Als de net afgestudeerde journalist Gilad Perez zich vestigt in Tel Aviv, breekt kort daarna de oorlog tussen Israël en Hamas uit. Perez moet meteen aan het werk, voor het AD. In dit indringende boek doet hij verslag van zijn ervaringen. Ook reflecteert hij op zijn eigen tekortkomingen in de journalistiek. Ondanks worstelingen met zijn neutraliteit, als zoon van een Marokkaans-Joodse vader uit Israël, blijft Perez vastberaden het menselijk leed aan beide kanten te belichten. Hij spreekt met zowel familieleden van Israëlische gijzelaars als Palestijnen die ternauwernood ontsnappen aan de dood in Gaza, en met journalisten van links tot rechts. Perez legt bloot hoe media in zowel Israël als de Arabische wereld vaak vergeten het leed van 'de ander' te beschrijven, waardoor de haat aan beide zijden alleen maar toeneemt. Hummus en Hamas is het eerlijke, onthutsende en persoonlijke verhaal van een jonge twintiger, die naarmate het conflict langer duurt steeds meer bewonderaar wordt van het concept vredesjournalistiek. Gilad Perez (2001) studeerde af aan de School voor Journalistiek in Utrecht en volgt momenteel een master Midden-Oostenstudies aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam. Hij is correspondent voor het AD in Israël en de Palestijnse gebieden en verschijnt regelmatig bij Bureau Buitenland op npo Radio 1.

Abstract: We propose a novel way to search for feebly interacting massive particles, exploiting two properties of systems involving collisions between high energy electrons and intense laser pulses. The first property is that the electron-laser collision results in a large flux of hard photons, as the laser behaves effectively as a thick medium. The second property is that the emitted photons free-stream inside the laser and thus for them the laser behaves effectively as a very thin medium. Combining these two features implies that the electron-intense-laser collision is an apparatus, which can efficiently convert O ( 10 GeV ) electrons to a large flux of hard, collinear photons. The photons are directed onto a solid dump in which feebly interacting massive particles may be produced. With the much smaller backgrounds induced by the photon beam compared to those expected in electron- or proton-beam dump experiments and combined with a relatively shorter dump used here, the sensitivity to short lifetimes is unparalleled. We denote this novel apparatus as "optical dump" or NPOD (new physics search with optical dump). The proposed LUXE experiment at the European XFEL has all the basic required ingredients to realize this experimental concept for the first time. Moreover, the NPOD extension of LUXE is essentially parasitic to the main experiment and thus, practically it does not have any bearing on its main program. We discuss how the NPOD concept can be realized in practice by adding a detector after the last physical dump of the experiment to reconstruct the two-photon decay of a new spin-0 particle. We show that even with a relatively short dump, the search can still be background-free. Remarkably, even with a few days of data taking with a 40 TW laser corresponding to its initial run, LUXE-NPOD will be able to probe an uncharted territory of models with pseudoscalars and scalars. Furthermore, with a 350 TW laser of the main run, LUXE-NPOD will have a unique reach for these models. In particular it can probe natural scalar theories for masses above 100 MeV. We note that the new NPOD concept may be ported to other existing or future facilities worldwide, including, e.g., future lepton colliders

A novel method for extracting cosmological evolution parameters is proposed, using a probe other than light: future observations of the diffuse anti-neutrino flux emitted from core-collapse supernovae (SNe), combined with the SN rate extracted from future SN surveys. The relic SN neutrino differential flux can be extracted by using future neutrino detectors such as Gadolinium-enriched, megaton, water detectors or 100-kiloton detectors of liquid Argon or liquid scintillator. The core-collapse SN rate can be reconstructed from direct observation of SN explosions using future precision observatories. Our method, by itself, cannot compete with the accuracy of the optical-based measurements but may serve as an important consistency check as well as a source of complementary information. The proposal does not require construction of a dedicated experiment, but rather relies on future experiments proposed for other purposes.

A universe without weak interactions is constructed that undergoes big-bang nucleosynthesis, matter domination, structure formation, and star formation. The stars in this universe are able to burn for billions of years, synthesize elements up to iron, and undergo supernova explosions, dispersing heavy elements into the interstellar medium. These definitive claims are supported by a detailed analysis where this hypothetical ''Weakless Universe'' is matched to our Universe by simultaneously adjusting Standard Model and cosmological parameters. For instance, chemistry and nuclear physics are essentially unchanged. The apparent habitability of the Weakless Universe suggests that the anthropic principle does not determine the scale of electroweak breaking, or even require that it be smaller than the Planck scale, so long as technically natural parameters may be suitably adjusted. Whether the multi-parameter adjustment is realized or probable is dependent on the ultraviolet completion, such as the string landscape. Considering a similar analysis for the cosmological constant, however, we argue that no adjustments of other parameters are able to allow the cosmological constant to raise up even remotely close to the Planck scale while obtaining macroscopic structure. The fine-tuning problems associated with the electroweak breaking scale and the cosmological constant therefore appear to be qualitatively different from the perspective of obtaining a habitable universe.