‘Palestinians will bear the cost’: UK consulate in East Jerusalem prepares to shut its doors
The UK consulate in East Jerusalem gave few signs that it was at the centre of a geopolitical controversy this week, with little movement around the high-walled building save the fluttering of the union jack and the occasional car exiting the compound. The mission is to shut its doors on Thursday after Israel ordered its closure in response to a UK ban on trade with illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank and sanctions on those who help build or finance them. The forced closure marked the lowest point in UK-Israeli relations for decades, with reports of the UK considering a retaliatory expulsion of 27 Israeli diplomats from London. It would be the Palestinians who pay the price for the consulate’s closing, warned Amjad Iraqi, the International Crisis Group’s senior analyst on Israel and Palestine. The UK consulate in East Jerusalem is separate from the UK embassy in Tel Aviv – which remains open – and provides services to Palestinians in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza, services they will now lose. “It’s quite telling that the Israeli government response was primarily about blocking the UK’s ability to support Palestinians, rather than the core of UK-Israeli relations themselves,” Iraqi said. “For [the Israeli] foreign minister, Gideon Sa’ar, the response is low-cost, in their minds it’s just Palestinians bearing the cost.” Israel has already curtailed the diplomatic activities of countries like the Netherlands, Spain and Norway in the occupied West Bank. Palestinian residents of Sheikh Jarrah, the East Jerusalem neighbourhood that is home to the consulate, appeared resigned when asked about the impact the closure might have on their lives. “I mean, it was the British that were the basis of the issue wasn’t it? They were the ones who signed the Balfour declaration?” said Abu Abdo, a 79-year-old former repairman and resident of Sheikh Jarrah, referring to a 1917 document by the British foreign secretary Arthur Balfour, which expressed support for a Jewish state in Palestine. It was a dramatic end for the consulate’s tenure in East Jerusalem, which since its move to the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood in 1967, had seen its fair share of political upheaval. The UK government first bought the plot that would become its consulate in 1963, when East Jerusalem was still under Jordanian control. It was meant to be a direct liaison between the UK government and the Jordanian-administered West Bank and East Jerusalem. The compound took four years to build and was finally ready for the UK consul-general to move into by 1967. But by the time the consul moved into, however, East Jerusalem was no longer under the control of the Jordanians. Just weeks before the new consul-general, John Henry Lewen, was to move into the building, the six-day war broke out, and Israel captured East Jerusalem from the Jordanian forces. Lewen assumed his post at the present day consulate in a changed East Jerusalem under Israeli control. The consulate he oversaw occupied a unique position, as the UK did not recognise Jerusalem as being under any single country’s control. As the UK foreign secretary told parliament in June 1967: “Our consul-general in Jerusalem is subordinate neither to the ambassador in Tel Aviv nor to the ambassador in Amman, but directly to the Foreign Office.” Lewen’s tenure was marked by the political problems that plagued Jerusalem in the aftermath of the six-day war, and the birth of Israel. In 1969, a bomb was placed under the window of a consul secretary, harming no one but damaging the compound. Years later, Palestinians would present their grievances to the British consulate in Sheikh Jarrah. In 2017, protesters demonstrated outside the consulate to mark the centenary of the Balfour declaration. Men placed flags in the consululate windows reading “Balfour is a crime”, while schoolgirls carried thousands of letters written by Palestinian students asking Britain to apologise for the declaration. This week, however, there was little sign of the political turmoil which the British consulate had waded through during its 60-years on the site. The neighbourhood, mostly made up of diplomatic missions and UN and other international organisations’ offices, was quiet. Residents in the area expressed disappointment over what they saw as a lack of international support for the Palestinian people in recent years. “We have seen very little but studies and words, no action from the international community,” said Abu Abdo.
