250 delegates representing Your Party branches and former branches across England, Scotland and Wales met in an online conference on 31 May and launched the Socialist Federation.

Delegates included representatives of groups in London, Bristol, Cardiff, Birmingham, Coventry, Leeds, Sheffield, Manchester, Essex, North Devon, Dundee, Newcastle and Cumbria.

Attendees said they’d comprehensively lost patience with Jeremy Corbyn and his close-knit entourage, who failed to build on the promise of the mass signups to a new party initiative in summer 2025.

And the assembled members and ex members of Your Party agreed to create an initial federal organisation with the aim of rallying forces to establish a new socialist and working class party, independent of Labour and the Greens.

Socialist Federation spokesperson Joseph O’Connor Meldau (aka Raz O’Connor) said:

The Socialist Federation brings together people from all over the country who have been building socialist groups in their local areas.

Some did so as part of the wave of enthusiasm that met the announcement of Your Party last year, when 800,000 people expressed an interest in a new political force that was explicitly socialist.

The enthusiasm around Your Party was ruined by the actions of Jeremy Corbyn and his allies, but we have learned we don’t need celebrity politicians to organise things for us.

It is the grassroots activists building power in working class communities and workplaces that have always been the heart of the socialist movement, not bureaucratic leaders.

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The Socialist Federation plans a further national conference on 28 June to finalise its structure and policy proposals, prior to an in-person Congress in the Midlands in the autumn.

Featured image via Christopher Furlong / Getty Images

By The Canary

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Chevron CEO, Mike Wirth, who is the money behind Donald Trump, said his company would not pay a toll to enter the Strait of Hormuz, claiming it is “international waters”.

Trump recently threatened to blow up Oman if it, along with Iran, were to charge a toll on the ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz.

Alongside Wirth, Trump also alleged the strait is international waters.

The question is: do these Americans really have a choice?

Chevron has six vessels under charter in the strait

Iran has said:

The process of ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz by Iran is NOT a temporary process and Iran will not back down from it.

Fox News called Oman “a country that has spent decades quietly serving as America’s backchannel to Iran”.

The news agency, which rarely criticises Trump, also quoted an expert saying that though the president had an unconventional style, his comment was still shocking. It shows Iran has cornered the US.

Trump and his cronies are still looking at how to spin a victory narrative, however impossible such a narrative may seem.

US magazine Foreign Affairs noted:

Hegseth’s bluster could not hide the fact that the core objectives of Operation Epic Fury—notably, effecting regime change and eradicating Iran’s nuclear program—had not been achieved. And with Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the overall situation was worse than it had been before the start of the operation.

Ships attacked, CEO claims

Wirth himself, in the interview where he says he won’t pay a toll, admitted that Iranian authorities “have been successful” in collecting fees.

He also boasted about US sanctions, noting that the Treasury had recently “sanctioned the new authority that has been put in place to oversee transit through the strait”. When asked if he knows how people are paying the toll, he replied:

I’ve heard reports of people using cryptocurrency in various countries.

Meanwhile, he confirmed that Chevron has “six ships inside the strait right now with our cargoes”, all chartered and all stuck. The decision to risk transiting, he said, ultimately belongs to the ship owners, not Chevron.

He added:

There still has been kinetic activity this week, some of which has been reported in the media, some of which has not. We see risks very real still in that environment.

There have been vessels that have been in transit that have suffered attacks. They’re maybe not every day, but there have been multiple incidents that have occurred.

Trump backers’ disdain for Iran

Wirth is not the only Trump backer squirming at the capitulation to Iran.

After calling Iran “evil”, Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan Chase, said that NATO allies should have gotten together 25 years ago and gathered 500,000 troops together to attack Iran.

Of course, the billionaire or his friends would not have been in troops.

He chastised those criticising the war on Iran, saying that a threat doesn’t need to be imminent for it to be a threat.

Dimon also warned that Iran getting a nuclear weapon “may be the biggest threat facing mankind” because allied nations like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Japan would then seek their own. His argument is that military and economic dominance are both needed for the US dollar to remain the world’s reserve currency.

