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The Labour conference fringe event was billed as an audience with the peer and 'Blue Labour' guru Lord Glasman about how the movement he founded had taken over the party.

The problem was Lord Glasman told them unequivocally that he didn't think it had.

Instead he suggested that while Keir Starmer's Government might be having a "Blue Labour moment" it had fallen well short of proposing the radical change that would be required if Labour was to retain power and regain the votes of working class people from Reform.

The event had been organised by Unherd, the media organisation founded by Conservative hedge funder and GB News co-owner Paul Marshall, which promises to "give a platform to the overlooked, the downtrodden and the traduced."

What the audience of Labour members, lobbyists and journalists got from the Blue Labour peer was a tour de force of what he saw as the failures of British governments from the times of Thatcher to the present day.

Blue Labour on MAGA Square: Maurice Glasman's Journey to Trumpism

Jon Bloomfield and David Edgar look at the nationalist populist drift of Labour's anti-progressive tendency

Jon Bloomfield and David Edgar

His told his audience that his political awakening came when he was 18 and Thatcher won the election. "What people have forgotten is that the first 18 months of her Government was a catastrophe" citing rising unemployment and inflation only to be turned round later by the Falklands War.

He was similarly scathing about Tony Blair's Labour Gobvernment, warning his audience that anybody using the word 'New' to describe the party under Blair was not to be trusted as there really wasn't anything new about it - more a continuation of a longstanding political consensus.

Glasman blamed Thatcher and Blair equally for the globalisation and deindustrialisation of the UK, saying that while Thatcher started it, "Blair consummated it".

As for New Labour's song slogan "Things can only get better" he described it as "idiotic optimism". No wonder when I mentioned his name to Alastair Campbell, one of the architects of New Labour, who was wandering nearby after the session, I got a very frosty reception about a man he thought had lost his way.

While Glasman had little positive to say about recent governments and the ministers, the one exception was the new Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, who he praised for her commitments to stop the boats, "secure the borders" and deal with the implementation of the European Convention of Human Rights, adding that while he was "in favour of the rule of law" he was not in favour of "the rule of lawyers".

He also praised Mahmood, who has been tipped on the right of a party as a future leader, for what he described as her interest in developing a ten year industrial strategy - something well outside of her current brief.

This all brought Johnny Ball, Unherd's political journalist interviewing him, to ask the question "Would he join Reform?" to which Glasman replied that he wouldn't - citing the Farage's sympathies for "the despot Putin" and his actions in Ukraine.

However, while he refused to endorse Reform, he did condemn Starmer for calling Nigel Farage a racist. Indeed after the fringe finished he went as far to apologise personally on GB News to Nigel Farage for what he called Starmer's "disgraceful slur" of the Reform leader.

Insisting that any politician who calls people racist or sexist is in the world of name-calling 'student politics', Glasman also took aim at the current media obsession with who should lead the Labour Party. In his view this is irrelevant and the real question is about which strategy is needed to save and revive the country. As a result, he told his audience he would not be voting in Labour's ongoing Deputy Leadership contest.

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In front of the Parliament building in Chișinău, a monumental white concrete structure built during the Soviet era and designed to resemble an open book, several hundred protesters wave Moldovan flags. On this autumn afternoon, their cries echo down the central avenue: "Freedom!" and "Moldova!" Many have come to support Igor Dodon, the former, pro-Russian, President, who disputes his defeat in the parliamentary elections on Sunday evening.

Close to the Kremlin and regularly accused of being Moscow's mouthpiece for discrediting the ruling power in Moldova, Dodon embodies an opposition that makes no secret of its sympathies for Vladimir Putin. His supporters denounce electoral fraud, but for the Moldovan authorities, the real and massive interference took place elsewhere: online.

Disinformation articles, fake videos of politicians, cyberattacks, Russian-funded bots on social media - throughout the weekend, the country was bombarded with content designed to undermine confidence in the election.

To no avail. President Maia Sandu's center-right Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS), in power since 2021, won 50.20% of the vote, according to figures from the Electoral Commission. In this country of 2.4 million inhabitants, wedged between EU and NATO member nation Romania, war torn Ukraine, and the pro-Russian separatist region of Transnistria, the vote was seen as a test for Russian hybrid warfare.

