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If you’re anything like me, you’ll have been rocking skirts all summer.
I love having my legs loose and knowing that, even when the sweat gets unbearable, the air can reach my chafing thighs.
But even I know that there are some moments when you have to switch out your skirt for trousers.
Public transport isn’t exactly short skirt friendly, and when it’s windy outside, you don’t want to have to think about being upskirted by the wind.
Or maybe, you’re just a trousers person! But not all trousers are created equal for summertime. We all know the allure of a linen or wide-legged pair come summer, and this year cropped trousers are trending.
To make sure you stay bang on forecast, we’ve dug through our favourite sites to find 13 of the very best wide legged and cropped trousers to keep you breezing through the heatwave.
Reform UK has sparked outrage after putting forward plans which would criminalise election campaign materials in Gaelic and Scots. Another case of English supremacy within the Union…
The hard-right political party has endorsed plans to criminalise all political materials that are not written or spoken in English or Welsh. Nigel Farage‘s party has moved an amendment to a Westminster bill that would, if passed, make campaigning in other national languages illegal.
If Reform’s amendment to the Representation of the People Bill passes, those breaching the law could face jail time for up to six months. Those prosecuted could also face unspecified fines.
Reform UK’s deputy leader Richard Tice brought forward the amendment. Reform MPs Lee Anderson, Sarah Pochin, Danny Kruger, Robert Jenrick, Andrew Rosindell, and Suella Braverman all backed it.
Backlash to Reform’s English supremacism
The SNP have said that Reform UK are plotting “to crush Scotland’s native Scots and Gaelic languages“. Scotland’s ruling party has taken various measures to safeguard ancient Scottish languages. The SNP said Reform’s amendment was “despicable” and “anti-Scottish”.
The SNP Highlands and Islands representative, Maree Todd MSP, said Reform’s reactionary plans were
all too reminiscent of the brutal anti-Gaelic laws of the Highland Clearances.
This despicable anti-Scottish amendment is deeply telling – Reform want to see any trace of our native languages removed from Scottish politics.
Not content with plans to cut our MSPs and ‘review’ the powers of Holyrood, Farage and his cronies want to threaten jail time upon anyone in Scotland who publishes political materials in Scots or Gaelic.
Todd called on Reform to “do the right thing”. The MSP for Highlands and Islands, where more Scots speak endangered minority languages, said Reform must:
apologise to the people of Scotland for attempting to criminalise election materials written in Scottish languages.
She demanded the party “immediately withdraw this outrageous amendment”.
Language specialist and journalist Sophia Smith Galer branded Reform UK’s proposal as “plainly discriminatory“. The linguist says that it targets both indigenous UK languages and multilingual communities.
Smith Galer told Byline Times:
It’s discriminatory not only to the other indigenous languages of the UK … but also to individuals who could be publishing political literature in any of the migrant languages that also have a home here.
It comes after Farage launched an attack on bilingual children in Glasgow last year, many of whom speak Gaelic. Previously, Farage bizarrely accused them of “culture smashing” the city.
Alba’s history as a multilingual country
‘Alba’ is the Gaelic name for historic Scotland, seen on official signs. Gaelic was given official status alongside Scots in June 2025 via the Scottish Languages Bill, which was voted through unanimously.
Around 130,000 Scots have some Gaelic skills, according to the 2022 Census, while nearly 2.5 million have some skills in Scots. There was some argument that Gaelic was given greater priority than Scots. Last year, Emma Grae wrote in the National:
while Gaelic initiatives had a budget of at least £28 million between 2021 and 2023, Scots initiatives received just £448,000 of support…
Eventually both received the recognition they deserved in the Languages Bill. But the struggle for Gaelic and Scots language recognition is long and arduous. It has roots dating back to the “unification” of Scottish and English crowns in 1707, the early imperial period.
This article in the Scottish Left Review (re-)frames that sordid history, especially that century’s Highland Clearances, in considered detail:
In the two centuries following unification, the Anglicised Scots of the lowlands would fit into the new imperial Britain built upon capitalism, expansionism, and Protestantism. In contrast, the Gaels of west Scotland’s Highlands and Islands would be violently eradicated, along with their clan-based way of life and Celtic Catholicism.
In their place, their ancestral lands would be monetised to serve the colonial centre, and the brutally depopulated islands and dells would be mythologised as gloriously empty get-away destinations for those seeking an escape from life at the centre of empire. This is a story we are more familiar with in Ireland, and the Gaelic peoples of Ireland and western Scotland are closely connected.
