William Bell of Christian Aid on a decades-old cycle of violence and the UN commission of inquiry’s report that said Israel and Hamas have both committed war crimes since 7 October

The UN commission of inquiry’s report should shock us all to our very core (Israel and Hamas have both committed war crimes since 7 October, says UN body, 12 June). It describes in graphic detail the contempt with which Israeli and Palestinian military forces treat innocent civilians.

Sexual violence, collective punishment, starvation, humiliation, extermination and more are highlighted in a catalogue of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Of course, words of denial and accusations of bias are issued in protest. But the truth is that civilians have routinely been targeted in this decades-old cycle of violence.

A large increase in the Greens’ vote share will make other politicians wake up, writes Cherry Waters. Plus letters from Dave Walker, Daniel Wimberley, John Searby, Tim Rickard and George Carnarvon

George Monbiot urges those lucky enough to live in one of the four constituencies with a real chance of electing a Green MP to vote for them (Who should hold the next prime minister to account? Our best hope lies with the Green party, 12 June). But he doesn’t go far enough. In this election, more than any other, there is a real point in voting for every Green candidate, wherever they are standing, now that it’s a given that the Tories are toast and Labour are going to win.

The more of the electorate who vote Green but are not represented by a Green MP, the stronger the case is for proportional representation. And with two, three or even four Green MPs in the Commons to lead the other MPs who empathise with Compass, which has long been campaigning for PR, we will have the best chance yet of achieving real democracy for future elections.
Cherry Waters
South Milford, North Yorkshire

The older generation now accounts for half the combined net worth of the US – and in the UK they hold 78% of the UK’s private housing wealth

Name: Geriatric millionaires

Age: 61.

K-Zungu, an up and coming singeli artist with albinism, says he was lucky to have a protective family because so many with the condition in Africa have not been so fortunate

• Words and photographs by Diego Menjíbar Reynés in Dar es Salaam

Every day during school break, Ramadhani Idrisa Muhando and his friends would turn on their radio to listen to 20 Percent or Jose Chameleone, stars of bongo flava, a Tanzanian music genre influenced by hip-hop and R&B.

So his love of music, he says, “has its roots in that schoolyard” in Tanga, on Tanzania’s east coast, but it was singeli, a style developed 125 miles away in Dar es Salaam, that changed the course of his life.

Jeremy Strong, Daniel Radcliffe, Ariana DeBose and Angelina Jolie were among the crowd for the 77th annual Tony awards, held in New York on Sunday

• The full list of winners

Israel’s prime minister is said to have called the decision ‘unacceptable’ after Itamar Ben-Gvir said whoever decided it was a ‘fool’

• Read all our coverage of the Israel-Gaza war

Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly criticised plans announced by the military to hold daily tactical pauses in fighting along one of the main roads into Gaza to facilitate the delivery of aid

On Sunday the military announced a daily pause that would begin in the Rafah area at 8am and remain in effect until 7pm along the main Salah al-Din road, to allow aid trucks to transit between the Kerem Shalom crossing from Israel, adding that the pause would take place every day until further notice.

Jordanians died in Saudi Arabia after suffering heatstroke, said officials, with temperatures reaching 47C in Mecca

At least 14 Jordanian pilgrims have died while on the hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia as temperatures soar in the kingdom.

Jordan’s foreign ministry said “14 Jordanian pilgrims died and 17 others were missing” during the performance of hajj rituals. It said its nationals had died “after suffering sun stroke due to the extreme heatwave” and that it had coordinated with Saudi authorities to bury the dead in Saudi Arabia, or transfer them to Jordan.

In making wealth the number one priority, Keir Starmer is agreeing to longstanding economic myths, writes Bernie Evans. Plus letters from Yvonne Williams, Anthony Cheke and Eva Tutchell

With “stable economic growth” at the heart of Labour’s manifesto, and wealth creation “the number one priority”, it would appear that Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves have agreed not only to Tory fiscal rules, but also to longstanding economic myths, still parroted by the government but discredited by almost all serious economists. As your editorial (13 June) states, persuading businesses to “behave very differently from the ways it has grown used to” is going to be difficult enough, especially as the last decade has seen a propensity to seek quick profits, a reliance on cheap labour, an absence of serious investment in training and technology, and an obvious over-rewarding of bosses.