Wirth and Dimon both accrue massive rents from the dollar being the reserve currency.

Wirth through owning oil and selling it in dollars. Dimon, through financing the American empire and, with his new security and resiliency initiative, which is massively investing in rearming the United States.

But Iran is not capitulating. It holds the chokepoint, it has US ships stuck, and it has proven that sanctions, bluster and fantasies of a half-million troops cannot break its resolve. You can see exactly why Wirth and Dimon are squirming.

Featured image via Anna Moneymaker/ Getty Images

By Nandita Lal

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On 7 May 1915, the pristine waters off the old head of Kinsale became a graveyard. Within just eighteen minutes of being struck by a single German torpedo, the RMS Lusitania – the world’s most celebrated luxury liner – vanished beneath the Atlantic, taking 1,198 lives with her. Historically, this tragedy is framed as a shocking turning point; a brutal act of piracy that shattered American isolationism and catalysed a moral crusade against imperial tyranny.

Yet, when we peel back the layers of standard textbook narratives, the fate of the Lusitania emerges as something far more calculated. Beneath the murky depths of this disaster lies a masterclass in crisis engineering – an intricate nexus of resource warfare, strategic maritime blockades, and the brutal leverage of financial markets.

It was an event transformed behind the scenes by architects of power, including the First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill, into a mass intelligence test. By deconstructing the chasm between the overt humanitarian narrative and covert geopolitical determinants, we can decode the hidden mechanics of more contemporary conflicts.<

War as an Engineered Industry

In classical political philosophy, war is often defined as an extension of politics by other means. However, a critical reading of political economy suggests a more chilling reality: modern total wars do not break out spontaneously; they are deliberately designed.

For any state to transition from peacetime into total war, it must first break the instinctive social contract of its citizenry. Democratic societies do not willingly sacrifice their youth, wealth, and liberties without an acute, existential provocation. This necessitates a “shock event” – or what strategic literature brands a “false flag” operation. By executing an attack or deliberately manufacturing a vulnerability, ruling elites can fabricate evidence to frame an adversary, thereby legitimising military aggression in the eyes of an outraged public.

The First World War (1914–1918) served as the premier laboratory for this brand of total mobilisation. It was not merely an escalation of armies, but a systemic restructuring. Entire civil institutions and societies were weaponised under totalitarian state control, all masked by the collective war effort. In this grand theatre, the entry of the United States in 1917 represented the ultimate geopolitical pivot.

The war dismantled three great empires – the Russian, German, and Ottoman – leaving millions dead and mutilated in its wake. Crucially, the Russian and German empires stood defiantly outside the orbit of western ‘Money Powers’ – non-elected, transnational network of central banks, Wall Street cartels, and mega asset management firms that controls the global reserve currency and uses sovereign debt to dictate international policies and conflicts to preserve its financial hegemony – whilst the Ottoman Empire occupied a Levant targeted for oil colonization and strategic British realignment.

Yet, this monumental American intervention would never have materialised without the psychological and political groundwork engineered through the wreckage of the Lusitania two years prior.

Geopolitical Background and the Ethnic Context

Prior to the disaster, President Woodrow Wilson’s administration faced a complex domestic quandary. London was desperate for American intervention; the British economy was utterly exhausted, and the Western Front was consuming human lives at an unsustainable rate. For decision-makers in Whitehall, dragging Washington into the trenches was a matter of sheer survival.

However, American public opinion leaned overwhelmingly towards isolationism, viewing the European conflagration as a distant imperialist squabble. Furthermore, Wilson faced a profound demographic dilemma: a relative majority of the American populace was of German descent, with the German language deeply embedded in local schools, press, and communities.

To shatter this domestic deadlock, British political planners recognized that they needed something louder than diplomacy. They required a direct assault on American sovereignty or dignity – an event so emotionally devastating that it would rewrite the collective consciousness and morph into an undeniable moral justification for total war.

Deconstructing the Incident: Myth versus Reality

When the German U-20 boat targeted the Lusitania, claiming 1,198 lives – including 128 American citizens – the Allied media machine instantly weaponised the tragedy. It was branded a savage German war crime against defenceless civilians. However, a century of maritime exploration and declassified documentation has exposed a truth entirely at odds with the official narrative.

