Alex Salmond. Always My Hero. October 13, 2024: - Before Alex Salmond, Scottish Independence was an impossible dream, a romantic aspiration, outside the realm of practical politics. After Alex Salmond, it is the dominant question in Scottish politics and by far the biggest threat to the UK state. I would argue that, with every poll for a decade showing overwhelming support for Independence among the under 30s and support for the UK only in a majority in the over 55s, Alex made Independence inevitable. In Scotland's national story, he deserves a place alongside William Wallace and Robert Bruce. (In my last conversation with Alex, about two weeks ago, he… Simply No Red Lines At All October 11, 2024: - There is literally no act so vile that the UK, US and Germany will not support if perpetrated by the terrorist state of Israel. Yesterday Israel: deliberately attacked UN peacekeepers in three separate bases; bombed residential central Beirut killing and maiming hundreds; abducted, beat up and held an American journalist; slaughtered 30 Palestinian refugees in an UNRWA school; was found by an official UN Commission Report to be guilty of the crime against humanity of "extermination" in Gaza. Any single one of these outrages would be roundly condemned if committed by any country at all except Israel, and would lead…
In Praise of Civil Disobedience October 9, 2024: - Western governments are deeply involved, strongly against the will of the majority of their population, in committing a colonial genocide of indigenous people. This happens because the political class have been bought by the Zionist lobby. The causes may run deeper, but that is the mechanism. Democracy has therefore failed, having been fatally corrupted. In these circumstances, civil disobedience is not just ethically justified, it is the duty of the good citizen. Palestine Action continue their highly effective actions to disrupt the chain of supply of the Israeli weapons industry. On Friday morning I was at the Old Bailey with… 
A Very Peculiar Triumph October 5, 2024: - At the end of Julian Assange's testimony before the Judicial Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, 95% of the entire room of 220 people rose in a standing ovation. The audience consisted of members of the Parliamentary Assembly, who are delegated members of their national parliaments, from all over Europe. Furthermore they included members of the full European political spectrum, including the dominant national parties. The audience also included Council of Europe staff and experts, and worldwide media. Note this well - and I have never witnessed anything remotely like this - the 100 or so… 
Netanyahu Plays Chicken September 21, 2024: - Netanyahu is desperate to keep war simmering along and to draw the USA closer and closer to him. At the same time he cannot send ground forces into South Lebanon where they will take massive casualties. Israel can assassinate, it can employ indiscriminate terrorism and it can bombard from the air, and it has done all these things against Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran. But Israel cannot destroy Hamas nor Hezbollah, cannot get back its hostages from Gaza and cannot make Northern Israel safe for its colonialists. Nothing Israel is doing in any way advances those declared objectives and in… 
A New Left Wing Party in the UK? September 18, 2024: - Keir Starmer has left about 70% of the landscape of historic western political and economic thought vacant to his left. It is unsurprising that a new party will arrive to claim the unoccupied ground. A meeting at the weekend discussed a new party provisionally called The Collective, which may be led by Jeremy Corbyn, who addressed the meeting. That was strangely secretive but seems to have been an adjunct of Corbyn's Peace and Justice Movement international conference, which occurred simultaneously and featured many of the same cast. The Collective is not new. This name was used for a loose coalition… 
Some Truth Bombs At the UN September 16, 2024: - Alongside Richard Medhurst I had the chance to state rather more truth than is generally heard inside the United Nations in Geneva: "Not only is the West complicit in the Genocide in Palestine, the ruling class of the West is so scared of its own citizens that it is now prepared to persecute its own citizens in support of a genocide". Richard Medhurst followed up on the same theme: Our appearance at the UN was organised by Justice for All International, an admirable Geneva based NGO with which I am proud to be associated. If you can donate to their… 
That Harris/Trump Debate September 11, 2024: - I just sat through a recording of the Trump/Harris debate. Ignoring the merits of their political stances, I agree with the general consensus that Kamala Harris "won" in performance terms, but only because Trump was awful. Both were of course terrible on Palestine. While I appreciate that that is of most interest to perhaps a majority of my readers, and that it is a key issue for a significant slice of US voters, it is not what this post is about. I am considering more broadly the prospects for who becomes US President. Trump's ability to make a coherent argument… Scotland and The Devolution Trap September 9, 2024: - As Starmer and Reeves subject the UK economy to yet more austerity and deregulation, the Scottish Government takes the blame for cutbacks caused by an economic policy in which they have zero say. That has always been the problem with devolution: it is responsibility without power – an invidious position to be in. That is not to say the Scottish government does not make plenty of mistakes of its own - the absurdly large sums of money thrown at the "third sector", often to further pet causes, is one example. Angus Robertson has just imposed cuts on Creative Scotland programmes,… 
