Coming soon: behind the Tories support for destroying the climate
It will mostly review financial support for the Conservatives from fossil-fuel interests.
If not by small boats, how CAN people seek asylum in the UK?
https://www.solidaritee.org.uk/post/if-not-by-small-boats-how-can-people-seek-asylum-in-the-uk
Recent UK immigration politics has focused largely on ‘getting numbers down’ by reducing the number of so-called ‘illegal’ entries, which usually involve people crossing the channel on small boats or on the backs of lorries. The government often refuses to acknowledge that the high number of ‘illegal’ entries is intrinsically linked to the lack of official routes provided for coming to the UK to claim asylum. And whilst those travelling by unofficial means may not abide by UK immigration law and documentation processes, international law states that asylum seekers cannot be punished or criminalised for the way they enter.
The 1951 Refugee Convention states that asylum seekers should not be discriminated against for their mode of entry into another country. People fleeing persecution have the right to travel to any country via any route possible in order to claim asylum, provided they inform the authorities of their presence upon arrival and have a good reason for seeking asylum.
Despite this, arrival in the UK by small boat crossings or other ‘clandestine’ routes across the Channel are frequently referred to as ‘illegal’ because the person entering does not have a valid visa in place. This is where the UK asylum system is deeply contradictory: it is not possible to claim asylum from outside the UK, and it is also not possible to obtain a visa before travelling to the UK to claim asylum.
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Article continues at https://www.solidaritee.org.uk/post/if-not-by-small-boats-how-can-people-seek-asylum-in-the-uk
dizzy: I suggest that people referring to small boat migrants as being illegal reflects more on their intolerance and prejudices that anything else.
There’s an obvious way to challenge Nigel Farage. But Keir Starmer won’t do it
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/aug/27/nigel-farage-keir-starmer-brexit-truth
Labour’s reluctance to name Brexit as the cause of so many problems hasn’t stopped Reform’s rise. It’s time to try the truth
By Rafael Behr
So begins another chapter in the liberation struggle. Released from bondage to the EU, Britain finds itself subjugated to a more insidious foe. The border that should have been sealed is wide open. The foreign hordes are still coming, but their passage is no longer directed by bureaucrats from Brussels. This time, national emancipation depends on breaking the tyranny of human rights lawyers.
That is the plot to Nigel Farage’s Brexit sequel, previewed on Tuesday in an airport hangar in Oxfordshire. The Reform UK leader laid out plans for “mass deportation” of migrants – all who arrive without permission, plus those who are here already and came by illicit channels.
Tens of thousands will be targeted. There would be cash incentives for anyone volunteering to leave. Refusers would be rounded up, detained in camps and flown to their countries of origin or, if those places won’t have them, some other place. A remote island, maybe. The exchequer would remunerate receptive governments.
If deportees face the likely prospect of torture or death on arrival, well, that would be unfortunate but not sufficient grounds to stop the flights.
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Are we really going to spend the next four years watching Farage leaf casually through the familiar playbook, running the same campaign to the fawning applause of the same courtier commentariat? Is it too much to expect a Labour government to raise, by way of rebuttal, the Reform leader’s proven failure as an arbiter of the national interest? We tried listening to him. His probity and judgment were sold as the product called Brexit. It turned out to be a piece of shit. Enough people already know this is the truth, but it would be liberating to hear it from the prime minister.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/aug/27/nigel-farage-keir-starmer-brexit-truth
Mass displacement from Gaza City’s northeast begins as Israeli attacks intensify
This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
The mass displacement of Palestinians from northeastern Gaza City began on Friday evening as Israeli forces escalated attacks from the north and south, bombarding entire neighbourhoods, Anadolu reports.
A Palestinian security source told Anadolu that the situation in the city’s eastern neighbourhoods is deteriorating “at a rapidly accelerating pace” due to Israel’s intensifying offensive.
The source said the Israeli army has increased demolitions in southern and northeastern Gaza City, using explosive-laden robots alongside artillery shelling and airstrikes.
Anadolu’s correspondent reported “mass displacement” of residents from the city’s northeastern districts toward western Gaza City or farther south in the enclave.
He also reported additional shelling in Gaza City’s southern al-Sabra neighbourhood.
READ: Gaza death toll tops 63,000 as 5 more Palestinians die of starvation
Israel declared a “dangerous combat zone” on Friday and launched one of its most intense bombardments since the war began, striking by air, land, and sea, while nearly 1 million Palestinians are still trapped inside.
The offensive is part of an Israeli plan approved earlier this month to gradually reoccupy Gaza, beginning with the enclave’s largest urban centre, which houses roughly half of the population.
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) warned that the assault could force up to 1 million people to evacuate their homes again.
Israel has killed over 63,000 Palestinians in Gaza since October 2023. The military campaign has devastated the enclave, which is facing famine.
Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.
BREAKING: 4 Israeli soldiers missing, others killed in resistance ambush in Zeitoun neighbourhood east of Gaza: Israel media
This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Israeli media reported that 4 soldiers were missing, and others were killed and wounded in Gaza, as part of a large ambush to capture Israeli soldiers carried out by the Qassam Brigades in the Zeitoun neighbourhood east of Gaza City.
Sources reported that the operation began with a large ambush in the Zeitoun neighbourhood, which resulted in the deaths of several Israeli soldiers, while other reports confirmed injuries described as critical.
Hebrew media added that the Israeli army deployed 6 additional helicopters to evacuate the dead and wounded from the ambush site, while firing flares intensively into the skies over central Gaza in an attempt to secure its forces.
Reports also indicated that the Israeli army activated the Hannibal Protocol, an emergency military measure used in such situations to prevent its soldiers from being captured.
Sources confirmed that forces from the (162) Division and the (401) Armoured Brigade were the ones who fell into the ambush, and that these forces were under heavy field pressure due to fighting in the Zeitoun neighbourhood with the arrival of more Palestinian fighters to support the operation.
READ: Gaza death toll tops 63,000 as 5 more Palestinians die of starvation
Israeli media reported that Qassam fighters attempted to capture soldiers during the ambush in the Zeitoun neighbourhood, while the Israeli army continues extensive searches for the missing soldiers.
Reports also indicated that the first operation took place in the Zeitoun neighbourhood when a force from the Nahal Brigade fell into a well-planned ambush, killing one soldier and wounding others. Other forces were then subjected to a second ambush in the Sabra neighbourhood, prompting Israeli helicopters to intervene and bomb the site.
Abu Obeida, spokesman for the Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), confirmed that the Palestinian resistance is on high alert to confront Israel’s plans to occupy Gaza City, which he said would be devastating for the occupation’s political and military leadership. He noted that the Israeli prisoners would be with the resistance fighters in the fighting areas.
In a series of posts on Telegram on Friday evening, Abu Obeida said that the plans to occupy Gaza “will be paid for by the enemy army in the blood of its soldiers, and will increase the chances of capturing new soldiers, God willing.”