When I was 17, the schoolmaster tasked with overseeing my moral development frowned at my show of indecision about the future direction of my education and, as if letting me into a trade secret, carefully explained: “Look, clever people go …
The Gilets Jaunes achieved nothing
Five years ago today, Paris was liberated. Or, if you were a Parisian, the streets of the capital were blocked by tens of thousands of ploucs (yokels) in high-vis jackets. Right from the start, the Gilets Jaunes rebellion defied the …
Ayaan Hirsi Ali answers her critics
CHAPTERS – CLICK TO JUMP
ISRAEL AND GAZA
Should pro-Palestine protests be banned?
Can the Muslim population be integrated?
How widespread is antisemitism?
FUTURE OF LIBERALISM
Have you lost faith in Western liberalism?
Can a secular rationalism compete with religion?…
Nigel Farage is a gameshow king
In all the hue and cry over Tory civil war, the scotching of the populist experiment, and — some say — betrayal of a once-vaunted political realignment, the week’s other political bombshell was buried. As 2015’s last great Blairite returns …
How the judges took back control
The Supreme Court’s ruling against the Government’s Rwanda plan may have been a foregone conclusion, but the broader political fall-out was not. Even though the Supreme Court struck down the migrant bill without relying on the European Convention of Human …
Twilight has made monsters of us
Fifteen years ago, in a world rattled by economic turmoil and facing impending recession, one of the most influential phenomena of our time emerged — an issue that would dominate the discourse, capture the intellect, and shape the political destinies …
David Cameron destroyed the Tories
When the collateral damage from the Gaza War is finally totted up, Suella Braverman’s political career will not top the list of those most deserving sympathy. When the Metropolitan Police commissioner Sir Mark Rowley publicly mocked Braverman’s characterisation of pro-Palestine …
America and China should kiss and make up
If Presidents Xi and Biden have one thing in common, it’s that both desperately need a historic win. In the 23 years since Bill Clinton welcomed China into the World Trade Organization, the aura of the two nations’ relationship has …
Orthodox Jews aren’t safe in New York
The other day, my husband took my middle son, who is almost five, to a Whole Foods near our home in New York. When he came back, he told me he’d felt uneasy there. Usually, strangers smile at my son …
The resurrection of Cornish mining
“Are you here for the attempted murder?” asks a punter when I step into the Red Lion. My answer — I’m here for the return of lithium mining — stirs little interest among the pub’s patrons. The last time the …
Suellaism is here to stay
Rishi Sunak doesn’t know what he’s trying to sell. Suella Braverman does. Herein lies a problem for the Conservative Party.
Just over a year ago, Sunak claimed his mandate to govern came from Boris Johnson’s victory in 2019, a victory …
Israel’s true border crisis
Of all the lessons to be learned following Hamas’s brutal incursion into Israel, one is so glaringly obvious that it runs the risk of going unnoticed: the attack was a failure not just of Israel’s border security systems, but of …
Stop blaming parents for everything
By the time my husband and I had our second child five years ago, I had long been researching “parent-bashing”. I knew that while parenting matters, it doesn’t matter nearly as much as the hoards of “parenting experts” would have …
Are the Dutch farmers heading for power?
“Sweet Caroline…” bellows the crowd. “Good times never seemed so good!”
Times are indeed pretty good for Caroline van der Plas. Surrounded by the thousands of blooms that adorn the Royal FloraHolland Trade Fair, the leader of the BoerBurgerBeweging (BBB), …
Don’t be fooled by the march for peace
He was a fat bloke with a swastika tattooed on his beer belly and a teardrop inked beneath his eye. Let’s call him the cartoon fascist. The Guardian describes another: “a Port Vale fan supping a can of Stella Artois.” …