Even more difficult for Labour is persuading voters like those in East Thanet – who are “utterly ground down, mums who are doing three jobs, can’t get childcare”, to quote Polly Billington in Gaby Hinsliff’s article (Hope is not enough: people want to know that Keir Starmer can fix things, 14 June) – that the wealth created will “trickle down” to them, when, despite living in the sixth-richest economy in the world, it never has before. Manifestos often do huge damage and change voters’ intentions quickly, usually because of what they include; this one could well be detrimental because of what it doesn’t.

Many students have to do 20-plus hours a week of paid work to get by, and grants would let them focus more on learning than surviving, says Wendy Sloane, while Prof Andy Long also calls for reform of financial support for undergraduates

I’ve taught in higher education since 2010 and have known few students who haven’t had to take on paid work, often 20 hours weekly or more in low-paid retail or hospitality jobs (More than half of UK students working long hours in paid jobs, 13 June).

The lack of maintenance grants for less well-off students affects their livelihoods and education. It requires almost superhuman planning and fortitude to ensure that working long hours does not encroach on university life. One student got out of bed every weekday at 4.30am to spend four hours before class opening up a Pret – he graduated with a first. Another worked as a pub manager, often closing after midnight, yet managed to regularly attend class on time.

For 14 years, the Conservative government has shown no interest in the lives of young people in difficulty

James Munby’s heartfelt plea for suitable accommodation for children at serious risk to themselves or others (“Judges are sick of locking up children who just need help”), alongside the report that the NHS Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) are turning away children at risk of suicide (“Suicide-risk children refused places on NHS England waiting lists as services overwhelmed”), highlights once again that, since 2010, the Conservative government has displayed a total lack of interest in the needs of children who are experiencing difficulty.

Sure Start scrapped, youth services nonexistent, residential care in the hands of profit-seekers, levels of child mental ill health way beyond CAMHS’ ability to cope, special educational needs unmet, funding to voluntary organisations drastically cut, child poverty increased, and the recommendations of the government’s own review of children’s social care ignored. The list goes on, while the general wellbeing of the UK’s children continues to rank below the European average.

Olaf Scholz says plan put forward by Vladimir Putin not ‘meant seriously’; Zelenskiy predicts world will see ‘history being made’, but expectations of progress low. What we know on day 844

• See all our Ukraine war coverage

Police say eight-year-old shot in the head is in critical condition; suspect later died by suicide at home

Nine people, including two children, have been shot and wounded at a city-run water park near Detroit in what appeared to be a random attack, police have said.

Two children were among the victims, including an 8-year-old who was shot in the head and is in critical condition, after a shooter opened fire at the Brooklands Plaza Splash Pad park, where families had gathered to escape the summer heat.

Rebecca, 26, a senior marketing executive, meets Lars, 23, a journalist

What were you hoping for?
I wanted to approach the evening with an open mind. I just wanted to have a bit of an adventure.

A teenage Riley gets to know Anxiety and Envy in the Pixar animated sequel, and Westeros descends into civil war as the Game of Thrones prequel returns

Inside Out 2
Out now
The first Inside Out gave us five personified emotions living inside the mind of 11-year-old Riley. Now a teen, Riley and her brain must contend with the arrival of new emotions, including Anxiety (voiced by Maya Hawke), Envy (Ayo Edebiri), Ennui (Adèle Exarchopoulos) and Embarrassment (Paul Walter Hauser).

The strike on Tutor from Yemeni militants left the vessel unable to manoeuvre, while one crew member remains missing

The crew of a Greek-owned vessel damaged in an attack by Yemen’s Houthi militants has been evacuated and the abandoned ship is drifting in the Red Sea, according to the UK Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO).

One crew member from Tutor, the Liberia-flagged coal carrier, remains missing, officials in the Philippines said, after an attack near the Yemeni port of Hodeidah on Wednesday caused severe flooding and damage to the engine room, leaving the vessel unable to manoeuvre.

