High Stakes

National referendum is being seen as a de facto confidence vote on the government – and the polls are neck and neckIn the run-up to a referendum in Italy on a government quest to overhaul the judiciary, a campaign flyer circulated online quoting Giorgia Meloni, the prime minister, taking aim at judges and feminists. “Judges block the deportations of rapists. Where are the feminists? Vote yes – there will not be another opportunity,” it read.The flyer, posted on the Facebook page of Meloni’s Brothers of Italy, a party with neofascist roots, was subsequently removed. But its tone has defined a campaign dominated by inflammatory rhetoric rather than meaningful debate. Continue reading...

Regime will do whatever it takes to cling on to power – including sacrificing economies of other Gulf statesMiddle East crisis – live updatesBrinkmanship, the ability to take a country to the edge of war without plunging it into the abyss, was the cornerstone of cold war diplomacy. But in our different, more unstable times – in which the line between state and non-state actors has blurred, and weapons of war have diffused – the world this week finally tipped over the edge, and suddenly it is in freefall.The first six days of the Iran war cost the US $12.7bn (£9.5bn), but now the Pentagon is seeking as much as $200bn in military funding. Oil at $125 a barrel is no longer an Iranian, or Russian, fantasy. The crown jewel of Qatar, Ras Laffan – the world’s largest liquefied natural gas plant – may not reopen fully for five years, at a cost of $20bn a year. Other combustible oil depots in the Gulf, from Bahrain to Abu Dhabi, are exposed to Iran’s low-cost drones. Then add the human cost of 18,000 civilians injured and more than 3,000 killed in Iran alone. Continue reading...