… a campaign of ethnic cleansing was carried out in the western Highlands and Islands. This began with the erasure of Gaelic identity. Clan tartans were banned, as was the playing of the bagpipes. Such policies were intended to destroy Gaelic identity, born of an inherent racism held among the English and Anglicised Scots towards the Gaelic way of life.
They also served the practical purpose of diminishing clan identity and, thus, destroying the clans as a political force. The collectivist farms were broken up, and replaced with capitalist land farming – an approach familiar in the lowlands, but incompatible with the clan system of the Highlands and Islands.
… Whilst the scale of the clearances is dwarfed by the racist excesses of the British colonial project elsewhere in the world, it ought to be considered among them.
… Like Ireland, the Scottish islands are among the only places in western Europe now home to less people than at the start of the eighteenth century. The Clearances were not only an act of genocide, but an extremely successful one.
Featured image via the Canary
The post No, Waitrose, men don’t have periods appeared first on spiked.
New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s office says the Garden State should get a cut of the MetLife Stadium grass FIFA plans to sell to soccer fans.
Soccer’s global governing body, a Zurich-based nonprofit, is plotting to charge $450 for sod from this weekend’s World Cup final. But like a lot of the costs for hosting the World Cup, the pitch was subsidized by local hosts.
“New Jersey paid for the vast majority of the total expense for the pitch at MetLife stadium, so New Jersey taxpayers should share in any proceeds from this latest money grab,” Sherrill spokesperson Sean Higgins told New Jersey Playbook.
This is only the latest battlefield in the turf war between FIFA and Sherrill. FIFA did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
Yes, some Gen Z trends, like obscure internet slang, are the kind of thing you’d expect from a younger generation.
But others – like a rise in birdwatching and a newfound fixation on nuns – might be a little more surprising.
Some articles say under-30s are booking convent stays instead of beach getaways. Meanwhile The Dominican Sisters Open Mic, a podcast hosted by Catholic nuns, has gone mega-viral.
Sister Gemma Simmonds, a sister of the Congregation of Jesus and author of A Time to Reflect, told HuffPost UK the appeal might stem from younger people being exhausted by “a life of endless optionality and FOMO [fear of missing out]”.
“Our fixed rhythms of prayer, work and community, and a life not built around consumption, are being experienced as freeing rather than restrictive,” she added.
While previous years have paved the way for ‘hot girl summers’, 2026 is giving a new energy entirely, which some have coined ‘nun girl summer’.
What is a “nun girl summer”?
The term is a play on Meg Thee Stallion’s years-old “hot girl summer” trend, which is “about being unapologetically YOU, having fun, being confident, living YOUR truth, being the life of the party etc”.
Sister Simmonds told us “nun girl summer” is also about being ourselves.
“I think it might look and feel free: free from the exhaustion caused by the expectation that every domain of the self is permanently being watched and rated for optimisation, including by the person herself,” she said.
“Nuns don’t need to perform for the camera – we are convinced that we are ‘awesomely and wonderfully made’. If you believe that, you don’t need to wait for anyone else’s approval of how you look or sound, how you rate in anyone else’s estimation.
“It’s a different account of female worth that reframes identity away from being chosen or wanted by a man, toward a life whose meaning doesn’t depend on romantic uptake at all.”
Indeed, comments under a viral Open Mic clip include wistful asides about the sense of female community the Sisters seem to have. One reads, “Waittt the idea with living with your girles”, while another jokes, “I’m one situationship away from this”.
Of course, not all of these women want to live in a convent, and many are not religious. So, how can we embody a “nun girl summer” if we’re not (excuse the pun) already in the habit?
4 rules for a “nun girl summer”
1) Be profoundly present
We’ve written before at HuffPost UK about the arrival fallacy, which makes it hard to enjoy what you’ve achieved due to worrying about what you haven’t got yet.
Sister Simmonds said it’s important to get in touch “with your own capacity for appreciation of the here and now, not always looking around the corner for what’s next” – that way, you’re present “to the richness” of what’s right in front of you.
2) Log off
Not only is it great for your sleep, but the Sister said mindfully staying away from your screens for an hour or so a day might make a big difference to how you feel, too.
Try to build in unplugged periods like “meals, a commute, an hour before bed, where nothing is being produced or consumed, just being”, she advised.