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Ballot Battle Fought on Cell Phone Screens

To gauge the extent of online disinformation, all you have to do is accompany Mirula Burcalu. A foreign language student under a long beige coat and square glasses perched on her nose. As she crosses the center of Chișinău, she sits down on a bench in the cathedral park, and takes out her phone.

"Look at this one," she says, opening TikTok. After only five videos, her news feed is covered with pro-Russian content. On the screen, a man films himself in his living room, confidently denouncing President Maia Sandu, "He is saying that President Sandu has hidden million-dollar luxury properties on the East Coast," Mirula translates. She swipes. "On that one, they are calling Maia Sandu a liar."

For Mirula, the mechanism is relentless. "Moldovans are exposed to this narrative, no matter what they do," she sighs. She describes a succession of sequences in which the algorithm highlights accusations against President Sandu: embezzlement, betrayal of the country's interests. "It's like a nightmare," she says, "because Moldova deserves to be in the European Union, but these videos are trying to convince people otherwise."

Moldova - Testing Ground for Russian Hybrid Warfare in Europe

On September 9, Maia Sandu, invited to speak before the European Parliament, estimated that Moscow had "spent the equivalent of one per cent of Moldova's GDP to influence the 2024 presidential elections," or approximately €166 million.

"The Kremlin's goal is clear: to take over Moldova through the ballot box, use it against Ukraine, and turn the country into a springboard for hybrid attacks against the European Union," she explained to MEPs. Although nothing has been quantified for these elections, Maia Sandu believes that Russia's influence campaign for Sunday's elections was "unprecedented".

For many analysts, Moldova has become a prime testing ground for Moscow in its hybrid warfare in Europe. In his office in central Chișinău, Valeriu P...

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Whatever becomes of Trump's twenty-point peace plan, it marks an important turning point in the conflict in Gaza.

It's been two long years since Hamas fighters crashed through the borders into Israel, attacking attendees at a music festival and local kibbutzim and towns. This was not a spontaneous act of desperate individuals who had given up hope. Instead, it was a planned raid that was disastrous not just for their victims but for the organisation itself. Not only has Hamas itself been virtually destroyed as a fighting force, but its main allies and backers in Lebanon and Iran have also suffered serious blows. And as for the Palestinian people in whose name Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October 2023, the price they have paid for Hamas' miscalculation is almost unimaginably terrible.

From the very beginning, there was a way out. Calls for a ceasefire and the return of hostages were made within the first few weeks of the fighting. There were some early hostage releases, with Israel releasing Palestinian prisoners in exchange. There were brief ceasefires. Both sides almost certainly knew what the eventual deal would be to end this chapter of the longer war between Israel and the Palestinians. Many countries, including nearly all the Arab countries, were keen to help negotiate an exchange of hostages. But until this week, there was little hope that this would happen anytime soon.

This is, on the face of it, quite strange. The vast majority of Israelis have been demanding that their Government make a deal to bring the hostages home. Enormous street demonstrations are held on a regular basis in Tel Aviv and elsewhere. The slogans the demonstrators adopted were not about calling on Hamas to do anything. The demand of the tens of thousands of Israelis in the streets was always that their government do what it takes to bring the hostages home. Increasingly, that demand was accompanied by a call on Netanyahu to end the war as well.

And despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of Israelis now support the 'end the war' demand, Netanyahu still did not budge. The war went on, week after week, with no end in sight. Why? Probably because as soon as the war ends, Netanyahu will likely face elections in which his coalition will be defeated - as nearly all the polls show. He's being challenged not only by the usual crowd of centre-leftists and centre-rightists, but also by a resurgent Israeli Left. The two historic parties of that Left, Labour and Meretz, were on the cusp of disappearing from the scene, but have united and grown much stronger during the last couple of years.

And Netanyahu will also face the Israeli criminal justice system, which he distrusts and detests. He risks winding up, like at least one former prime minister and one former president before him, spending some time in a prison cell. This is something he is keen to prevent - at almost all costs.

