Mike Huckabee is the US ambassador to Israel. Huckabee has always been a controversial figure, and yet he’s never had a run like the last few days:

Reparations! https://t.co/xbFCOwIAmL

— Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) February 20, 2026

Don’t heart Huckabee

Al Jazeera reported the following on who Huckabee is:

The devout 69-year-old evangelical Christian was born in the southern US state of Arkansas.

He served as governor of his home state between 1996 and 2007 before launching unsuccessful bids to be the Republican presidential candidate during the 2008 and 2016 primary seasons.

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They added:

Huckabee is a staunch supporter of Israel.

After his appointment, Trump released a statement in which he said Huckabee “loves Israel, and the people of Israel, and likewise, the people of Israel love him. Mike will work tirelessly to bring about Peace in the Middle East!”

His appointment demonstrates a “very hawkish, very pro-right-wing Israel” approach by the Trump administration, Yossi Mekelberg, an expert on Israel at the Chatham House think tank, told Al Jazeera.

Many American evangelicals support Israel, but not because they like Israelis. In actuality, they think the creation of Israel is a signifier that the end times are approaching, and that Israel will trigger the Rapture.

If you’re unfamiliar with the term, the ‘Rapture’ is the time when God calls his faithful back to heaven. Said ‘faithful’ will not include the Jewish men and women who live in Israel, even if they do play an instrumental role in jump starting the Armageddon.

Israel — ‘Reparations!’

In the clip above, Huckabee was asked:

Should Israel be expected to even pay one penny to rebuild Gaza at this point?

The first point to make here is that even if Israel was asked, they wouldn’t be the ones paying; it would be the countries which keep this rogue nation financially solvent (i.e. the US and its lackey states like Britain). Secondly, of course they should be asked; they literally levelled the place.

This is how Huckabee responded:

Absolutely not. Absolutely not. And I’ll tell you, if anything, there ought to be reparations to Israel for the extraordinary fight that they have had to conduct to get their hostages back, 252 including many Americans.

To quote Drop Site’s Ryan Grim once again:

Reparations!

This really highlights the cry-bully mindset of the Zionists.

They don’t just want to commit genocide; they want the world to perceive them as the victims of their own atrocities.

Anti-democracy

Huckabee has also attracted criticism for comments he made in conversation with Tucker Carlson:

I am not a fan of Tucker Carlson. I disagree a lot with Carlson. But as an interviewer, Carlson actually, brilliantly, asks follow-up questions, and keeps going, in a way that pretty much no US TV interviewer has done with pro-Israel guests since Oct 7.
And Huckabee falls apart. https://t.co/NmzemGAWRU

— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) February 21, 2026

TUCKER: “How much does it matter what Americans think?”

AMB. HUCKABEE: “It matters every bit.”

TUCKER: “80% oppose war with Iran.”

AMB. HUCKABEE: “We don’t live in a world where polls dictate policy.”

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TUCKER: “Oh, I thought you said it matters what Americans think.” pic.twitter.com/MkDDkqfyCP

— The Tennessee Holler (@TheTNHoller) February 21, 2026

mike huckabee cares more about the greater israel project than he does about americans. he cares more about israel than the majority of american jews. totally insane person. https://t.co/BjbooXPuXI

— hasanabi (@hasanthehun) February 21, 2026

Tucker Carlson brutally corners Mike Huckabee on the fact that the Israeli government provides a safe haven for accused child molesters fleeing American justice. Huckabee is completely humiliated and tries to feign ignorance, but Tucker exposes the undeniable truth Israel… pic.twitter.com/SltptVD56w

— Furkan Gözükara (@FurkanGozukara) February 20, 2026

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There is literally no bottom with these people.

They will always find a way to sink further, and they will always be furious when you confront them with the reality of their own depravity.

Featured image via OPB

According to a new poll, Labour are on track to come third in the Gorton & Denton by-election. While you can never put too much stock in one poll, it’s far from the only sign that Labour are doing badly. Green Party leader Zack Polanski has now drawn attention to the Labour Party’s “panic”:

You can smell the Labour Governments panic.

They’re trying their hardest to discredit the new poll because it tells everyone that the alternative has well and truly arrived.

Gorton & Denton is the Green Party Vs Reform. pic.twitter.com/tcM1RjSb6g

— Zack Polanski (@ZackPolanski) February 20, 2026

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Zack Polanski’s Greens are favourites

The poll in question is this one from Omnisis:

🚨 POLL | Greens LEAD in Gorton and Denton
** Labour drop to distant 3rd **

🟢 Grn: 33% (+19)
➡️ Ref: 29% (+15)
🔴 Lab: 26% (-25)
🔵 Con: 5% (-4)
🟠 Lib: 2% (-1)

Source: Omnisis, 13-19 Feb (+/- vs GE2024) pic.twitter.com/Ji5muXiRbk

— Stats for Lefties 🍉🏳️‍⚧️ (@LeftieStats) February 20, 2026

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Source for data: https://t.co/GBbfcacQrA

Figures exclude undecided voters, as is common (indeed, universal) practice with voting intention polls.

