Our daily voyage around the world

🇵🇦🚢 The Panama Canal is experiencing a large ship pileup. The number of vessels waiting to cross the canal climbed to 154 yesterday, with a current average wait time of 21 days – and experts say the situation will likely worsen in the coming weeks before it gets better. The pileup is a result of water conservation measures Panama’s government enacted in late July due to drought, which temporarily reduced the number of ships allowed to book passage through the canal. An estimated 40% of all US container traffic travels through the Panama Canal each year.

🇮🇶 Iraq ordered companies to stop using the term “homosexuality” and replace it with “sexual deviance.” The new rule, which applies to all media, social media, phone, and internet companies operating in Iraq, also bans any use of the term “gender.” Iraqi officials said they haven’t yet determined a punishment for violating the rule. The country’s laws don’t explicitly criminalize gay sex, but some loosely-defined moral clauses have been used in the past to prosecute local members of the LGBTQ+ community.

🇸🇦 🇮🇱 Saudi Arabia and the US are discussing a deal for the Saudi kingdom to recognize Israel in exchange for concessions. A WSJ report, published yesterday, claimed that US and Saudi officials have agreed on “the broad contours of a deal” under which Saudi Arabia would establish formal diplomatic relations with Israel in exchange for concessions to Palestinians, US security guarantees, and help developing a civilian nuclear energy program. But White House spokesperson John Kirby later pushed back against the WSJ report, saying there’s currently no agreed-upon framework between the US and Saudi Arabia.