Politics
Goldman and Lander spar hard over Israel
DAYS THE BUDGET IS LATE: 57
BRIDGING THE GAP: The debate over Israel is proving to be a wedge issue in the competitive primary between Rep. Dan Goldman and former city Comptroller Brad Lander. But the incumbent, who’s fighting for his political life, is making the argument that he and his challenger aren’t so different on the issue after all.
“We are both progressive Zionists who believe in Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, and we both support a two-state solution to bring peace to the region,” Goldman said earlier today on a WNYC candidate forum. “It’s disappointing to me that he’s using this dog whistle attack, when in reality we really do share the same core principles.”
Lander — who, like Goldman, is Jewish and a Democrat — has positioned himself as more critical of Israel than the incumbent, and some in the party’s progressive wing have sided with him because of it. Lander and his supporters have repeatedly criticized Goldman for his ties to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the pro-Israel group that has become a major player in elections on both sides of the aisle — and a subject of intense debate — especially as the public has an increasingly negative view of Israel.
Progressives have targeted AIPAC in their messaging, a strategy Lander has also embraced. Goldman “can’t unrig the system because he’s part of this system, he takes money from Wall Street, from private equity, from crypto, from AIPAC,” Lander argued at the forum.
Like Goldman, some have raised concerns about the criticism of AIPAC, which has a mixed record in races it gets involved in. In an interview with POLITICO, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, one of a handful of Jewish governors, said he thinks the arguments against AIPAC spending have “been used cynically by some to try and silence certain voices, to try and say that certain people participating in politics shouldn’t count or should be viewed in a toxic way.”
Goldman, who is endorsed by AIPAC, has said he returned the money from the organization. And four weeks out from the primary, there’s no indication that AIPAC’s affiliated super PAC is going to spend in it.
Still, Israel remains a prominent issue in the race — no matter how much Goldman attempts to neutralize it. Last month, the incumbent rolled out an ad denouncing President Donald Trump and Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the war in Iran.
Public polling in the district, which covers parts of Manhattan and Brooklyn, has been scarce. But a recent Emerson College survey found Lander leading Goldman by more than 30 points. Lander is endorsed by Mayor Zohran Mamdani — whom Goldman did not support during the mayoral election — the Working Families Party and a slew of progressive officials and organizations. Goldman has the backing of Gov. Kathy Hochul and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, along with more than a dozen unions. Goldman also recently received the support of Hasidic leaders from Brooklyn’s Borough Park enclave.
As for Goldman and Lander’s similarities on Israel, the challenger pushed back, pointing to Goldman having “voted for every single U.S. military aid package to Israel.” In a back-and forth during the forum about the boycott, divest and sanctions movement — which both Goldman and Lander said they do not support — Goldman said he agrees with Lander that “Israelis aren’t going to be safe until Palestinians are free,” to which the challenger retorted: “You don’t do anything to make it happen.”
“I believe in the vision of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, but it’s not acting consistently with Jewish or democratic values right now, and it can’t while it keeps occupying the West Bank and Gaza, and imposing apartheid on Palestinians,” Lander said. “The differences here are strong. If people want someone who is really going to fight to end Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, to make it so that Jewish New Yorkers and Muslim New Yorkers can work together instead of be divided from each other, and try to address the failures of U.S. foreign policy, the choice is clear.”
Much of the forum focused on Israel. When asked if he would vote for the “Block the Bombs Act,” which would prohibit the sale or transfer of military equipment to Israel until the country guarantees compliance with international law, Goldman said it is “not going to come to a vote, because it was written last summer as an effort to support a ceasefire, which was reached in October, and our laws enforce international human rights law already.” When pressed again, he said the legislation has “been overtaken by events, and I think there are other issues with ‘Block the Bombs’” but also that we need to “aggressively enforce international law against Bibi Netanyahu.”
Lander has called Israel’s actions in Gaza a “genocide.” Goldman said today it’s “really important that we move away from labels and terminology, especially for legal terms, and focus on how we can arrive at a two-state peaceful solution.”
The incumbent also expressed regret for voting to censure Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) in 2023 over her criticism of Israel, saying “there are better ways of dealing with that that I wish I had pursued” and “it was a very emotional time and sometimes emotion gets the best of you.”
“This is an incredibly, incredibly emotional issue right now for very, very many people, and what I’m worried about is that it is dividing all of us; it is dividing Muslims and Jews, it is dividing Jews,” Goldman said. “This is part of the reason why I disagree a little bit about what the critical issues are in this race. The critical issues are the ones facing the voters, and those are not necessarily what’s going on 6,000 miles away, it’s what’s going on at their kitchen tables.” — Madison Fernandez
From the Capitol
REDISTRICTING REDUX: New York Democrats are expected to introduce bills by Friday to pave the way for new congressional lines in 2028, according to four people familiar with the talks.
Officials are weighing two constitutional amendments — one that would allow some minor tweaks, and another that would permit an aggressive Democratic gerrymander, according to the people, who were granted anonymity to discuss the closed-door conversations.
New York’s cumbersome process to change the state constitution restricts Democrats from redrawing House boundaries in time for the 2026 midterm elections. But House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, a Brooklyn Democrat, has made his home state’s House lines part of a broader, longer-term strategy to pick up seats in the closely divided chamber.