3) Stick to your routine, even when you don’t feel like it
You might already know that sticking to the same bedtime and wake time is great for your health, and that half-assing a workout is far better than skipping exercise altogether.
Sister Simmonds told us that much of nuns’ daily rhythm is “non-negotiable, regardless of mood”.
Whatever your reflective or health practices are, for her, “prayer works precisely because it doesn’t wait for you to feel like it”.
4) Build the capacity for real relationships
The Sister said it’s important to make space for relationships “that are non-transactional, that don’t come with an expiry date, that aren’t provisional, networked and subject to ghosting”.
“This can be hard work when you’re practising living with differences in age, outlook, culture, but it’s a strength worth building,” she said.
Research has shown that a strong sense of community may help to reduce dementia risk, and could even make you live longer.
Following Morocco’s defeat to France in the World Cup quarter-finals last week, violent disorder broke out in central London. Footage on social media showed hundreds of people gathered on the street after the match had finished. Some are captured throwing fireworks, bottles and other objects at Met officers. A few people, seemingly injured, can be seen being tended to by police. One officer was injured, and four people were arrested.
It seems pretty clear who the protagonists were. Edgware Road is home to a long-established Arab population, including many people of Moroccan heritage. And plenty of those seemingly involved in last week’s disturbances were wearing Moroccan football shirts or were draped in the Moroccan flag.
What happened in Edgware was replicated in other parts of Europe. Moroccan fans in the Netherlands took to the streets after the France defeat in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht, forcing riot police to intervene. This unrest followed the street ‘parties’ after Morocco knocked the Netherlands out of the World Cup in their round-of-32 fixture. During Moroccan fans’ celebrations, Dutch police officers were hit by stones, fireworks and other objects.
In Germany, Morocco’s defeat led to violent clashes between Moroccan fans and the police in Düsseldorf. These resulted in several arrests, as well as injuries to supporters and police alike. In France, the streets did remain comparatively calm. But this was largely thanks to the presence of over 20,000 police officers and gendarmes on the streets of Paris and other major cities.
It would be unfair to focus purely on the misbehaviour of Moroccan fans. There is a broader problem of football-related troublemaking among North African communities in Western Europe. In London, in the neighbourhood known as ‘Little Cairo’, also on Edgware Road, Egyptian fans clashed with police, climbed on double-decker buses and disrupted traffic after Egypt defeated Australia in their round-of-32 match.
In France, Algerian fans have, in the past, had serious clashes with the police, especially during the 2019 African Cup of Nations (AFCON). This year, there was trouble in several French cities following Algeria’s 2-0 loss to Nigeria in their AFCON quarter-final game. Much like the behaviour of Moroccan fans in the Netherlands during this World Cup, the results of the matches are not necessarily a predictor of whether or not disorder will unfold.
This new hooliganism shows that all is not well when it comes to integration in Western Europe. It also shows that the UK is far from being immune to trouble, despite its relative success historically at cohering diverse communities compared with its European counterparts. It seems that neither the UK’s laissez-faire multiculturalism nor France’s strict republican universalism is quelling football-connected disorder within North African communities.
It certainly looks as if the emotions prompted by an international football tournament are exacerbating pre-existing tensions in European societies – especially among Muslim youth of North African origin. Many are already estranged from, and antagonistic towards, mainstream European societies. And they now also have further cause for resentment as a result of Israel’s war in Gaza. They feel that the West has failed to express sufficient solidarity with the Palestinian people and has ultimately sided with Israel. This has turbo-charged their grievance levels. It seems their Muslim identity, their sense of solidarity with Muslim peoples and their attachment to their ancestral homelands have trumped their attachment to the European nations in which they live.
The drivers of the disorder may well vary, depending on the national context. But broadly speaking, anti-state resentment, hatred of the police, foreign-policy grievances and general feelings of identitarian victimhood are all at play. It’s this unhealthy concoction that is fuelling the surge in North African football hooliganism.
And if the Edgware unrest is any indication, Britain is in trouble, too. The claim that ‘diversity is our strength’ rings hollower by the day.
Rakib Ehsan is the author of Beyond Grievance: What the Left Gets Wrong about Ethnic Minorities, which is available to order on Amazon.
More than 80 MPs and peers have written publicly to foreign secretary Yvette Cooper, demanding immediate sanctions on Israel for its Gaza genocide.
