A judge on Wednesday said families who suffered losses in the 12-story collapse of a South Florida condominium building will receive at least $150 million in initial compensation.
The figure includes insurance on the Champlain Towers South building in Surfside. Expected proceeds from the sale of where the property once stood is also included.
“The court’s concern has always been the victims here,” Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Michael Hanzman said at a hearing. “Their rights will be protected.”
The figure does not count toward any proceeds from any of the numerous lawsuits filed since the June 24 collapse. Those lawsuits have consolidated into a class action. As of Wednesday, at least 97 people have died.

A Germany-based microbiologist whose profile surged during the COVID-19 pandemic as he spread various false accounts of the virus has been exposed as an antisemite who believes that Israel “is worse than Nazi Germany was.”
Sucharit Bhakdi, a former professor of microbiology at the University of Mainz, made several antisemitic comments in an online video promoting his parliamentary candidacy for “Die Basis” — a political party founded during the pandemic by conspiracy theorists who charge that governments have deliberately misled their populations over both the nature of the virus and its cure.

An escaped orangutan caused some commotion at Ramat Gan’s Safari Park Saturday, before getting shot with a tranquilizer and taken back to her enclosure.
Tana, a 12-year-old ape, escaped from the enclosure and climbed onto a tall tree near the staff compound. After refusing attempts to coax her down with food, Tana was hit with a tranquilizer dart with a low dosage of a sedative and taken down.
The safari said Tana used foliage added to the enclosure during the week to escape.
“Carers and vets worked professionally and gently and ensured at all times that her condition was good,” officials said, adding that “it’s important to note the location is not close to visitor areas and there was no danger.”

These are not the droids you’re looking for.
Japanese-based Softbank Group announced last week it was pressing pause on “Pepper”, an artificial intelligent robot it started producing in 2014, after multiple “firings.”
Pepper, which was supposed to be able to “read emotions” and converse with people, has been axed by multiple companies around the world for various issues.
Nissei Eco Co., a plastics manufacturer with a sideline in the funeral business, hired Pepper to chant sutras or scriptures to mourners at funerals, but soon fired it after Pepper kept breaking down during practice runs.
“What if it refused to operate in the middle of a ceremony?” funeral-business manager Osamu Funaki told the Wall Street Journal. “It would be such a disaster.”

A Google executive has left the company after publishing a manifesto in which he admitted to previously being anti-Semitic — but claimed to no longer hate Jews.
“I wanted to share that today is Amr Awadallah’s last day at Google,” Eyal Manor, Google Cloud vice president of engineering and product, wrote Thursday in an email to staff, which was viewed by CNBC. “Effective immediately, the Cloud DevRel organization will report into Ben Jackson, who will report into Pali Bhat.”

A 59-year-old Brooklyn man faces robbery charges after he allegedly took an electric scooter from a 7-year-old.
The NYPD says it happened just after 7 p.m. on July 7, 2021.  Officers say Daniel Ufares walked up to the little boy in the area of 36 St. and 12th Ave. in the Borough Park neighborhood.
Police released a video of a person of interest in the case last week.  They say they arrested Ufares on Monday.  He is charged with robbery and criminal possession of stolen property.  It was unclear if he had a lawyer who could speak on his behalf.
No other details were immediately available.
Read more at Fox5.
{Matzav.com}

The Ben & Jerry’s ice cream giant announces it will no longer distribute its products in the “Occupied Palestinian Territory,” though the flavors will remain available in Israel.
“We believe it is inconsistent with our values for Ben & Jerry’s ice cream to be sold in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT). We also hear and recognize the concerns shared with us by our fans and trusted partners.
“We have a longstanding partnership with our licensee, who manufactures Ben & Jerry’s ice cream in Israel and distributes it in the region. We have been working to change this, and so we have informed our licensee that we will not renew the license agreement when it expires at the end of next year.”

The Egged bus company has reported 11 rock-throwing attacks on its buses in Yerushalayim on Tisha B’av, mostly around Shaar Shechem, the Ynet news site reports.
The assaults injured one person, who was hospitalized with a head injury, the report says. A number of buses suffered shattered windows and other damage.
Egged chairman Avi Friedman brands the uptick in stone-throwing “a real terror attack that was premeditated with the aim of harming visitors to the Kosel and deterring them.”
Read more at Times of Israel.
{Matzav.com}
 

Foreign Minister Yair Lapid says there is no change to the longstanding religious arrangements on Har Habayis, under which only Muslims may pray at the site.
“There is no change to the status quo on the Gar Habayis. We’ve clarified this to the Jordanians,” says Lapid. The Jordanian Waqf are the official custodians of the site.
His comments come after sources in the Prime Minister’s Office told Army Radio that Prime Minister Naftali Bennett had misspoken on Sunday when he said both Jews and Muslims have “freedom of worship” on Har Habayis, which would be a potentially explosive change after decades of Jews being permitted only to visit, but not daven, there.

Heavy rains and flash floods grounded air traffic to a halt at Newark International Airport on Saturday.
The airport closed a flooded economy parking lot in the afternoon, and delayed all flights by 90 minutes, according to reports.
By Sunday morning, dozens of flights into the New Jersey hub had been canceled, according to the Port Authority’s website.
Some flights in and out of LaGuardia and Kennedy airports were delayed amid the wet weather, but the New York hubs escaped massive cancellations, according to flight tracking records.
Read more at NY Post.
{Matzav.com}