“This is a potentially existential matter for our democracy in the ‘28 elections,” said Assemblymember Micah Lasher, a Democratic House candidate who previously proposed an amendment to allow for mid-decade redistricting. “There’s a broad understanding that in the redistricting arms race New York can’t be on the sidelines.”
Read more from POLITICO Bill Mahoney and Nick Reisman.
HOCHUL BACKS ALT ROCK BAND: The governor’s press shop sent out a release today that heaped effusive and exuberant praise on a ‘90s rock band.
The missive — uncharacteristic of the staid memos typically dispatched by the gov’s press shop — was sent to promote a state-sponsored watch party on Long Island for the U.S. vs. Paraguay World Cup match on June 12, which will feature a pregame concert from Third Eye Blind, or 3EB.
“Participation in the older, untouchable realm of nervous star-making could color a band’s identity,” the governor’s office said. “In the case of 3EB, it often blurred the perception of their brilliant musical creations.”
It’s unclear if the band behind hits like “Semi-Charmed Life” and “Jumper,” which formed in San Francisco, feel the same way about the governor. In 2016, 3EB made headlines when their lead singer said he “repudiates” the Republican party and called Donald Trump’s then-presidential campaign deplorable. But there’s no record of him expressing similar passion — either in support or opposition — for New York’s 57th governor.
“3EB won wide success during a tumultuous group of years when the major-label recording industry was finally losing its grip on an enterprise that for decades it had dominated with steely efficiency,” Hochul’s office also said. “3EB now write, tour, record, and communicate in a fluid new world where their music continues to evolve naturally. Their exchange with their audience is unfiltered and being from the hub of tech, they are using it to develop a closer connection with their audience.”
Perhaps 3EB can release an updated version of its 2000 single “10 Days Late” to inspire lawmakers as they scramble to wrap up the nearly two-month late state budget. — Jason Beeferman
SHARPE SUBMITS: Libertarian Larry Sharpe has filed to run for the “Coalition Party” in this year’s gubernatorial campaign, making him the only candidate seeking to run without major party support.
The odds are long he’ll actually make the ballot — a reality he’s more than willing to concede.
“It doesn’t matter, we’re never going to make it. We’re going to be in lawsuits,” Sharpe said when asked how many signatures he submitted.
One individual familiar with the filing said he believes Sharpe submitted 1,600 of the required 45,000 signatures.
Third parties have become all but extinct in major races in New York since former Gov. Andrew Cuomo hiked the signature threshold from 15,000 in 2019. “Bobby Kennedy Jr. spent a million dollars,” Sharpe said of the now-health secretary’s 2024 presidential campaign. “He’s a fucking Kennedy and he couldn’t get on.”
The only other candidate to file for an additional ballot line in November was Bruce Blakeman, who submitted to add the “Vote Affordable” line to the Republican and Conservative ones he’s already running under. His campaign told the New York Post he submitted 66,345 signatures — not quite the number most experts say is needed to make a candidate immune from challenges. — Bill Mahoney
FROM CITY HALL
RAISING HELL: City Council member Shahana Hanif is under fire from critics for declaring on social media last night that two fellow Muslim women critical of Mayor Zohran Mamdani should be “condemned to Jahannam,” the Islamic concept of hell.
But Hanif, the first Muslim woman elected to the Council, says the criticism against her is overblown — and potentially bigoted.
“Let’s be serious: ‘Go to hell’ is a pretty common expression of frustration or disappointment … but the moment Arabic enters the conversation, suddenly people will act like I said something far more sinister,” Hanif told Playbook today.
Hanif delivered the broadside in an X post last night criticizing the two women, Anila Ali and Zeba Zebunnesa, for participating in a protest held outside Gracie Mansion to call on Gov. Kathy Hochul to remove Mamdani from office over the claim that he’s not doing enough to combat antisemitism.
“May Allah condemn you to Jahannam,” Hanif wrote in the post, which was responding to a message from Ali saying she and Zebunnesa were on their way to the Gracie demonstration.
Ali and Zebunnesa are organizers with a group called American Muslim & Multifaith Women’s Empowerment Council.
In the Quran, Jahannam is portrayed as a place of divine justice where sinners are sent to face punishment in the afterlife. Broken into seven descending levels reserved for different groups of sinners, Jahannam is considered the Islamic equivalent of hell, with punishments becoming more extreme the deeper one goes.
Elchanan Poupko, a rabbi and social media commentator, said Hanif crossed “a red line” with her tweet.
“Why is @ShahanaFromBK, an elected official, using religion for targeted harassment against a Muslim woman @anilaali, for exercising her constitutional rights protesting @ZohranKMamdani????” Poupko wrote on X. “This is unacceptable.”
A few hundred people participated in the protest outside Gracie Mansion last night, though no elected officials or mainstream Jewish groups were billed as being in attendance.
The event featured people brandishing Israeli flags and demanding that Mamdani, a vocal supporter of Palestinian rights, do more to combat antisemitism in New York. The event also featured more extreme, bigoted elements, including people shouting that Mamdani, an American citizen born in Uganda, should be deported.
Hanif pointed to the fact that rhetoric like that played out at the protest in justifying her Jahannam jab.
