In recent years, not many of us in Israel have imagined that the fate of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will be determined by outsiders. We always believed that our future should be discussed and negotiated between Israelis and Palestinians. Furthermore, the common view was that only the two sides should decide [...]

Donald Trump’s torpedoing of the Iran nuclear deal on highly specious and misleading grounds is an act of wanton diplomatic vandalism fraught with dangers. While the 2015 agreement may not yet be wholly sunk, it is holed below the waterline. Many in Tehran will see the sweeping reimposition of US sanctions as a [...]

Everyone likes a good Royal Commission – watching, as usual unaccounted people give account of themselves. With all the anger about inequality now, it is especially appealing to see the spectacularly paid elite getting their [...]

Benjamin Netanyahu’s amateurish PowerPoint presentation in Tel Aviv this week – “Iran lied” flashed up behind him in huge letters – was in fairness a great improvement on the cartoonish diagram of an atomic bomb the Israeli prime minister held up at the UN general assembly in September 2012. But it served [...]

Theresa May hates change, while ruling in an era of upheaval. It’s an unfortunate combination of inflexible temperament meets the changing circumstances. The result is periods of tense stasis punctuated by spasmodic crises. This is a chronic condition afflicting the government and Amber Rudd’s resignation on [...]

The other night, tears flowed down my face. I hadn’t cried that hard since my father died 15 years ago. As three more members of my immediate family died in the decade following my dad’s death, I cried less for each one until, eventually, I had no more tears to shed whenever anything sad happened in my [...]

As sanctions on Russia were started in 2014 and have been gradually escalating some of the Russian oligarchs embraced re-profiling their companies to the Western ones. It seemed a good way to go for those of businessmen who are heavy reliant on export volumes and US and European investments. Such is metal production [...]

Fanatical. Deluded. Emotive nonsense. These are unusually strong terms for a judge to use, particularly in a case as intensely sad and bitterly contested as that of the terminally ill child Alfie Evans. Yet Mr Justice Hayden, referring to some of the campaigners now surrounding Alfie’s parents, did not mince his [...]

Can a 40-year-old French president, who gives sweeping speeches about Europe, singlehandedly save the global liberal order – and western democracy with it – by whispering into a the ear of a 71-year-old US president who has only contempt for the European project and the values it is meant to uphold? To ask the [...]

West Midlands police has been censured by the region’s police and crime commissioner, David Jamieson, and told to remove “insensitive” posters. These come with the message “Your kindness could kill” and depict a crime scene body outline, full of coins: giving money to rough sleepers could help them buy drugs [...]