The proxy war in Ukraine is heading to a denouement with the US and Russia dividing the spoils while the European powers stand bewildered by events they have been wilfully blind to, says KEVIN OVENDEN
The pick ’n’ mix politics of Christmas
Marxist theologian PROFESSOR JAMES CROSSLEY looks at how the story of the birth of Jesus was created from multiple sources and how the political class use and abuse it today
One can only imagine what would happen if 2.2 million Palestinian refugees were pushed into Jordan, Egypt and other Arab countries, per Trump’s proposal, writes RAMZY BAROUD
This is the most anti-migrant government in decades, argues RAVISHAAN RAHEL MUTHIAH
VICTOR GROSSMAN reports, with a little chuckle, on how US readiness to work with Russia, not just on peace for Ukraine, has thrown a spanner into the German electoral machine
SOLOMON HUGHES probes the finances of a phoney ‘charity’ pushing the free schools and academies agenda
Freedom now for former PM Mir-Hossein Mousavi and other political prisoners
VIJAY PRASHAD examines why in 2018 Washington started to take an increasingly belligerent stance towards ‘near peer rivals’ – Russa and China – with far-reaching geopolitical effects
THE story of the birth of Jesus is found in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke.
While they are both relatively light on the familiar Christmas details, both tell stories of the virgin Mary, Bethlehem and angels (though admittedly angels were understood as militaristic supernatural figures, rather than twee figures of more recent imaginations).
From Matthew’s Gospel we get the unnamed and unnumbered wise men from the east, the gifts (frankincense, gold and myrrh), the star over Bethlehem, Herod’s massacre of the infants and Mary and Joseph’s flight to Egypt with their baby.
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JAMES CROSSLEY charts how anti Jewish sentiment developed from ancient days and the dawn of Christianity to the Middle Ages, the birth of Protestantism and the sinister era of of the Nazis
The peasants’ leader has inspired centures of reformers and revolutionaries since his execution in the Middle Ages following the failed revolt with his vision of an England freed from the Church and aristocracy, writes JAMES CROSSLEY
The sight of Lib Dem politicians engaging in a patronising gesture to Muslim voters by jumping on the Ramadan fast really hollows out the meaning and content of the term ‘solidarity', observes JAMES CROSSLEY
A new movement of socialist fight-sports clubs is smashing misconceptions that the left is a muddle of middle-class milquetoasts, writes JAMES CROSSLEY
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