“I can and will criticize MAGA influencers joining a MAGA hate rally full of conspiratorial rhetoric and f-bombs,” Hanif said. — Chris Sommerfeldt
IN OTHER NEWS
— TARGETING GAP: A database of more than 1,200 lawsuits shows more than 93 percent of immigration enforcement arrests in New York and New Jersey targeted Latinos, despite the fact that they make up only 66 percent of immigrants without legal status. (THE CITY)
— NO PLAYING AROUND: New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport and New York Attorney General Letitia James announced a joint investigation into FIFA’s ticket selling practices. (POLITICO)
— ‘I WAS HURT’: New York’s Legislature is considering bills to amend policies for imprisoned pregnant women after one gave birth while handcuffed in a Brooklyn courtroom. (Gothamist)
Missed this morning’s New York Playbook? We forgive you. Read it here.
One in five girls say they first experienced unwanted physical or sexual harassment before age 12. That’s the finding of new research from girls’ rights charity Plan International UK.
It sits alongside another recent report, which focussed on the pervasive impact of online misogyny.
Opinium Research polled 1,000 nationally representative girls and women in the UK aged 16-24. The findings highlight the vast majority (87%) have received unwanted comments about their appearance, such as catcalling and intrusive remarks.
As a result, many young women say they are adapting their behaviour, with nearly three in five (58%) saying they change how they dress in order to feel safe when they are out in public.
UK girls and young women face hidden inequalities
The alarming findings come as Plan International UK launches its new campaign, The Fine Print, which highlights the hidden inequalities and expectations girls and young women face.
As part of the campaign, the charity is unveiling a giant clothesline created in collaboration with artist Annie Frost Nicholson: oversized clothing hanging from a monumental washing line above the Thames, with each garment symbolising the inequalities stitched into girls’ lives.
Plan International UK previously commissioned a sand artwork on Blackpool beach, illustrating the lack of progress on gender equality.
Ealaf, 17, member of Plan International’s Youth Advisory Panel, said:
I first was followed by a boy at the age of 10. And because he was one of my peers it wasn’t taken very seriously unfortunately. I honestly can’t remember a time where I did not experience unwanted comments about my appearance, which is really disheartening to look back on my experiences, especially at institutions like school.
I study ‘Women in Literature’ for my A-Level topic and a lot of the themes that come up from texts from over 200 years ago aren’t too dissimilar from what I experience or see today!
The rise of far-right and anti-female rhetoric has actually begun to scare me in terms of the accomplishment for gender equality. It is really disheartening to see when so much work has been put into achieving so many of the freedoms we as women have begun to achieve today.
Girls surveyed also cited the ‘unwritten rules’ they are being expected to accept, including:
- Being polite or likable to avoid conflict (54%).
- Being more mature than boys (52%).
- Accepting unwanted comments or behaviour as ‘normal’ (46%).
Concern is also hitting across generations. Nearly two-thirds (64%) of parents say they are worried about raising a daughter in today’s climate, pointing to wider anxieties about safety, equality, and the environment girls are growing up in.
Rose Caldwell, CEO at Plan International UK, said:
Girls are often told that gender equality has been achieved, or even gone too far. Today’s findings tell a very different story, exposing the daily reality of inequality that girls and young women still face.
What is particularly concerning is how normalised this has become. Many girls told us harassment begins as early as primary school, which shapes how they dress, behave and move through the world from a young age.
There has been important progress, including the criminalisation of public sexual harassment which came into force this year after years of campaigning. But far more must be done to protect girls and young women, particularly from online harm.
Against a backdrop of political uncertainty, we are facing a perfect storm that threatens to stall, or even reverse, hard-won gains. Together we can change the conditions girls are born into. It’s time to take gender inequality seriously and ensure we don’t lose the progress that has already been made.
Challenges facing UK girls and young women are impacting attitudes towards the future, with more than half (56%) aged 16–24 saying they do not believe gender equality will arrive in their lifetime. One in five also say they feel they have had to lower their ambitions because of their gender.
Featured image via Christopher Furlong / Getty Images
By The Canary
Colombian mercenaries are being hired, trained and moved into Sudan by the United Arab Emirates (UAE), a new report warns.
The east African nation is locked into a civil war between the Sudanese government and the UAE-backed Rapid Support Forces.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported this week:
Colombian private military contractors, apparently hired by a United Arab Emirates (UAE)-based company, transited through UAE military bases before being deployed to Sudan to support the abusive Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
This is further evidence indicating that the UAE is assisting or otherwise substantially contributing to the Rapid Support Forces’ capacity to commit war crimes.
More information can be found in HRW’s From Bogotá to El Fasher report.
Sudan war began in April 2023
The three-year war has killed thousands and displaced millions. The RSF, backed by the UAE, is fighting the Sudanese government, with gold interests and regional influence at stake.
Numerous foreign actors, including the UK, have caused the war to fester through active participation and/or outright passivity. Israel, too, is a major player in the war.
The war in Sudan is theoretically between the Arab-majority RSF and the Sudanese government. But foreign states pursuing their own interests are backing the combatants.
Egypt backs the government, alongside Russia, Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar. Israel has backed both sides at different times.
The RSF has killed Sudanese civilians in vast numbers. Some estimates say 150,000 people have died and more than 10 million civilians have been displaced by fighting.