Robert Lizar, Alasdair Macdonald, Roger Humphries and William Bradshaw respond to an interview with the former foreign secretary, who is stepping down at the election

I wish Margaret Beckett a happy and healthy retirement, but would ask her to spend some of it checking her history books about her description of the current Labour leader as perhaps “the most working-class leader we’ve ever had” (Goodbye to all that, 10 June). Sir Keir Starmer, the son of a self-employed toolmaker, lived in his famous “pebbledash semi”, attended grammar school and was an Oxford postgraduate. He might be more accurately described as lower middle class. She should compare him to the former Labour prime minister Ramsay MacDonald, who was born into poverty and agricultural labour, and left school aged 15.

The crucial point is surely whether a politician’s personal history is still reflected in their politics, rather than in a cosy backstory that turns social class into an identity category. The comparison with MacDonald shows that even a genuine working-class Labour leader should be judged not by their origins, but by their politics. MacDonald joined the benefit-cutting Tories in a national government in 1931 and was expelled from Labour for his betrayal.
Robert Lizar
Manchester

Shamin Vogel sets out the stark reality for today’s young women who face ridiculous societal expectations and high living and childcare costs. Plus letters from Rachel Fowler and Claire Elizabeth Brown

I read Emma Beddington’s column with delight (Young women are telling each other to ‘date rich’. How terrifyingly retro, 9 June). I was raised to think that I can achieve whatever I want, always with the reminder that generations of women before me fought for equality. Moving to London for my studies, I became acquainted with the concept of women studying just to find a rich husband and to be a housewife and mother. This idea was utterly foreign, even incomprehensible, to the career‑oriented 19-year-old me.

A decade later, I am surrounded by female friends who now regret not having found a rich husband – who are faced with rising living expenses, a ticking body clock, ridiculous housing prices, seemingly out‑of‑reach childcare and fertility costs, and a never-ending parade of hopeful online dating matches. Yes, life is hard working as a man, but for women there are some more items on the list: you need to push for a good career, look fabulous, find a nice husband, have kids, be part of Forbes’ 30 under 30, be an executive but not forget to have a clean white kitchen and make kids’ birthday cakes.

Alan Mitcham says leftwing parties must make ending war their priority, Gillian Homeri encourages citizens to be more politically active and Barry Kushner says centrist parties must reach across the class divide

I read your reports on the European elections, including your assessment that the political landscape has moved to the right (EU elections 2024: how did key countries vote and what does it mean?, 10 June). Although this is correct, I feel that it doesn’t tell the whole story.

The main and paramount criteria for my vote (here in Germany) was to vote for a party which proposes a diplomatic solution to the various wars that are raging. To me it is obvious that no other problems (especially the issue of climate change) can really be solved until the wars stop. I voted for Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW), which surged from a standing start of zero to six seats, because this party proposes a diplomatic solution to the wars. The only other viable party proposing negotiations with Russia is the AfD – so, despite everything, if BSW had not been available, I, a liberal, would have voted AfD.

Dr Ian Saville and Ben Norman respond to an article by Frances Ryan on Labour’s plans on tax and wealth creation

Frances Ryan describes the situation very well (There is no ‘change’ for Britain without a massive injection of cash. Why won’t our politicians admit it?, 7 June). The decision by Rachel Reeves to work within the Conservative tax framework, apart from small changes that can only raise inadequate amounts, must condemn a Labour administration to pernicious austerity. The obvious remedy for this is a modest wealth tax, raising enough to improve public services considerably.

More significantly, Reeves, like her Conservative counterpart, relies on the dream of growth to pay for the improvements we all desire. But the commonplace insistence on the need for growth must be challenged. Economists like Kate Raworth and Kohei Saito have argued persuasively that the continuing pursuit of growth on a finite planet must lead inevitably to environmental destruction and widening inequality.