There is a historical precedent for what might happen next.

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Hamas timed their attack - almost certainly intentionally - to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary of what Israelis call the "Yom Kippur War". Back in October 1973, the Egyptian and Syrian Governments, still stinging from their defeat in the 1967 Six Day War, launched surprise attacks on Israel's southern and northern borders.

Like the Hamas raids, those armies crashed through Israeli defence lines that seem, in retrospect, to...

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A "mass action" against the Palestine Action ban will take place in Trafalgar Square this Saturday (4th October), with 1,500 people having signed a pledge making to join the action and risk arrest by pledging their support for the banned organisation.

They will, as in previous protests, hold signs saying "I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action." Organisers Defend Our Juries believe hundreds more will join the action on the day without registering in advance - making it the largest such protest yet.

Over 1,600 people have been arrested for peaceful sign-holding under the Terrorism Act 2000 since the Palestine Action ban came into effect on 5th July - more than six times the total number of counter-terror arrests in the whole of last year, according to Defend Our Juries. The mass action in Trafalgar Square could therefore see the total number of people arrested so far nearly double.

Responding to Byline Times at a press conference on Wednesday (1st October), Saeed Taji Farouky, a Palestinian filmmaker and journalist, said: "The level of anger, the level of despair amongst the British public, is unlike anything I've seen in 30 years of activism for Palestine. So I have no doubt that Defend Our Juries can continue as long as it takes."

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"It's very clear that the government has said they won't back down. It's very clear that Defend Our Juries have said they won't back down - not only about Palestine in particular, but about the foundations of British democracy, about the right to freedom of speech in this country."

He added: "Defend Our Juries plan to continue the protests and escalate in terms of numbers, if that's necessary."

And the Palestinian activist believes that if Defend Our Juries was banned or stopped their campaign, "you'd still see 1,500 to 2,000 people show up at Parliament Square once a month, taking action."

"It has become almost an autonomous movement in itself. It's a bottom-up civil disobedience movement that is more steadfast than anything I've seen in years in this country."

Martin Cavanagh (PCS Union National President) also attended the press conference. He told a clutch of reporters: "We have been pushing [for unions] to attend the general Palestine protests. We've been pushing the trade union movement to take a far more proactive and more vocal stance over the last two years.

"We were there at the very beginning - on day one, ourselves and Unite were the only two trade unions represented at that very first national demonstration, and it has been growing since."

Asked if he believed union chiefs should risk arrest by attending, he added: "Are we as a union pushing general secretaries to take part in the action? The answer is that unions and general secretaries will make their personal choice about what action they can take in pursuit of getting the government to stop the arms sales."

The Met Police has been contacted for comment.

'BBC's Language Around "Palestinian Journalists" Is an Egregious Double-Standard'

Usually reporters close to a story and source are celebrated for their insight - in Gaza, it is framed as 'bias', argues Karishma Patel

Karishma Patel

Defend Our Juries argues Palestine Action was banned "not because it posed any threat to the public, but because it threatened the profits of the arms companies enabling Israel's genocide." Arms firms were among those recently revealed to have lobbied for th...

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A key sponsor of Tommy Robinson's large far-right 'Unite the Kingdom' rally in central London is a convicted fraudster alleged to be behind two cryptocurrency scandals - so-called 'rug-pulls'.

Rug-pulls are schemes in which the owner of a cryptocurrency inflates the value by hyping up the currency's potential, only to pull the rug by cashing out their coins for a profit, causing the value to plummet and leaving everyone else with worthless tokens.

The far-right activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, otherwise known as 'Tommy Robinson' recently gathered between 110,000 and 150,000 people on the streets of London for the 'Unite the Kingdom' rally on September 13th. The rally featured speakers from far-right movements around the world, including far-right billionaire Elon Musk and the French politician Eric Zemmour, whose party Reconquest is considered more extreme than Marine Le Pen's National Rally.

Robinson's rally was "sponsored" by two cryptocurrency firms, Athena Bitcoin Global and Just FOMO, as well as V Social, a social network promoting "free speech" itself owned by Just FOMO's director, and Advance UK, Ben Habib's right-wing split from Reform UK.