British links to Colombian mercs?
Britain is the former colonial power in Sudan and there are reports it is still enabling the violence today. The Guardian revealed “connections between the mercenaries hired to overrun El Fasher and addresses in the UK capital” last December.
The investigation stated Zeuz Global, a business registered at a Tottenham flat, was “set up by two individuals named and sanctioned last week by the US treasury for hiring Colombian mercenaries to fight for the RSF”.
Journalists added:
The firm is active. The day after the US treasury announced sanctions on those behind the Colombian mercenary operation – 9 December – Zeuz Global abruptly moved its operation to the very heart of London. On 10 December the firm shared “new address details”. Its new postcode matches One Aldwych, a five-star hotel in Covent Garden.
Now, new evidence uncovered by HRW links the Colombian mercenary operation to the UAE too.
Evidence collected by Human Rights Watch indicates that, since 2024, an Abu Dhabi-based security company–which is licensed to work for the Emirati government and has links to the ruling family and senior United Arab Emirates (UAE) officials–has appeared to hire Colombian private military contractors (PMCs) who were deployed to Sudan to fight alongside the RSF.
A witness to the RSF’s October 2025 massacre in the southern Sudanese city of El Fasher told HRW:
…those doing the killing were Arab Sudanese, but standing next to them were white people, who she said were shorter than the Sudanese fighters, and, unlike them, wore fatigues and helmets.
“They had sniper rifles…small weapons with silencers…They were wearing something around their chest, short sleeves, and insignia.”
The report claims that the “white uniformed fighters” the female witness described “were most likely Colombian PMCs, who stood by while RSF fighters killed men and women, including people with disabilities”.
The UK has substantial links to the UAE, including Manchester City football club. The Gulf state is a major buyer of British arms. Furthermore, a recent report even suggested that the UK downplayed and downgraded the genocide in Sudan in order to avoid “pissing off” the Emiratis.
The UK appears complicit in not one but two active genocides, in Sudan as well as Gaza. Sudan is a criminally under-reported war. This suggests an absolute disregard for African lives who recall the most vicious days of the empire.
Featured image via UNHCR
By Joe Glenton
New York mayor, Zohran Mamdani, unveiled his groundbreaking ‘Block by Block’ housing plan yesterday, which will see 400,000 affordable homes with stabilised rents.
This restoring news follows a successful collection of more than $9 million in unpaid fines from billionaire Bezos’ Amazon.
Mamdani has long made clear that he grasps the scale of the financial crisis facing ordinary people, who find themselves increasingly priced out of housing and have an uphill battle to achieve financial security.
The New York mayor will also target rogue, exploitative landlords, and create tens of thousands of jobs needed to build new homes. In turn, he will help make home ownership genuinely possible for working-class people.
Announcing this “ambitious housing plan”, Mamdani refreshingly declared:
New York is facing a historic housing crisis. We’re pursuing a historic solution.
We can only hope that politicians in the UK take heed of this policy because this housing crisis is something millions of Brits recognise in their own lives.
Today we announced the most ambitious housing plan in our City's modern history: Block by Block.
We're building 200,000 new affordable homes. We're overhauling code enforcement. We're cracking down on bad landlords. We're creating tens of thousands of good-paying jobs. We're… pic.twitter.com/sea4liWEmg — Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani (@NYCMayor) May 26, 2026
Mamdani: ‘Publicly owned and publicly operated’
In an incredible reprioritisation of the state’s role in ensuring workers have the ability to own their own homes, Mamdani highlighted how 70% of New Yorkers don’t own their properties. Home ownership has a massive impact on social mobility, with more and more people pushed into paying extortionate rents.
This has, of course, been a boon for private landlords, whilst hard-working people find themselves increasingly entrenched under ever-rising living costs.
Powerfully, and bang on the money, Mamdani stated:
When New Yorkers can afford a home, they can afford to dream.
He added:
For centuries, New York City built enough housing to keep pace with our population growth, until the 1960s.
Over the past 60 years, however, government helped create the housing crisis we now face through a series of choices.
If the absence of good government created the conditions we now face, the presence of good government can build the solutions we now need.
In contrast to British MPs who continue to pander to the richest in society whilst disavowing, disenfranchising and frankly, abandoning those without hoardes of cash, Mamdani makes clear that he is working for the masses.
Pledging to build 200,000 new homes over the next decade, whilst preserving and applying rent controls in New York, Mamdani said:
This historic production push will increase the number of homes for homeless New Yorkers by nearly 45%.
In order to make this pretty incredible policy work, New York will receive a capital investment of $22 billion in just five years.
Mamdani emphasised that “no plan of this scale has ever been imagined by a past mayor, let alone proposed”.
Private tenants to receive greater protection
Recognising that home ownership won’t be instant, and that renters are long overdue adequate protections from exploitative landlords, he also revealed extensive protections for private tenants.
It appears the NY mayor is finally making it so that rich people face real consequences for their profiteering whilst providing no value for money.
However, these positive, progressive, people-first policy commitments don’t stop there: Mamdani will also require the city to investigate every heat complaint made through New York’s 311 system and send inspectors to each reported case.
In a remarkable change of direction to typical neoliberal politics, Mamdani will transfer ownership for buildings which have long been neglected to “responsible stewards”.