The End of Western Pluralist Democracy September 1, 2024: - No major western leader is ever again going to be able to speak about human rights or ethical values, without attracting howls of derision. They are turning on their own people in order to prevent protest at a genocide they actively support. Keir Starmer stepped up the pressure on opponents of Zionist genocide on Thursday with the arrest of journalist Sarah Wilkinson and the charging of activist Richard Barnard, both under the draconian Section 12 of the Terrorism Act which carries a sentence of up to 14 years in prison. The UK MSM has of course ignored these, but is… Pavel Durov and the Abuse of Law August 27, 2024: - The detention of Pavel Durov is being portrayed as a result of the EU Digital Services Act. But having spent my day reading the EU Services Act (a task I would not wish upon my worst enemy), it does not appear to me to say what it is being portrayed as saying. EU Acts are horribly dense and complex, and are published as "Regulations" and "Articles". Both cover precisely the same ground, but for purposes of enforcement the more detailed "Regulations" are the more important, and those are referred to below. The "Articles" are entirely consistent with this. So, for…
The Attack on Truth: Julian Assange and Richard Medhurst August 22, 2024: - Julian Assange was released in the midst of the election campaign and the event was not really given the attention it deserves. Alex Salmond invited me to take a look back with him on what this persecution means and where we are now. I do recommend that you subscribe to Alex's show Scotland Speaks. He is a fascinating and, in my view, admirable man whose public image is massively distorted by the mainstream media. I think you will be pleasantly surprised by the range of topics he tackles and his approach to them, as well as his breadth of intellect.…
Richard Medhurst and the Right to Armed Resistance August 20, 2024: - We were waiting for Richard Medhurst to arrive and join our panel at the Beautiful Days festival, when he was arrested and imprisoned for 23.5 hours. Obviously we were all worried sick about him. I was arrested at Heathrow Airport under the Terrorism Act, Sec 12 because of my reporting.6 police officers were waiting for me at the entrance of the aircraft.I was held for almost 24 hours and questioned.I believe I'm the first journalist to be arrested under this… pic.twitter.com/pbf6q5dXIf— Richard Medhurst (@richimedhurst) August 19, 2024 It is now becoming easier to list the truly dissident UK journalists who… 
The Purpose of Scottish Independence August 18, 2024: - The purpose of Scottish Independence is not to replicate the UK state on a smaller scale with a prettier flag. The purpose is to eschew the imperialist past, stop invading other countries, and build a fairer and more equal society both domestically and internationally. I thank God I was alive and campaigning in 2014 when for a joyous few months a better world seemed within our grasp; genuine transformational change to a better society was almost tangible, we only had to reach for it. In all the speeches I gave in that campaign, I concentrated on international relations, because others… 
We Are The Bad Guys August 12, 2024: - In Murder in Samarkand I describe how as a British Ambassador, when I discovered the full extent of our complicity in torture in the War on Terror, I thought it must be a rogue operation and all I had to do was make ministers and senior officials aware and they would stop it. When I was reprimanded and officially told that receipt of intelligence from torture in the "War on Terror" was approved from the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary down, and it became clear to me that there was a deliberate promoting of false intelligence narratives through torture which… 
Skin in the Game August 9, 2024: - I cannot think of a period in my lifetime when so much was happening in the world so quickly with which it feels that, as a reluctant UK citizen, I have a direct connection and indeed responsibility. Race riots in the UK, the genocide in Gaza, the attacks on civil liberty and decline in effective democracy across the western world, the ever darkening reach of mass surveillance, including of the individual's use of currency; those are just a few of the issues in play and the links between all of them are intimate and inextricable. I do not believe that… Freedom of Speech and the Fascist Wave August 3, 2024: - UPDATE The people of Blackburn scored a vital victory today against the forces of fascism as "Tommy Robinson"'s overweight racist disciples were met with an overwhelming show of solidarity in the street, of which I was proud with my friends to be a part. The fascists like to attack defenceless targets. Faced with the prospect of real resistance, they ran away. Poor little Tommy is not happy in his Spanish hideaway, where he lives his life as an immigrant. Blackburn should be a model of how to face down the fascists. Yesterday I received a phone call from a police… The Israeli Terrorist State July 31, 2024: - It is no longer possible to categorise the nihilistic violence of the Israeli state. It appears to have no objective other than violence and an urge for desolation. In 24 hours Israel has murdered the man with whom it would need to negotiate hostage release in the short term and political settlement in the long term, and a key figure in its most dangerous potential military enemy which has refrained from full-on war. In doing so it has violated the territory, indeed the capitals, of two crucial regional states. Israel has also taken a policy decision that the mass rape…
The Relative Value of Life and Death July 29, 2024: - The cause of the tragic Druze deaths in Majdal Shams was the illegal Israeli occupation in Syria, a fact which the residents of the town are clear about. The large majority of the Druze community in the Golan Heights has always refused to accept Israeli citizenship. That picture is from a demonstration four years ago, but it shows that the Golan Druze know where their allegiance lies, and it is not with their Israeli occupiers. The deaths are a tragedy, and they would be a tragedy if they were Druze, Palestinian or Jewish kids. The right of occupied peoples to… 
The Presence of Evil July 25, 2024: - I have frequently explained that when I sat in the International Court of Justice and heard Israel's lawyers tell lie after lie to justify or excuse the Gaza genocide, I could feel I was palpably in the presence of evil. At least in the Hague you could also feel and indeed observe that most people in the courtroom - including the majority of the judges - were repulsed by the evil. Yesterday that same evil, and the same lies, was manifested in the US Congress by Netanyahu, to an audience which glorified, reflected and amplified that evil. Let us not… ————————————————-
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