Byline Times can reveal that Ashley Ward, the owner of Just FOMO, is a convicted fraudster alleged to be behind two so-called cryptocurrency rug pulls.

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Ward appears to have been previously involved in scams operating under his birth name Ashley Keable in his hometown of Leicester, before his foray into crypto.

Various website bios including a Tumblr blog, a Flickr account, and a profile on the website Stage 32 suggest Keable was working as a filmmaker. The websites have photos of Ward under the name Ashley Keable.

In an interview promoting his other (seemingly dormant) cryptocurrency Roo Coin, Keable claimed that he had previously been a filmmaker. On Companies House, he is listed as the owner of Film Peeps Media Group a video production and web services company that dissolved in 2021, and as the owner of Blighty Media, a creative agency which dissolved in 2014.

Keable had previously been jailed for 12 months after admitting to 15 eBay frauds involving jewellery and digital cameras. In 2010, Judge Simon Hammond told Keable: "It was a carefully worked-out scam and carefully planned - a serious form of confidence trick."

In 2012, the Leicester Mercury reported that Keable had been convicted for the second time of fraud after scamming a professional photographer out of £1,800 by advertising a camera on eBay that he did not have.

Operating under his new name Ashley Ward and the username Toshi, he launched crypto firm FOMO Network in 2024 and built hype for the project on Discord and Telegram, while people invested in Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) and the FOMO cryptocurrency behind it.

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The process of building hype for the currency also involved sponsoring a Tommy Robinson protest on 1st June 2024, with Ward/Keable (as we shall refer to him from now on) bragging on Telegram that he had access to "the biggest names in politics". Footage of the 1st June protest shows Robinson speaking in Parliament Square on a stage bearing the Just FOMO logo on either side.

But on 10th July last year, the value of FOMO crashed as liquidity was withdrawn from the currency in a move that the site Holy Coins described as a suspected rug pull.

Messages in the FOMO network's Discord...

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There are still four years to go until the next general election, but for anyone attending Labour's conference in Liverpool it has often felt like Nigel Farage is already comfortably in Number 10.

At fringe events and on the conference stage Cabinet Ministers have spoken endlessly of the Reform leader and his four Members of Parliament, while the thoughts and wishes of Labour's 400 elected MPs have firmly taken a back seat.

In her first conference speech Labour's new Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood declared that she would have to get "tough" on migrants in order to fend off Reform, telling Labour party members that they "may not like" what she had to do.

So just days after the Prime Minister declared that Farage's mass deportation plans were "racist" and "immoral", Mahmood instead unveiled her own toned-down version of those plans, in which migrants will now be forced to wait ten years and conduct compulsory "voluntary" work, in order to avoid also being expelled from the country.

Unveiling what was billed in the press as a "major crackdown on migration" Mahmood announced that migrants would also be barred from claiming any benefits whatsoever if they wanted to ever be given leave to remain in the country.

The only way to beat the racists in Reform, we seemed to be told, was to give them almost everything they wanted.

And yet while the threat of Reform was repeatedly raised on stage, the Prime Minister himself appeared to reserve an almost greater level of disdain for what he described as the "extreme" left, who he labelled "snake oil merchants" who hated their country.

Speaking on Sky News, the Prime Minister's right hand man in Downing Street, Darren Jones, warned that "the progressive movement outside of the Labour Party" must understand that "populism on the left… risks taking us down a much darker path for our country".

When Downing Street briefed the press last week that he would launch a "progressive fightback" it wasn't clear that what he really wanted to do was to launch a fightback against progressives.

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An Alternative Path

Not everyone appeared to agree with this strategy. Across the conference fringes Labour's Mayor of Manchester Andy Burnham beguiled Labour members with the suggestion that, just perhaps, the Government could be doing a few things that they, rather than Nigel Farage, wanted them to do. Perhaps it would be possible for a Labour Government with a huge landslide majority and several more years to play with, to actually cut living costs, change the electoral system and move back towards the EU.

