This year’s Bristol Radical History Festival focused on the persistent threats of racism, xenophobia and, of course, our radical collective resistance to it across Ireland and Britain, reports LYNNE WALSH

THE humanitarian impact of Israel’s attack on Gaza is difficult to comprehend. Not only the bombardment but the severe restriction of aid into Gaza has killed tens of thousands of people.
Most awfully, these factors often combine, as on February 29. A crowd of desperate Palestinian civilians had gathered to wait for an aid convoy delivering bags of flour when Israeli troops fired into the crowd for a reported hour and a half. At least 118 civilians died in the “Flour Massacre,” as the event has been dubbed, with hundreds more injured.
As Al-Jazeera reported, though there is dispute over what led the Israeli forces to fire, the basic facts are clear: “Israeli forces fired indiscriminately into the crowd which killed dozens of people and led to a stampede in which more people died.”

A maverick’s self-inflicted snake bites could unlock breakthrough treatments – but they also reveal deeper tensions between noble scientific curiosity and cold corporate callousness, write ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and MIRIAM GAUNTLETT
Science has always been mixed up with money and power, but as a decorative facade for megayachts, it risks leaving reality behind altogether, write ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and MIRIAM GAUNTLETT