Indefensible
Leeds East Labour MP published a copy of the letter. It reminds Cooper of her government’s “indefensible” failure to do anything meaningful to curb Israel’s arrogant impunity or fulfil the UK’s obligations under international law:
BREAKING: With @Imran_HussainMP and 80 other MPs and Lords, I have written to the Foreign Secretary calling for comprehensive sanctions on Israel.
The world’s top court is clear. Israel’s occupation of Palestine is illegal – and Governments must act now to end it! pic.twitter.com/bzRzwokgy5
— Richard Burgon MP (@RichardBurgon) July 14, 2026
In full, it reads:
14 July 2026
Dear Foreign Secretary,
Re: Two Years On – the Government Must Act in Line with the International Court of Justice’s Advisory Opinion on Israel
We write ahead of the second anniversary of the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) landmark Advisory Opinion on Israel’s occupation of the Occupied Palestinian Territory, issued on 19 July 2024. We urge the Government to impose sanctions and other concrete measures to uphold its legal obligations under this ruling and wider international law.
The world’s highest court, the ICJ, found that Israel’s continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) is unlawful. It called for Israel to end this presence “as rapidly as possible” and cease all new settlement activity.
Two years on, Israel has not only ignored the Court but deepened its illegal occupation. This includes recent orders by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for Israel’s army to seize large areas of the Gaza Strip, alongside intensified annexationist measures in the occupied West Bank, including the approval of plans to register land there as Israeli state property.
These examples underline how, without much bolder action, the Israeli Government will continue to simply ignore the words of condemnation from political leaders and governments and deepen its illegal occupation.
All States have an obligation to act.
The ICJ is clear that all States have an obligation not to recognise this illegal situation and “not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by Israel’s illegal presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.”
The Court also made clear that all States must “abstain from entering into economic or trade dealings with Israel concerning the Occupied Palestinian Territory or parts thereof which may entrench its unlawful presence in the territory” and “take steps to prevent trade or investment relations that assist in the maintenance of the illegal situation created by Israel in the OPT.”
Additionally, the ICJ reiterated the obligations of all State Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention to ensure Israel’s compliance with international humanitarian law.
The Government’s Responsibilities
The ICJ’s Opinion identifies clear legal responsibilities on the Government. Yet, despite acknowledging the Court’s findings, two years on, the Government has still not formally responded or taken the steps required to meet its legal and moral obligations. Further delay is simply indefensible.
The Government knows what needs to be done. It has rightly imposed widespread sanctions on Russia for its illegal war on Ukraine. Yet there has been no such comprehensive response to Israel’s actions in Gaza and the rest of the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
We are clear that international law cannot be applied selectively. The Government must apply the same principles to Israel’s unlawful occupation as it does elsewhere.
In line with the ICJ’s Advisory Opinion and to uphold its legal obligations, we urge the Government to act without delay by:
- Banning all trade in goods and services with illegal Israeli settlements and taking action against companies profiting from or sustaining the illegal occupation.
- Imposing targeted sanctions, including travel bans and asset freezes, on all individuals and entities complicit in maintaining Israel’s unlawful presence in the OPT, including political leaders responsible for illegal settlement expansion and annexationist policies.
- Suspending the UK-Israel trade agreement until Israel complies with international law.
- Ending all arms transfers to Israel, including F-35 components and other equipment that may be used in violations of international humanitarian law.
If the Government wants to show that its stated commitment to international law and human rights is more than words, then it must act decisively and without further delay.
