“Oil to oil, ashes to ashes, and dust to dust”: Christian climate protesters lie motionless beside the steps of the Treasury to urge the government to reject the deadly Rosebank oilfield.

Members of Christian Climate Action lay covered in shrouds to represent the millions who will die due to climate change, as ministers prepare to decide on the North Sea’s largest undeveloped oilfield this summer.

Descriptions of deaths due to famine, floods, heat and drought were read out in the dramatic die-in protest outside the Treasury offices on Wednesday.

Christian Climate Action said the action highlights the real cost for humanity of continuing to expand oil and gas extraction during a time of Climate Emergency.

If the Rosebank oilfield is approved it will produce more than 200 million tonnes of CO2, the same as the annual emissions of the world’s 28 poorest countries combined, or 70% of the UK’s annual emissions.

Christian climate protesters highlight fossil fuel risks

Rev James Grote, a Baptist minister, said:

Every year we delay moving away from fossil fuels, more lives are damaged by floods, fires, heatwaves and hunger.

We cannot keep sacrificing people and communities to protect the profits of oil giants. If we are serious about hope, justice and protecting God’s creation, then we must act now – and that means stopping Rosebank.

Rosebank’s original approval was overturned by a Scottish Court of Session in January 2025 and oil company Equinor was ordered to submit an Environmental Impact Assessment which included the impact of burning its 200 million barrels of oil.

The government is expected to decide on the new application in June or July amid fears of a policy shift if chancellor Rachel Reeves is attracted by tax receipts produced by the oilfield.

But Rosebank will do nothing to provide the UK with energy security or lower household bills, as the oil is almost entirely bound for export.

The huge cost of developing the oilfield will be mainly borne by the UK government – but its profits will go overseas as Equinor is a Norwegian company which is 67% owned by the Norwegian government.

The oilfield could also produce around £253m for the Delek Group, an Israeli fuel conglomerate flagged by the UN for human rights violations in Palestine. The UK government has been warned it could breach its own obligations under international law if it approves the oilfield.

Protester Judith Russenberger, a Franciscan tertiary, said:

Before entering government, Ed Miliband called Rosebank ‘climate vandalism’. He was right then, and he would be wrong to approve it now.

At a time when millions are struggling with the cost of living, the government should be investing in warm homes, affordable renewable energy and a fairer future – not pouring support into an expensive, polluting industry that keeps households trapped on the fossil fuel rollercoaster.

Andy Hansen, a retired member of the British Council, added:

Clean energy is not just better for the planet – it’s cheaper, safer and more secure. The faster we move away from oil and gas, the faster we can protect people from rising bills and climate chaos.

Featured image via Christian Climate Action

By The Canary

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The US, enabled by the UK, has been accused of “provocatively” removing Venezuela’s highly enriched uranium (HEU), which has added to “grievances” relating to the country’s loss of sovereignty following the capture of former President Nicolás Maduro by US special forces.

Maduro was arrested in Caracas, Venezuela, on 3 January 2026 and taken to the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York, USA, where he is awaiting trial on federal charges including narco-terrorism and drug trafficking.

His former deputy, Delcy Rodríguez, took over as acting president and is cooperating with the US Government. Since the transfer of power took place, the US Government has been working to extract Venezuela’s natural resources for the benefit of US companies.

Trump’s nuclear spoils of war

On 8 May, the US Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) announced it had removed the uranium, which it described as “a win for America, Venezuela, and the world”. The HEU, enriched to 20%, was removed from the Venezuelan Institute for Scientific Research’s RV-1 research reactor.

The US Department of State said in a statement on 14 May:

The RV-1 was the country’s first and only nuclear reactor, originally built for peaceful scientific research and later repurposed for gamma-ray sterilization of medical supplies, food, and other materials.

The NNSA statement from 8 May said officials from its Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation (DNN) worked:

in close cooperation with the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) throughout, the team securely packaged the uranium into a spent fuel cask.

It added:

The group then escorted the material 100 miles overland to a Venezuelan port. There, they transferred the cargo to a specialized carrier supplied by the U.K.’s Nuclear Transport Solutions (NTS).

The vessel carried the material to the United States arriving on U.S. shores in early May. Upon arrival, U.S. teams unloaded the casks and transported them to the Savannah River Site (SRS) for processing and reuse.

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UK taxpayer helped cover risk of transport of Venezuela’s uranium

NTS is owned by the UK Government via the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA). NTS is described by the NDA as “the most experienced transporter of nuclear material in the world” and has a fleet of three “specialist nuclear vessels”.

UK Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) minister of state Michael Shanks made a statement to parliament on 14 May where he said:

The UK had received requests for assistance from both the United States and the International Atomic Energy Agency which had in turn received a request for assistance from the de facto authorities in Venezuela.

“De facto” means the reality on the ground, which can be different from “de jure”, which means what is officially written down. This reflects the fact that the government in Venezuela entered a period of change due to the arrest of Maduro.

Shanks continued:

The UK’s main contribution was the provision of a purpose-built vessel from Nuclear Transport Solutions to transport the material by sea. The arrival of the material in the US represents the conclusion of the UK assistance to this project.

He went on to explain that it is “normal practice” for the government to inform parliament:

when a government department proposes to undertake a contingent liability in excess of £300,000 for which there is no specific statutory authority.

This was to enable the government to “take on an indemnity” to cover the risk of the operation.

He added:

The indemnity was required to cover any residual risk that was left between commercial insurance and the United States of America’s Price-Anderson Act. The maximum potential liability was capped at £10bn.