He said:
Stewards that include community land trusts, non-profits, or even the tenants themselves.
NOW: Mamdani says his admin will transfer ownership from bad landlords to non-profits.
“For buildings that have suffered chronic neglect, we will work to transfer ownership to responsible stewards.
Stewards that include community land trusts, non-profits, or even the tenants… pic.twitter.com/YHhzGWPgWh — Brecca Stoll (@breccastoll) May 26, 2026
Going further, Mamdani has equally committed to the “largest capital commitment” to New York City’s Housing Authority (NYCHA).
Promising to invest $5.6 billion over five years and, in a move that highlights how corrupted our own politicians are, he has refused to sell out publicly owned assets.
And we will do all this while ensuring NYCHA remains publicly owned and publicly operated.
Therefore, it’s apparent that Mamdani plans to maintain this landmark investment in the prospects and futures of ordinary families, rather than allowing it to be steadily eroded in favour of rising profits, as seen in the increasingly privatised state in the UK.
Nevertheless, the ‘Block by Block’ plan does commit to including private developers, so it will be essential to maintain public pressure to ensure that long-forgotten people remain the priority over the profits of developers and their shareholders.
Will British MPs take heed of Mamdani’s courage?
Mamdani’s politics have been popular amongst voters, particularly in New York where nearly a fifth of children under 18 live in poverty. With increasing poverty in the UK, and a widening chasm of inequality, British MPs and commentators would do well to remember that all human life has value regardless of how bottomless their bank accounts are.
In a society where ordinary people are waking up to the abuses of corporate interests and billionaires, there is a pretty stark absence of any real meaningful efforts to address the cost of greed crisis in the UK.
Housing associations have taken over much of the responsibility for social housing, and this shift reduces value for money for both taxpayers and renters alike.
Thankfully, Mamdani’s ‘Block by Block’ policy underscores the reality that having the political will to stand up for the masses is all that is required to make sure actual change is delivered.
As Mamdani makes clear, public ownership is the way forward to lift the country off its knees, not endless privatisation which fleeces us all.
Featured image via Michael M. Santiago/ Getty Images
Reform Senedd candidate Corey Edwards, who stepped down from the election after a photo emerged of him doing a Nazi salute, is now, apparently, the special adviser for the far-right party’s Welsh leader.
Mere hours after Reform announced him as a candidate for Bridgend and Vale of Glamorgan, a photo of Edwards performing a Nazi salute (complete with a finger in place of a Hitler-style moustache) came to light.
The picture was reportedly taken more than six years ago. Edwards ‘apologised’ publicly but also tried to play it down as a joke. He even attempted a feeble swipe at anti-Zionist protests.
My dear grandfather fought against the Nazis and his brother-in-law was a prisoner of war. I’m a staunch champion of Judaism, and it sickens me to see the recent openly anti-semitic marches on the streets of Britain.
Utterly shameless. He fits right in with the Reform lot.
Senedd collagues volunteer to be bullied instead
Fortunately, party leader, Nigel Farage, is (allegedly) no stranger to the occasional youthful Nazi salute-and-heil. He merely stated that he “wouldn’t approve of it”, but he wouldn’t kick Edwards out of the party.
However, in what was hopefully a relief for the people of Bridgend, Edwards ducked out of his own accord. A Reform UK Wales spokesperson said:
Corey Edwards has informed us that he is stepping down as a candidate for the Senedd election this May, citing issues with his mental health.
We wish him well for the future and hope his privacy can be respected at this difficult time.
The party also said it would provide mental health support to the poor wee racist.
However, now it seems the promised mental health support has taken the form of a shiny new job as a special adviser for Reform’s Senedd leader, Dan Thomas.
Fellow Reform Senedd appointee Llŷr Powell rushed to Edward’s defence, arguing that he would rather people focus their criticisms on him than staff behind the scenes.
I’m big enough, with my shoulders open, so is Dan Thomas.
I think leave staff alone. I don’t like this bullying culture that is here in Cardiff Bay. I’m not prepared to stand for it.
If the media and other critics want to carry on, fine.
You know what, that’s awfully big of Powell, and we’ll gladly take him up on it.
Richard Gurner, editor of the Caerphilly Observer, personally credited Powell with tanking Reform’s chances at dominating Wales.
As part of a BBC debate, a member of the public charged Powell and his party with making her mixed-race family feel unwelcome in the area. This, according to Gurner, was “the line in the sand” for his community.
Plaid Cymru went on to beat Reform 43 seats to 34, helped along by Powell being a desperately uncharismatic, racist tosser.
‘Reform have shown their true colours’
Speaking of Plaid Cymru, the victorious Welsh party had words to say about Edward’s appointment:
Once again, Reform have shown their true colours. It’s no wonder the people of Wales decidedly chose hope with Plaid Cymru over Reform’s division.
Likewise, a spokesperson for Welsh Labour also chimed in, stating that their far-right counterparts “haven’t learned their lesson and their values do not align with the people of Wales”.
Reform UK didn’t have the decency to deem Corey Edwards unfit to be a candidate. He stepped back himself after the truth came out. Now they think he is fit to advise their leader in Wales.
Of course, it’s hardly surprising that Reform has given a racist dropout a cushy new job. Back in April, the Canary reported that suspended bigot Adam Mitula had continued working as an election agent for Reform’s Matt Goodwin. Hell, the party even deployed him in a public-facing campaign role.