Yours sincerely,
Richard Burgon MP and Imran Hussain MP
The letter is co-signed by the following parliamentarians. If your MP has not signed, write to them and demand that they do:
Diane Abbott MP
Lorraine Beavers MP
Shockat Adam MP
Orfhlaith Begley MP
Lord John Alderdice
Apsana Begum MP
Tahir Ali MP
Sian Berry MP
Paula Barker MP
Lara Bird MP
Lee Barron MP
Olivia Blake MP
Baroness Christine Blower
Rachael Maskell MP
Ian Byrne MP
Paul Maskey MP
Ellie Chowns MP
Douglas McAllister MP
Jeremy Corbyn MP
Andy McDonald MP
Pat Cullen MP
John McDonnell MP
Ann Davies MP
Llinos Medi MP
Marsha De Cordova MP
Abtisam Mohamed MP
Carla Denyer MP
Iqbal Mohamed MP
Dave Doogan MP
Lord Shaffaq Mohammed
Lord Alf Dubs
Grahame Morris MP
Neil Duncan-Jordan MP
Brendan O’Hara MP
Colum Eastwood MP
Simon Opher MP
Sorcha Eastwood MP
Kate Osborne MP
Cat Eccles MP
Yasmin Qureshi MP
John Finucane MP
Adrian Ramsay MP
Mary Kelly Foy MP
Martin Rhodes MP
Andrew George MP
Marie Rimmer MP
Mary Glindon MP
Bell Ribeiro-Addy MP
Lord Peter Hain
Liz Saville-Roberts MP
Claire Hanna MP
Lord Prem Sikka
Chris Hazzard MP
Lord Indarjit Singh
Lord John Hendy
Cat Smith MP
Chris Hinchliff MP
Hannah Spencer MP
Daire Hughes MP
Zarah Sultana MP
Rupa HuqMP
Jon Trickett MP
Adnan Hussain MP
Baroness Pola Uddin
Baroness Meral Hussein-Ece
Baroness Sayeeda Warsi
Kim Johnson MP
Nadia Whittome MP
Afzal Khan MP
Steve Witherden MP
Ayoub Khan MP
Mohammad Yasin MP
Ben Lake MP
Peter Lamb MP
Ian Lavery MP
Chris Law MP
Brian Leishman MP
Clive Lewis MP
Baroness Ruth Lister
Cathal Mallaghan MP
Starmer’s government is about to end. New PM Andy Burnham has offered only mealy-mouthed words on Israel and Gaza so far. He must be made to listen and implement real change.
Featured image via the Canary
By Skwawkbox
Is it us or are wasps everywhere right now?
According to conservation specialist Buglife, there are 9,000 species of wasps in the UK and, ideally, we’d like none of them to be in our homes.
Fortunately, it turns out, there are some unique ways to keep the stripy stingers away from your body (and pints) when out and about.
How to keep wasps away
Wear red clothing
Did you know that most insects can’t see the colour red? This includes wasps!
Wasps are drawn to brighter shades like yellows, blues and whites because they’re similar to flowers, however they’re not attracted to darker shades like brown and black.
But for clothing, the safest bet is red because wasps just can’t see it and therefore aren’t attracted to it.
Mix basil and garlic
Basil and garlic combined may sound dreamy to us – but to wasps, it’s a pretty revolting concoction. Keeping basil plants and garlic cloves around your home – especially near windows – can help to keep the stripy stingers outdoors.
Make your home minty-fresh
Wasps also hate the smell of mint so if you mix some peppermint oil with dish soap and spray it around the home, not only will your home smell minty fresh but wasps will steer clear.
Alternatively, mint plants placed near windows or on tables will help keep them at bay, too!
Lay off the perfumes and aftershaves
This probably isn’t all that surprising, but those perfumes and aftershaves you wear to smell vaguely floral? They smell like flowers and therefore attract wasps. Lay off the sweet scents and keep it neutral to keep pests away from you.
Splash the cash (or pennies) around
Wasps are reportedly averse to the smell of copper so if you rub some of the pennies you have and leave them lying around your home, they’re more likely to avoid buzzing about the place.
LONDON — A police cover-up after a 1989 football stadium tragedy was seminal in shaping soon-to-be new British Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s political outlook.
Upon returning to the House of Commons this evening for the first time as a member of parliament, Burnham used his maiden speech to hail a proposed new Hillsborough law — named after the Sheffield football stadium where 97 Liverpool fans lost their lives in a crush — which imposes a duty of candor on public officials.
Burnham faced raw anger and heckles of “justice” and “truth” in 2009, when he was culture secretary, at a memorial service at Liverpool’s Anfield stadium to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the disaster.
Days before he moves into No. 10 Downing Street, Burnham pledged to end the U.K.’s “cover-up culture” and put “decency back at the heart of the British state.”
Burnham said the law will “change the way this country thinks and works about justice,” as it “truly is a rewiring of the state and a passing of power from the authorities to the hands of ordinary people.” MPs approved the legislation Tuesday evening, and it will now go to the House of Lords for further scrutiny.
A prominent Arabic-language media outlet appears to have ties to Israeli intelligence. Jusoor, which boasts 11 million Facebook followers and bills itself as the “pulse of the Arab street”, may be anything but an ordinary news outlet, according to leaked documents seen by +972 Magazine.
+972 reported on 13 July that Jusoor:
describes itself as an “independent media platform” that is “not affiliated with any political entity” and seeks out stories that “reflect the pulse of all societies and peoples” in the Middle East and North Africa.