Farmed kelp could produce plastic substitutes, beauty products and food supplements. Just steer clear of seaweed chocolate

• Photographs by Christian Sinibaldi, words by Joanna Moorhead

Think sun, sea, Skye – and seaweed. It’s early summer off the west coast of Scotland, and Alex Glasgow is landing a long string of orangey-black seaweed on to the barge of his water farm. It emerges on what looks like a washing line heavy with dirty rags, hoicked up from the depths. And yet, this slippery, shiny, salty substance might, just might, be going to save the planet.

When it comes to sustainability, seaweed is about as shipshape as it gets. Minimal damage to the environment, check. No use of pesticides, check. Diversifies ocean life, check. Uses no land, check. And, in the case of Skye’s seaweed farm, spoils no one’s view, check.

Kyla Orr and Martin Welch of KelpCrofters check the crop from their boat

Approval gives initial victory to Javier Milei, who has set out agenda of radical economic deregulation but has not yet passed a single piece of legislation

Police in Buenos Aires have used water cannon and teargas to tackle violent protests as Argentina’s Senate narrowly voted to approve the first set of harsh austerity measures proposed by President Javier Miliei.

The result came after protesters urging senators to reject Milei’s programme of cuts and economic deregulation hurled sticks, stones and molotov cocktails at police, and overturned cars.

French president says suspension will give ‘full strength to dialogue on the ground’ as well as opportunity to ‘return to order’

Controversial voting reforms in New Caledonia will be suspended, Emmanuel Macron has announced, after a period of deadly unrest in the French Pacific territory.

The reforms, which would have altered voting rights, are contested by the Indigenous Kanak people who say they would be marginalised further should the changes go through.

Musk ordered firings after engineers raised concerns about alleged sexual harassment and discrimination, lawsuit says

SpaceX and its chief executive, Elon Musk, were sued on Wednesday by eight engineers who say they were illegally fired for raising concerns about alleged sexual harassment and discrimination against women, their lawyers have said.

The eight engineers include four women and four men and claim that Musk, who owns the rocket-maker, the electric carmaker Tesla and the social media platform Twitter/X, ordered their firing in 2022.

Iain Dalton urges Leeds’s Labour-led council to reconsider nursery closures, while Anne-Louise Crocker and Emily Brookes wonder where new staff for the promised 100,000 extra places will come from

I’m sure many parents who are struggling to find a nursery place for their children will be happy to hear the proposal from Labour to create 100,000 new places in England, including in areas currently with limited provision (Labour pledges to create more than 100,000 new nursery places, 9 June).

But in a number of Labour-controlled local authorities, there are desperately needed nursery places that are facing the axe, including here in Leeds, as well as places such as Hackney and Brighton. Why convert schools, when there are purpose-built places already available that just need to be kept open? One of the reasons we have been given for the proposal to close three nurseries in Leeds, and privatise up to 12 others, is a lack of staffing, so parents will be keen to learn how Labour’s proposal will ensure these are fully staffed places with correct training.

D-day commemorations have failed to mention equally important turning points in the war, says Prof Colin Green. Plus a letter from Ben Summerskill

The D-day 80th anniversary events were really moving, especially hearing from the veterans who survived. Much has been made of Rishi Sunak’s failure to attend the international event (Furious Tories turn on Rishi Sunak over D-day commemorations snub, 9 June). I was more saddened by the repeated claim in TV programmes that D-day was the turning point of the second world war, without mention of the 27 million Soviets (including Ukrainians) who lost their lives and were ignored in this commemoration.

The eastern front was crucial to defeating Hitler and the Nazi armies well before 1944. Moscow in 1941, Stalingrad in 1942, three battles for Kharkov in 1941, 1942 and 1943, the great tank battle of Kursk (1943) and the siege of Leningrad (1941 to 1944) decimated the best German troops and were, collectively, the war’s true turning points. How Erwin Rommel would have welcomed defending Normandy with just a fraction of the 152 German divisions (3 million men) that invaded the Soviet Union in Operation Barbarossa. I feel great sadness for all deaths, including on D-day, and wake up every morning well aware that I owe my happy life to so many courageous men and women who gave their lives or were injured.
Prof Colin Green
Harrow, London

Digital art collective that now owns album sues convicted pharmaceutical executive for making copies

The convicted pharmaceutical executive Martin Shkreli has been sued in New York by a digital art collective that said it paid $4.75m for a one-of-a-kind album by the hip-hop group Wu-Tang Clan, only to learn that the man nicknamed Pharma Bro made copies and is releasing the music to the public.

