27 h. ago The Guardian view on the Manchester synagogue attack: a tragic wake

An assault of this kind was widely feared. Now that it has happened, Britain faces a choice between deeper division and greater toleranceThe attack on the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation synagogue in Manchester was outrageous. It took two innocent lives, and several others were injured. Yet it could have happened almost anywhere. It is an event with wider national meaning and lessons. On Thursday morning, Britain looked over the edge into one of the dark places to which modern public life has been heading. Having looked and seen, Britain now needs to learn and step back.The violence began around 9.30am, just as morning prayers were being held on Yom Kippur, Judaism’s most solemn and sacred day. The synagogue was inevitably well attended. Yet within a short period of time, two Jewish victims lay dead from stabbing, with four others injured, outside what ought to be a place of prayer and community. The attacker was then himself shot and killed, possibly as he attempted to get inside t...

Events

36 h. ago One third of children in parts of Kenya severely malnourised as aid cuts worsen crisis

Exclusive: Data from Save the Children reveals a devastating shortages of food in affecting tens of thousands of infants under the age of five

Events

3 d. ago YouTube agrees to pay Trump $24.5m to settle lawsuit over account suspension

Platform suspended the US president’s YouTube channel in 2021 after the January 6 Capitol riotYouTube has agreed to pay $24.5m to settle a suit brought by Donald Trump in 2021 that alleged the platform wrongly suspended his channel after the January 6 attack on the US Capitol. The Google subsidiary is the latest in a long string of tech companies to make a multimillion-dollar payout to the president over past decisions about his accounts.Trump had filed the suit against YouTube and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, alleging that the platform had “accumulated an unprecedented concentration of power, market share, and ability to dictate our nation’s public discourse”. YouTube said it suspended Trump’s channel because it had violated the website’s policies against inciting violence. Because of the settlement, the case is now dismissed. Google and the White House did not immediately return a request for comment. Continue reading...

Economics

4 d. ago Former MI5 boss warns aid cuts risk UK’s influence on world stage

Baroness Manningham-Buller says the cuts will allow China to ‘move in’ and lessen Britain’s diplomatic power

Events

7 d. ago Health authorities sound the alarm as 35 deaths linked to new Ebola outbreak

The World Health Organisation says 57 cases have been reported since the outbreak was declared on September 4

Events

7 d. ago Voices: Taxes on alcohol and smoking can help countries facing severe aid cuts

The benefits of health taxes are clear, writes the World Health Organisation's Jeremy Farrar. But it requires political courage to invest in all of our futures

Politics

7 d. ago Trump’s aid cuts bring fresh hate for those with HIV in Kenya: ‘It takes little to push people back’

The slashing of foreign aid and closure of HIV programmes earlier this year is continuing to impact people living with HIV, writes Nick Ferris in Nairobi, causing serious damage to long-term efforts to end stigma around HIV and its treatment

Politics

7 d. ago They fled war and sexual violence and found a safe space in Athens. Then the aid cuts hit

Thirty women and their children found themselves out on the streets when their shelter closed. It was a direct result of US and European governments slashing their aid budgetsThe night of 29 May was sombre at 15 Mitsaki Street, a women’s shelter in the centre of Athens. Shoes, winter coats, shampoo bottles and sheets lay strewn around: belongings the 30 refugee women and five children living there had worked hard to acquire, and would now have to abandon. The next day, the shelter would be shuttered for good.“I was so stressed I couldn’t sleep,” says Oksana Kutko, a Ukrainian. “I knew I had nowhere to go.” Continue reading...

Events

8 d. ago A new Ebola outbreak in Congo kills dozens as health officials warn of lack of funds

Health authorities and organizations say they lack funds to respond to a deadly Ebola outbreak in southern Congo

Events

8 d. ago Unsafe abortions and no antenatal care: aid cuts hit women hardest in one of Africa’s poorest countries

Mobile clinics in rural Malawi that provided pregnancy checks as well as vaccinations and TB tests have been lostA blue, burgundy and white patterned wrapper hides the swell of Joanna Banda’s belly. Eight months pregnant, she has had just three of the five antenatal appointments she should have had. She is unlikely to attend her final three either, as she still has to save 3,000 kwacha (£1.28) for a bicycle to take her six miles on rutted dirt tracks to the nearest health centre when she goes into labour.In remote villages in Malawi, pregnant women such as 22-year-old Banda, who has one child after losing her first soon after giving birth, are struggling to get the medical care they need. Continue reading...