Such "snake oil" was not warmly received, however, with Cabinet Ministers and Downing Street aides pouring bile into journalists' ears about Burnham's preposterous suggestion that a Labour Government could actually do some things that Labour MPs, members and voters wanted.

In his speech, the Prime Minister strongly resisted such calls for what he described as "unfunded tax cuts or unfunded spending" saying that the "fiscal rules" holding them back from doing the sorts of things Burnham and others were calling for were "non-negotiable".

Instead Starmer offered vague promises to "rewire the economy" in order to give voters "agency over the state" at some indeterminate point in the future. Unlike back in the Blair era, when ministers used conference speeches to announce and promote popular new schemes and policies, there was n...

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SC: My dear friend and colleague, Mairi Clare Rodgers, said I should experiment with a podcast that creates a space for people to discuss, in long-form, in a comfortable, non-combative way. We are at this moment, culturally, politically – a scary moment – that feels a little bit too much like the 1930s, and that is where the concept of the 'speakeasy' came from. There are some very, very polarising things happening on the streets, in mainstream politics even, and people who are interested in resistance need a place to be themselves, to talk critically in a comfortable environment, and that's the concept behind the podcast.

I hope I am exaggerating but, to my mind – I'm 56 years old and have been quite politically aware since my childhood – I think this is the scariest moment in terms of the rise of the far-right, not just in the UK but internationally.

The populist hard men can beam themselves in from Silicon Valley to a demonstration in central London, can inspire and organise online. Wealth and power is more concentrated than ever – and if you have got wealth and power, and you want to hang on to it in the face of legitimate grievance on the part of millions and millions of people on the planet, the far-right strategy is to divide. It's an old trick, which helps the wealthy and the powerful – but it doesn't end well for anybody else.

When you see a pattern developing around the world of these hard, supposedly charismatic, leaders who claim a direct line to the 'will of the people', and therefore want to cut across institutions which they consider elite and corrupt, whether it is parliaments and other legislatures, this is what makes it feel like the 1930s to me. And it is not just rhetoric anymore – it is not just the attack on these institutions and on 'activist lawyers' and 'unelected judges' and 'the blob' – we are now seeing it on the streets, spikes in hate crime, and a toxicity of discourse where there isn't room for reasonable disagreement or discussion.

There isn't enough of a consensus about the rules of the game. In the end, for me, the difference between a democrat and a populist of left or right is whether you respect fundamental rights and freedoms and the rule of law. When you don't, anything goes.

The podcast is a series of interviews with people with different democratic political persuasions from me. We've got [former SNP Scottish First Minister] Nicola Sturgeon. I'm obviously not a Scottish nationalist – I believe in self-determination, but I would be very sad to see the fracturing of the United Kingdom at a time when, it seems to me, that the planet needs more collectivism rather than fragmentation – but she also speaks about progressive politics, her belief in human rights, her concerns about the climate emergency. So hopefully listeners will hear a reasonable discussion between people with different politics, but with things in common.

She speaks personally about the price of being a very senior woman in politics, which I felt quite moved by because I've seen it with other friends and colleagues, like Diane Abbott. The price that people pay for choosing that path, which is not a path I've ever been on because I'm an unelected peer… They pay a price in the bruising hatefulness, the misogyny.

We have Charlotte Owen [the then 30-year-old who was appointed as a Conservative peer in 2023] who had a terribly bruising experience when she was first appointed to the House of Lords by Boris Johnson as a former Number 10 special advisor. She faced a really disgusting barrage of misogynistic innuendo and abuse. There were young chaps in the same cohort who were also appointed to the Lords, but the same fuss wasn't made about that. We have lots of political differences, but what we agree on is Charlotte's successful campaign, and I hope it will continue, against deepfake pornography.

There are moments of q...

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Anti-corruption campaigners and the Liberal Democrats are calling for fresh investigations into Russian interference in British politics, after Reform UK's former leader in Wales admitted to taking bribes to make statements in favour of Russia.

Last Friday's guilty plea in the trial of Nathan Gill, Reform UK's former leader in Wales, demonstrates the "real risks of foreign interference and corruption" in Britain's politics, according to the monitoring group Spotlight on Corruption.

