Robinson successfully defended his school from closure, fought for the unification of the teaching unions, mentored future trade union leaders and transformed teaching at the Marx Memorial Library, writes JOHN FOSTER
July 1943: the Sicily landings and the Kursk battle
JOHN ELLISON shows how the calculated moves of the West and East during their time as allies against fascism would prefigure the divided Europe of the cold war to come
DISASTER FOR THE NAZIS: A German soldier in the Orel Salient sitting in despair on the remains of an artillery piece after the Battle of Kursk. A dead comrade lies nearby
A judge in a German court ruled that the ban activity imposed on renowned Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah was unlawful, reports LEON WYSTRYCHOWSKI
At the very moment Britain faces poverty, housing and climate crises requiring radical solutions, the liberal press promotes ideologically narrow books while marginalising authors who offer the most accurate understanding of change, writes IAN SINCLAIR
From Gaza protest bans to proscribing Palestine Action, political elites are showing a crisis of confidence as they abandon Roy Jenkins’s apologetic approach for Suella Braverman’s aggressive ‘hate march’ rhetoric, writes PAUL DONOVAN
ANSELM ELDERGILL examines the legal case behind this weekend’s Tolpuddle Martyrs’ Festival and the lessons for today
Ben Chacko talks to RMT leader EDDIE DEMPSEY about how the key to fixing broken Britain lies in collective sectoral bargaining, restoring unions’ ability to take solidarity strike action and bringing about the much-vaunted ‘wave of insourcing’
The summer of 1950 saw Labour abandon further nationalisation while escalating Korean War spending from £2.3m to £4.7m, as the government meekly accepted capitalism’s licence and became Washington’s yes-man, writes JOHN ELLISON
IN July 1943, 80 years ago, WWII, inherently horrific, as is all war, became still more so. On July 5, south-west of Moscow, a massive tank-centred attack by Nazi Germany commenced against the westward-leaning Kursk “bulge,” located between Nazi-occupied Orel and Belgorod, more than 150 miles further south.
Five days later, substantial landings of Western Allied forces took place in Sicily.
Information received in Britain about progress in both places was inevitably limited. On July 13 the Daily Worker commented: “The two battles, in Sicily and at Kursk, grow in intensity. The next days and hours are an anxious period in which big issues will be decided.” Two days later the paper announced: “From both the news is good.”
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The summer of 1950 saw Labour abandon further nationalisation while escalating Korean War spending from £2.3m to £4.7m, as the government meekly accepted capitalism’s licence and became Washington’s yes-man, writes JOHN ELLISON
JOHN ELLISON looks back at Labour’s opportunistic tendency, when in office, to veer to the right on policy as well as ideological worldview
JOHN ELLISON recalls the momentous role of the French resistance during WWII
JOHN ELLISON looks back to the 1974 general election in Greece which freed the people from the oppressive military junta
