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

ISRAEL’S genocidal assault on the people of Gaza, its state-sponsored provocations against Palestinians in besieged Gaza, the illegally occupied West Bank and its unremitting bombardment of Lebanon have sharpened international condemnation of the zionist state.
The United States, Britain and most members of the EU, plus Japan, Canada and Australia — which constitute themselves as “international opinion” despite comprising a minority of UN members — provide diplomatic cover and, in various quantities, military and financial aid to Israel’s war effort. But, faced with Israel’s continuing starvation tactics as it ethnically cleanses north Gaza (in preparation for its resettlement?) even the US has been forced to propose a month’s probation for the Israeli state.
Israeli ruling circles and the military leadership have abandoned any notion of proportionate response and to their targeted bombardment of schools, hospitals and residential areas have added attacks on United Nations peacekeepers in Lebanon, UN refugee workers in Gaza and, at the UN general assembly in New York, the United Nations itself.

Holding office in local government is a poisoned chalice for a party that bases its electoral appeal around issues where it has no power whatsoever, argues NICK WRIGHT

From Gaza complicity to welfare cuts chaos, Starmer’s baggage accumulates, and voters will indeed find ‘somewhere else’ to go — to the Greens, nationalists, Lib Dems, Reform UK or a new, working-class left party, writes NICK WRIGHT

There is no doubt that Trump’s regime is a right-wing one, but the clash between the state apparatus and the national and local government is a good example of what any future left-wing formation will face here in Britain, writes NICK WRIGHT

European Central Bank chief Christine Lagarde sees Trump’s many disruptions as an opportunity to challenge the dollar’s ‘exorbitant privilege’ — but greater Euro assertiveness will also mean greater warmongering and militarism, warns NICK WRIGHT