Appearing at the Old Bailey last week, Gill admitted he accepted corrupt payments in exchange for making pro-Russia statements in 2018 and 2019 as a UKIP Member of the European Parliament when Nigel Farage was leader. Gill also represented north Wales in the Welsh Parliament for the Reform predecessor party. The prosecution successfully argued he received bribes from Oleg Voloshyn, a former Ukrainian official under ousted pro-Russian president Viktor Yanukovych.

Nathan Gill pleaded guilty to eight out of nine counts under the Bribery Act, admitting receiving financial advantages in the form of money between December 2018 and July 2019 which constituted "improper performance" of his role as an elected official. He is due to be sentenced on 21st November.

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The Liberal Democrats' Foreign Affairs Spokesperson Calum Miller has now said a new investigation should be launched looking into potential ties between Nigel Farage, Reform UK and Russia following the latest revelations. The party has said that a review by Parliament's Intelligence and Security Committee should be completed and laid before Parliament before the next General Election.

News outlet Nation.Cymru revealed in 2023 that Gill had been on multiple trips organised by people suspected of being Russian agents, including Ukraine and Moldova.

Susan Hawley, Executive Director of Spotlight on Corruption, said the UK must ensure that it has "robust, and well-resourced law enforcement response across the board to tackle corruption and electoral interference."

"The Government also needs to be far more transparent about the levels of foreign interference that the UK faces, and what it is doing to tackle it. It should be reporting annually to parliament on this," she added.

Where Is the Opposition to Nigel Farage's Immoral Mass Deportation Plan?

Keir Starmer's Government's refusal to explicitly condemn the Reform leader's plans to tear thousands of families and communities apart is only clearing his path to Downing Street, argues Adam Bienkov

Adam Bienkov

It comes after Reform boss Zia Yusuf appeared to dodge questions about the issue on Monday morning after BBC Breakfast showed a series of photos of Nigel Farage campaigning with Nathan Gill during previous Welsh elections.

Farage was previously paid to appear on Russia Today before it was banned in the UK in 2022. The Reform UK leader also previously declared that Putin is the world leader he admires the most. Farage led UKIP and served in the European Parliament with Gill, though there is no suggestion the former was involved in illegality.

Calum Miller, Liberal Democrat Foreign Affairs Spokesperson, said: "The revelations in recent days show the lengths to which Russia will go to subvert our democracy and influence our politics. There is a strong case for the Intelligence and Security Committee to launch a new inquiry into Russian interference in our politics,...

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It will be very easy for some to dismiss US President Donald Trump's 20-point peace plan for Gaza, and there are dozens of reasons why the plan could fall apart.

Hamas probably won't accept it. Even if they do, they might not be able to deliver on all of the commitments expected from them - for example, they claim that they no longer know the whereabouts of all the Israeli hostages. Some of their members, or members of other militant factions in Gaza - such as Palestinian Islamic Jihad - may prefer to fight on, defying their leaders' wishes.

In Israel, right-wing extremists will be willing it to fail, and will pounce upon any opportunity to proclaim that Hamas has breached the terms. They may be willing to bring down Benjamin Netanyahu's Government, rather than give up on their dream of annexing all of Gaza and the West Bank. They might demand a high price for their support, such as a commitment to more settlements on Palestinian land.

The Israeli Prime Minister himself probably only went along with the proposal following his meeting at the White House in order to please Trump, and buy himself political time.

He has already reneged on certain aspects of it, for example reiterating his opposition to Palestinian statehood, which is mentioned in the plan as a possible long-term outcome, and declaring that Israeli Defence Forces will be allowed to stay on in Gaza, contrary to what is stated in the plan.

Netanyahu will doubtless be delighted to latch onto any foot-dragging by Hamas to declare that the plan has failed.

There are also dozens of elements of the plan which are less than satisfactory.

Trump is not known for his attention to detail or patience - making it doubtful whether he is best suited to be the head of the proposed "Board of Peace" overseeing the process.

Some will question the proposed involvement of former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair.

There is no explicit commitment to a two-state solution.

