20231015

Seoul to Adopt Crowd Alert to Avoid Repeat of Halloween Tragedy

South Korea’s capital announced plans to strengthen surveillance to avoid a repeat of last year’s crowd crush that killed almost 160 people at a nightlife district during Halloween festivities.

Seoul Metropolitan Government will implement a people counting system which automatically detects crowds through closed-circuit televisions and notifies authorities of danger signs, the city said in a statement on Thursday. The system will be operational from Oct. 27.

A software that analyzes population density will be connected to CCTVs that automatically count the number of people in an area. When the system detects a large crowd, it will send an alert to disaster safety teams at ward offices, the city government, fire authorities, and the police, according to Seoul city.

At least 158 people were killed in South Korea’s deadliest civilian crowd crush almost a year ago. Those killed were trapped in a 3.2 meter-wide alley that connects the main street of the central Itaewon neighborhood to an area with restaurants, bars and nightclubs.

Seoul has an extensive network of public surveillance cameras that are a core pillar of its anti-crime and public safety strategy. A total of 909 cameras will be installed in 71 crowded places in Seoul by the end of the year.

EK: Why don’t you just stay at home, kids? You don’t even know the origin and history of Halloween. Americans and Europeans have enjoyed the traditions since they were little, knocking on neighbors’ door. Maybe you should stop complaining to the government that it was their fault not to have prevented those deaths. It really wasn’t. And stop partying on AMERICAN HOLIDAYS. Damnit, I hate all those alerts coming in. It’s really annoying, overwhelming, and waste of tax.

Stanford Suspends Teacher as Mideast Conflict Roils Campus

Stanford University suspended a teacher over allegations that students were targeted for their identities amid the Middle East conflict, adding to a growing backlash on campuses over the war.

The temporary removal comes after reports the non-faculty instructor called out individual students based on their backgrounds while addressing recent events in Israel.

“This report is a cause for serious concern,” the university said in a statement. “The instructor in this course is not currently teaching while the university works to ascertain the facts of the situation.”

Other schools including Harvard University and the University of Pennsylvania have come under criticism for their responses to the Hamas attacks on Israel. Students have staged protests and vigils in the aftermath of the violence, which has killed roughly 1,900 Palestinians and 1,300 Israelis.

“As a moral matter, we condemn all terrorism and mass atrocities,” Stanford President Richard Saller and Provost Jenny Martinez said in the statement. Still they reiterated the university’s policy of not taking positions on “complex political or global matters that extend beyond our immediate purview,” adding that their focus is on supporting members of the community.

More than 30 Harvard student groups signed a statement of solidarity with Palestine last week, saying responsibility for the violence falls on Israel. The letter sparked criticism from some peers and alumni.

Israeli billionaire Idan Ofer and his wife quit their positions on the Harvard Kennedy School Dean’s Executive Board, citing a “lack of clear evidence of support” toward the people of Israel from university leadership.

Meanwhile, Penn has been mired by accusations of antisemitism after the university hosted the Palestine Writes Literature Festival last month, with major donors including Apollo Global Management Inc.’s Marc Rowan calling on its president and board chair to resign.

On Saturday, Penn trustee Vahan H. Gureghian, the founder of charter school firm CSMI Consulting Group, resigned in protest against the school leadership, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The university confirmed the resignation, with board Chair Scott Bok expressing “regret” at Gureghian’s decision to step down.

“The University vehemently condemns the atrocious terrorist attacks by Hamas on Israel and unequivocally rejects antisemitism in all forms, everywhere it exists,” Bok said in a statement Saturday. “We stand with our Jewish students, faculty, staff, and alumni and with Jewish people all over the world.”

EK: The Literature Festival happened a month ago, for God’s sake, BEFORE the Hamas attack. Jews, it’s not about antisemitism but about anti-Israeli government and pro-Palestinians whose rights for their land have been denied for decades. Voices of the general student populations are usually right as they have less agendas. Free Palestine.

UPenn Rejects Apollo CEO Rowan’s Call for Resignations in Antisemitism Fight

The University of Pennsylvania stood by its president and chair of the board of trustees, rebuffing calls for their resignation by major donors including Apollo Global Management Inc.’s Marc Rowan, who accused them of tolerating antisemitism.

“The university has publicly committed to unprecedented steps to further combat antisemitism on its campus, reaffirmed deep support for our Jewish community, and condemned the devastating and barbaric attacks on Israel by Hamas,” Vice Chair Julie Platt said in an emailed statement Thursday.

The board’s executive committee “unanimously endorsed the actions taken by the university,” Platt said. She expressed “full confidence” in Penn’s president, Elizabeth Magill, and board chair Scott Bok.

Accusations of antisemitism roiled Penn as the university hosted the Palestine Writes Literature Festival last month, weeks before the Hamas attacks. Rowan, who’s also chairman of the board of advisors of Penn’s Wharton business school, said it featured “well known antisemites and fomenters of hate and racism” and accused Magill of failing to condemn the rhetoric from the event.

“I call on all UPenn alumni and supporters who believe we are heading in the wrong direction to ‘Close their Checkbooks’ until” Magill and Bok step down, Rowan wrote in a letter earlier this week.

Another prominent donor also weighed in. Dick Wolf, creator of the Law & Order franchise and namesake of Penn’s Wolf Humanities Center, said Magill and Bok’s leadership has “inadequately represented the ideals and values of our university and they should be held to account.”

Rowan, who along with his wife Carolyn donated $50 million to Wharton in 2018, told CNBC on Thursday that he was “strongly encouraged” to reconsider his chairmanship of Wharton, but rejected that advice.

On Sept. 12, the Philadelphia-based university had addressed the controversy over the festival, saying “we unequivocally — and emphatically — condemn antisemitism as antithetical to our institutional values. As a university, we also fiercely support the free exchange of ideas as central to our educational mission. This includes the expression of views that are controversial and even those that are incompatible with our institutional values.”

EK: I support Penn for not being so money-driven. Sometimes, there are costs worth paying for the free exchange of ideas for the sake of a greater mission.