I didn’t like it when critics started calling Israel an “Apartheid state” and I don’t like the accusations of “genocide” either. South Africa’s racial discrimination was uniquely venal and using the word “Apartheid” for other places takes away from that. And whilst some Israeli government statements are unquestionably racist about Palestinians I think on balance that the actions of the Israeli government cannot be termed genocidal, but it’s certainly close.
But are we dealing with reasonable people who just have a grievance if we institute dialogue with and between Hamas and Israel? I don’t think we are in either case. And, tragically, there’s nothing new about the situation. The problem is that it goes back to 1948 and, arguably, well before that. Land was confiscated and a state created some of which, today, with land acquired in wars and not returned in peace, but settled.
Israel’s actions for decades can be described as being the seeking of and gaining of Lebensraum. This word should send a chill through the blood of Jewish people anywhere, including in Israel. Because if one state gains room another state, or people, loses it. There’s a zero sum.
And Hamas and their powerful backers are at the core fighting about the loss of land – in short about losing their land to a huge scale pogrom – an irony that should make Israelis pause for thought. But Netanyahu has made it clear that his goal is fully to incorporate Gaza into Israel. And then…? The Israeli Prime Minister’s “New Middle Easr” doesn’t imclude Palestine. Negotiate your way out of that!
There’s no such thing as a typical English constituency, but Rochdale certainly isn’t one. Eighteen constituencies across the UK have a higher Muslim population than Rochdale (24%) but it is clearly a crucial element in the voters’ dynamic. George Galloway knew this and saw his chance. But extrapolating from the freak circumstances which gave us this result is wrong. Labour won’t make the same mistake again.
It was the coincidence of Time (when Muslims are being killed in Gaza) and Place (a constituency that is among our most Islamic) along with the foolish remarks of Labour’s candidate which caused this upset. It happens at both ends of the political moral continuum. Remember Martin Bell in his white suit beating Neil Hamilton?
That Muslims are the most protesting against the flattening of Gaza and the pogrom against its people is hardly surprising – in Rochdale, elsewhere in Britain and around the world. To categorise it as “Mob Rule” was as offensive as it was wrong.
Ethnic minorities should be represented in Parliament a fact that for obvious reasons our Prime Minister should acknowledge. But Sunak comes across as more Winchester and Oxford than British Asian. He’s very distanced by his elitist class from his co-religionists in Leicester or Brent or Harrow.
The electors of Rochdale had a terrible choice. It was a protest vote and we should listen not condemn.
Other than as symbolism the truth is that it really doesn’t matter who wins the London Mayoral election. And it’s not just in London that it doesn’t matter. If Ken Livingstone and Boris Johnson can each win two elections and do a “job” for eight years there’s surely something wrong with the job – and there is.
The elected Mayors are faux-democracy. Do we blame the Birmingham Mayor for the economic catastrophe in England’s second city? We shouldn’t. He had little or no freedom to act on the matter. To run something above all you need tax-raising powers. The Mayors don’t have them.
If you believe in subsidiarity – the taking of political decisions at the lowest practical level – the Mayors don’t do that. Yes there is the London Assembly, a largely impotent talking shop. By comparison with its nominal predecessors the LCC and the GLC it’s powerless and the Mayor with it.
Margaret Thatcher knew what she was doing when she abolished the GLC. She took power to where she thought it should be, with central government. Subsequently, for show, we’ve elected a Mayor in London and elsewhere and it’s made not a jot of difference to the quality of our governance. It’s a sham.
Braverman, one of the conspiracy theorists who blames “Islamist’s”
For 150 years Britain was driven by (largely) unchallenged Nationalism and its bedfellow Imperialism. We went it alone because we had the power and resources to do so. Military setbacks (Boer War for example) were rare and turned into victories. The Dunkirk spirit didn’t just happens after Dunkirk. Then the Great War happened and it gradually dawned on us in the trenches that we weren’t all powerful after all. We nearly lost that war and were rescued by our cousins from across the pond.
Those cousins assumed the world power role as Britain began gradually to decline. We had neither the military power nor the economic resources to challenge the rise of Hitler so chose Appeasement instead. When the inevitable happened and another war broke out we were alone and bravely the Few won the Battle of Britain. After that it was the big beasts of America and Russia fighting alongside us that preserved democracy – ironically we have Stalin to thank for us not descending into totalitarianism!