The publication’s main output consists of short video segments circulated largely through social media, where its audience has grown rapidly. On Facebook alone, it recently surpassed 1 million followers.
But new documents suggest that:
the outlet has been connected with intelligence services in Israel. And an examination of the organization and individual behind the outlet points to Jusoor’s role within a vast and long-term covert operation designed to engineer public opinion in the Arab world in favor of Israel and its allies.
The ‘Shia Axis’ project
The leaks came about after Iranian hackers got access to millions of documents:
from the inboxes of Israeli politicians, ministries, and other prominent institutions and organizations.
+972 reported how one recent hack:
made accessible to journalists via the nonprofit whistleblower group Distributed Denial of Secrets, targeted Israel’s foremost security think tank, the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS).
The INSS collaborates:
closely with Israel’s intelligence community — comprising the Mossad, the Shin Bet, and the Military Intelligence Directorate — and whose fellows often come directly from its ranks.
The INSS runs a program about the so-called “Shia axis”:
encompassing Iran and its allies including Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and, prior to its collapse, the Assad regime in Syria.
Among the thousands of leaked files and messages from this program, clues have emerged regarding who is actually behind Jusoor and what its real mission is.
One leaked email describes an October 2024 Zoom meeting between the Shia Axis project and the founder of the Center for Peace Communications (CPC) Joseph Braude. The emails claim CPC counters extremism in the region. Both Braude and CPC are key players in the project.
Another email claims CPC works to:
manage creative consciousness campaigns against Israel’s enemies, with a recent emphasis on Hamas and Hezbollah.
Jordanians, Cyprus and a secret meeting
Another leaked message from September 2025 describes:
a secret meeting took place in Cyprus involving an INSS fellow and several journalists, researchers, and influencers from Israel and Jordan. Israel’s deputy ambassador to Jordan was also present.
An INSS member summarised this meeting as being about:
actions needed in the media to improve relations between Israel and Jordan.
The workshop, the summary goes on:
was organised by the Center for Peace Communications and the Jusoor channel, led by Joseph Braude and his team.
The summary also says many of the Jordanian participants in the meeting:
take part, openly or covertly, in the activities of Jusoor.
According to +972:
the group agreed to establish teams for future projects, specifically to support “videos that will be produced by CPC and shown on the Jusoor channel” that would “disprove anti-Israeli conspiracy theories” or feature Israeli speakers “expressing appreciation for the Jordanian royal house.”
Gaza reporting and remarkable levels of access
The leaks contain other strange details about Jusoor too. At the height of the famine in Gaza, Jusoor still had on-the-ground access to the besieged area. And one leaked message details how Jusoor reached out to an “anti-Hamas activist” inside Gaza to try and source footage of thriving food markets, people shopping for food and:
videos of people cooking, eating, filling up buckets of water, and kids playing with water.
+972 reported:
Despite mounting international concern over the increasingly desperate humanitarian situation in Gaza, Jusoor appeared to be seeking footage portraying the exact opposite, which could then be used to fend off allegations of impending famine.
The footage was never provided, presumably because no such scenes existed in an active famine.
Jusoor also published:
a largely sympathetic video profile of Yasser Abu Shabab, the then-leader of the pro-Israel Popular Forces militia in Gaza, a little over a year ago.
Going even deeper, +972 reported that:
According to U.S. tax documents, CPC is a relatively small organization based in Long Island, New York, with an official annual budget of roughly $1.5 million. All of its publicly listed donors support Jewish and pro-Israel initiatives.
Jusoor editor Hadeel Oueis is “employed directly by CPC”, +972 reported. Oueis, a Syrian national based in the US, was once known as Hadeel Kouki. She came to prominence as a young anti-Assad activist during the Arab Spring.
+972 reported:
In 2012, still using the name Kouki, she was invited by the Geneva-based pro-Israel advocacy group UN Watch to a conference it co-organized, as well as a meeting of the Human Rights Council.
From there, according to Oueis’ biography on WINEP’s website, she met a U.S. delegation that helped facilitate her relocation to the United States.
You can and should read the full, highly detailed +972 report here. If Jusoor is an influence operation, it is one of many. The Canary has reported on similar projects like the BlackCore scandal, English language psychological operations courses and Israeli military-controlled journalism. And as Israeli control of the narrative on Palestine cracks further, we can expect many more to come to light.
