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Middle East crisis live: UN rights chief ‘horrified’ by mass grave reports at Gaza hospitals
Tue, 23 Apr 2024 11:49:55 GMT
Emergency services said bodies found at Nasser hospital as Volker Turk says he is ‘horrified’ by destruction at al-Shifa medical facilities
A source close to Hezbollah said an Israeli strike deep into Lebanon killed a fighter of the Iran-backed militant group on Tuesday as he was travelling in a vehicle, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
The strike hit the Abu al-Aswad area near the coastal city of Tyre, about 35 kilometres (22 miles) from the border, an AFP journalist reported.
Continue reading...Every genre of music has made its mark on Manchester, including dialect ballads, classical, TV theme tunes and all the strands of post-punk. Welcome to the north-west sound
Myth distorts any city’s musical history, and in Manchester myth looms as large as the new Co-op Live, a £365m, 23,500-capacity mega-venue that opens today and will soon be staging big-name acts, including Take That. So, for every occasion a music fan mentions the hit-making boy band or, for that matter, 10cc or the Hollies, a thousand more bark back: Joy Division, the Fall, Happy Mondays. Not that 10cc were a small Manc band, but they peaked before punk and a wall went up at the end of the 1970s that relegated all that had passed prior to 4 June 1976 – the night the Sex Pistols performed at the Lesser Free Trade Hall – to prehistory, as in dinosaurs, fossils, folk musicians. New hagiographies about music impresario Tony Wilson (1950-2007) are no doubt at the printers as I write. But how about we spend half an hour mooching round the Rainy City aboard the free buses and trams in search of the underplayed, surprising and tangential – with a few Gen X/6 Music standards for when we’re stuck at the lights.
You might not think Coronation Street a promising departure point, but it gives us an in to Bowton’s Yard. It’s one of those ditties that may prompt unpleasant memories of the BBC TV series Sit Thi Deawn, but listen carefully and you’ll hear it is in fact a Victorian reality show made song. Written by Marsden-born, Stalybridge-based Samuel Laycock, it inspired Tony Warren when he was devising the characters for his Weatherfield/Salford-set soap opera. Granada Studios on Quay Street also played a leading role in disseminating the north-western sound, from regional accents to theme tunes to the Beatles’ first TV appearance, in October 1962.
Continue reading...PM pledges equipment including 400 vehicles, 1,600 weapons and 4m rounds of ammunition, plus £500m in funding
Rishi Sunak has promised the UK’s largest ever military support package for Ukraine as he warned that Vladimir Putin would “not stop at the Polish border” if Russia won the war.
The prime minister will visit Poland on Tuesday to discuss European security and the threat from Russia with the Polish leader, Donald Tusk, and the Nato secretary-general, Jens Stoltenberg, before travelling to Germany to meet the chancellor, Olaf Scholz.
Continue reading...Saleh Ahmed Handule Ali, now 33, had indefinite leave to remain in UK, but Home Office failed to keep a record
A refugee who left the UK on holiday as a teenager in 2008 has been stranded in east Africa for the last 16 years in a case that senior judges have described as “extraordinary”.
Saleh Ahmed Handule Ali, now 33, arrived in the UK at the age of nine in April 2000 with his mother and two younger siblings from Somalia. They came to join Ali’s father, who had been granted refugee status by the UK government. The family were also recognised as refugees by the Home Office and Ali was given a travel document in 2004 under the refugee convention, which was valid for 10 years.
Continue reading...The state says EMTALA, a law barring discrimination in emergency medical care, interferes with its abortion ban.
The post Idaho Goes to the Supreme Court to Argue That Pregnant People Are Second-Class Citizens appeared first on The Intercept.
We’d like to hear from people who have made a booking for accommodation on an online travel platform, only for their host to cancel it at the last minute
We’re interested in hearing from people who have made a booking for accommodation on an online travel platform, only for their host to cancel it at the last minute.
Earlier this year, Taylor Swift fans in Australia were left without accommodation after Airbnb hosts cancelled their bookings. Airbnb’s “host cancellation policy” does not seem to have deterred hosts from then relisting their properties at a higher price. Has something similar happened to you? Are you a Swiftie whose plans to watch her European tour have been affected? Or have you made plans for a holiday elsewhere or another trip that have been thrown into disarray by a host’s cancellation?