1. The Auxiliary Cruiser

The Lusitania was never a purely civilian vessel. She was officially registered on the British Admiralty’s auxiliary warship rosters, designed from her very inception to specifications that allowed immediate conversion into an armed cruiser during wartime. In fact, her construction had been heavily subsidised by military loans from the British Government on the explicit condition that the Navy could claim her when required.

2. The Cargo

Despite vehement denials from British political circles, subsequent investigations and physical expeditions to the wreck proved that the ship’s holds were packed with massive shipments of military supplies destined for the British Army, including millions of rifle rounds, shrapnel shells, and fuses shipped out of New York.

Paradoxically, this lethal ammunition was loaded quite openly. This explains the mysterious, massive secondary explosion that ripped through the vessel immediately after the single German torpedo strike, causing her to sink in a mere 18 minutes. Under international maritime law at the time, the Lusitania was an entirely legitimate military target.

3. The Suppressed Warnings

Operating within strict maritime protocols, the German Chancellery saw through the British plot to use civilians as human shields for weapons transport. In an extraordinary move, the German Embassy in Washington purchased advertising space in major American newspapers – including prominent New York broadsheets – explicitly warning passengers that boarding the Lusitania was a high-risk venture, as she would pass through a designated war zone carrying military material.

Tragically, pro-British interest groups within the United States successfully suppressed the publication of these warning advertisements in several pivotal cities, leaving the civilian passengers entirely in the dark – disposable pawns in a high-stakes geopolitical chess game.

Winston Churchill and Engineered Risk Management

At the very centre of this web sits Winston Churchill, the First Lord of the Admiralty.

Declassified records reveal that Britain’s legendary naval intelligence hub, Room 40, had successfully cracked the German military wireless codes. Consequently, the Admiralty possessed precise, real-time tracking of German U-boats patrolling the Irish coast.

The profound suspicion surrounding the incident lies not just in the sudden withdrawal of a military escort for the Lusitania, but in a sequence of direct, highly irregular directives emanating from Churchill’s personal office:

Step 1: A secret, direct order is issued from the personal office of the First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill.

Step 2: The order is relayed past standard naval command straight to the Captain of the Lusitania as she approaches British waters.

Step 3: The luxury liner is commanded to reduce her speed off the Irish coast, placing her precisely within the active U-boat nexus.

This final directive flew in the face of all established naval protocols, which dictated that fast vessels must maintain maximum speed and zigzag to evade torpedoes. Internal Admiralty testimonies indicate that Churchill’s own aides confronted him, warning that slowing the ship would drastically increase the probability of an attack. His stern, unyielding reply was:

The order is mine; pass it on.

By confirming the military cargo, suppressing public warnings, intercepting the intelligence codes, and actively slowing the ship into the path of a known submarine, the incident shifts from the realm of tragic military negligence into the territory of deliberate facilitation – the engineering of a catastrophic trap.

Propaganda Mechanisms and the Dehumanisation of the Adversary

The moment the ship sank, the Allied media apparatus executed a meticulously prepared crisis management plan. Empirical military facts were instantly replaced with highly emotional, weaponised vocabulary. Overnight, headlines coalesced into a unified, thunderous battle cry: “The Barbarians Dare Again” and “The Hun Butchers Murder Mothers and Children”.

This wartime propaganda went far beyond mere reporting; it sought the total dehumanisation of the adversary – a psychological prerequisite required to prepare ordinary citizens to kill without guilt. The campaign succeeded brilliantly in shattering American isolationism. While Washington delayed its official declaration of war until 1917, the ghost of the Lusitania served as the emotional fuel and political legitimacy that President Wilson required to successfully market total war to Congress and an outraged American public.