After WW2 we finally shed Empire – though the Land of Hope and Glory mindset hung around. The conspiracy theories are essentially a reaction to Britain’s decline. We have to blame someone. The EU (hence Brexit). Immigrants. Non religionists (hence antisemitism and Islamophobia). Not of course the heroes of Dunkirk and the Falklands. Put out more flags.
“The number of recorded antisemitic incidents across the country rose by 147 per cent in 2023, which itself was a record high.” The Times.
With a few exceptions distinguished members of Britains Jewish communities have been silent on Netanyahu’s war. It’s almost as if to be Jewish means you have to support whatever the Israeli government does. And that is surely a cause of antisemitism in all too many cases.
We may not like it but it’s a fact. These instances of antisemitism are mostly a direct response to Israel’s attacks on the people of Gaza. The conflation of “Israel” and “Jewish people” is inaccurate and ignorant, but it’s understandable, though shocking, why people do it. It’s not helped by Britain’s Jewish commentators almost to a man or woman failing to condemn Israel’s actions.
That Netanyahu was right to respond strongly to the Hamas attack on 7th October should not be in doubt. But the launch of all out war on the people of the West Bank is another matter. This prompted many people around the world to protest – a perfectly understandable and uncontentious thing to do. Except when to be anti the actions of the Israeli government (reasonable) turns itself into antisemitism (obscenely wrong).
With a few exceptions distinguished members of Britains Jewish communities have been silent on Netanyahu’s war. It’s almost as if to be Jewish means you have to support whatever the Israeli government does. And that is surely a cause of antisemitism in all too many cases.
I came across a delightfully elitist quote from the great Oscar Wilde today:“By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, it keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community,” he wrote.
Oscar was talking about journalism and you can see what he meant. Reportage has a role in journalism – telling us what is happening and what the great unwashed is thinking. And if you back that with “consumer research” you can give the research a statistical credibility. “Seventy percent of the population supports the Monarchy” – that sort of thing.
Wilde references education and ignorance suggesting that the opinions of those with a deficiency of the former and plenty of the latter we (regrettably) have to take note of. Or at least least “keep in touch” with.
Politicians do it all the time ‘The people support what we are doing” a populist politician will say to justify some illiberal policy. This reduces every issue to a pseudo referendum. Manifestos become less a statement of what is right and more a response to collective opinion whether right or not.
As Bismarck put it politics is the “art of the possible” – a matter of pragmatism, instead of idealism. The EU Referendum was a classic example of this. Those who understood the subject were overwhelmingly pro Europe. The higher the level of education a voter had the more likely they were to vote “Remain”. The converse of this, Wilde’s uneducated and ignorant, was also true.
Reducing political complexity by presenting the voter with a simple binary choice is a technique as old as the hills. At its most venal it descends into prejudice and blame throwing. This Nazi poster denigrates the WW2 allies implying that it was Jews who were behind them:
And yet the obscenity of Nazi ideology did not teach us to be more careful. This poster from Farage and the “Leave” campaign was only half a step removed from Goebbels:
One of the variants of Conservatism being peddled at the moments is “National Conservatism”, another is ‘Popular Conservatism”. They are both unashamedly populist movements in the tradition of hard Right parties of the past like the National Front and UKIP.
In the upcoming Elections in the United States and here we can expect Trump (if it’s him) and Sunak punting a “reductio ab absurdum” message full of faux-patriotism and blame calling. We’ve been there before. A political campaign based on nationalism and populist xenophobia is no doubt being carefully planned in Tufton Street and CCHQ.
NATO was established when half of post war Europe was under Soviet domination, including much of Eastern Germany. To protect the west from Soviet threat Europeans needed America. And it was in America’s interest peacefully to protect us. But times have changed.
Former Soviet dominated countries are now free. And Europe is economically united, a symbol of its cultural and historic common heritage. And European integration, the practical manifestation of a common bond and outlook, means that approaching a half of a billion people are meaningfully European citizens.