Continue reading...Cruising is booming – 2023 ticket sales have surpassed historic levels and 2024 has seen the launch of the largest cruise ship ever built. But as cruise tourism's popularity has increased, so have the pollution problems it brings. To customers, it may not be evident that any problems exist, since some cruise line companies claim to be becoming more climate-friendly. But the truth can be quite different. Josh Toussaint-Strauss interrogates what impact the world's biggest ships are having on the planet
‘Biggest, baddest’ – but is it the cleanest? World’s largest cruise ship sets sail
‘A good cruise is one that doesn’t come’: Europe’s ports bear brunt of ship pollution
Shipping’s dirty secret: how ‘scrubbers’ clean the air – while contaminating the sea
From biking adventures to city breaks, get inspiration for your next break – whether in the UK or further afield – with twice-weekly emails from the Guardian’s travel editors. You’ll also receive handpicked offers from Guardian Holidays.
From biking adventures to city breaks, get inspiration for your next break – whether in the UK or further afield – with twice-weekly emails from the Guardian’s travel editors.
You’ll also receive handpicked offers from Guardian Holidays.
Continue reading...AI models take every toxic gendered beauty norm and bundle them up into completely unrealistic package
Meet Madame Potato. She doesn’t actually exist, but, if things go my way, she’s going to be the world’s first “Miss AI”. I recently created her image on a website that generates AI faces and then entered her into a beauty pageant. Now I am sitting back in anticipation of netting the $20,000 grand prize.
What fresh hell is this, you ask? Well, I regret to inform you that AI beauty pageants are a thing now. A company called Fanvue, which is a subscription-based content creator platform along the same lines as OnlyFans, recently teamed up with the World AI Creator Awards (WAICA) to launch the world’s first “Miss AI” competition. A team of judges – comprising two humans and two virtual models – will sort through AI-generated pictures of women and choose one to crown as “Miss AI”. The winner gets a cash prize along with the chance to monetize their creation on Fanvue.
Continue reading...Claire O’Neill, a former climate minister, says PM’s move was to ‘try and create political division and dividing lines’
The UK government’s decision to weaken some of its climate commitments was a “retrograde step” that would set back vital cross-party action to cut carbon emissions, Claire O’Neill, a former Conservative climate minister, has said.
O’Neill, who was known as Claire Perry when she served as a minister under David Cameron and Theresa May, said the rolling back of emission reduction efforts by Rishi Sunak appeared to be a ploy for political advantage.
Continue reading...Replacing red meat with fish could prevent diabetes, reduce our carbon footprint and save lives. So who’s for spaghetti and fishballs?
“What’s for supper?” my wife asks. We are watching the six o’clock news and the pause I leave before answering is longer than I mean it to be. I’m trying to find the words.
“Fish wellington,” I say, finally. The silence that follows is longer still.
Continue reading...In this flawed but powerful book, a housing lawyer argues that an abundance of private landlords, not a dearth of homes, is to blame for the miseries of ‘generation rent’
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the housing crisis could be solved without building any more homes? There would be no carbon emissions from construction sites, no green fields covered over, no householders upset at dwellings appearing in their view. Instead, rents would become affordable and decent homes available through changes in government policy. Such is the promise of Against Landlords by the author and barrister Nick Bano, a man who has been described as “Britain’s top Marxist housing lawyer”.
The crisis, he argues, is not one of supply but of cost. There are enough homes to go around, but they are notoriously expensive. The cause of high prices is the dominance of private landlords, of whom there are now 2.5 million – one in 21 of the population – receiving a combined £63bn per year in rent. They are supported by government policy, which allows them to turn tenants out without giving a reason, lightly regulates them and sometimes directs vast sums of money in their direction, out of the £23.4bn annual housing benefit bill.
Continue reading...International Energy Agency says 17m vehicles will be sold this year, up more than 20% compared with 2023
Electric and plug-in hybrid car sales will jump to a new global record in 2024 despite slowing growth in some markets, according to forecasts from the influential International Energy Agency (IEA).
The Paris-based forecaster said that 17m battery electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles will be sold in 2024, up more than 20% compared with 2023.
Continue reading...Chris Stark says populist response and culture war around the term is inhibiting environmental progress
The concept of “net zero” has become a political slogan used to start a “dangerous” culture war over the climate, and may be better dropped, the outgoing head of the UK’s climate watchdog has warned.
Chris Stark, the chief executive of the Climate Change Committee (CCC), said sensible improvements to the economy and people’s lives were being blocked by a populist response to the net zero label, and he would be “intensely relaxed” about losing the term.
Continue reading...Historic hearing will receive submissions from people whose human rights have been affected by climate change
Julian Medina comes from a long line of fishers in the north of Colombia’s Gulf of Morrosquillo who use small-scale and often traditional methods to catch species such as mackerel, tuna and cojinúa.
