Contemporary politics,local and international current affairs, science, music and extracts from the Queensland Newspaper "THE WORKER" documenting the proud history of the Labour Movement.
MAHATMA GANDHI ~ Truth never damages a cause that is just.
Israel
has told the United States it is conducting limited ground operations
focused on Hezbollah infrastructure in Lebanon near the border.
Israeli
tanks have been gathering near the country's border with Lebanon, as
speculation continues to grow it will launch a ground invasion.
What's next:
The
deputy secretary-general of Hezbollah, Israel's primary adversary in
Lebanon, says the militant group is ready for any invasion by Israel.
Link copied
Israel
has told the United States it is conducting limited ground operations
focused on Hezbollah infrastructure in Lebanon near the border with
Israel, the US State Department has said.
"This
is what they have informed us that they are currently conducting, which
are limited operations targeting Hezbollah infrastructure near the
border," State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters.
Asked to confirm they were limited ground operations, he said: "That is our understanding."
It
comes as Israel's defence minister all but confirmed plans to launch a
large-scale ground invasion of Lebanon — although not the timing of it —
as the country's military continued gathering near the border.
The operation aims to clear areas near the so-called Blue Line, which separates the states, of Hezbollah infrastructure.
Such a move would be the first time since 2006 that Israel had invaded Lebanon.
It
would also signal yet another escalation in its conflict with Hezbollah
just days after the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) assassinated the
militant group's leader, Hassan Nasrallah, in Beirut.
In
a speech to troops on Monday, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said: "The
elimination of Nasrallah is an important step, but it is not the end."
He said Israel would use "all the means that may be required ... from the air, from the sea and on land. Good luck."
His statement appeared to confirm what many observers have been predicting.
Along
with the statements from officials pointing towards that happening,
video has emerged of more Israeli tanks gathering near the border and
the IDF has mobilised multiple brigades of reserve soldiers to serve
around the country — clear signs all pointing in one direction.
Hezbollah,
which is designated as a terrorist organisation by the Australian
government, says it is ready for a potential Israeli ground invasion.
The
militant group's deputy Naim Qassem on Monday gave a televised address —
his first since Nasrallah was killed in an Israeli air strike late last
week.
"We will face any
possibility and we are ready if the Israelis decide to enter by land and
the resistance forces are ready for a ground engagement," he said.
He also said the group would pick a new leader soon.
Hezbollah
is particularly influential in southern Lebanon — an area that borders
Israel, and from where it launches many of its attacks.
On
Monday, Lebanon's caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati announced his
government was prepared to send its military to the border in a bid to
stop Hezbollah's attacks as part of a potential ceasefire agreement with
Israel.
Meanwhile, the IDF's
air strikes in Lebanon continued on Monday, with multiple locations
around the country struck again, mainly in the south.
The attacks have so far killed about 1,000 people and displaced 1 million, according to the Lebanese government.
There are more than a few question marks over Australia's driving future.
Are
hydrogen cars becoming a bigger part of the market? Is interest in
electric vehicles stalling? And aren't we supposed to be in driverless
cars by now?
Yet there are some
concrete changes, too. The ACT, for example, has already said it will
ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2035.
That's only 11 years away. So what are Australians likely to be driving by then?
How many Australians are actually driving EVs?
Australia is still a long way behind other nations when it comes to electric vehicle (EV) use.
That's in contrast to Europe, where last year more than 23 per cent of new car registrations were EVs.
But he says recent headlines declaring "EV sales are falling off a cliff" in Australia are inaccurate.
"The
growth in EV sales has slowed, absolutely, but there's still a fair bit
of interest there, and there are a lot more models coming," he says.
"Tesla's led the way until now, but you're starting to see a lot more competition kick into the market."
In Australia last year, Tesla EVs still accounted for the top two EV models sold, but there are now nearly 100 other models on the market here, up from 70 models in total in 2022.
EV sales slowed after a boom of early adopters, excited to rush out and grab hold of the new technology, Hagon says.
But
it's a harder sell to convince the next portion of the market — those
less excited by the new tech, who've been buying petrol and diesel cars
for decades — that an EV is a better option for them.
EV sales are also lower in Australian rural and regional areas than in metro areas.
Jennifer
Dudley-Nicholson, future economies reporter with the Australian
Associated Press, says that's because those drivers are more likely to
experience "range anxiety" — concern about the limited distance EVs can travel on one charge and access to charging stations across the country.
Stations increased by about 70 per cent last year and they're still rolling out to meet demand.
"[But]
we will obviously have to make a lot more of them by … 2035 when we'll
see a lot more electric vehicles on the road," Dudley-Nicholson says.
