Minister

In today’s newsletter: As ​the polls tighten a​​round Benjamin Netanyahu, the coming months may redefine Israel’s political order without resolving its most entrenched conflictsGood morning. On Wednesday, Israeli legislators took the first steps towards dissolving parliament and calling fresh nationwide elections. Leading leftwing Knesset member Yair Golan hailed it “the beginning of the end of the worst government in Israel’s history.” Benjamin Netanyahu has spent 20 of the last 30 years as Israel’s prime minister, the last four of which have seen him helm a far-right coalition.Under the incumbent government, settlement building in the illegally occupied West Bank has accelerated, while many international humanitarian NGOs have been banned from the Palestinian territories. Following Hamas’s killing of 1,200 Israelis on 7 October 2023, Netanyahu has orchestrated a campaign of violence in Gaza, wiping out more than 10% of the population, and flattening the strip in what the UN has declared a genocide. Netanyahu remains on trial for three counts of corruption.UK news | The parents of a girl critically injured in the Southport attack were allowed no more than 12 counselling sessions after the atrocity, while others described a “woeful” lack of support.UK politics | Sadiq Khan has blocked a £50m Metropolitan police deal with the controversial US tech company Palantir, sparking a bitter row between the London mayor and Scotland Yard.Israel | Israel has said it has deported all the foreign activists it seized from a Gaza-bound flotilla, after a global outcry over their treatment in custody.UK news | Single-sex toilets and changing rooms in England, Wales and Scotland must exclude transgender men and women, according to a new code of practice from the equalities watchdog.Ukraine | Ukrainian drones hit the Syzran oil refinery more than 800km inside Russia, setting it on fire, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Thursday. Continue reading...

• Foreign ministers from the Council of Europe have adopted a political declaration concerning the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and migration. • The consensus text integrates diverse national perspectives with established Strasbourg case-law to address the complexities of migration within the legal framework. • This move reinforces the ECHR's central role in protecting human rights, upholding the rule of law, and ensuring democratic security and peace across Europe.

Israel’s far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has triggered global outrage after sharing footage of himself taunting bound activists who had been detained as they tried to sail to Gaza with aid. The video has been widely condemned by world leaders, including the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, and by Israeli politicians, among them the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.Lucy Hough speaks to the Guardian’s chief Middle East correspondent, Emma Graham-Harrison – watch on YouTube Continue reading...

Péter Magyar’s draft amendment would prevent Viktor Orbán from returning to the roleEurope live – latest updatesHungary’s new government, led by Péter Magyar, has put forward a constitutional amendment that would limit prime ministers to a maximum of eight years in office, effectively barring Viktor Orbán from returning to the role.The draft amendment was submitted on Wednesday, just over a week after the new government took office. It marked Magyar and his Tisza party’s first step in dismantling a constitution that was unilaterally rewritten and amended more than a dozen times as Orbán and his Fidesz party worked to turn Hungary into a “petri dish for illiberalism”. Continue reading...

Documents released by government also show queen was ‘very keen’ for former prince to have prominent roleUK politics live – latest updatesFormal security vetting and due diligence appears not to have been carried out before the appointment of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor as trade envoy, the government has said, as it emerged that that the late queen was “very keen” for her son to take up a prominent role in promoting Britain’s interests.The first batch of documents relating to the appointment of the former prince as trade envoy in 2001 by Tony Blair have revealed a memo addressed to Robin Cook dated 25 February 2000, in which the then chief executive of British Trade International, David Wright, said Queen Elizabeth II’s “wish” had been for Mountbatten-Windsor, then the Duke of York, to take on the role. Continue reading...

Manchester mayor and Labour’s Makerfield byelection candidate wants to make politics ‘less point-scoring, more problem-solving’UK politics live – latest updatesAndy Burnham has said he will back sweeping changes to the electoral system to make politics “less point-scoring, more problem-solving” if he becomes prime minister.The Greater Manchester mayor has previously called for the introduction of proportional representations for UK general elections, handing more power to minority parties like the Greens. Continue reading...

Treasury’s Lucy Rigby says Rachel Reeves introduced measures in her first budget as Streeting calls for capital gains rates to be aligned with income taxGood morning. It’s a big day for Rachel Reeves, the chancellor. In a Commons statement, she is announcing a series of measures to help people with the cost of living. She wants people to enjoy a “Great British summer”, she says. Reeves’s plan for what makes for a good summer is not quite the same as Samantha Niblett’s; the chancellor is talking about free bus travel for children, as Heather Stewart, Peter Walker and Sarah Butler report in their preview.Reeves is speaking after 11.30am.We already tax wealth in this country. The chancellor introduced a host of measures in her first budget, and then further measures in the last budget as well, that try and make sure that tax is as progressive and fair as possible. Continue reading...