The risk of this indemnity being relied upon was deemed to be very low. NTS operate a unique maritime transport capability and have done for half a century. They have had no significant safety incidents over that time.

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Manner and timing of HEU removal was ‘for propaganda purposes’ – campaigner

The Hands Off Venezuela (HOV) Campaign was established in December 2002 and organises “solidarity activities with Venezuela’s Bolivarian revolution”, according to its website.

HOV secretary Jorge Martin gave his reaction to the seizure and the UK’s involvement to the Canary:

The problem is not so much the removal of the HEU, but the very provocative way in which the US has chosen to do so, for propaganda purposes and also to send a message to Iran.

Many Venezuelans are unhappy in general about the loss of sovereignty regarding oil and mineral resources, the control the US exercises over these and other aspects of policy, so the removal of the HEU by the US in the way in which it was carried out adds to the grievances.

The US Government has made removal of Iran’s nuclear materials – specifically its approximately 440kg of HEU – a key objective of the conflict the US started on 28 February.

The US says it has concerns that the HEU could be used to develop nuclear weapons, while Iran maintains that it only wants to use its HEU for peaceful purposes, such as research.

Martin also reacted to the UK’s involvement in the seizure of Venezuela’s HEU. He said:

I do not think the participation of the UK in this particular question is very significant. Of much more significance is the continued participation of Britain in the imperialist bullying of Venezuela for the last 25-30 years, and particularly the seizing of the Venezuelan Central Bank gold reserves deposited in the Bank of England, on instructions from the US.

He also conceded that the HEU “had to be removed for safe disposal once it was no longer of any use for scientific research”, and that his main concern about the US/UK operation was “the manner in which it was done and the timing.”

The NNSA’s 8 May statement said that, since 1996, it had:

removed or confirmed the disposition of over 7,350 kilograms (16,250 pounds) of highly enriched uranium and plutonium from dozens of countries.

The UK’s assistance to the US with its removal of Venezuela’s HEU raises the possibility of UK involvement with any future removal of Iran’s HEU, which would likely be much more complicated.

Complications could arise from the presence of hostile state or non-state armed forces, the fact that the HEU is likely underground and buried under rubble, and that transport out of the region would involve navigating more complex air, land or sea routes than the journey that Venezuela’s HEU took to the US.

Featured image via Jesus Vargas / Getty Images

By Tom Pashby

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As attention on prospective Labour leader (and, for that matter, prospective Labour MP) Andy Burnham mounts, caution is necessary. Whilst Burnham may currently appear to be the messiah in comparison to the dreadful Keir Starmer, he may well just be a very naughty boy.

Burnham’s association with right-wing think tank the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) suggests that Burnham’s politics may not be all that radical.

Andy Burnham and the Centre for Social Justice

Epitome of ‘centrist dad’ vibes – Burnham might seem to Labour MPs scrabbling to salvage the sinking Labour Party ship as some sort of liberal saviour. Alas, to the rest of us – that just means more of the same. Burnham is a continuity candidate in marginally more progressive-looking clothing (if you can even call it that).

And nothing says that better than Burnham’s role for the shady dark money think tank. Since 2023, the former Labour cabinet minister and Greater Manchester Mayor has been a ‘commissioner’ for the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ).

An edgy-sounding name for sure. You’d think it’s a radical organisation working to dismantle systems of oppression. Not so.

The CSJ is the brainchild of ex-DWP ‘grim reaper’ Iain Duncan Smith – and has a chequered history to match its infamous founder.

It brands itself ‘centre right’: a convenient liberal euphemism for right wing. Like all ‘centre right’ misnomers, it oozes the paternalistic urge to paint right-wing fiscal conservative policy as ‘mature’, natural end-point pragmatism as opposed to the capitalist sham it really is.

The think tank is best-known for its role – alongside its founder IDS – as a key architect of Universal Credit. To say that’s been a veritable shitshow would be an understatement.

The forced ‘managed migration’ from old-style benefits has stripped hundreds of thousands of their vital social security. It also left many more much worse off.

But the CSJ isn’t worried about a small matter like shunting hundreds of thousands into destitution. And it hasn’t exactly been shy about its role shaping UC either – treating it like its headline success story.

Labour Party in bed with the CSJ

A right-wing lobby group doesn’t change its stripes. Because where cruel welfare cuts are concerned, that’s only the start. The brilliant LurgeeLiz on X has been collecting the receipts – and the Canary has too.

We previously exposed how the CSJ had been lobbying the Labour Party with its machinations for punching down on poor and disabled people.

And of course, this Labour government has listened. Enter its massively-trumpeted and overblown WorkWell scheme.

WorkWell’s a born and bred Mancunian work programme. Its flop of a precursor scheme started life in the city. And Burnham was all too pleased to host one of the newer glorified work programme’s pilots.

As the Canary’s Rachel Charlton-Dailey previously noted however:

it’s a scheme ran by the DWP where instead of supporting disabled people who can’t work they’ll pass you around to other services.

And that about sums it up: palming people off to pre-existing services. It’s a voluntary scheme, but as Charlton-Dailey also highlighted, there’s no way of knowing:

how many disabled people were forced into this “voluntary” support, despite the DWP knowing they couldn’t work. And who were made to go through the humiliating rigmarole of applying for jobs they’d never be hired for.