— Stats for Lefties 🍉🏳️‍⚧️ (@LeftieStats) February 20, 2026

There are important things to consider about the poll. The first is that the sample size was only 452 people, which is less than half of what’s considered to be ideal (1,000 people). As noted above, the results also leave out undecided voters, with the New Statesman’s Megan Kenyon noting:

Should note 27 per cent say they are still undecided. Polls open next Thursday, 26 Feb.

— megan kenyon (@meganekenyon) February 20, 2026

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Zack Polanski has taken the poll very well, anyway, which is obviously how any good politician should respond to positive news:

This is huge – and proves exactly what we’re saying.

We cannot have a moment of complacency – only the Green Party can stop Reform.

Vote Hannah Spencer and the Green Party on Thursday in Gorton and Denton. 💚 https://t.co/DQNjUJoxyA

— Zack Polanski (@ZackPolanski) February 20, 2026

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Labour’s Lucy Powell, meanwhile, said this:

No-one should take this poll seriously:
-funded by a Green donor
-incredibly small sample and half unlikely to vote
-over-indexes green/Lab wards

I’ve been door-knocking most days. We’ve spoken to over 50 TIMES more voters.

V clear it’s between us and Reform https://t.co/tR5MhaMXGw

— Lucy Powell MP (@LucyMPowell) February 20, 2026

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There are a few problems for Labour, of course.

The first is that bookies have not looked favourably at Labour’s chances.

The second is doorstep polling from Reform and the Greens has put Labour in third place.

The third is that it’s just very difficult to believe Labour are doing well right now, because the party is embroiled in a never ending stream of paedophile and sex pest scandals, including:

It’s also the case that Powell literally begged the Greens to stand down in an open letter, which is never a sign that things are going well.

It’s not looking good

Of course, Starmer’s lack of popularity is no guarantee Labour will lose. Britain didn’t particularly care for the Tories, yet people kept voting them back in, because they felt like it was in their best interests.

What we’ve seen in recent years, however, is that voters no longer feel like the only options are ‘Labour’ or ‘Conservative’. And if either the Greens or Reform take Gorton & Denton, that will be more true than ever.

Featured image via Barold

What to do if you encounter bed bugs

US Senate hopeful Juliana Stratton is letting the expletives fly in a new campaign ad spelling out what she – and her supporters – really think about President Donald Trump.

“Fuck Trump, vote Juliana,” three people say at the start of the Illinois Lt. Gov.’s campaign video released on Thursday.

“They said it, not me,” Stratton responds.

She then adds: “I’m Juliana Stratton and I’m proud to have lived my whole life on the South Side of Chicago. I’m not scared of a wannabe dictator. I’m running for Senate to stand up to Donald Trump. I’ll abolish ICE and hold Trump accountable for the crimes he’s committed. Just like they said…”

Two more supporters then repeat the phrase, “Fuck Trump.”

Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) delivers the same line on camera.

And Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D), a potential Democratic 2028 presidential candidate who hasn’t been shy about attacking Trump, then appears alongside Stratton at the end of the ad, saying simply, “Vote Juliana,” omitting the profanity.

Stratton is currently trailing Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) in early polling in the race to replace retiring Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.). The Illinois primary is scheduled for Mar. 7.

JD Vance attempted to make a joke at Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s expense at Thursday’s Board of Peace meeting, but she ended up getting the last laugh when his jab was met with deafening silence.

The vice president addressed officials from nearly 50 countries shortly after President Donald Trump used his own speech to attack the New York lawmaker’s appearance at the Munich Security Conference, when she struggled to answer a sensitive question about whether the United States should send troops to Taiwan.

Like his boss, Vance tried to mock the Democrat on Thursday when he began his remarks. But he may not have been happy at how his joke landed.

“I knew exactly what I wanted to say, but then after the president said that I was so smart, and that I didn’t want to repeat our congresswoman, who froze for 20 seconds over in Munich,” he began.

“Now I’m tempted, sir, just to freeze, for 20 seconds, and just stare at the cameras,” he continued. “And maybe they’ll say nice things about me like they do about Congresswoman Cortez.”

Vance seemed to be expecting a laugh from the crowd, but none came.

Ocasio-Cortez later poked fun at Vance for the response to his “joke.”

“The only thing longer than my pause to think was their silence to his joke 💀” she wrote on X.

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Wes Streeting, less than a month into his new job as Health Secretary, declared that a strike that had “caused untold misery to patients and staff” was all but over.