Shkreli paid $2m in 2015 for the album, Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, and gave it up to partially satisfy a $7.4m forfeiture order after his 2017 conviction for defrauding hedge fund investors and scheming to defraud investors in a drugmaker.

Bliss in St Louis has made headlines by announcing that only men over 35 and women over 30 can eat there. Is this the future of grown-up dining?

Name: Youth-free dining.

Age: New.

Sam Hanna (1903-96), a pioneering film-maker from Burnley, Lancashire, was once called the ‘Lowry of film-making’. His work depicts people of all ages as they lived and worked in a region that was rapidly losing its economic role and industrial identity in postwar Britain. A collection of his work is available to view at the North West Film Archive at Manchester Metropolitan University

Round Our Way: Sam Hanna’s Visual Legacy by Heather Norris Nicholson is published by Pendle Press

Andrew Forsey suggests reforms that would ensure fewer children’s lives are blighted by poverty and hunger

Even in the light of the latest rise in the proportion of children becoming eligible for free school meals, there are still hundreds of thousands of poorer children caught in the hunger trap (A quarter of state school pupils in England receiving free school meals, 6 June).

The best estimates suggest that about 200,000 eligible children are not registered to receive their free school meals. Moreover, even if full take-up was secured among those eligible, there are children whose parents work in care homes, coffee shops, clothing factories, police stations, sorting offices and schools, for example, with wages that are not high enough to lift the family out of poverty, but are deemed to be too high to qualify their children for free school meals – and the accompanying place at holiday activity and food (HAF) clubs.

Readers on the loss of the TV and radio presenter who changed so many lives with his advice on health and fitness, particularly with regard to obesity and type 2 diabetes

The death of Dr Michael Mosley is truly a national tragedy (Michael Mosley: TV presenter found dead on Greek island, wife confirms, 9 June). During all my 50-plus years as a practising physician, I have never met a doctor who better melded the art and science of medicine with the single aim of improving the health of his fellow citizens.

Listening to the paean of praise from a former, previously obese MP on how Dr Mosley radically changed his life for the better and cured his type 2 diabetes was electrifying, and I know that there are thousands more grateful members of the public whose lives have been dramatically improved by following his advice. He was a very unusual doctor, one who had all the skills necessary to change human behaviour for the better, by measurable means, and that is a very rare gift indeed.

The popular book site has determined the 45 sauciest stories ever written. The results may surprise you

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Name: The sexiest books of all time.

Age: Surprisingly youthful.

Families in Taranto, Italy, watch their kids play in polluted soil in the shadow of a steelworks, knowing that many people there have lost their lives to cancer. Lisa Sorgini captures their struggle

Incident comes at time of heightened tensions between neighbours, as tit-for-tat actions increase after North Korea sent rubbish-filled balloons into the South

South Korea’s military has said it fired warning shots after North Korean soldiers briefly crossed the border this week, amid rising tensions after Pyongyang sent rubbish-carrying balloons into the South and Seoul retaliated with a loudspeaker propaganda campaign.

“Some North Korean soldiers working within the DMZ on the central front briefly crossed the Military Demarcation Line,” the Joint Chiefs of Staff [JCS] said in a statement on Tuesday, referring to the line of control in the heavily fortified border between the two Koreas.

Thirteen leading businesswomen back Labour’s shadow chancellor and her ‘commitment to a genuine plan for economic growth’

In our lifetimes, we have seen incredible progress for women – in business, politics and all across society. We have been part of that change, and been supported and inspired by women who went before us.

There are, however, telling gaps in the area of economic policymaking. There has still been no woman governor of the Bank of England, or permanent secretary to the Treasury. Damningly, the post of chancellor of the exchequer is more than 800 years old – and every one has been a man.

New Jersey attorney general looks into whether Trump is ineligible to hold licenses at three of his golf courses in state

The ripple effects of Donald Trump’s felony conviction widened on Monday to encompass one of his most famous business assets: golf courses.