One thing we do know, as LurgeeLiz incisively pointed out, is that the scheme targeted disabled people literally in hospital:

Andy Burnham:

Commissioner for the Centre for Social Justice

Said there are too many people on "sickness" benefits (see clip)

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Spearheads the Manchester "WorkWell" programme which has seen a total of 902 ill & disabled people 'helped' with work for £7m, some were in hospital pic.twitter.com/2b2rW0o0Fa

— LurgeeLiz (@LurgeeLife) May 15, 2026

When it comes down to it then, Burnham’s the Labour right’s favourite ‘work as a health outcome’ posterboy.

Spearheading welfare cuts

And where was the CSJ when Labour was attacking Personal Independence Payment (PIP) and slashing Universal Credit’s health element in half? Not kicking up a fuss, that’s for sure.

Funny, for a think tank that says its whole vision is to “influence policies” to do:

all it can to address the root causes of poverty.

Instead, the CSJ was telling ministers ahead of the cuts how “conditionality has become a dirty word” and, you guessed it, called for more conditionality for disabled claimants.

Low and behold, the CSJ thinks kicking disabled people off benefits is a great idea:

Andy Burnham's Centre for Social Justice wants to remove PIP & LCWRA from 1.1m claimants – those currently assessed as too ill or disabled to work

But simultaneously only expects 10% (110,000) to move into work

So enforced poverty on ~1 million chronically ill & disabled people pic.twitter.com/DRDeWb8ZLc

— LurgeeLiz (@LurgeeLife) May 19, 2026

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All the while, Burnham has remained a CSJ commissioner, naturally.

More of the same

At the end of the day, the fact that Burnham rubs shoulders with a think tank that Tory austerity acolyte IDS set in motion tells you a lot about the kind of Labour leader – and prime minister – he would be.

Publicly, Burnham has opposed the disability benefit cuts. However, some are wary that he’ll be a shameless turncoat in power – because the Labour right certainly have form on this:

Considering how quickly and thoroughly every Labour MP betrayed disabled people, I am just assuming Burnham will be exactly the same.

— Spin Decoders (@leith1076) May 14, 2026

And Burnham himself is no stranger to bottling it on opposing benefit cuts either:

Just been reminded Andy Burnham said he’d abstain on Iain Duncan Smith’s Welfare Reform and Work Bill having previously said he’d vote against it. This u-turning is a thing with Labour MPs as we see time and time again.

— Dr Jay Watts (@Shrink_at_Large) September 13, 2025

This was, unironically, Iain Duncan Smith’s vile programme of welfare cuts. Who ever would have guessed the liberal sell-out who’d later join IDS’s diabolical dark money group would put party ‘unity’ over protecting poor and disabled people from Tory austerity?

Featured image via Getty/Ian Forsyth

By Hannah Sharland

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A blistering new report from War on Want, an organisation fighting poverty, has exposed just how complicit the Premier League is in Israel’s genocide of Palestine.

Football is supposed to be a refuge from politics. A place where the roar of the crowd drowns out the world’s worst headlines. But when club sponsors profit from or enable state violence, that refuge becomes a stage for sports washing: the deliberate use of sport to launder reputations and normalise injustice.

War on Want’s report, ‘Red Card: English Premier League Sports washing of Israel’s Atrocities against the Palestinians’, pulls the curtain back on how corporate sponsorships tie Premier League clubs to companies linked to Israel’s occupation, apartheid and alleged genocide.

War on Want found the following evidence of complicity:

Premier League: who’s guilty

War on Want’s research identifies at least 15 corporations sponsoring Premier League clubs that it links to Israel’s actions, naming familiar global brands such as AXA, BP, Cisco, Coca‑Cola, Expedia/Hotels.com, HSBC, Standard Chartered, Oracle and Sony. These are not obscure backers; they are household names whose logos appear on shirts, stadium hoardings, and broadcast graphics, the very places fans look to for identity and trust.

The detailed report also ranks clubs by what it calls complicity, listing teams from Liverpool and Arsenal down to Burnley. That ranking reframes a familiar debate: it’s not just about individual corporate behaviour, but about how clubs amplify corporate reputations and, by extension, political narratives.

What sportswashing looks like

Sportswashing is simple in practice and powerful in effect. A sponsor’s logo on a shirt or around a stadium turns a football match into a marketing moment. Millions of viewers see the brand; the brand’s controversies fade into the background. War on Want argues that this visibility helps normalise and legitimise companies implicated in human rights abuses. Which by extension, the states those companies are linked to. The report is blunt:

Football should not be used to normalise genocide and apartheid.

This is not theoretical. Sponsorship deals are multi-million‑pound contracts that buy sustained exposure. When a club accepts money from a company tied to contested state policies, it hands that company access to a global audience and a veneer of social acceptance. Fans who buy shirts, attend matches, or watch on TV become unwitting participants in a PR campaign.

Clubs often claim neutrality: sport is separate from politics. But neutrality is a choice with consequences. Accepting sponsorship from a company linked to human rights abuses is an active decision that communicates values, whether intended or not. War on Want’s report forces clubs to confront that reality: sponsorship is not a neutral transaction; it is a public alignment.

The briefing also calls on the Premier League, clubs themselves, and the UK government to act. We must show apartheid and genocide the red card. That demand reframes responsibility beyond individual corporations to the institutions that enable them: leagues that approve sponsorships, governments that regulate corporate conduct, and clubs that sign the deals.

What action need to be taken

The recommendations are clear, practical, and uncompromising. The report urges clubs to end sponsorships with companies linked to the occupation and to adopt human rights‑aligned sponsorship policies. They call on the Premier League to publish transparency about sponsorship deals and to adopt rules that prevent clubs from partnering with companies implicated in serious human rights violations. They also press the UK government to use regulatory levers to prevent sports-washing.