Events

9 d. ago Former president Peter Mutharika defeats incumbent in Malawi presidential election

Lazarus Chakwera, who presided over a multi-year economic crisis, concedes election after 85-year-old Mutharika wins 56.8% of voteMalawians have voted in an 85-year-old former leader over an incumbent who presided over a multi-year economic crisis, high inflation, essential goods shortages, climate disasters and international aid cuts.Peter Mutharika got 56.8% of the vote compared with 33% for Lazarus Chakwera, according to official results of the 16 September presidential election announced on Wednesday. Continue reading...

Politics

9 d. ago Murdoch’s TikTok? Trump offers allies another lever of media control

Under the known terms of the deal with China, TikTok would get a new board, including Murdochs and EllisonsDonald Trump revealed last week the US and China are close to inking a deal to let TikTok continue operating in the US. Details are not final, but should the agreement go through as has been reported, the owners of the US’s most powerful cable TV channels may soon also steer the nation’s most influential social network. The arrangement would gift Trump’s billionaire allies a degree of control over US media that would be vast and unprecedented.Here’s what we know. Under the known terms of the deal, which Trump declared has the tentative buy-in of Chinese president Xi Jinping, TikTok in the US would get a new group of US investors, led by the US software giant Oracle, which would license TikTok’s vaunted recommendation algorithm and take over its security. Continue reading...

Politics

9 d. ago The nation where Trump’s aid cuts are colliding with a deadly Ebola outbreak: ‘What we feared has now happened’

As the Democratic Republic of Congo faces its 16th Ebola outbreak, aid cuts mean support for its response is dwindling, writes Rachel Schraer

Politics

1 week ago Trump’s pick to run the nation’s 250th anniversary celebrations says he was fired over Charlie Kirk Instagram post

Commission planning 250th anniversary has been riven with internal tensions for years

Politics

1 week ago Voices: In our new global order we must focus on aid, not just development

As humanitarian need hits record levels, aid budgets are being cut and redirected, says David Miliband, the president of the International Rescue Committee. A clear strategy is needed to ensure the poorest and most fragile communities are not abandoned

Politics

1 week ago Death by aid cuts: how a decision in the US led to the loss of a mother in Yemen

While the Trump administration claims no one will die over the axing of its overseas development budgets, aid agencies say the action will cost at least 3 million lives. Fatima and her baby were among the firstWhen she woke on that Sunday morning, Fatima was part of a family preparing to celebrate – she was due to give birth to her third child any day and her brother was on his way home from Saudi Arabia to get married.But by mid-afternoon, the family were instead preparing for a funeral – both Fatima and her baby were dead. Continue reading...

Events

1 week ago Judith Butler is being targeted by the US government. We must stand up | Joel Swanson

What is happening to Judith Butler – a Jewish intellectual – in the name of fighting ‘antisemitism’ is outrageousAmid all the other breaking news consuming the United States this month, the University of California, Berkeley, arguably the nation’s most elite public university, gave the Trump administration a list of 160 names of faculty, staff and students, as part of an investigation into “alleged antisemitic incidents”.While all the names on this list are significant, one name in particular that UC Berkeley handed over to the Trump administration stands out: Judith Butler, the eminent queer theorist, literary theorist and philosopher, and one of the most famous public intellectuals in the United States today.Joel Swanson is professor of Jewish studies at Sarah Lawrence College Continue reading...

Politics

1 week ago Voices: In our new world order, it is aid, not development, that matters most

As humanitarian need hits record levels, aid budgets are being cut and redirected, says David Miliband, the president of the International Rescue Committee. A clear strategy is needed to ensure the poorest and most fragile communities are not abandoned

Politics

1 week ago UK aid cuts 'are a gift' to China and Russia's bid to undermine United Nations

In a report published ahead of the UN's General Assembly week, the Foreign Affairs Committee urged the Government restore the aid budget

Politics

2 w. ago Trump’s take on a court decision on tariffs is bonkers – even for him | Steven Greenhouse

The president’s claim that undermining his tariffs would ‘literally destroy’ the country gets the situation backwardsJust hours after an appeals court ruled that it was illegal for Donald Trump to impose his unpopular across-the-board tariffs on dozens of countries, he posted a frantic, over-the-top rant that declared: “If allowed to stand, this Decision would literally destroy the United States of America.”So here the president of the United States was asserting that if the courts torpedoed his tariffs, then the US, the most powerful nation on earth, would be destroyed, would “literally” be kaput. Trump seemed to suggest that court rulings that blocked his beloved tariffs would have the destructive power of, say, 100 hydrogen bombs.Steven Greenhouse is a journalist and author, focusing on labour and the workplace, as well as economic and legal issues Continue reading...

Politics