If Edwards tosses in a few racist social media rants, Reform might even let him run for election again next time. A history of vile posts is virtually the party’s only selection criterion at this point.
Featured image via the Canary
Tony Blair certainly has a sense of timing. Just as the Labour Party enters a long march into the least-exciting leadership contest in recent memory, the former UK prime minister arrives with a wide-ranging and widely praised essay on the state of the nation.
His essay is the purest expression of the technocratic spirit – the very form of politics that has, right across the world, taken such a battering in recent years. It is also the most desperate expression of that spirit – prepared to cede much ideological ground in the desire to hold on to power.
This is not to say that Blair refuses to recognise many important truths. He understands that Labour’s victory in 2024 was not one of enthusiasm, that voters are angry with a system they see as totally failed, and that the ideological projects of mass migration and environmentalism have to be jettisoned by any party keen on winning and keeping power.
At the heart of Blair’s essay is an attempt to develop the concept of ‘radical centrism’. Blair considers his centrism ‘radical’ because ‘the centre should never be the place of managing the status quo’. Indeed, Blair recognises how far the status quo has failed, and takes this to mean that ‘radical’ solutions are required – on welfare, migration, the EU and more.
Of course, this is Tony Blair, the ultimate architect of contemporary managerialist Britain, and so his idea of radicalism is rather unlike what you and I might think of as radical. Indeed, Blair manages to present technocracy itself – government by experts – as the most radical thing imaginable. In one of the typically clunky but rather telling phrases of the essay, he says that where ‘the correct answer requires radical change, the centre should be the radical changemaker’. For Blair, the emphasis is always on ‘correct answer’ rather than on ‘radical change’.
But what are the ‘correct’ and ‘radical’ answers that Blair has to offer? They are a mixture of the mundane, the too little too late, and the impossible. The essay abounds with the recondite obsessions of the international set that patronise Blair’s Institute for Global Change, such as digital ID and artificial intelligence. Where he concedes ground, it is too little too late, as shown by his volte-face on Net Zero. And his most incendiary proposal – doing ‘whatever it takes’ to deal with small boats – is impossible without taking on the human-rights framework of the European Court of Human Rights, whose decisions Blair made the UK subject to when his government passed the Human Rights Act in 1998.
But for all the ‘radicalism’ of Blair’s prescriptions, there is a more profound failure to understand the root cause of the issues he identifies. The problem with the political class is not just that it lacks convictions (or what Blair calls ‘ballast’) or lacks the technical insight to pursue the ‘correct policies’. No, the political class is structurally incapable of ‘good policies’ because of its alienation from and hatred of ordinary people.
No number of reports from the Institute for Global Change will change the fact that the political class is intractably resistant to the desires and aspirations of ordinary people. Blair is wrong when he says that the problem is policy rather than politics, because no amount of ‘policy’ can bridge the political chasm that exists between the ordinary voter and the average Labour-Tory politician.
Indeed, that this chasm exists is largely Blair’s doing. New Labour was, above all, a project of detaching the state from the control of ordinary people – the outsourcing of power once held by democratically elected politicians to quangos, NGOs and bureaucrats. It is therefore no surprise that Blair cannot understand that the problem is not that the political class have the ‘wrong’ policies, but that they refuse to implement the policies understood instinctively to be necessary by most ordinary people.
Blair says we need a ‘wholesale reconfiguration of government’. What he really means is just the managerial approach – one of ‘specialist technical skills’, ‘systemic change’ and ‘change management’ – that he introduced, preferably done by him.
This is the irony of even the most sensible of the centrists. No matter how much they come to accept the horrors wrought by mass immigration, climate alarmism or the endlessly expanding state, their ‘solutions’ will never amount to much. Because anything they try to do will inevitably be defeated by the very Blob they constructed.
There is one final irony to Blair’s diagnosis. He insists that the ‘centre ground’ is ‘where elections can be won’, and that the centre can be ‘radical’. But if the centre ground simply means what voters want, then this is much more radical than Blair would ever accept. Today’s actual centre ground is for deporting illegal migrants and tearing up the human-rights framework. It is for burning the NGO deep state to the ground. Today’s centre ground is not that of yesteryear. And this is true of political parties as well. Across Europe, the median voter is much closer to the parties derided as ‘far right’, whether that be Reform UK, the AfD in Germany, Vox in Spain or the National Rally in France.
There is indeed a radicalism brewing in politics, but it is the radicalism of ordinary people. Tony Blair’s vision, in contrast, is merely the last desperate gasp of a dying technocratic elite.
Jacob Reynolds is a writer based in Brussels and London.
The settler-colonial state of Israel has issued a new displacement order in south Lebanon, following a day of heavy airstrikes and artillery. IDF Arabic spokesperson Col. Avichay Adraee posted on X:
In light of the terrorist Hezbollah party’s violation of the ceasefire agreement, the Defense Army is compelled to act against it forcefully, The Defense Army does not intend to harm you.
The Lebanese citizens under bombardment might beg to differ.
Adraae added:
To ensure your safety, you must evacuate your homes immediately and move away from the villages and towns by a distance of at least 1000 meters to open areas. Anyone present near Hezbollah elements, their facilities, and combat means exposes their life to danger!