The New Jersey’s attorney general’s office is looking into whether the former president’s recent convictions make him ineligible to hold liquor licenses at his three New Jersey golf courses, according to a spokesperson for the attorney general’s office.

Prof Nick Megoran on the horror of Hiroshima, Andrew Aikman on Russia’s need for buffer states, Norman Rimmell on fears of a nuclear accident, and Alex Hamilton on the deterrent power of the atomic bomb. Plus a letter from Ted Schrecker

It is ironic that news of Keir Starmer’s plan to restate Labour’s commitment to “a ‘triple lock’ for the UK’s nuclear deterrent” (Keir Starmer to declare Labour as ‘party of national security’, 2 June) emerged on the same day that Toshiko Tanaka, a survivor of the Hiroshima atomic bomb, addressed a spellbound meeting in London – organised by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and the Quakers – about her childhood experiences in 1945.

She spoke of seeing the initial explosion that killed every one of her classmates. She recounted regaining consciousness with a mouth full of dirt, running home to a mother who could not recognise her own badly burnt daughter, and smelling the lingering stench of burning flesh as bodies were cremated. To this day, she struggles to sleep as new sores break out on her skin, and cannot see a grilled tomato without remembering the ghastly sight of skin peeling off the dying who staggered through her neighbourhood like zombies.

LSE professors Mike Savage, Suzi Hall, Sam Friedman and Suki Ali decry the party’s action and support Shaheen running as an independent

We write as London School of Economics professors and colleagues of Dr Faiza Shaheen, one of the UK’s leading experts on inequality. We have hugely benefited from her long-term collaboration with the LSE’s International Inequalities Institute and especially her work this past academic year, when she was hired by the sociology department to teach graduate students on our flagship MSc inequalities and social science. Faiza used her extensive campaigning and academic experience, both in the UK and globally, to provide excellent guidance and insight to our students. Her tolerance and respect for different perspectives and openness to debate was absolutely clear.

We were completely shocked that someone with her outstanding abilities, experience and dedication was deselected as parliamentary candidate for the Labour party for Chingford and Woodford Green. The utter disrespect shown to her by the manner of this deselection, especially given her own outstanding professionalism, integrity and commitment, was appalling. As colleagues of Faiza, who can testify at first hand to her many qualities, we are in an excellent position to state that she is exactly the kind of person who would be a major asset in the House of Commons.

We are delighted to bring you the first episode in our latest series of Pop Culture with Chanté Joseph. Chanté (not a Swift fan) is joined by the writer Elle Hunt (is a Swift fan) to talk about why Taylor Swift is not just a pop sensation, bringing her billion-pound Eras tour to the UK, but has also managed to become a business icon. The pair also chat about whether or not one artist should even have that much influence in the first place.

If you like the episode, please search for Pop Culture with Chanté Joseph and hit subscribe.

Archive: Vogue, Today, MTV, Firstpost, BBC, Billboard, Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour, ITV

Extensive retrospective celebrates the work of Boris Savelev, a leading independent Russian–Ukrainian photographer who first worked in the Soviet Union. He lived in Moscow before returning in 2010 to his native Ukraine, where he remained until moving to Spain as a refugee at the start of the 2022 invasion

• Viewfinder – A Way to Look is at El Espacio Cultural Serrería Belga, Madrid, until 14 July as part of Photoespana

Moya Sarner’s decision to let go of perfectionism strikes a chord with Annie Hall and Mariam Khan

I must congratulate Moya Sarner for accepting that being less than perfect is OK (I’m a recovering perfectionist. Here’s how I embraced the joy of ‘good enough’, 3 June). I was one of the lucky mums who read Bruno Bettelheim’s book A Good Enough Parent when I had my first child. It made me a much more relaxed mum.

However, I think there is a new influence to be “perfect” in schools, where there is never the idea of good enough. Teachers want every single bit of work the child does to be perfect. Please could someone find me a teacher somewhere who thinks what a kid does is OK, even though they know that it isn’t 100% what they might be capable of on a good day?
Annie Hall
East Preston, West Sussex

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