Tropical Storm Isaias near Mexico is forecast to become a hurricane
Tropical Storm Isaias formed early on Wednesday in the warm waters off eastern Mexico and forecasters said it was expected to strengthen into the first hurricane of the belated Atlantic season before hitting the US Gulf coast later in the week. Isaias succeeded Tropical Depression Nine as it strengthened overnight. It was located about 285 miles (460km) west of Progreso, Mexico, and about 580 miles (935km) south-west of where the Mississippi River spills into the Gulf of Mexico in Louisiana, according to the National Hurricane Center (NHC). The storm on Wednesday morning had maximum sustained winds of 40mph (65kph) and was moving east to north-east at 8mph (13kph). The first hurricane of the Atlantic season has not formed this late since 8 October 1905. The NHC said the storm is expected to strengthen rapidly and become a strong category 2 hurricane before landfall. It was not immediately known where the storm may make landfall on the US Gulf coast. The hurricane center’s initial projections said the center of Isaias could come onshore somewhere between eastern Louisiana and the western Florida Panhandle. People in those areas were urged to prepare for the storm . “There is an increasing risk of dangerous wind and storm surge impacts along portions of the northern Gulf Coast,” the hurricane center, based in Miami, Florida said. “Residents from Louisiana to the Florida Panhandle should closely monitor the latest forecast updates and ensure they have their hurricane plan in place.” Forecasters added that there is “uncertainty in where the system makes the northeast turn and how fast it moves toward the coast”. The direction of the storm could see it make landfall where Alabama meets Florida early on Saturday, but the NHC reiterated that the exact path is uncertain. The storm comes as the Atlantic hurricane season has been unusually quiet this year owing to a particularly strong El Niño, which disrupts storm formation over that ocean. Storm activity in the Pacific has been above average. This year’s huge El Niño is causing climate chaos around the world. Temperate records have already been broken, with extreme heat reported from western Europe to California. Meanwhile, Bangkok is suffering massive flooding and the weather phenomenon is projected to cause a further 450,000 deaths globally by February. The Associated Press contributed reporting.
World leaders pay tribute to victims as Israel marks three years since 7 October attack by Hamas – live
US secretary of state Marco Rubio said his country “will never forget this act of barbarism against an ally” in his message to mark the anniversary of the 7 October attack in Israel. In a post on X, he said: Three years ago today, Hamas terrorists tortured, mutilated, and murdered 1,200 innocent civilians in Israel. Among those slain were men, women, and children – including dozens of Americans. We will never forget this act of barbarism against an ally and recommit ourselves to the defense of civilization.”
‘Now is the moment’: housing activists at Madrid encampment pin wary hopes on Spain’s early election
At a makeshift lunch counter tucked within a maze of tents at a housing protest camp in Madrid, Sélpide San Luis pointed to the dizzying pace of change. “We built a city in a week,” said the 26-year-old, whose videos documenting day-to-day life at the encampment have attracted tens of thousands of views on social media, as she pointed to the more than 1,200 tents set up in the central Puerta del Sol square. “We have urban planning, the streets have names and we’ve put surveillance systems in place. And thanks to what we’re doing here, media have not stopped talking about the issue of housing – something that we’ve been trying to get on the agenda for so long.” This week marked another significant moment for the impromptu movement. After days of protests and encampments that have sprouted up across the country after the eviction from of 87-year-old Maricarmen Abascal from her home, the Socialist prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, announced a snap general election in response to rightwing parties torpedoing emergency legislation to tackle the housing crisis. Housing campaigners vowed to keep up the pressure. “The power of the people has ushered in a new era,” said Alicia del Río, of the Madrid Tenants’ Union, as she floated plans for a general strike in November. “An election campaign is now beginning that will be deeply shaped by the housing issue. So we ask the members of parliament, are you going to introduce the measures that people are demanding – ones demanded by the majority of voters across all parties – or are you going to continue to be the lackeys of the rentier economy?” The election, which did not have to held until August 2027, is a high-stakes gamble for Sánchez. Polls suggest the most likely outcome will be a rightwing coalition between the People’s party and the far-right, anti-immigration