Once the bustling heart of Christian pilgrimage, Bethlehem now faces shuttered hotels, empty streets and a shrinking Christian community, while Israel’s assault on Gaza and the tightening grip of occupation destroy hopes of peace at the birthplace of Christ, writes Father GEOFF BOTTOMS
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‘Here I am, whether you like it or not!’
Louise Raw talks to grime legend and ‘mistress of clashing’ LADY SHOCKER about her east London roots, the energy of the youth circuit and the challenges of being a woman in a male-led industry
After years hidden away, Oldham’s memorial to six local volunteers who died fighting fascism in the Spanish civil war has been restored to public view, marking both a victory for campaigners and a renewed tribute to the town’s proud International Brigade heritage, says ROB HARGREAVES
The June 2025 attacks on Iran have heightened the risk of a wider war, exposed the fiction of a rules-based international order and left ordinary Iranians trapped between external aggression and internal repression, says the Committee for Defence of Iranian People’s Rights
While pretending to seek peace, Europe is heading toward a collision course with Russia – using security guarantees, troop deployments, expropriation and censorship as tools, writes SEVIM DAGDELEN
A WWI hero, renowned ornithologist, medical doctor, trade union organiser and founder member of the Communist Party of Great Britain all rolled in one. MAT COWARD tells the story of a life so improbable it was once dismissed as fiction
The long-term effects of chemical weapons such as Agent Orange mean that the impact of war lasts well beyond a ceasefire
LIKE grime music itself, Lady Shocker was born and bred in Bow.
Writing her first lyrics as a schoolgirl and hanging out with renowned Grime MCs like Wiley and God’s Gift, “Shocks” went on to form Female Allstars (FA), grime’s first all-woman “crew.”
Grime was no record company invention, but a real working-class movement “from the streets,” as Shocks puts it.
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When a couple moves in downstairs, gentrification begins with waffles and coffee, and proceeds via horticultural sabotage to legal action
It’s tiring always being viewed as the ‘wrong sort of woman,’ writes JENNA, a woman who has exited the sex industry
JANE WRIGHT talks to App Drivers and Couriers Union members and activists about their experience of biased apps, sexist customers and lack of toilet facilities while driving the streets of Britain’s cities