It was a great privilege to meet President Catherine Connolly this morning and to discuss the deep connections and shared values of Ireland and Scotland. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🇮🇪

🍿🍿🍿 parliamentlive.tv/Event/Index/...

Memorial to the Jewish volunteers of the International Brigades. It plays with Star of David and the 3-point of the IB. Around 20% (about 7,000) of Brigaders were Jewish. Fossar de la Pedrera, the mass grave of the victims of the Franco regime in Barcelona, Montjüic cemetery

President Michael D Higgins said some of the EU's strongest members are "deciding to stay silent in watching emaciated children in what is a human, manmade, really atrocious infliction on people" in Gaza

Huge if true!!

Perth asylum hotel this morning, No pasarán!

So, you mean 80% of graduates have benefited financially from it? And, whisper it quietly, but *UNIVERSITY EDUCATION ISN’T JUST ABOUT SALARY*

Does Starmer have a strategic foreign policy or is his government's backing of Ukraine, arms to Israel, seeking trade anywhere irrespective of human rights, Reform rhetoric on migration just an immoral mess? My blog open.substack.com/pub/kirstyhu...

Bewildering. 1. For the past week the Starmer has been calling for de-escalation. 2. Yesterday the US escalates - big time. 3. Today Starmer ‘supports’ this. 4. This evening the UK insists at the UN that there must be de-escalation. Is this what passes for a coherent foreign policy?

EXC: Labour have been branded 'deeply authoritarian' after reports emerged that the UK Government is set to proscribe Palestine Action 👇

Gaza: Open letter to EU heads of state www.doctorswithoutborders.org/latest/gaza-...

Very good thread

Great initiative (and good to see that two of my favourite historical crime novelists - @stephmerritt.bsky.social and Andrew Taylor have signed). www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...

Very good background on the UK's paradigm shift on Israel-Gaza from @patrickwintour.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

This is Nick Clegg-post-tuition-fees level bad approval ratings. This is a cold, airless, lonely place in the nation's affections from which leaders do not often come back.

Oh my God! I'm older than the Pope!

A luta continua! Sempre!

Another tragic loss in Gaza www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...

‘If I die, I want a loud death’: Gaza photojournalist killed by Israeli airstrike

The refusal of most western journalists to speak out about Israel targeting & murdering their colleagues in Gaza has been shameful. Alex Crawford is one of the few mainstream UK journalists to have spoken out (clip from February last year)

Excellent piece. Clear-sighted and elegantly written as always from Behr.

Trudeau telling it like it is

In the words of that great American union song: ‘Which side are you on?’. Keir?

We live in Britain, and there are now profound questions to ask our government. There's no conceivable bridge between Europe & this US administration. Whether we escape tariffs is a laughably parochial question. Yesterday is now an awfully long time ago.

Mixed outcomes for Starmer. The Zelensky confrontation made his own performative Trump encounter look even more supine and pathetic. But then, it was a useful distraction from the resignation of his principled (rare word re-Labour nowadays) overseas aid minister.

#Gaza ceasefire is such a relief - tho it could have been agreed months ago & saved so much suffering & pain. And effects of genocide will be felt for years - unexploded ordinance, destruction of infrastructure, health system etc. Lasting peace must involve an end to occupation & a Palestinian state

Despite the sniffy reviews, I think @channel4tv.bsky.social Patience is really good wine-and-wood-burner telly.

Great interview with our really-not-grumpy national treasure (though he might pick a fight over which particular nation he’s a treasure of).

Ah! It's a 'red WIND warning'! I thought I was going to have to switch to white this evening.

Incredibly powerful speech from Scottish artist Jasleen Kaur ✊ The artist spoke out during her #TurnerPrize acceptance speech at a ceremony held at Tate Britain on Tuesday

This is excellent. The Observer view: ICC’s Israel arrest warrants are a test the world must not fail

A day inside, I think …

Orban is the only barely credible Brexit benefit www.theguardian.com/world/live/2...

2001. Labour Manifesto Launch. Deputy PM John Prescott is hit by an egg after encountering pro-fox-hunting protesters in Rhyl. He responds with a left jab. Prescott later tells Blair 'well you asked me to go out and connect with the electorate'. RIP JP 🌹🌹🌹

This is spot-on Anatomy of a non-scandal: the defence of Allison Pearson reveals how ‘free speech’ has been weaponised | Jane Martinson