Vox party. But as anger seethes over rents that have surged 80% in a decade and housing costs that have risen by 63%, the protests also present Sánchez with an opportunity to keep his leftwing coalition in power. “Bringing forward the elections is risky. But there’s also a feeling of ‘now is the moment’,” said Antonio Prieto, 36, as he and other volunteers transformed the steady stream of food donations into lunch for those at the Madrid camp. “If we had waited until 2027, the right and far right would have crushed us. And now, at least with this momentum, putting the focus on housing, we can have a tiny bit of hope.” Prieto is among the many closely watching the parties to the left of the Socialists, hoping they will unite to form a broad front before the election. “I’m hopeful that what we’re doing has really got through, so that parties on the left realise that this is a big issue and they start working on real solutions,” he said. The eviction of Abascal, a wheelchair user who was carried from the home she had lived in for more than seven decades on a stretcher, catapulted the long-simmering frustration over the deepening housing crisis into public view. It cast a spotlight on the intense competition for housing across Spain, one that pits local people against tourists lets, investment funds and short-term rentals. As a wave of outrage swept the country, the investment firm that bought Abascal’s home said she could return home without paying the 230% rent hike it had reportedly demanded. But the protests and encampments have continued to gain strength as people demand change. Prieto described them as a “moral duty”, given that the Spanish constitution recognises the right to “decent and adequate housing” for all. “What we’re seeing is a systematic violation of the constitution … So we have to be here,” he said. The growing tent city has had visitors too – some to snap photos, others to ask questions and some to provoke. But the vast majority express their support, said Juan Vázquez, of the Housing Union of Carabanchel, a district in the south of Madrid. “People of all ages have stopped by to wish us strength, bring us water and food, and tell us to keep going,” he said. The challenge now is to translate the groundswell of support into concrete change. “On the one hand we have a right wing that pursues policies of misery and directly attacks the working class,” Vázquez said. “But on the other hand, Sánchez and his government have not gone after the profits that speculative rentiers make from our misery.” He described the coming weeks, as people across Spain prepare to vote, as crucial. “Basically, what we want is to channel all this energy so that it doesn’t just remain a footnote in a week-long encampment – to organise, apply pressure and secure our rights. We know that the organisation of the working class is the only means of looking after our interests.” Jorge Rubio, 27, said the scale of the protests had hopefully made it clear to everyone just what was at stake. “If you don’t vote, the impact could be huge. You could end up without a place to live,” he said, citing rooms for rent that had surged from €180 to €700 (£150 to £600) a month in six years. “It’s crazy. It’s not viable. We’re all affected by this,” he said. He was among the many hoping the movement would go further. “Housing is not just a problem here, it’s a European problem. The revolution needs to reach them too.”
French police suspend use of stun grenades after high school protester loses hand
France is suspending the use of stun grenades by police at high school demonstrations, the interior minister has said, amid mounting accusations of police brutality during a fortnight of protests marred by often violent clashes that have injured hundreds. Laurent Nuñez told RTL radio on Wednesday that he had ordered a temporary halt to the use of the grenades “in the context of the high school students’ movement” after a 15-year-old lost a hand during a protest in Lens, northern France, on Monday. Authorities have not confirmed the exact circumstances – in particular, whether the boy had picked up the grenade or been struck by it – but said up to 200 protesters had been hurling projectiles at police when the riot squad intervened. Nuñez said he was suspending use of the grenades “until we know exactly what happened”. The boy’s mother said on Wednesday that her son’s hand had been amputated. She told BFMTV: “His life has been stolen. He’s a 15-year-old kid, how can children be treated like that?” She said her son had not tried to pick up the grenade. The education ministry said classes had been wholly or partially suspended in 429 of the country’s 3,700 lycées – high schools attended by pupils aged between 15 and 18 – on Wednesday, a significantly lower number than on Tuesday. However, 80 university campuses, including the prestigious Sciences Po in Paris, were being blockaded by students on Wednesday, student unions said, and teachers’ and other unions said they would