He had, after all, just handed a 22.3 per cent pay rise to resident (formerly known as junior) doctors after 11 rounds of industrial action, in the weeks after Labour’s election victory in July 2024. Settling the strikes had been his “priority from day one”, he said, jubilant that the British Medical Association (BMA) had accepted the award.

Except that – as we now know – the huge settlement did not end the strikes. Within 11 months, the BMA was back on the picket line to Streeting’s extreme displeasure. To his critics, a hubristic Streeting has been taught a painful and expensive lesson in power dynamics. His allies insist that his approach is slowly working.

There are indeed signs that – despite winning a fresh mandate for yet more strikes – a new leadership at the BMA is looking for a way out. But the finishing line is still some way off and the obstacles forbidding. A deal to reduce competition for specialist posts from foreign graduates could cause problems elsewhere. And other health staff with pay claims of their own are watching like hawks.

First, tempers need to cool a little – on both sides – for any settlement. “We gave them a big pay increase because we recognised their value, and I think there was a feeling that we’d get them on our side. That clearly hasn’t happened,” says one Labour MP.

The BMA argues that resident doctors’ pay remains 20.8 per cent lower in real terms than it was in 2008, which they say is when their pay cuts began. Critics point out that they use the RPI rather than CPI measure of inflation to reach that percentage, and that most resident doctors had not even started their medical degrees in 2008.

The most recent round of strikes, held just before Christmas, saw tempers run high. Streeting accused resident doctors of taking a “self-indulgent, irresponsible and dangerous” decision by choosing to strike during a flu season, “at a risk of serious harm to patients”. Dr Jack Fletcher, chair of the BMA’s resident doctors committee (RDC), said politicians were “scaremongering” by suggesting that the number of flu cases was more severe than in reality.

Since the new year, however, the tone on both sides has become more conciliatory. Earlier this month, the BMA’s resident doctor membership voted by 93 per cent in favour of extending their mandate for strike action for another six months – but crucially, this was on a reduced turnout of only 53 per cent, suggesting that enthusiasm for the cause has ebbed somewhat.

“I don’t think the doctors have an appetite for years of rolling strikes, like they’ve had for the last three years,” says one Labour MP. “If you mandated all the doctors to vote, my guess is that the actual appetite for striking among all the doctors is not there. This is not the miners’ strike. The sort of people that get involved in BMA politics are a self-selecting group.”

For its part, the BMA claims it does not plan to use its new mandate.

 “There is no intention to go on strike,” RDC deputy chair Dr Arjan Singh told the BBC’s Today programme. “[It is] a negotiating tool, but we’ve got no intention of actually using it. I would say that our relationship with government over the last few months has become increasingly positive.”

The BMA declined to make Fletcher, Singh or any of their RDC colleagues available for an interview with The House. MPs who have met Fletcher, however, say he is a “serious” and “co-operative” figure who “wants to see a solution”. They also point out he is a Labour member who “wants the government to work”.

One MP adds: “He has a committee who I think are not always on the same page as him, because they’re a little bit more militant.”

Before Fletcher was elected last year, the committee’s four previous co-chairs belonged to a hardline faction called DoctorsVote. It was this group which had pushed hardest for strike action and for “full pay restoration” to 2008 levels. DoctorsVote no longer holds any officer positions on the RDC committee, but full pay restoration “by 2027/28” remains BMA policy. Fletcher is said to regard this aim as “not realistic”.

The BMA says the dispute is not only about pay but also about addressing the “bottleneck” that resident doctors face when applying for specialty training posts. The ‘competition ratio’ for those jobs has got tighter over recent years, largely due to an increase in applications from international medical graduates (IMGs) – which leaves many UK-trained doctors unable to progress in their careers.

To address that issue, the government is passing emergency legislation – the Medical Training (Prioritisation) Bill – which will ensure UK-trained graduates are prioritised for foundation and speciality training posts. Streeting claims that for speciality posts, the bill “effectively reduces the competition for places from 4-1 to 2-1”.

The legislation was given its First Reading on 13 January, and the government aims for it to receive Royal Assent by 5 March. Passing the bill by that deadline should mean its effects are felt by this year’s round of applicants, whose jobs would start in August.

Yet there are concerns that the rushed-through bill could have damaging impacts on the government’s ambitions elsewhere in the health service.

Lucina Rolewicz, a fellow at the Nuffield Trust, warns that the NHS has “previously relied” on IMGs “to fill a big proportion of general practice training places, so if this bill deters them from applying for jobs that are less popular with UK graduates, it could torpedo efforts to expand general practice, especially in poorer areas”.

She tells The House: “Competition and interest in different specialities are not equal. This is especially the case in general practice and for core psychiatry training as well…

“The bill won’t stop internationally trained doctors from applying to those routes, but it could discourage them from putting applications forward in the first place.”