From the Lusitania to the Twenty-First Century: Continuity of the Model

Deconstructing this history is not an exercise in mourning the ruins of the past, but an effort to extract the immutable structural rules of crisis engineering. It reveals that central planners and ruling elites treat mass casualties as mere cost variables in equations of global hegemony. This exact political blueprint has repeated itself across subsequent, well-documented historical milestones:

The Gulf of Tonkin Incident(1964): Washington claimed that an American destroyer fell victim to an unprovoked North Vietnamese assault. Declassified documents later exposed the attack as entirely fabricated and illusory, yet it served as the official pretext granted by Congress to launch full-scale military intervention in the Vietnam War.

The 9/11 Attacks (2001): Irrespective of the details heavily classified under absolute state secrecy, these attacks represented the ultimate modern “shock event.” It cleared the path for totalitarian domestic legislation like the Patriot Act and launched two decades of pre-emptive wars that redrew global energy maps and geopolitical borders at the cost of millions of lives.

The Economic Reality of Systematic Warfare

The ultimate umbilical cord linking engineered conflicts to the global order is forged in finance and credit. During the First World War, Great Britain funded its astronomical war effort by borrowing heavily from Wall Street, specifically the J.P. Morgan banking group. By 1916, British military debts to American banks had ballooned to exceed 10% of the entire United States Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

This massive financial exposure created an unyielding economic chain of events. The accumulation of military debts to the point of exceeding the 10% threshold automatically rendered an Allied victory an absolute matter of domestic national security for the United States. This was essential to protect the banking and financial system from total systemic collapse.

Consequently, America’s entry into the trenches was not a spontaneous, idealistic crusade to protect global democracy. It was an intervention emotionally brokered by the tragedy of the Lusitania to safeguard the investments of the financial elite on Wall Street and secure the ultimate repayment of British sovereign bonds.

Wars as Mass Intelligence Tests

Parroting official political narratives without subjecting them to rigorous geopolitical and critical analysis constitutes a failure of a collective intelligence test. The global financial and monetary elites who steer the international order do not view the world through the lens of sentimentality, national borders, or human cost; they view it through the prism of centralised control and the restructuring of financial systems via the controlled shocks of total war.

Reading the Lusitania incident provides the necessary lens to decipher our current global landscape. The very same archetypes that deployed print propaganda in 1915 are utilizing digital simulation models, viral pandemic narratives, climate emergency rhetoric, and modern energy blockades today to usher in a highly centralized financial and social order. As history repeatedly warns us, the capitulation of the masses to emotional propaganda is a blank cheque signed by the victims for their executioners, ensuring the repetition of the catastrophe in every age.

Featured image via Three Lions/Getty Images

By Mohammad Fakih

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The Labour front bench will not be looking forward to the return of Parliament. On 1 June 2026, after the parliamentary recess, the second set of the Mandelson Files will be released, set to expose the disgraced Epstein-informant’s cosy relationship with senior Labour Party officials.

Mandelson and the Policy Network

Last week, it was revealed that United Kingdom Security Vetting (UKSV) had flagged Mandelson’s bimonthly conversations with Tamir Hayman, a former Israeli military intelligence chief. Earlier this year, we learnt that UKSV’s recommendation that Mandelson not be granted security clearance was overruled by Foreign Office officials.

However, less attention has been paid to Policy Network, the Mandelson-led think tank whose list of former directors reads like a Who’s Who of Labour Party grandees.

The organisation has previously been criticised for obscuring how much it was receiving from specific funders, although David Sainsbury was confirmed as a core donor. Sainsbury has also financed Labour Together, giving £125,000 in March alone.

In 2021, Peter Mandelson’s Policy Network merged with Progress, another Labour Party-linked operation which had received tens of thousands in donations from Mandelson and Tony Blair, amongst others. Progressive Britain is now led by Adam Langleben, a former national secretary of the Jewish Labour Movement.

Patrick Diamond

One of Policy Network’s co-chairs was Patrick Diamond, a former Special Advisor to Mandelson.

In the early 1990s, according to Diamond’s Wikipedia page, he spent time living and working at an Israeli colony called Lahav. Strangely, no other reference to his time at Lahav can be found online.

Like the IDF stint of Labour peer Jonathan Kestenbaum, unreported in the British media until my investigation last month, and the list of Labour Friends of Israel parliamentary supporters, scrubbed from the internet during the 2024 general election, it seems that links to the settler state have become less of a boasting point for senior Labour politicians.