back further strike action on Thursday. At least 215 teenagers and 85 school staff have been injured since the start of the protests over chronic teacher shortages, crowded classes, dilapidated buildings and long school days. About 750 police offers have also been injured. Nuñez said 18 internal police investigations had been launched over allegations of brutality during the demonstrations, including one incident in which a young protester lost multiple teeth and another in which a student lost the use of an eye. He said inquiries were always opened over accusations of “non-proportional” policing, but he insisted officers were there to protect the students. Rights groups and trades unions have repeatedly accused the police of using unnecessary force. On Tuesday at least 250,000 pupils, parents, teachers and unionists took to the streets in cities across France on the biggest day yet of the campaign, prompting the president, Emmanuel Macron, to hold an emergency cabinet meeting. Most marches passed off without serious incident but some, including in Paris, ended in sporadic vandalism and running skirmishes with riot police, with officers firing teargas and carrying out baton charges to disperse protesters. The prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, is due to make a speech on Wednesday on the demonstrations as well as the dire state of the country’s finances, which is severely constraining the government’s capacity to act on the protesters’ demands. Lecornu on Tuesday condemned the violence and told parliament it could not be tolerated, while also rejecting accusations that the government had ordered “police repression” against the protesters. Over the past fortnight, demonstrators have set dustbins on fire outside their schools, destroyed bus shelters and hurled projectiles at riot police, who have responded using batons, teargas and riot-control rounds. Twenty-four schools have been burned or ransacked, while more than 6,500 people have been arrested, almost all of them minors. More than 1,800 are being prosecuted, nearly 1,500 of them under 18, the justice ministry has said. Anne Savinel-Barras, the president of Amnesty France, said earlier this week that images and testimony from the protests “raise alarming concerns about the dangerous use of teargas, batons and policing techniques”. The protests, months before key presidential elections to choose Macron’s successor, have rattled a government trying to reduce a ballooning budget deficit amid mounting investor concern over France’s sky-high debt and weak economic growth. They have also sparked a heated political row, with the government accusing the radical-left La France Insoumise party of encouraging and even orchestrating the movement after numerous LFI MPs attended school blockades. The party’s veteran leader and presidential candidate, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, has strongly supported the protests while urging non-violence.
Flávio Bolsonaro’s advance in Brazil’s election is grim jolt for climate campaigners
More fire, more ash, more crime, more death. And a globally important ecosystem driven ever more rapidly towards a point of no return. That is the prospect for the Amazon rainforest for at least the next four years if Flávio Bolsonaro holds on to the lead he established this week in the first round of Brazil’s presidential election. This appears to be of far more concern to the outside world than to voters in Latin America’s biggest, richest and most biodiverse nation. The far-right son of the former president and jailed coup-monger Jair Bolsonaro won 47% of the vote, putting him in pole position before the 25 October runoff with the incumbent, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who was backed by 44.2%. The result is an unnerving jolt to climate and nature campaigners. Taken out of context, this appears to be a vote against the forest. The current administration of Lula (as the veteran Brazilian president is best known) has reduced deforestation in the Amazon by almost 50%. But that success secured little noticeable electoral traction for either Lula or pro-forest candidates in other polls held the same day. The former environment minister Marina Silva lost a bid for the Senate and Joenia Wapichana, a former head of Brazil’s Indigenous affairs agency, Funai, failed to win a seat in Congress. Out of 57 Indigenous candidates, only two won. Flávio Bolsonaro is the heir to the political legacy of his father, Jair Bolsonaro, a former army captain whose four years in power resulted in a 59.5% increase in Amazon deforestation, roughly equivalent to destroying 2bn trees. If he wins, Bolsonaro has promised to free his father, who was imprisoned for plotting a military coup and attempting to annihilate democracy in Brazil. He has said that his father could have any position he wants in his administration. Flávio Bolsonaro has shown that he will be just as willing as his father to dismantle protections for climate and