内容摘要：The late Pope Francis, who died last month, warned that AI risked turning human relations into mere algorithms and called for an international treaty to regulate it.

The late Pope Francis, who died last month, warned that AI risked turning human relations into mere algorithms and called for an international treaty to regulate it.

But the military’s use of human shields appears to have been normalised since then, particularly over the past 19 months of war in Gaza.Indeed, there are indications that orders may be coming from the very top.

Haaretz’s investigation from last August cited sources as saying that former Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi was among the senior officers aware of the use of Palestinians in Gaza as human shields.And this week’s report by the AP cited an anonymous Israeli officer as saying that the practice had become ubiquitous by mid-2004 in Gaza, with every infantry unit using a Palestinian to clear houses by the time he finished his service, and with orders “to bring a mosquito” often being issued via radio.The report also cited an anonymous Israeli sergeant as saying that his unit had tried to refuse to use human shields in Gaza in 2024, but was told they had no choice, a high-ranking officer telling them they shouldn’t worry about international humanitarian law.

Responding to claims in the AP report, the Israeli military told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday that it would investigate the claims “if further details are provided”.“In several cases, investigations by the Military Police Criminal Investigation Division were opened following suspicions that the military was involving Palestinians in military missions. These investigations are ongoing, and naturally, no further details can be provided at this time,” it said.

In March, Haaretz reported that Israel’s military police were investigating six cases in which Israeli soldiers were alleged to have used Palestinians as human shields after the publication of a Red Cross report earlier in the year that highlighted the abuses.

In the face of growing evidence that Palestinians are systematically being used as fodder for the Israeli military machine, in a war that has already killed more than 54,000 people, the military may find it increasingly difficult to kick the biggest can of all down the road.Cartographers as far back as the early 20th century knew the Mercator projection was problematic.

Developed by Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator in 1599, the projection was one of the first ever to represent arched, imaginary sailing courses as visible, straight lines. Its simplicity for sea navigation cemented its popularity at the time, but its huge errors soon became hard to ignore.“It preserves shapes and angles, and that’s good for navigation, but it’s terrible for scale,” geography professor Lindsay Frederick Braun of the University of Oregon said of the Mercator map. The map is most suitable for local area mapping and is used by digital platforms like Google Maps.

When enlarged into a world map, though, Mercator becomes problematic, Braun said. The map’s mistakes were not likely to be a conspiracy against Africa or the Global South, but its continued use, he added, is inherently political.“Part of the reason Mercator got wide use is because it was widely available for nautical charts, but also because it rings true as a vision of the world to the people who were looking at it, the people whose countries are a little bigger.”