These are not cosmetic fixes. Transparency and policy change would shift the balance of power: clubs would have to weigh reputational risk against short‑term revenue, and sponsors would face real consequences for harmful conduct.

Fans are a force

Fans are not passive. Boycotts, protests and public pressure have forced corporate and sporting change before. Essentially this report is a rallying call to fans to recognise the stakes and to act now, not to silence the game, but to demand that the game not be used to sanitise suffering. When supporters ask hard questions about who pays the bills, clubs and sponsors feel it in the market and in the media.

The power of fans is simple: attention. Sponsors crave it. Remove or redirect that attention, and the calculus changes. This is about more than football. It’s about how global brands operate in a world where corporate power often outstrips democratic oversight. Sportswashing is one tactic among many but it’s effective because sport is emotional, visible, and culturally central. The briefing uses football’s visibility to expose a broader pattern: when corporations profit from or enable state violence, they should not be allowed to hide behind the spectacle of sport.

Final word

War on Want’s Red Card is a compact, urgent briefing: it names sponsors, ranks clubs, and issues a clear moral challenge. The message is short and sharp. Football should not be used to normalise genocide and apartheid. Regardless of if it comes with a demand for accountability from clubs, leagues and governments. F

ans, too, have a role: attention is influence, and influence can force change. The pitch is no place for silence when human rights are at stake. If football means anything, it’s that the the fans views matter. War on Want’s Red Card hands the fans further reason to stand on the right side of history.

Featured image via Getty/Marc Atkins

By Faz Ali

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On 18 May, we reported that online influencer “EDobbins” had sexually harassed a child at Tommy Robinson’s Unite the Kingdom rally. Since then, the Rochdale-based micro-celebrity has attempted to defend himself, but no one’s buying it:

Scott Margerison aka E.Dobbin is feeling the pressure from his video. He claims the person he harassed is not a child (because she has tattoos and her mum was ‘having a joke’), and that anyone who is concerned with his creepy behaviour should tell the police. Sounds like a… https://t.co/xD8IBGsby0 pic.twitter.com/Gg09Z75gUU

— HUMAN WA$TE (@Dplanet) May 19, 2026

Excuses

In the video above, EDobbin said:

Hello everyone. So I’m getting loads of messages telling me that I’m a nonce. So ‘nonce’ means ‘Not of Normal Criminal Exercise’.

Technically, it stands for ‘Not on Normal Courtyard Exercise’, referencing the sex offenders who weren’t permitted to mix with other inmates. It’s now common British slang for “paedophile”, and the reason people are calling him a ‘nonce’ is because he published a video in which he sexually harassed a girl who was said to be 15 years old.

EDobbin continued:

If you truly believe that I am a criminal and that I have criminally done something and engaged in something what I shouldn’t be doing, then please report me to the police. I will happily engage with conversation with the police. The girl that I spoke to, now, if we can get a message to this girl so she can just tell us all how old she is, she’s got tattoos.

People have disputed the idea that she had tattoos, and we couldn’t see any ourselves:

He’s saying she was over 20, but that’s irrelevant. He was told she was 15, yet still followed her and joked, “I’m going to jail in a minute.” He knew he was being a wrong’un.

— Mukhtar (@I_amMukhtar) May 19, 2026

EDobbin also said:

Her mum was having a joke. You’ve got to have a look into it a little bit deeper than the surface level shit that you’re all used to. You’re so toxic, you just jump on. If you watch The Simpsons, you lot are all the people who just chase The Simpsons with pitchforks and attack, and attack, and attack. And you’re all stupid c*nts.

That girl was not 15 years old who I was talking to. She was over 20-something.

Hopefully, she will potentially put a message out just to prove it, that she is.

EDobbin would later claim the girl contacted him:

Lying cunt update.
Report his Instagram.
Report his TikTok.
Report his Facebook.
Get. Him. Gone.
https://t.co/oXyO2yE7pu pic.twitter.com/13mCn10dLU

— Zomby Pop (@TheZombyPop) May 19, 2026

The Instagram in question belongs to a young woman who looks similar to the girl in that they’re both brunettes. They don’t seem to be the same person upon closer inspection, but it’s difficult to say conclusively, because the woman on Instagram could be using any number of filters or camera tricks.

In his video, EDobbin also said:

There’s no such thing as negative press.

And:

F*ck yourself.

This was all filmed in a van with a mattress in the back of it:

The fuckin bed in the back https://t.co/zfAmYUxaQN

— Xannon The Buses (@xannon199) May 19, 2026

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Caught on camera

EDobbin is an incredibly strange individual who believes the Earth is flat and that mountains are the fossilised remains of dragons. As we said on 18 May, however, being an oddball is no excuse for behaving like an out-and-out paedophile.

This is what happened in the video which originally brought him to national attention:

At the start of the video, ‘influencer’ EDobbin greets a trio of men in Union Jack suits before putting his arm around a passing child and describing her as “my little girlfriend”. After asking what her name is, the teenage girl’s mother said:

She ain’t no child bride.

When asked how old the girl is, the mother clearly answered “15”. Whoever captioned the video wrote “16”, which is the legal age of consent in the UK.

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Suggesting that EDobbin definitely heard “15”, he responded:

Fucking hell. How old are you really? Please, I’m going to go to jail in a minute.