nature and allow illegal miners, loggers and land grabbers to invade Indigenous territories. As a lawmaker, he backed a 2019 bill to eliminate requirements for landowners in the Amazon to conserve a proportion of native vegetation. In his manifesto, he completely ignored the climate crisis. And he has courted support from some of the most predatory landowners in the rainforest. He is also part of a movement – Bolsonarism – that is geared towards maximising profits for extractive industries regardless of the environmental cost. Take its victorious candidate for the Amazonian state of Pará, Daniel Santos, who was fined $275,000 (£208,000) for deforestating 280 hectares (692 acres) of his land without authorisation and is now promising to waive such penalties. As a result of Sunday’s election, Bolsonarists now control seven of the nine states in the Brazilian Amazon, and could win an eighth in the runoffs. Bolsonarist influence in the legislature, which is dominated by agribusiness interests, is also growing. Jair’s brother, Eduardo, and mother-in-law, Michelle, were elected to the Senate, while an uncle and brother won seats in the lower house of deputies. Even before the election, Congress had been pushing hard to weaken environmental protections. Now it will be almost impossible to stop, particularly given the current chaos in the supreme court, which has been a partial check on untrammelled expansion by miners, ranchers and monoculturalists. Against these forces, Lula would struggle to govern even if he wins the runoff. As a result, it is not just the Amazon that is in peril, but all of Brazil’s biomes, its traditional peoples and the stability of the global climate. The question now is why voters paid so little heed to these concerns. That inquest is already under way. Many focus on the influence of social media, which has been used far more effectively by the far right. During the Bolsonaro administration, his sons were part of the “hate cabinet” that spread fear and disinformation via WhatsApp groups and other online channels – Bolsonaro’s second son, Carlos, was indicted by federal police for leading the group. Environmentalists were often the target. Another factor is the expansion of US-style Pentecostalism, which is steadily supplanting Catholicism across Brazil, particularly in the Amazon. The political and environmental consequences of that religious shift can be seen by comparing the pro-nature treatise of the past two popes with the sermons of many evangelical preachers who encourage followers to seek wealth today as much as, if not more, than following moral creeds to ensure a good afterlife. Lula, 80, has been slow to adapt. Although he is arguably the most iconic and successful Latin American politician of the 21st century, his messaging seems less attuned to the people than it was in his heyday. The Workers party has struggled in an era of weaker unions and in some ways been the victim of its own success – with education and social policies that raised millions out of poverty and created greater expectations for consumption and entrepreneurism; and huge subsidies to farmers, who now support the right wing because they chaff at environmental limits. Tied into those explanations are the geopolitics of the climate and nature crisis, which is exacerbating great power rivalry between the US and China and amplifying extreme ideologies as much as extreme weather. In this light, the Brazil election is just the latest in a broader pattern of the far right taking control to expand extractivism despite growing evidence that the capitalist economy is breaking planetary boundaries. In the past two years, Donald Trump has ripped apart environmental regulations in the US and treated the rest of the Americas as his sphere of influence. Argentina was already onboard. Venezuela has been invaded for its resources, while in Colombia, Peru and Chile there has been a sharp shift to the right. Will Brazil be the next domino to fall to Trumpism and its bonfire approach to nature? The Bolsonaro family certainly hope so. Jair went so far as to salute the US flag. His son Eduardo urged the US to apply tariffs on Brazilian people to “punish” the government for imprisoning his father. The Brazilian intelligence agency has warned that the US was trying to interfere in the election. That election isn’t over yet. Lula stands a small chance if he can win over the many millions of voters who chose not to mark their ballots for either candidate. But the odds are stacked against him. Most of the eliminated candidates were on the right so their supporters are more likely to switch to Bolsonaro. No first round leader has ever failed to win the runoff of a Brazilian presidential election. Voters, of course, are allowed to change their minds. Either on 25 October or, constitutionally, in four years’ time. But for how much longer will that be possible? If Bolsonaro wins, it won’t just be Lula that is finished, it could also be the Amazon and democracy itself.