Kibbutz Lahav, situated just 5km from the illegal Eshkolot settlement, was originally set up in 1952 by the Nahal, an IDF program that combined military service with the establishment of settlements. During the Gaza genocide, the IDF’s Nahal Brigade was being led by Nochi Mandel, a religious nationalist Israeli settler who called for Gaza to be deprived of aid. Mandel was only sacked, however, after an air strike on a World Central Kitchen convoy killed seven aid workers, including three British citizens.

Roger Liddle

Policy Network’s second co-chair was Roger Liddle, a Labour peer and former Special Adviser to Tony Blair.

In 2010, Liddle’s entrance to the House of Lords was officially “supported” by Mandelson. Later, during Keir Starmer’s first years in power, his “supper parties” would regularly host the Epstein-associate’s network, with Mandelson, Wes Streeting, and Morgan McSweeney amongst attendees. McSweeney’s inner circle would also be present: Matthew Doyle, Matt Faulding, and Matt Pound.

A former Labour frontbencher who served under Ed Miliband told me in February that McSweeney’s inner circle “ruled with a rod of iron” and “talked openly of taking over the Party”. Wes Streeting now wants Starmer’s job. His partner, Joe Dancey, is an ex-aide to Peter Mandelson.

Jonathan Mendelsohn

Jonathan Mendelsohn, an ex-chair of Labour Friends of Israel, was another director of Peter Mandelson’s Policy Network.

Mendelsohn has donated to a string of Labour Party MPs (sometimes through his Red Capital Ltd. operation), which includes ex-Health Minister Wes Streeting and current Foreign Minister Yvette Cooper. He also funded former Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

In 2007, the Jewish Chronicle lauded the lobbyist’s influence, saying:

At ease in the corridors of power, Mendelsohn has the contacts and know-how to advance Israel’s case in his [Labour Friends of Israel] role.

When Gordon Brown appointed Mendelsohn as Labour’s director of general election resources, he was criticised for promoting an individual who had previously lobbied on behalf of the Ladbrokes betting firm.

In July 2008, Brown, a long-standing supporter of Labour Friends of Israel, became the first British Prime Minister to address the Israeli Knesset, declaring proudly:

My father … had a deep and life-long affection for Israel.

Stephen Hockman and Liam Byrne

Other Policy Network alumni include Stephen Hockman, one of the three UK Lawyers for Israel patrons accused of “using their professional seniority” to intimidate others in a legal complaint issued last week.

There is also Liam Byrne, a parliamentary supporter of Labour Friends of Israel who has previously accepted transportation paid for directly by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The Labour Party hierarchy are now desperate to distance themselves from the Prince of Darkness, but the true extent of his influence is a story still waiting to be told.

Featured image via the Canary

By Jody McIntyre

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Lots of toddlers seem to go through a phase where they reject one of their parents – and oh boy can it hurt.

Taking to Reddit, one mum going through it said her two-year-old only wanted her dad. “I know this is ‘normal toddler behaviour’ and that kids go through stages like this, but it’s been going on for a few months now and it’s starting to really get to me,” said the parent.

“Today I was outside with her and she got hurt. She was fine, but then she acted mad at me and wouldn’t let me comfort her – just wanted dad. It crushed me. I try so hard to be present and loving, but right now it feels like I’m not the parent she wants.”

As children try to exert as much independence as possible – moving about unaided, eating their own dinner and playing alone – they might start to lean towards one parent (and away from the other).

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If you’re ‘the shunned one’, you might find your toddler doesn’t want you to hug or touch them, or even read to or play with them anymore. Bedtime can also be a major point of contention.

While it can be pretty soul-destroying, Rachel Melville-Thomas, a child and adolescent psychotherapist, said it won’t last forever. And you’re certainly not alone.

“It is quite common,” she told HuffPost UK. “It’s the task of toddlers to try to make sense of the family world, and who they are attached to. Sometimes they make very fixed decisions!”

Why do some toddlers favour one parent over the other?

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People seem to have differing theories on this. A New York Times article suggested it’s a way of toddlers showing their independence, as they have few outlets for autonomy.