Following the above, EDobbin proceeded to follow the mother and child down the street, asking the young girl for her “details”, and saying “look at that” as he secretly filmed her.

As people have highlighted, EDobbin wears glasses that allow him to covertly film the people he speaks with:

Mate, if you're not a pervert, why are you wearing Zuckerberg's Pervert Goggles? https://t.co/5p7eKE75Lr

— The Marquiz de Slade (@Mudkipstoat23) May 19, 2026

Reporting on the Meta Ray-Ban glasses, Open wrote:

What Makes Meta’s Smart Glasses Difficult to Spot?

The camera in Meta’s Ray-Bans sits flush within the frame, and the recording indicator light is reportedly so dim in daylight that most bystanders never notice it.

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To the untrained eye, they are ordinary eyewear, which makes covert recording effortless.

Who Is Already Being Filmed Without Their Knowledge?

Reports have emerged of women being secretly recorded in public by men wearing AI glasses, often for prank or unsolicited content.

One woman told the BBC that when she requested a video of herself be removed, she was told it was “a paid service.” Since public photography is broadly legal, victims have little recourse

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When people talk about the risks of this technology, EDobbin is precisely the sort of person they’re warning about.

Grim

The grim irony in all this is that many of those who spoke at the Unite the Kingdom rally claim to be protectors of women. In reality, these people ignore their friends to focus on a minority of a minority for political capital. Unite the Kingdom organiser Tommy Robinson is among the worst offenders for this:

British grooming gangs pic.twitter.com/p00ZHFYCBH

— The Saviour (@TheSaviour) May 18, 2026

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As Maddison Wheeldon wrote for the Canary on 20 October:

Women and girls have a legitimate reason to feel increasingly unsafe in our society, but it’s not because of immigrants and foreigners, it is far simpler than that; it’s because of men.

I can hear the protestations already, ‘Not All Men’, and of course, that would be ridiculous to assert. So then, why do we feel so comfortable to slap a label on all male immigrants, simply because the establishment tells us to?

When we dig just a little deeper, it very quickly becomes obvious that the ‘threat of the immigrant’, touted by the mainstream press and far-right pundits is as baseless as their moral consciences. Trust me, it would be wonderfully helpful if there were identifying characteristics that could help women and girls stay safe, but that is a complete fiction.

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Another grim reality is that Black and minoritized migrant women face additional challenges on this front as a result of government failings, as the women’s organisation Hibiscus stated:

At a time when meaningful action is urgently needed, the government has once again failed to address the structural inequalities that make women vulnerable to violence in the first place. There are no concrete commitments to invest in specialist support services, no long-term funding guarantees for by and for organisations, and no serious recognition of the socio-economic and political realities facing Black and minoritised migrant women. Instead, several of the proposed bills appear either dangerously indifferent to these realities or intentionally punitive in nature.

A serious issue

While it’s easy to ridicule figures like EDobbin, it’s crucial to remember that there’s nothing funny about men like him to the women and children they harass. We’ve very little time for the adults who attended the Unite the Kingdom rally, but even they don’t deserve to be followed and harassed by creeps like this, and that’s especially true for any children they took with them.

Featured image via Twitter

By Willem Moore

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The largest ever gathering of people dressed as slugs slid into Westminster on 19 May, in support of forests and ancient woodlands. They were calling on the government to deliver on its promise to restore the nation’s ‘ghost woods’ (ancient woodlands buried beneath timber plantations) before they disappear for good.

From Parliament Square, the procession slowly inched its way to Defra’s offices to deliver a petition of over 145,000 signatures.

National treasure Judi Dench is among those backing the petition. It urges Defra and Forestry England to move faster on their commitment to restore these smothered ancient woodlands by 2030. Forestry England is the body responsible for managing and promoting publicly owned forests in England. People from every single constituency in the UK have signed the petition.

MP Andrew George attended the event, alongside more than 50 costumed nature lovers, A lemon slug led the way. This is a rare, bright yellow species native to England’s ancient woodlands.

Waving placards reading “The slime is up” and “No more sluggish progress”, the unhurried march took place at a critical moment for the nation’s forests. The government is preparing a new Trees Action Plan aimed at improving the resilience and condition of the country’s woodland.

Ancient woodlands are vital for biodiversity

Speaking at the event, Wild Card campaigner Rosie Smart-Knight said:

Today’s slugrising puts the spotlight on our vanishing ghost woods. Only 1.6% of England remains ancient woodland*, after vast areas were replaced with single-species plantations.

The government has promised to restore these sites to rich, thriving forests, but progress has been painfully slow.

Planting new trees is important, but we can’t afford to sidestep what’s already here. Ancient woodlands are irreplaceable and support more biodiversity than any other land habitat in the UK.

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If we don’t act now, we risk letting these ecosystems slip away and no amount of new planting will bring them back.

Wild Card teamed up with Oscar-winning actress and nature-lover Dench and people-powered campaign group 38 Degrees to launch the petition. This came after analysis revealed that Forestry England is woefully behind on fulfilling its targets. Matthew McGregor, CEO at 38 Degrees, said:

We fight every day for a fairer, greener Britain. Almost 150,000 of us from every single constituency across the country urgently want our nation’s ancient woodlands restored.

Forestry England and Defra would be wise to listen to the public and save these ‘ghost woods’ before it’s too late.

The UK is one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world. And the nation’s forests are in a particularly dire state. A Woodland Trust report found woodland biodiversity is continuing to decline, with only 9% of England’s forests in favourable condition.