The 80-year-old market trader who became a Chilean music star
At a concert hall in the Chilean capital, Santiago, an 80-year-old man edges unsteadily down a steep staircase. With one hand he grips the metal bannister, in the other he carries a mug of hot water with a slice of lemon, as if heading to bed. But when the red stage curtain is pulled aside for him, Luis Gómez, or JM as he is universally known, transforms in an instant. He skips on to the stage to a roar from the crowd and launches into a bolero, punctuated by hip thrusts and shuffling two-steps. JM is the frontman of Los Crack del Puerto, and one of the last remaining voices of a golden generation. Born and raised in Valparaíso, Chile’s vibrant second city, JM’s late foray into music has taken him all around the country, as well as to Mexico, the UK, Argentina and France. But things could – and probably should – have worked out very differently. At 65, he was still hawking vegetables at the market he had worked at since the age of eight. This May, Los Crack del Puerto released their fourth record, Lo Mucho Que Nos Queda (So Much Yet to Come), as a cassette – to great acclaim. “Singing has always been my release,” JM says in a wavering voice, in contrast to his confident onstage vocals. The father of two speaks with captivating enthusiasm about his life, often leaping to his feet to re-enact minor scenes. Scattered with bursts of song, most conversations return to his mostly tongue-in-cheek fear of his wife of 55 years, his penchant for sports clothing, or the market on Avenida Argentina in Valparaíso. JM was born in the O’Higgins neighbourhood of Valparaíso in 1945, the youngest of five children. He was three years old when his father died, and 10 when he lost his mother. For a time, he would sleep out on the street between parked cars, until his aunt and uncle took him in and laid down the law, insisting that he was home by 10pm each night. “JM” was a cheeky nickname bestowed upon him by the family – the initials of a childhood friend, Juan Muñoz, with whom they said he spent too much time. The moniker has long since replaced his full name. Valparaíso then, as it is now, was defined by its music. As in many ports, cultures and ideas have long arrived in the city and been woven into its fabric; but the musical styles of its 20th-century heyday, from boleros to waltzes, tango to cueca, Chile’s official national dance, have barely changed in generations. “The same songs that were sung before are still the ones they sing now,” says JM decisively. Many now form Los Crack del Puerto’s repertoire. One of his cousins, Juan Navarro, known simply as Juanín, would bring friends home and play his guitar for them, and the younger JM would come sing along. The cousins remained lifelong friends while Juanín pursued a career in the police and JM sold vegetables at the market. “That’s still what I am – a market trader,” he says. Through middle age, the self-taught double act entertained crowds in Valparaíso’s bars – JM the entertaining foil to his more serious older cousin, who would perch on a stool to play his guitar, always in an immaculate pressed suit. “Sometimes Juanín would just invent chords,” says Los Crack del Puerto’s manager, Juan Nuñez. “The rest of the band would stop and ask him what chord he’d just played, and he’d just shrug.” “JM was the entertainer, he can make anyone laugh,” Nuñez adds. But the dynamic worked. In 2017, JM and Juanín began taking their music more seriously, forming the band with a group of talented local musicians. “That generation is an intangible cultural heritage. They’re a living legacy,” says 33-year-old musician Felipe Riveros, who has played with JM as a guitarist. “He’s charismatic. People go mad when he comes on stage. He and Juanín are the archetypes of the old porteño.” Juanín died in 2025 at the age of 87. “For three or four months, I missed him so much, I couldn’t bring myself to get back on stage,” says JM of his cousin. “People would request Juanín’s songs, but they were his, I didn’t feel like we could play them.” Now, as JM approaches his 81st birthday, the royalty cheques that supplement his miserly state pension are of little consequence to him. “I never planned any of this, and I’d be happy still working at the market,” he says quietly during a break between songs at the Quinta de los Nuñez, a hillside restaurant where he sings every Sunday for an adoring crowd. “But I suppose it’s never too late to give something a try.”