Medina went into business as a young man but was drawn back to his roots, and ended up leading a fishing organisation. For years he has campaigned against the encroachment of fossil fuel companies, pollution and overfishing, which are destroying the gulf’s delicate ecosystem and people’s livelihoods.
Continue reading...Though touted as a model of environmental preservation, the country has recently signalled a shift from phasing out fossil fuels to boosting the economy. Franz Tattenbach on the tension between green credentials and growth
“This country is what the world would like to be but is not,” says Franz Tattenbach, Costa Rica’s minister of environment and energy. The 69-year-old economist is keenly aware of his role as guardian of the country’s reputation for forward-looking biodiversity initiatives and forest restoration. Since the 1970s, successive governments have sought to do justice to its wildlife, enacting a widely praised conservation policy that has boosted the country’s image as a model of environmental preservation.
From his ninth-floor office window in San José, Tattenbach can see the mountains surrounding the Central Valley. Beyond them lie the jungles, the wild beaches and the areas where nearly 6% of the world’s biodiversity resides in just 51,100 sq km (19,700 sq miles) of land, and extensive marine protected area.
Continue reading...Like countless other hostilities, the stealthy Israeli missile and drone strike on Iran doesn’t risk war. It is war.
The post Israel Attack on Iran Is What World War III Looks Like appeared first on The Intercept.
The university suspended three students out of hundreds participating in an on-campus encampment to protest the Israeli government.
The post Columbia Suspends Ilhan Omar’s Daughter One Day After Omar Grilled School Administrators appeared first on The Intercept.
In congressional testimony, school administrators also said they are investigating pro-Israel and pro-Palestine professors.
The post Columbia Suspended Two Students for Assault on Gaza Rally, School Says in Antisemitism Hearing appeared first on The Intercept.
New York congressional hopeful John Avlon, a centrist with GOP ties, was endorsed by a party chair widely blamed for losing the House.
The post Remember the Centrists Who Lost the House in 2022? They’re Back! appeared first on The Intercept.
Cruising is booming – 2023 ticket sales have surpassed historic levels and 2024 has seen the launch of the largest cruise ship ever built. But as cruise tourism's popularity has increased, so have the pollution problems it brings. To customers, it may not be evident that any problems exist, since some cruise line companies claim to be becoming more climate-friendly. But the truth can be quite different. Josh Toussaint-Strauss interrogates what impact the world's biggest ships are having on the planet
‘Biggest, baddest’ – but is it the cleanest? World’s largest cruise ship sets sail
‘A good cruise is one that doesn’t come’: Europe’s ports bear brunt of ship pollution
Shipping’s dirty secret: how ‘scrubbers’ clean the air – while contaminating the sea
SEMrush and Ahrefs are among
the most popular tools in the SEO industry. Both companies have been in
business for years and have thousands of customers per month.
If you're a professional SEO or trying to do digital
marketing on your own, at some point you'll likely consider using a tool to
help with your efforts. Ahrefs and SEMrush are two names that will likely
appear on your shortlist.
In this guide, I'm going to help you learn more about these SEO tools and how to choose the one that's best for your purposes.
What is SEMrush?
SEMrush is a popular SEO tool with a wide range of
features—it's the leading competitor research service for online marketers.
SEMrush's SEO Keyword Magic tool offers over 20 billion Google-approved
keywords, which are constantly updated and it's the largest keyword database.
The program was developed in 2007 as SeoQuake is a
small Firefox extension
Features
Ahrefs is a leading SEO platform that offers a set of
tools to grow your search traffic, research your competitors, and monitor your
niche. The company was founded in 2010, and it has become a popular choice
among SEO tools. Ahrefs has a keyword index of over 10.3 billion keywords and
offers accurate and extensive backlink data updated every 15-30 minutes and it
is the world's most extensive backlink index database.
Features
Direct Comparisons: Ahrefs vs SEMrush
Now that you know a little more about each tool, let's
take a look at how they compare. I'll analyze each tool to see how they differ
in interfaces, keyword research resources, rank tracking, and competitor
analysis.
User Interface
Ahrefs and SEMrush both offer comprehensive information
and quick metrics regarding your website's SEO performance. However, Ahrefs
takes a bit more of a hands-on approach to getting your account fully set up,
whereas SEMrush's simpler dashboard can give you access to the data you need
quickly.
In this section, we provide a brief overview of the elements
found on each dashboard and highlight the ease with which you can complete
tasks.
AHREFS
The Ahrefs dashboard is less cluttered than that of
SEMrush, and its primary menu is at the very top of the page, with a search bar
designed only for entering URLs.