There are many unanswered questions which have always bedevilled previous peace attempts - for example, the future status of Jerusalem, the size and shape of any future Palestinian state, the status of settlements in the West Bank, the future role of the Palestinian Authority, and whether Palestinians abroad will be given any 'right of return'.

Anyone with knowledge of the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is probably right to be pessimistic about the chances of success.

And yet, what alternative do we have?

From Maggie to MAGA: The Transformation of the Conservative Mind

James Bloodworth examines how the rise of the radical-right is not a sudden aberration but the product of decades of neoliberal policy and the collapse of alternatives

James Bloodworth

Anyone like me, who is sickened by the bloodshed and destruction of the past two years, must yearn for a way to bring the conflict to an end.

America is the only player with the power and connections to bring all the sides together. Trump personally has forged unusual ties with leaders across the region, which he can leverage to secure support for the deal.

And I believe that there are many core aspects of the deal which make it a good starting point.

Points in Support of Trump's Gaza Plan

It is right to insist that Hamas must give up the hostages. Their seizure and prolonged detention has been illegitimate and barbaric. It is unrealistic to expect Israel to agree to any kind of permanent end to the conflict without their release.

It is also right to insist that Hamas is no longer allowed any future role in the governance of Gaza. Their horrific actions on 7 October 2023 made it unacceptable for them to stay in power. But, even before that, their rule has been oppressive, undemocratic, and disastrous for Gazans. By their own actions, they have shown themselves completely unconcerned for the welfare of either...

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For two weeks, the skies over Kyiv have been quiet. Too quiet. Each day, the silence feels heavier, like something pressing down. Everyone knows it won't last. So when the attack finally comes - loud, violent, expected - there's no panic. Just a kind of grim relief. At least it's not hanging over us anymore.

For close to ten hours, the staccato hammering of heavy machine guns rattled the windows in downtown Kyiv. Their targets, the black, delta-winged Shahed drones, with the high-pitched whine of their two-stroke engines, have earned them the nickname 'mopeds'.

Every so often, a thunderous boom rolled through the flats. Plaster flakes sifted from the ceiling; the acrid tang of cordite clung to the cold night air. Iskander ballistic missiles - 700 kilograms of high explosive packed into each warhead - tore into sleeping blocks with surgical brutality. The mopeds and the Iskanders aren't hunting soldiers; they stalk kitchens, bedrooms, playgrounds. Their aim is simple: terror and death.

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When daylight broke, I drove across town. Autumn rain mingled with the smoke, settling on weary residents who shuffled through the ruins. The night's chaos was over; It was time to count the cost.

In a quiet suburb of western Kyiv, my stomach churned. The sounds were achingly familiar: diesel engines straining, steel tracks grinding, buckets tearing through concrete and brick - sifting through the rubble of people's lives.

The scene was devastation, absolute. Rubble and walls bled together until the street itself had vanished. The neat line of family homes was gone, replaced by a tide of brick dust, splintered beams, twisted aluminium and glass that cracked beneath every step. On the roof of a blackened car sat a child's surf boot - absurd, tragic - above panels crumpled like cheap foil.

On the second floor of a shrapnel-scarred building, an elderly woman stood at a glassless window. Our eyes met for a moment. Still in shock, she didn't register the camera - her gaze drifted back to the wreckage of what had once been her life.

Radios crackled as search and rescue teams in orange boiler suits tried to impose order on chaos. Against ruin on this scale, the broom seemed absurd. Yet, while earthmovers clawed at the wreckage, civilians pressed forward with brushes in hand, beginning the impossible task of sweeping up the remnants of Putin's ire.

A solitary figure in neat trainers, a black raincoat and orange gardening gloves stood staring over the wreckage, as if the enormity of it had just struck him. I watched. The moment passed. He bent again to his broom, shifting rubble into tidy piles.

It is difficult to see what Putin thinks he gains from these attacks. If the goal is to grind civilians into submission through exhaustion, he has already failed. The strikes are devastating, but their effect is to harden resolve and weld communities together against him. On the front lines, Ukrainian soldiers are tenacious and formidable. In their homes and cities, they are unbreakable.