazek / Getty Images