Children are exploring decision-making at this age, and parental preference is one way to test it out, Dr Nia Heard-Garris, a physician at a children’s hospital in Chicago, told the publication.

Melville-Thomas suggested young children are trying to understand how the family works and their role within it. “Some toddlers will be very sensitive to how much attention they receive from each parent – so may react really strongly to a loss of closeness to a particular parent,” she said.

This loss of closeness could be as a result of a new baby, new working situation or other changes. “The reaction then is to save all their focus for the one they see most,” she continued.

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The therapist added that this is indeed a phase and “it tends not to last long, as the child develops and begins to accommodate the patterns of family life”.

By the time your child is three or four years old, they learn to trust that both parents are equally caring and connected.

Gender also seems to play a part in who children choose to side with as they develop, the therapist has noticed.

“Toddlers, at about two years, notice they share the same gender as one of the parents and just want to be with them and do the same things in a passionate process of ‘being the same’,” she said.

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“Then the opposite gender parent can be seen as different, and ‘not like me’ and can be pushed away. In same gender couples, the toddler might identify with the parent most like them – for example, the lively physical parent, or the quiet cuddly one – and then pull away from the other.”

But when children reach about three years old, the reverse can happen, she added – so the opposite gender or different personality parent might become very exciting all of a sudden.

StefaNikolic via Getty Images

How to cope if you’re the rejected parent

While it’s nice to know it’s nothing personal, it can still suck if your child won’t even let you cuddle them.

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“Try not to take it personally and see the big picture of a toddler’s view of the world – it will change,” said Rachel Melville-Thomas.

So what can you do in the meantime? Dunya Poltorak, a paediatric medical psychologist in Michigan, told the NY Times we should listen to our child’s preferences, so if they refuse to hug you, just accept it. It’s really important to not take it personally or to show it bothers you.

You can also see the plus side. A child showing they’re comfortable rejecting a parent means they’re securely attached – so your child knows the love you have for them is unconditional, according to Dr Heard-Garris.

If you’re the parent who’s currently flavour of the month, there are things you can be doing to support your partner.

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Accept the situation for the time being, advised Melville-Thomas, while speaking warmly of the other parent, and gently encouraging the toddler to enjoy some time – whether that’s storytime, singing or play – with the other parent.

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Bafta-winning screenwriter Russell T Davies has another critical hit on his hands thanks to his new show Tip Toe.

The unflinching new drama stars Alan Cumming and David Morrissey as two neighbours who find themselves in a feud that quickly spirals out of control with disastrous results, while diving into thorny issues like online radicalisation, prejudice against the LGBTQ+ community, misinformation in the digital age and generational conflict.

During a recent interview with HuffPost UK, Russell called Tip Toe an “urgent” and “necessary” reflection of a world that is “out of control” and “at war with ourselves”, which critics have certainly agreed with so far.

Ahead of episode one’s premiere on Sunday, reviews have near-unanimously praised the series – the latest TV offering from the creator of shows like Queer As Folk, Years And Years and It’s A Sin – which they’ve hailed as “chilling”, “devastating”, “terrifying” and “unforgettable”.

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Here’s a snippet of what the critics are saying about Tip Toe…

“This is urgent, state-of-the-nation stuff from one of our shrewdest screenwriters […] Tip Toe isn’t just sobering; it’s visceral and chilling viewing for all queer people and everyone who loves and supports us.”

“At times it feels as subtle as a brick in the face. But when Davies steps down from his pulpit and lets his characters breathe, his storytelling is visionary, devastating, passionate and humane. And we should listen.”

“Alan Cumming is extraordinary in this terrifying, landmark queer drama […] While this series is a fiction, and one that makes its arguments with sledgehammer grace, it is sadly not absurd, or abstract.”

“Tip Toe, the latest gut-punching drama from Russell T. Davies – his first since the life-altering It’s A Sin – is an alarming, though not inaccurate, portrayal of what it’s really like to be unapologetically gay in a Britain that hates us […] Tip Toe is Davies at his most impassioned; a wake-up call that this is not a time to be complacent.”

