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
Latest editorial
Unions need women and women need unions
As 65 per cent of the public-sector workforce are female, this puts them on the front line of the struggle against privatisation and de-regulation — unions must centre women workers for an effective fightback, writes HELEN O'CONNOR
Low pay, scandalously low levels of sick pay and the failure to grant paid carers’ leave are all issues that plunge working women and families into poverty and are driving increasing numbers of families to food banks and homelessness.
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
THE 1980s under Margaret Thatcher marked a regressive period for working-class people as a whole — and women in particular.
The conditions were laid down for a savage assault on the public sector. Competitive tendering was laid out in the provision of domestic, catering and laundering services, which led to the super-exploitation of outsourced hospital workers that we see today.
Monetarist policies, economic deregulation, the slashing of social security, privatisation of public services and anti-union legislation had a devastating impact through deindustrialisation and unemployment rose to three million. State benefits including child benefit were cut and child poverty doubled as Thatcher attacked working mothers for “raising a creche generation.”
Similar stories
Working-class women lead the fight for fair work and equitable pay and against sexual harassment, the rise of the far right and years of failed austerity policies, writes ROZ FOYER
From the ‘motherhood pay penalty’ to low-paid care work, the Morning Star Women’s Readers and Supporters Group in Scotland has been looking at how neoliberalism has been pushing back women’s hard-won gains, writes KATE RAMSDEN
As the government ploughs ahead with £3 billion in welfare cuts, arbitrary office-return mandates, and below-inflation pay rises, women will bear the brunt through deepening poverty and increased caring burdens, argues FRAN HEATHCOTE
Persistent inequality for women shows we still have a long way to go, but Wales TUC leader SHAVANAH TAJ is confident we can build a fairer country when we work together