Ancient woodlands are capable of supporting more biodiversity than any other land-based habitat in the UK. So their restoration has never been so crucial.

Featured image via Nigel Howard Media

By The Canary

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A new report by the Palestinian Liberation Organisation’s Negotiations Affairs Department marks the 78^th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba. It argues that violent attacks against Palestinians by Israeli colonial settlers in the occupied West Bank are not isolated incidents. Instead, they are part of a coordinated and institutionalised system, tied directly to settlement expansion and territorial control.

Settler violence is the main method of consolidating control over Palestinian land

The report, titled Israeli Settler Terror Unmasked: State institutional roles, legal tools, and international legal consequences, documents an escalating pattern of violence carried out by these illegal colonists against Palestinian communities across the occupied territory.

It argues that this settler violence is now a main method of dispossession, fragmenting communities and consolidating Israeli occupation control over Palestinian land. Alongside settlement construction, land confiscation, military restrictions, and political policy, this violence aims to weaken Palestinian presence in strategically important areas of the West Bank.

The report claims that settlement expansion and settler violence are both components of a wider territorial project by the Israeli occupation government:

enabled, financed, legitimised, and operationalised through government portfolios, [with terror being] a central mechanism and a key tool of this territorial control.

This project seeks to expand control over the occupied territory, while eroding Palestinian protection. Through its various ministries, military bodies, legal mechanisms, educational structures, and grassroots settler networks, the Israeli occupation’s government now operates through a unified annexation system that shapes conditions on the ground.

Multiple ministries play a role in facilitating settlement growth, infrastructure development, and security arrangements across the occupied West Bank. The report highlights ministries responsible for defence coordination, settlements and national missions, transportation, agriculture, heritage, communications, and national security. Budget allocations, sometimes amounting to billions of Shekels, cited in the report include funding for settler only roads, improvement of settler communication coverage, support of settler “shepherds”, theft of West Bank heritage sites, and the arming of illegal settlers.

Land, law and territorial transformation

The report describes how land is being reclassified and controlled, and it outlines a series of mechanisms – legal, administrative, and military – through which land is transferred, restricted, or reallocated.

These include declarations of “state land,” the use of military zones, nature reserve designations, and infrastructure-related confiscations. Far from being neutral planning tools, the purpose of these is to gradually reduce Palestinian access to land, while enabling illegal settlement expansion.

According to the report, “colonial farm installations”, also known as outposts:

serve as the ultimate method of annexing land for settlement purposes.

They are a key instrument in controlling large areas of rural land. Through grazing, fencing, surveillance infrastructure, and informal settlement expansion, hundreds of thousands of dunums of land have been brought under such control in recent years, with the vast majority located in Area C, where civil and military authority remains under Israeli occupation control. By 2025, 14 percent of the occupied West Bank was controlled by 156 of these colonial farm installations.

Beyond institutions and land policy, the report turns to what it calls the “educational ecosystem” sustaining a radical settler ideology. It describes a network of religious schools, pre-military academies, youth movements, and informal educational environments that collectively shape identity and political outlook:

systematically embedding exclusionary, supremacist, and anti-Palestinian worldviews into the consciousness of large segments of Jewish youth.

This system, the report states, ensures a worldview that is centered on entitlement to “holy land” and confrontation. Expansion is normalised and terror is enabled on the ground. Yeshivot and Hesder programmes combine religious study with military service, producing graduates who view settlement activity as a civic and spiritual duty. Youth movements and informal hilltop communities are described as reinforcing these ideas through direct engagement with land, agriculture, and territorial activity.

Education, religious figures and institutions normalise settler violence and settlement expansion

Influential religious figures and organisations shape ideological narratives that emphasise historical entitlement to the land and religious duty tied to territorial expansion. These messages contribute to a generational culture that normalises violence and expansion.

The report also focuses on “patterns of settler terror” targeting Palestinian civilians and communities since October 2023. It documents a range of incidents including assaults on farmers, destruction of property, arson attacks, livestock theft, and damage to water infrastructure. These events are presented not as isolated outbreaks but as recurring patterns that intensify during agricultural seasons, especially the olive harvest. The report highlights repeated targeting of rural communities, especially in Area C, where the Israeli occupation authorities maintain full control and settlers operate with impunity. This reflects:

a deliberate strategy to render Palestinian life unviable.

Testimonies included in the report describe coordinated attacks involving groups of settlers, often masked and armed, who carry out raids on agricultural land, homes, and vehicles. The violence is often supported or tolerated by the Israeli occupation authorities,

Reference is also given to religious sites, including mosques and churches, which have been damaged or attacked in separate incidents. Water infrastructure is another recurring focus, with repeated allegations of sabotage of wells, pumps, and irrigation systems. The overall effect, over time, is not only physical damage and destruction, but a gradual erosion of Palestinian rural life and economic viability.

The Israeli occupation operates an apartheid legal and enforcement system in the occupied West Bank, which works hand-in-hand with settlers attacking Palestinians. This creates conditions that almost always enable settlers to evade accountability, whatever their crime.

Settlers, police, army, courts and government all work together against Palestinians, but are illegal under international law

According to the report, Israeli occupation military and police “often show passivity-or even direct involvement-in settler terror attacks”, while 94 percent of investigations into settler-related violence are closed without any indictment.

Settler colonial terrorism in the territory of the State of Palestine is part of Israel’s apartheid regime, illegal under international law. In 2024, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) also deemed the entire Israeli occupation of Palestine as illegal.