IDF evacuation orders, Israel’s colonial ambitions
As the Canary reported this week:
Israel launched an intense bombardment across southern Lebanon on the eve of Eid. Over 100 airstrikes were accompanied by ferocious artillery bombardments across the south and in Bekaa. Targets included a Palestinian refugee camp. Multiple people were killed.
And the Cradle reported that the evacuation order included the ancient city of Tyre.
BREAKING | Israel issues forced displacement orders for the city of Tyre in south Lebanon and surrounding Palestinian refugee camps and neighborhoods ahead of further intensified attacks, ordering residents to flee north of the Zahrani River immediately. pic.twitter.com/3ypudqSXfY
— The Cradle (@TheCradleMedia) May 27, 2026
Lebanese media said the order also included the city of Nabatieh.
— L'Orient Today (@lorienttoday) May 27, 2026
#WarinLebanon | The Israeli army has issued new evacuation orders for the entire city of Nabatieh, one of the main cities in south Lebanon, just a day after issuing such an order for the first time.
The renewed assault comes as the US and Iran appear to be finalising a peace deal. Israelis reportedly fear that they have lost influence in Washington.
The officials are now said to fear that a US-Iran agreement could place restrictions on Israel’s future military operations in Lebanon and Gaza.
The Canary likes to give context unlike the legacy media.
Israel violated the US-brokered Lebanon 2024 ‘ceasefire’ more than 15,400 times since it was signed. That must be a world record.
Yet a short salvo from Hezbollah in March this year was framed as a signal outrage by legacy media. That attack has been cited by the settler-colonial state as a pretext to invade.
Not satisfied with pulling the US and its allies into a runaway war with Iran, Israeli troops have pushed into Lebanon with airstrikes pummeling the capital Beirut.
The Canary reported the early moments of the new war. You can also read about the secretive Israel-US ‘side letter’ pact, which gave Israel carte blanche to keep bombing through the ceasefire, and our coverage of Israel’s regular breaches of the ceasefire.
Israel’s longstanding colonial ambitions in south Lebanon, which they consider their own, have little to do with ‘defence’. And the people paying the price for those ambitions are the Lebanese people.
Featured image via the Canary
By Joe Glenton
Billy Allison, of Operation Raise the Colours, has been charged with murder and grievous bodily harm with intent.
It follows an assault outside a Lichfield bar, in the West Midlands, on Sunday 24 May, in which two men were punched.
One of the victims sadly died on Tuesday. The second victim has since been discharged from the hospital.
Allison, 36, from Solihull, appeared at North Staffordshire Justice Centre on Wednesday 27 May.
ITV News reported:
Allison appeared at North Staffordshire Justice Centre today (Wednesday 27 May) ahead of a further appearance tomorrow (Thursday 28 May). No plea was entered today.
Billy Allison, the original founder of Raise the Colours, has been charged with murder and grievous bodily harm with intent after a man was badly beaten in a bar in Lichfield on Sunday. The victim died in hospital yesterday from his injuries.
He's due to appear in court today. pic.twitter.com/jswzNjFlNW
— Mukhtar (@I_amMukhtar) May 27, 2026
What is Operation Raise the Colours?
Operation Raise the Colours is the movement of men erecting flags around the country. Although every square metre of the UK now has 1,488 flags on it, things are still rotten in Great Britain, suggesting the issue was never a scantness of bunting.
Featured image via Christopher Furlong/ Getty Images
By Willem Moore
The post Will Peter Murrell’s shopping spree sink the SNP? appeared first on spiked.
Andy Burnham has hit back at Tony Blair after the former Labour prime minister urged the party not to go further left.
The Greater Manchester mayor is currently campaigning for the Makerfield by-election so he can get a seat in parliament and challenge Keir Starmer’s leadership.
He has promised to implement change after what he has described as “40 years of neoliberalism.”
While the ex-PM told BBC Radio 4′s Today programme that he hopes Burnham – who used to serve in Blair’s government – wins the crunch Makerfield contest, he questioned his analysis.
Blair said: “We’re in 2026. Let’s go back to 1986. So we assume he doesn’t mean the first seven years of Margaret Thatcher. So back to the 70s? Nothing good in that period of Thatcher with the business community or New Labour?
“I don’t think he [Burnham] really means that, but what I’m saying is if you’re going to change leader you’ve really got to force people to say where they stand.”
He also called for Labour to govern from the “radical centre”.
But Burnham suggested to The Observer that Blair was missing the point, saying: ”[He] criticises my phrase about 40 years of neoliberalism but the last 40 years has given us wide inequality – that’s what’s responsible for the abandonment of the centre.
“People don’t think the centre has delivered for them in terms of their lives, therefore they’ve gone further to the extremes.”
It comes after Blair penned at 5,600 word essay calling for Labour to take a completely new approach to its policies rather.
The ex-PM accused Labour of suffering from a “perennial delusion”, believing “that when we lose seats to the right the country is really signalling it wants Labour to move left”.
He also claimed the party was “playing with fire” by trying to replace Starmer without first deciding on a different policy direction, and therefore risks consigning the UK to “relegation from the Premier League of nations”.
But Burnham tore into Blair’s vision of what the UK should look like.