Additional features of the Ahrefs platform include:
SEMRUSH
When you log into the SEMrush Tool, you will find four
main modules. These include information about your domains, organic keyword
analysis, ad keyword, and site traffic.
You'll also find some other options like
Both Ahrefs and SEMrush have user-friendly dashboards,
but Ahrefs is less cluttered and easier to navigate. On the other hand, SEMrush
offers dozens of extra tools, including access to customer support resources.
When deciding on which dashboard to use, consider what
you value in the user interface, and test out both.
If you're looking to track your website's search engine
ranking, rank tracking features can help. You can also use them to monitor your
competitors.
Let's take a look at Ahrefs vs. SEMrush to see which
tool does a better job.
The Ahrefs Rank Tracker is simpler to use. Just type in
the domain name and keywords you want to analyze, and it spits out a report
showing you the search engine results page (SERP) ranking for each keyword you
enter.
Rank Tracker looks at the ranking performance of
keywords and compares them with the top rankings for those keywords. Ahrefs
also offers:
You'll see metrics that help you understand your
visibility, traffic, average position, and keyword difficulty.
It gives you an idea of whether a keyword would be
profitable to target or not.
SEMRush offers a tool called Position Tracking. This
tool is a project tool—you must set it up as a new project. Below are a few of
the most popular features of the SEMrush Position Tracking tool:
All subscribers are given regular data updates and
mobile search rankings upon subscribing
The platform provides opportunities to track several
SERP features, including Local tracking.
Intuitive reports allow you to track statistics for the
pages on your website, as well as the keywords used in those pages.
Identify pages that may be competing with each other
using the Cannibalization report.
Ahrefs is a more user-friendly option. It takes seconds
to enter a domain name and keywords. From there, you can quickly decide whether
to proceed with that keyword or figure out how to rank better for other
keywords.
SEMrush allows you to check your mobile rankings and
ranking updates daily, which is something Ahrefs does not offer. SEMrush also
offers social media rankings, a tool you won't find within the Ahrefs platform.
Both are good which one do you like let me know in the comment.
Keyword research is closely related to rank tracking,
but it's used for deciding which keywords you plan on using for future content
rather than those you use now.
When it comes to SEO, keyword research is the most
important thing to consider when comparing the two platforms.
The Ahrefs Keyword Explorer provides you with thousands
of keyword ideas and filters search results based on the chosen search engine.
Ahrefs supports several features, including:
SEMrush's Keyword Magic Tool has over 20 billion
keywords for Google. You can type in any keyword you want, and a list of
suggested keywords will appear.
The Keyword Magic Tool also lets you to:
Both of these tools offer keyword research features and
allow users to break down complicated tasks into something that can be
understood by beginners and advanced users alike.
If you're interested in keyword suggestions, SEMrush
appears to have more keyword suggestions than Ahrefs does. It also continues to
add new features, like the Keyword Gap tool and SERP Questions recommendations.
Both platforms offer competitor analysis tools,
eliminating the need to come up with keywords off the top of your head. Each
tool is useful for finding keywords that will be useful for your competition so
you know they will be valuable to you.
Ahrefs' domain comparison tool lets you compare up to five websites (your website and four competitors) side-by-side.it also shows you how your site is ranked against others with metrics such as backlinks, domain ratings, and more.
Use the Competing Domains section to see a list of your
most direct competitors, and explore how many keywords matches your competitors
have.
To find more information about your competitor, you can
look at the Site Explorer and Content Explorer tools and type in their URL
instead of yours.
SEMrush provides a variety of insights into your
competitors' marketing tactics. The platform enables you to research your
competitors effectively. It also offers several resources for competitor
analysis including:
Traffic Analytics helps you identify where your
audience comes from, how they engage with your site, what devices visitors use
to view your site, and how your audiences overlap with other websites.
SEMrush's Organic Research examines your website's
major competitors and shows their organic search rankings, keywords they are
ranking for, and even if they are ranking for any (SERP) features and more.
The Market Explorer search field allows you to type in
a domain and lists websites or articles similar to what you entered. Market
Explorer also allows users to perform in-depth data analytics on These
companies and markets.
SEMrush wins here because it has more tools dedicated to
competitor analysis than Ahrefs. However, Ahrefs offers a lot of functionality
in this area, too. It takes a combination of both tools to gain an advantage
over your competition.
When it comes to keyword data research, you will become
confused about which one to choose.
Consider choosing Ahrefs if you
Consider SEMrush if you:
Both tools are great. Choose the one which meets your
requirements and if you have any experience using either Ahrefs or SEMrush let
me know in the comment section which works well for you.
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