Cultural and Economic units such as the EU/EFTA also need to defend themselves. The case for a European Defence Force is overwhelming. It would be politically logical and accountable (to member States via the EU Parliament). There would be no reason why a Europe taking responsibility democratically for its own defence couldn’t negotiate mutually beneficial military alliances with other countries with which it has a common interest , especially former NATO partners like the United States and Canada and Britain.
Only a part of our hydrocarbon consumption is substitutable by renewables. Power generation certainly but there are limits. The capital cost of wind turbines is high and probably requires subsidy at a time when national exchequers in the West are struggling to balance their books. Also the effective lifetime of a turbine is unknown as is the maintenance cost over time. Solar has its place but you cannot replace a 3Gw power plant with solar panels.
Some parts of energy consumption are oil or gas specific and cannot change within known technologies. Indeed international trade is dependent on container ships which run on oil. So do ferries and cruise ships and the rest. The big new giant cruise ship runs on LNG , hydrocarbon Gas in other words. Air travel is oil specific and is growing. There is no alternative to oil other than making jet engines more efficient which has been happening successfully for a long time.
Commercial Road Transport (lorries and trucks etc.) is also (realistically) oil specific. Personal transport (private cars) can switch to battery power but that would bring other raw material challenges. And the range problem has not yet been solved.
In short those nations with substantial oil and gas reserves will be in the economic and political pound seats for a very long time.
This is the front page of The Times today (that’s in what was once referred to as a “newspaper of record”). Is the Monarch’s illness really such an important story that it warrants such blanket coverage?
Research suggests that the generation born in the new millennium are not as enamoured of the Royals as their parents and grandparents. And whilst other nations have monarchs as head of state (some even borrow ours) nowhere is there such sycophantic adulation as here.
The nations of the United Kingdom have interesting histories and our collective Imperial ambitions and “success” certainly made us a global power. Similarly the Industrial Revolution of the Victorian nineteenth century (warts and all) created a preeminent manufacturing and trading nation. In the 20th Century our military might and national courage helped us win two World Wars (with a little help from our friends). But now?
Some of the historic pomp remains though not much of the circumstance of the past. We are like a national Miss Haversham reluctant to discard our once finery despite the fact that we have been jilted. And that’s what the royals are – glitz and pseudo glamour without any substance. How preposterous is this image in the twenty first century?
The explanation for the ongoing obsession with this frankly dysfunctional family is that there isn’t much else. The Empire is long gone as is our industrial and military might.
In 1962 Dean Acheson memorably said that “ Britain had lost an empire and had not found a role. He added:
“Britain’s attempt to play a separate power role – that is, a role apart from Europe, a role based on a ‘special relationship’ with the United States, a role based on being the head of a Commonwealth which has no political structure or unity or strength and enjoys a fragile and precarious economic relationship – this role is about played out.”
And that was sixty years ago and in truth we have gone further backwards since with Brexit setting us apart from Europe and creating an insane anachronistic faux independence that makes us look ridiculous.
Ridicule is the only sane reaction to Little England and our silly delusional games. Hugh Grant’s Prime Minister in “Love Actually” said
“We may be a small country, but we’re a great one too. The country of Shakespeare, Churchill, TheBeatles, Sean Connery, Harry Potter, David Beckham’s right foot, David Beckham’s left foot, come to that.”
That summed it up – though he didn’t mention The Queen or James Bond. Or Dunkirk, a crushing defeat that we incomprehensibly turned into a noble victory!
After we decided to be European we actually played the role rather well for a time. We celebrated joining the Union and Brits played a significant role in the governance of the uniting Europe . Then we blew it all.
This brings us back to what we are now. “Played out” as Acheson put it and absolutely without a “role”. So we substitute genuine significance with the illusory pretensions of Royalty. It goes down well in America the inventors of the soap opera. In truth we are more Schitts Creek than anything substantial. Living rather like Moira Rose on departed glories but still dressing extravagantly in denial about the loss of of meaningful fame.
Moira Rose in Schitts Creek
I wish Charles Windsor well – my despair about the monarchy and its grossly inflated significance in the national psyche is not personal. But that royal obsession is a veneer below which we are, it has to be said, “played out”.
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