International law places a series of obligations on Israel, third states, and international institutions. Israel must immediately end its occupation of Palestinian territory, stop all its settlement expansion, and remove settlers from occupied areas. The Israeli occupation is also required to provide reparations to Palestinians for damages caused by occupation and settler violence, including compensation, restitution, and guarantees of non-repetition.

The report argues that Israel has a legal duty to investigate and prosecute settlers and state officials accused of war crimes or crimes against humanity, while dismantling its apartheid system based on systematic domination over Palestinians. This, it says, would require structural reforms, including changes to legal and educational institutions.

Other countries are obligated not to recognise “Israeli” annexation or settlements as lawful, and should avoid supporting activities linked to the occupation. It calls on states and international bodies to pursue accountability through sanctions, universal jurisdiction cases, and support for investigations by the International Criminal Court.

The report aims to shift attention away from isolated incidents, towards what it describes as “structural conditions of control, displacement, and impunity”, which is the current reality on the ground.

Featured image via PLO 

By Charlie Jaay

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Israeli soldiers have admitted that their mission is to destroy villages and prevent inhabitants from returning home, which directly contradicts their Zionist government’s claims that they are only targeting Hezbollah.

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In an interview with Haaretz, Israeli soldiers said:

The only mission is to continue the destruction. There is no other mission. ⁣

They added:

At the end of every day, there’s a report on how many homes were destroyed.

One commander even told Haaretz that Israel’s claims of only targeting “terrorist infrastructure” are false:

It isn’t terrorist infrastructure – we’re destroying everything.

Israel has been destroying homes and other civilian property, such as schools and churches, in more than 55 towns that it is illegally occupying in Southern Lebanon. The villages are predominantly Shia Muslim, and inhabitants are unable to return home.

Israel agreed to a ‘ceasefire’ in Lebanon on April 16. However, since then, it has violated that agreement almost every day. Even Netanyahu posted a video of IOF attacks in Lebanon with the caption “Lebanon – continuing.”

No ceasefire

Israel has displaced more than 1m people and killed over 2,500 since the beginning of March.

The Israeli government’s official line has always been that the IOF is targeting Hezbollah infrastructure.

Yet we have heard IOF soldiers, more government officials than I can count, Israeli journalists and influencers, and so many more inciting genocide. Actors, footballers, heads of CEO’s, settlers and mayors – the list is endless.

To make matters worse, we have an almost endless supply of video evidence on social media, which proves that Israel has a somewhat precarious relationship with the truth.

The IOF has repeatedly been seen destroying the olive trees of Palestinians. When did they become terrorists? 

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Despite all of this evidence, Western governments and media outlets parrot the ‘official Israeli line’ about targeting Hezbollah. It’s amazing what money and the fear of being nuked can do to your editorial process.

‘Greater Israel’

Contrary to the illegal settler state’s government, Israel’s goal has always been the complete and systematic destruction of civilian infrastructure. After all, its goal is a ‘Greater Israel’ – which Zionists first mentioned in 1967.

It is used to refer to the territories Israel illegally stole in 1967: the Palestinian territories, the Golan Heights in Syria, and Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.

However, Zionists have also referred to it as including all of Palestine, Lebanon, and Jordan, along with significant parts of Syria, Iraq, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

In 2024, Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s finance minister, advocated expanding Israel’s borders. He said:

It is written that the future of Jerusalem is to expand to Damascus, invoking the “Greater Israel” ideology.

According to Middle East Eye, he then suggested that:

Israel would gradually grow to encompass not only all Palestinian territories but also parts of Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Saudi Arabia.

Additionally, during Israel’s genocide in Gaza, an IOF soldier wore a patch showing a map of “Greater Israel” on his uniform. This map included parts of Syria, Iraq, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia.

Of course, that goal will not be possible without Israel destroying everything in its path.

For a long time now, Israel has made its intentions clear. It’s textbook colonialism wrapped up in ‘never again’.

International law?

United Nations (UN) experts have repeatedly warned that destroying civilian housing and infrastructure is a war crime. According to the UN:

systematic or widespread bombardment of housing, civilian objects and infrastructure are strictly prohibited by international humanitarian law, criminal law and human rights law.

Moreover, under international law, every person living in occupied territories has the right to engage in armed resistance.

Hezbollah literally only exists because Israel invaded and illegally occupied Lebanon in 1982.

Hezbollah’s main foundational goal was to fight the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon. The group’s resistance to Israeli occupation was instrumental in the IOF leaving Lebanon in 2000, after 18 years.

Importantly, armed resistance is legal under international law. A United Nations General Assembly resolution states:

The General Assembly,

Reaffirms the legitimacy of the struggle of peoples for independence, territorial integrity, national unity and liberation from colonial domination, apartheid and foreign occupation by all available means, including armed struggle;

Israeli definition of terrorism

The Israeli government decides someone is a terrorist, and normal rules of international law do not apply. That’s pretty convenient. Of course, the rest of the world follows. If Israel says they’re terrorists, then they must be. At this point, if Netanyahu told most Western leaders to jump off a cliff for the good of Israel, I think they would.

From where I’m standing, there’s only one terrorist group indiscriminately killing children and bombing hospitals – and that’s the Israeli government.

Featured image via Adri Salido / Getty Images

By The Canary

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Sky News had a segment today discussing the government’s rumoured proposals to cap food prices on essential goods such as bread, eggs and milk.

However, rather than show any awareness about the back-breaking burdens on families and vulnerable people surviving this ‘cost of greed crisis’, Sky News appeared to have far more sympathy for the big supermarkets.