“He doesn’t mention inequality once,” he said. “If you don’t get how that’s driving politics now, if you are not rooting your analysis in the fact that people are unable to live and that things that were taken for granted are no longer affordable, then you are not understanding what’s going on.”
Subscribe to Commons People, the podcast that makes politics easy. Every week, Kevin Schofield and Kate Nicholson unpack the week’s biggest stories to keep you informed. Join us for straightforward analysis of what’s going on at Westminster.
A disgusting new report has landed from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) and it’s damning.
Between 2015 and 2024, there were 921 illegal attacks on protected birdlife across the UK and the data shows that criminals are targeting raptors in disgustingly cruel ways.
The charity’s Patterns of Persecution report also states that more than half of these confirmed kills have taken place near or on land managed for game shooting. These are the hunting grounds of the wealthy and the landed gentry, so of course, this needless slaughter is being driven by profit.
Their excuse? Gamekeepers slaughter innocent birds of prey to stop them eating young pheasants, partridges and grouse.
I don’t get it. Why are they complaining so much when they’re releasing millions of these birds artificially only to murder them themselves anyway?
Bird killings are ‘relentless’, RSPB says
RSPB’s report exposes the bloody playground of corrupt wealthy people. It’s a place where landowners swan around like they’re above the law and sentient life. Even the lives of our rare birdlife, means nothing to them.
These wealthy knuckle-draggers pay vast sums to shoot these animals for nothing more than entertainment. Driven by financial incentives, corporate rural estates ruthlessly and systematically wipe out native predators.
This barbaric industry treats majestic, protected birds as nothing but vermin that threaten profits. They don’t give a shit if they’re damaging ecosystems or decimating protected species. All they care about is their systematic class violence and lining their own pockets.
And this argument of protecting pheasants is absolute crap when it’s they themselves who release 40 million of them into our countryside each year, just to slaughter them.
But now, the RSPB has revealed the facts about this direct human violence that shields this bloody, upper-class trade.
British landowners are avoiding all accountability for allowing these illegal shoots to happen on their property. They just don’t give a damn about the laws that everyday people like me and you have to adhere to. (One rule for them.)
They don’t just kill, they torture
Shooting is still the most frequent method of death for hunted birds in the UK. Some 443 birds lost their lives to a gun, the RSPB found. Gamekeepers also lace dead animals with banned pesticides, which wreaks havoc on local predators.
These murderers use illegal pole traps that clamp heavy frames around birds’ legs, which causes an agonisingly slow death.
In 2022, investigators discovered the mutilated corpse of a tracked hen harrier named Free. He was discovered near the North Yorkshire border. Both his legs and head had been ripped from his body whilst he was still alive. To make it worse, a post-mortem of the poor creature revealed that this torture could have only been carried out by human hands.
The same year, four helpless chicks were found stamped to death inside their nest.
A motion-activated camera had been set up by Natural England to monitor the progress of the chicks, but footage was interrupted one evening by a bright artificial light which obscured the camera’s view.
Some vile rich criminal then left mother bird, Susie, as the lone survivor. The poor mother tried to feed her dead chicks the next morning.
I don’t get it. What is it about rich people that they find some kind of comfort in cruelty? It’s twisted, it’s wrong and these horrible little polyps need to be brought to justice. Their indifference to life is something indicative of something deeper and darker inside of them, and they need to be stopped.
Local extinctions for profit
This silent but unending onslaught has ruinous impacts on wild bird populations. We have highly vulnerable species, such as the hen harrier, being amongst the hardest hit by this vile industry.
Studies reveal that the average lifespan on a young harrier after fledging in the UK is only 121 days. During this decade-long study, exactly 100 tagged harriers completely disappeared, with a suspicious 79% of them doing so over grouse hunting grounds.
The golden eagle faces the exact same campaign of extinction.
Between 2015 and 2024, 19 of these birds that were being tracked by satellites, completely vanished without a trace in Scotland. Of these, 16 of their last noted locations were on or near grouse moors. Another 14 confirmed golden eagle kills were logged over the same period. Many of these were due to nest destruction, shooting and poisoning.
Criminals will go to any lengths to hide their needless murder. In 2020, people hiking along the Perthshire River pulled a missing golden eagle’s satellite tracker out of the water. It was wrapped in heavy lead sheeting to trap the signal and to hide their crimes.
Legal loopholes, just for the rich
This corporate shooting industry is decimating OUR local wildlife and it operates with absolute impunity. Landowners face no accountability, tucked up on their vast, private estates. Hidden away, these offenders avoid justice and any meaningful penalties.
Despite nearly 1,000 documented crimes, courts have only convicted 24 people in this 10-year period.
On grouse moors specifically, only four people were convicted for a total of 190 crimes. That means these rich gamekeepers have a 98% chance of escaping justice. In short, corporate shooting groups are fighting against any regulation.
The British Association for Shooting and Conservation opposes licensing, claiming it adds unnecessary rules. But it’s very bloody evident that we cannot leave these rich estates to police themselves.
What this report reiterates is that it’s time to enforce strict licensing laws across the country. We need to stand up and end the commercialised murder of our wildlife.
How many more protected birds need to die before the government gets off its arse and stops protecting rich bloodsports?
Featured image via RSPB
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