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“Television writers will tell you that they never want to come across as preachy, and that good drama should ask teasing questions and then step away. The sense in Tip Toe is that Davies is done with this kind of pussyfooting around, and is up for a scrap.

“It makes for a drama that takes wrong turns but is never less than bold and, in the round, deeply stirring. TV polemic is back, loud and proud.”

“Tip Toe may be an extreme example of how frenzied that intolerance can become. Its dialogue, with long, culturally-charged monologues, can also be a little tiring. But it should be all of these things […] A word of warning, though, from someone who literally watches TV for a living: by the end, this is the most distressing series I’ve ever seen. It’s not rewatchable, but it’s unforgettable.”

“[Tip Toe] lacks the discipline that made his other state of the historical/future nation pieces, Years and Years or It’s a Sin, so powerful and moving, but the strands begin to interweave, momentum builds and if the extremity of the conclusion still doesn’t quite ring true, everyone has worked hard to get it as close to authentic and emotionally credible as possible.”

The first two episodes of Tip Toe are now streaming on Channel 4, with the final three following on Sunday 7 June.

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After the Atlas Lions stole the show at the 2022 Qatar World Cup, becoming the first Arab and African team to reach the semi-finals, Morocco enters the 2026 edition with aspirations that extend far beyond repeating their historic achievement.

Having transformed from the tournament’s surprise package to one of the world’s leading teams, Morocco now faces a new test: was their Qatar triumph a one-off, exceptional moment, or the beginning of a new era for Moroccan football?

Morocco face Brazil in first World Cup game

Since the end of the Qatar World Cup, Morocco has continued its path of development and technical stability. The team has maintained its core structure while integrating promising young players who have strengthened the squad’s depth. As a result, the team has become one of the best in the world in the FIFA rankings, confirming that its success in 2022 was no fluke.

Morocco still relies on a group of key players who made the achievement in Qatar, led by captain Achraf Hakimi, alongside Nayef Aguerd, Noussair Mazraoui, Sofyan Amrabat and Azzedine Ounahi.

Brahim Diaz is one of the most prominent attacking weapons thanks to his ability to make a difference and add individual solutions in the final third.

But the most significant difference between the 2022 and 2026 World Cups lies in the emergence of a new generation of young talents, giving the national team wider options and more diverse solutions.

A mix of experience and youth

Among these names are Ayyoub Bouaddi, one of the most promising young talents in European football. There is also Bilal El Khannous, who has established himself as one of the team’s key midfielders, as well as Chamseddine Talbi and Ismail Sibaari, who add considerable dynamism and speed to the forward line.

In contrast, the squad is missing some names that were present in Qatar’s achievement, most notably Youssef En-Nesyri, Hakim Ziyech and Sofiane Boufal, who represent the end of one phase and the beginning of another that relies more on young players seeking to write their own history.

Realism and ambition

The new format of the World Cup, featuring 48 teams, gives stronger teams a better chance of advancing from the group stage, but the competition will become much tougher in the knockout rounds. Therefore, reaching the quarter-finals seems a realistic goal for Morocco, given the quality of the squad and the experience players have gained in recent years.

Repeating or even surpassing the semi-final achievement will require a combination of consistent performance, mental fortitude, and a bit of luck against top teams. While Morocco may not possess a single ‘superstar’ who can consistently decide matches, they compensate with a cohesive team structure and tactical flexibility that make them a formidable opponent for any national team in the world.

A project that goes beyond results

Morocco is no longer merely a representative of Arab and African football at the World Cup; it has transformed into a comprehensive sporting model based on planning, stability and investment in talent. The Moroccan experience has proven that competing with the world’s best is no longer a distant dream, but an achievable goal when vision and sound management are in place.

Whether the Atlas Lions succeed in repeating or surpassing the achievement of 2022, their participation in the 2026 World Cup will remain an important milestone in the rise of Moroccan and Arab football. It is also a new opportunity to prove that what happened in Qatar was not a passing exception but rather the beginning of a new chapter in history.

Featured image via Alex Livesey/ Getty Images 

By Alaa Shamali

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