Don’t hold your breath though: a government official quickly stepped in to rule out any discussion of price caps, once again showing just how little establishment parties prioritise the interests of the 99%.

Needless to say, presenter Wilfred Frost gave a pretty pathetic bit of lip-service to the need to watch out for profit-seeking price gouging. But once again, the media and political establishment side with the richest in society while rising costs push even more people towards hunger in the days, weeks and months ahead.

Moreover, those prices never come down, which is a win for the billionaires, while ordinary people suffer hunger and negative health consequences.

Can you imagine a news channel presenter editorialising that price controls are a good idea.

Of course you can't.

Here's Eton educated Wilfred Frost explaining why capping the prices of essential items so people can afford to eat is a bad idea. pic.twitter.com/2Hh3ZH7aKp

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— Saul Staniforth (@SaulStaniforth) May 20, 2026

Families must consider ‘poor’ billionaire owners?!

One thing is abundantly clear: our political and media establishment has abandoned the very people it claims to represent. Instead of standing up for the public, politicians and the mainstream media now ask us to sympathise with supermarkets operating in an industry that continues to generate enormous profits.

Meanwhile, those same supermarkets have posted record-breaking profits throughout the cost-of-living crisis. Or, more accurately, the cost of greed crisis. Now, profits look set to rise yet again while more hard-working families fall into food poverty.

Once again, vulnerable people will pay the price because their basic needs simply don’t rank as a priority in a society that increasingly protects profit before people.

What’s even worse, is that it seems these wild profits aren’t enough for these greedy monsters.

Clearly their appetite is ever surging, as our food prices will, whilst appetites go unsated for millions living in poverty.

In April, the Canary reported on surge pricing, ‘greedflation’ and the negative impact this would have.

But, hey, we can’t forget the struggling CEOs

Who are we kidding? Of course, CEOs’ pay will continue to increase exponentially. This week the Canary reported on how the boss of Tesco’s salary had increased by almost a million pounds.

This isn’t only in our food sector of course. All essentials are subject to this as James Wright wrote:

Water and energy companies are also making significant profit that further shows the ‘cost of living crisis’ is manufactured by the current system. In 2022/23, water utilities in the UK made £1.7bn — almost double what they made in 2018/19. And in the first quarter of 2026, BP more than doubled its profits. Clearly, the same trend is seen with Tesco in food retail.

Food prices up 50%.
Wages barely moved.
Billionaire wealth exploded.

This isn’t a cost of living crisis.
It’s a greed crisis.

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— Harry Eccles (@Heccles94) May 19, 2026

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Poverty and suffering a mere inconvenience to some

For as long as history has been recorded, the super-rich have treated poverty and human suffering as little more than inconveniences. Billionaires repeatedly put profit before people and reduce working-class families to unlimited sources of wealth extraction.

At this rate, you could almost imagine corporations charging us for the air we breathe — all while executives demand even more sympathy for protecting their margins.

People have had absolutely enough of the greed that has defined this era.

Across Britain, families watch billionaires move the goalposts yet again, but the public can only tolerate so much exploitation before anger boils over.

Then, with the help of super-rich far-right conmen like Nigel Farage, they pit our communities against refugees. Finally, if that doesn’t work, they pit us against one another.

But instead of the media insisting on changing course, they keep finding new ways to make rising costs feel permanent and unavoidable. Consequently, suffocating pressures for ordinary people in the months and years ahead will go on unabated.

Therefore, the 99% can no longer afford to ignore the class war being waged against them while living standards keep falling day by day. Ordinary people do not have a common enemy in refugees or immigrants, no matter how hard parties like Reform try to sell that narrative.

The real threat lies with corporate billionaires and major corporations that dodge taxes, hoard wealth, and keep grinding working people down while the rest of society pays the price.

Featured image via Matthew Horwood/ Getty Images

By Maddison Wheeldon

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76 civil society organisations have written to the justice secretary David Lammy, urging the UK government to act on a “long-overdue” commitment to protect basic human rights in UK law.

Just Fair has coordinated the joint letter and published it on 20 May. It marks exactly 50 years since the UK ratified the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). This was a landmark treaty recognising rights to housing, food, health, education, social security and decent work.

Signatories warn that, despite this long-standing commitment, these human rights remain largely unenforceable in UK law. And this is leaving millions of people unable to rely on the basic foundations of a decent life.

Jess McQuail, director of Just Fair, said:

Fifty years ago, the UK made a promise, that everyone should be able to rely on the essentials of a decent life. Today, that promise is still being broken.

Millions of people are going without the essentials, not by accident, but because these rights are not properly protected in our laws. Delay is no longer acceptable. Incorporation is the next step, and it is long overdue.

The letter calls on the UK government to commit to incorporating economic, social and cultural rights into domestic law. That way, human rights can be enforced in practice and provide real accountability when systems fail.

Campaigners say not only would this help tackle poverty and inequality. It would also offer a shared foundation that brings people together, at a time of growing division in UK politics. McQuail added:

At a time when some seek to divide communities and scapegoat others, rights offer a different path, one rooted in dignity, fairness and shared standards we can all rely on.

Incorporating these rights into UK law is a practical step towards building a fairer and more just society.

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The call follows recent recommendations from the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. It urged the UK to give these human rights full legal effect and access to justice when they are violated.

Fifty years after ratification, campaigners say the UK must now move from promise to delivery.

Featured image via Scott Olson / Getty Images

By The Canary

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