Stuart Hoddinott, associate director at the Institute for Government, points out: “Almost the entire increase in the GP trainee workforce, since 2019, has come through IMGs… They now make up more than 50 per cent of GP trainees. This is a very important route for general practice.”

More deprived areas, including many of the rural and coastal areas now turning to Reform UK, could be especially badly hit by any downturn in international applications, as UK-trained doctors disproportionately tend to apply for GP posts in urban areas close to the teaching hospitals where they studied.

When it comes to settling the dispute, however, there is a quiet optimism in Parliament that once the bill has been passed in March, a deal could potentially be reached with the BMA in the weeks that follow, without any further strikes having been called.

“That’s the intention of the Secretary of State,” says a Labour MP. “In the early spring, hopefully there’ll be a relatively harmonious deal, and they can move forward.”

But anyone watching the dispute agrees that the BMA is serious about needing to also see some form of improved pay offer – and one may be on the way.

“It sounds like there will be a pay-off of some sort which might be attractive,” says an MP, who adds: “What’s needed is a multi-year settlement which is just a little bit over inflation – that would solve the [pay] problem.

“I would give them a three-year rolling pay settlement, and I’d give it at a percentage or two above inflation for two years, and then a bit more in the third year. You’re not going to take it back to some mythical date of 2008, because it’s not affordable.”

But even a deal of that nature would risk further problems for Streeting, as other unions representing healthcare workers would take immediate notice of it.

“I don’t envy Wes Streeting in his job at the moment, because he’s got to balance all these things out,” says one backbencher. “He wants the doctors back. That might involve a more-than-inflationary pay increase, which then might bring all of the other professions into play.

“The main cost for the NHS is people. If you lose control of the pay aspect, then the costs will go up enormously.”

Unions representing NHS staff tell The House they are monitoring the resident doctors’ dispute and do not rule out balloting their own members for strike action if a generous deal is agreed.

“All NHS staff are deserving of above-inflation pay rises,” says Richard Munn, national officer for health at Unite, which represents almost 100,000 healthcare workers.

“Unlike resident doctors, the lower-paid NHS staff do not have the opportunity to progress to be consultants, GPs or surgeons as their careers develop.

“We hope that the government will see the unfairness of treating doctors more favourably than other NHS staff and will look to offer all staff above-inflation pay offers.”

A spokesman for the Society of Radiographers says their union is watching the resident doctors’ dispute “with interest”, adding that “balloting for strike action would depend on what follows for other NHS staff and how this is received by our members”.

The Royal College of Nursing, meanwhile, says it was “an insult” for the government to offer a 3.3 per cent pay uplift to their members and has pledged to “look at whether this is fair treatment compared to other professions and sectors”.

Hoddinott says: “The resident doctors are actually a relatively cheap staff group to pay. If you want to pay them a lot more money, you can actually do so relatively easily.

“An extra percentage point increase in their salary is worth roughly £51m, which sounds like a lot, but in NHS terms is not that much.

“More worrying is the contagion effect to other staff groups – if you get ‘Agenda for Change’ staff, which is all non-medical staff in the NHS, walking out.

“If you give them a percentage point increase that matches the resident doctors, that is suddenly something like £730m. That starts to get very expensive, very quickly.”

For Streeting, there will also be a personal incentive to resolving the dispute. The Health Secretary has been touted as a challenger to Keir Starmer’s leadership, and preventing further strikes – by reaching a deal which the public believes to be fair – will be a key test for him.

“It’s damaging for any secretary of state to have this hanging over their head,” says Hoddinott. “It gives the impression of dysfunction, and it does hurt your ability to demonstrate progress towards your ambitions.”

A DHSC spokesperson said: “Resident doctors have already had a 28.9 per cent pay rise over the last three years – we’ve gone as far as we can on pay this year.

“We’re working constructively with doctors on the long-standing issues they face in their careers and we’ve already made progress, including fast‑tracking legislation so UK medical graduates get priority for specialty training places. Our focus remains firmly on continuing this work and preventing strike action, which has already caused too much disruption for both patients and NHS staff.”

In a written statement, Fletcher told The House: “This is not a problem the government can wait out.

“From the very start of my engagement with government, I have made clear I am serious about getting to a deal. Strikes could have been avoided from the get-go if government had simply engaged with us on those terms.

“Sadly, we had to go through strike action before they would talk seriously. We hope that the talks we are now in will result in an offer that means there need be no further strikes.”

Regarding pay erosion since 2008, he added: “Our job is not 21 per cent less difficult, so it should not be paid 21 per cent less. The choice to cut this pay was a political on,e and the choice to restore it must be a political choice too.”