As it stands, she says a long-distance drive in an EV requires a fair bit of forward planning to mark out charging points.
They also require a substantial investment.
The cheapest EV in Australia, the MG4 hatchback,
currently costs less than $31,000 — and while that's about $20,000 less
than the cost of Australia's top-selling Tesla model, cost is still one
of the biggest barriers to EV uptake.
Why aren't there more electric utes?
Charging infrastructure isn't the only thing holding back the Australian EV market.
"The big holdout is utes," Dudley-Nicholson says.
The ute market in Australia is massive, comprising more than 20 per cent of cars sold.
That's a very big slice of a market which, last year, saw more than 1.2 million new cars sold.
Yet there's only one electric ute model currently sold in Australia.
That's because luxury cars offer EV sellers greater profit margins, Hagon says.
But he says utes are also a harder car to make electric.
"The
ute is sort of the Swiss Army knife of cars. These days people expect
it to not only do the family duties, they expect it to lift heavy
things, tow a lot and go big distances," he says.
Performance and towing aren't the issue; range is.
"You can
halve your range, or even get less than half your range, once you're
towing a decent load on the back. So it makes it very tough for the
utes," Hagon says.
"I'd argue that probably the hardest piece of that puzzle is the charging.
"Once you've got that charging infrastructure into those more remote areas, then it makes a ute a lot easier."
Hagon sees change on the horizon.
"You've
got car makers lining up, waiting to do it, and particularly the
Chinese brands are very keen to jump on board and sell as many as they
can into as many market segments as they can," he says.
"The puzzle pieces just have to come together."
According
to the National Roads and Motorists' Association (NRMA), there are
Dutch, Chinese and Japanese car manufacturers "poised" to enter the EV ute market in Australia.
What's the main problem with hydrogen cars?
Another much-touted alternative to petrol and diesel cars is the hydrogen car.
In
these vehicles, colourless, odourless hydrogen gas passes through the
car's fuel cell, where it interacts with oxygen — a process that
generates electricity.
Toyota's local manager of carbon policy, Andrew Willis, told the ABC
the only emission from the cars is water vapour, after the hydrogen
reforms with oxygen, which is "pure and green, and you could water the
garden [with it]".
But hydrogen cars also face hurdles to becoming a market staple.
One is infrastructure. Unlike electricity, hydrogen isn't accessible in every corner of the country.
Dudley-Nicholson
says there are currently only three hydrogen cars on the road in
Australia, and fewer than 10 hydrogen refuelling stations.
Another hurdle is cost.
Hydrogen fuel cells are very expensive to produce compared to a normal electric car battery, Hagon says.
However,
at least one company — Toyota — is optimistic about hydrogen's future,
and is exploring alternatives to battery electric vehicles.
"I think it's good that the car makers are exploring other alternatives," he says.
"That's
terrific, if they can make it work … The reality at the moment is they
haven't been able to from a financial perspective."
When will cars drive themselves?
Driverless cars are already being trialled in several different countries, with mixed results.
"The brands are all working towards it," Hagon says.
Although
several years ago some car makers claimed we'd all be in driverless
vehicles by now, this has proven to be a premature call.
"The
challenge all of [the car manufacturers] are hitting is that it is far
harder than any of them had anticipated," Hagon says.
"We
are still many, many years away from what you would consider a true
driverless car. I'm talking no pedals, no steering wheel, sit in the
thing, let it go."
Dudley-Nicholson agrees we're a long way off driverless cars.
"I love that this generation thinks that they might not have to drive, but I think they will," she says.
"Driverless
cars have certainly evolved … and maybe it can follow the car in front
of you, maybe it can scan the signs and tell you what speed that you
should be going at.
"But if you've driven one of those cars, you probably know how many times it beeps when it doesn't need to."
Driverless
technology operates either through "geofencing" — mapping an area to
the millimetre, so a car knows exactly where it is and how to deal with
its surroundings. Or, it adapts to its environment visually.
"That's the approach that Tesla's taking … They're getting their cars to work purely off cameras," Hagon says.
"And
take a country like Australia, it's impossible to go and map every
centimetre of Australia [perfectly] once you get to those remote areas.
"There's a heck of a lot of work to do."
But the potential of driverless technology is huge, Dudley-Nicholson says.
"The
car manufacturers can see this opportunity where cars can drive
themselves and they're not going to get distracted by text messages or
noisy messages or noisy kids in the car, and they're not going to get
drunk and go out at the wrong time on a particular night," she says.
"There's so much promise, but we're just not there yet."