Featured image via the Canary
By Joe Glenton
MADRID — A soccer-racism row involving a former prime minister has triggered renewed scrutiny of a perennial Spanish problem.
Mariano Rajoy, who governed Spain between 2011 and 2018 as leader of the conservative People’s Party, described the French team in a column he wrote for El Debate news site as a “very high-level squad. Of course, without Frenchmen,” in reference to the African heritage of some of the players.
The remarks sparked a fierce backlash from across the border ahead of tonight’s World Cup semifinal between Spain and France in Dallas.
On Monday, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said, “France has no skin color. Any contrary claim stems from stupidity, racism or a combination of the two.”
Several other French politicians also criticized Rajoy, while the French soccer federation president, Philippe Diallo, wrote on social media that the remarks “carry an intolerable whiff of racism.”
Even the spokesperson for the far-right National Rally party, Julien Odoul, said: “Mr. Rajoy is a racist. Simply, his statements are scandalous, shameful, and regrettable. Everyone should condemn them.”
Spain’s socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez also took France’s side against his predecessor.
“There are those who still measure belonging by surname, place of birth, or skin color,” he wrote on social media. “Spain belongs to those who love it and work for it. Not to those who shame it with xenophobic comments. France, we will see you in the semi-final. May the best team win and may racism lose.”
Rajoy’s comments have reignited a debate that has dogged Spanish soccer for decades, even as it has morphed into a World Cup superpower. While high-profile cases involving stars like Samuel Eto’o and Vinícius Júnior have prompted tougher punishments and greater public condemnation, racist abuse from the stands — and broader questions about race, identity and belonging in Spain — have proved harder to eradicate. The latest controversy underscores how soccer reflects Spanish tensions that extend beyond the pitch.
In 2004, Spain fans made monkey noises at Black English players during a game in Real Madrid’s Bernabéu Stadium. Weeks earlier, Spain’s then-coach Luis Aragonés had been caught on microphone calling French star Thierry Henry a “black shit.”
In 2006, Barcelona’s Cameroonian forward Samuel Eto’o refused to continue playing a league game in Real Zaragoza’s La Romareda Stadium after home fans repeatedly directed monkey chants at him. Eto’o’s stand was seen as a reckoning for racism in Spanish soccer, although many believed the €9,000 fine handed to Real Zaragoza was laughable.
In the years since, there have been a number of similar incidents. Most notoriously, in 2023, Real Madrid’s Brazilian forward Vinícius Júnior stopped playing and confronted Valencia fans who had been shouting racist abuse at him in their Mestalla Stadium. The controversy drew a show of outrage and solidarity for the player from the Brazilian government.
Racist abuse by fans had become increasingly common in the 1990s as Spanish soccer drew more players from abroad, including Africa and South America. At approximately the same time, Spain was also starting to see a large influx of immigrants, many of them from those same continents.
In a 2024 research paper on racism in Spanish soccer, the Funcas think tank, an independent institution focused on economic and social analysis, found that many radical fans were unhappy about the arrival of nonwhite players in La Liga.
“What is happening in football reflects what is happening, sooner or later, in broader society,” one fan was quoted as saying in the document.
“If there isn’t a solution, we’ll be invaded by a legion of foreigners and Spain will lose its identity,” the fan added.
Although Spanish authorities have clamped down on radical fan groups since the turn of the century, many of those sentiments have not gone away.
However, the Júnior episode shows that Spain’s soccer institutions take racist abuse more seriously than they did 20 years ago. Three Valencia fans were given eight-month jail sentences for their role in the Mestalla incident. Four fans of Real Madrid’s cross-town rival Atlético de Madrid were also given jail terms for hanging an effigy of Júnior from a bridge before a game.
The Rajoy racism case has surprised many because he is viewed as a moderate and yet his comments chime with the sentiments of the far right.
Political commentator Marc Bassets from the left-leaning El País warned in an op-ed that the kind of opinions voiced by Rajoy are too often tolerated or trivialized. He said the broader political context is significant, including the far-right Vox party’s introduction of a Spaniards-first “national priority” policy in regions where it governs alongside Rajoy’s PP.
“In times of ‘national priority’, the white noise of casual racism that can be seen in society risks becoming even more casual,” Bassets said.
At a press conference Monday, Spanish football star Lamine Yamal hit back at Rajoy.
“If football has a purpose, it is to unite society, and there is no better example [of that] than us and France,” Yamal said, describing both national teams as models of integration.
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