Tour de France 2026: stage 18 heads for summit finish at Orcières-Merlette – live

Stage leaves from Voiron for latest mountains test
Anti-doping chiefs reject Seixas favouritism | Mail Tom

161km to go The five riders up the road are Mathis le Berre (TotalEnergies), Jonas Abrahamsen (Uno-X Mobility), Nikolya Vinokurov, Aaron Gate (XDS Astana) and Lewis Askey (NSN). They managed to get 45secs on the main bunch but that is about to disappear rapidly.

174km to go Five riders have broken away and churned out a lead of around 20 seconds. That is unlikely to last when they hit Côte d’Engins shortly.

Beyond the body: Wayne McGregor stretches the definition of dance at this year’s Venice Dance Biennale

With the British dance legend at the helm, this year’s themes ranged from quantum gravity to slightly muted geopolitics

The most memorable performance in the opening days of this year’s Venice Dance Biennale had barely any dance in it at all. Italian choreographer Andrea Salustri’s Invisible is built around movement, but it’s movement of light, air, water and sound waves, with Salustri and co-creator Alice Rende as shadowy figures conducting the elements. They brew up storms like Zeus and Poseidon, with flashing veins of light, sounds of pummelling rain (in fact small drips and bubbles amplified by powerful microphones) and an enormous amount of billowing smoke that ultimately whips itself into a spinning tornado.

Salustri, who won the Italian callout to create a new work for this year’s biennale, is a circus artist and philosophy graduate, and he is also a choreographer – a definition so much wider than one who devises dance. This year marks the 20th dedicated dance festival in Venice (dance was previously seen as part of the theatre or music programmes here until 1999, since when it has been an annual, then biennial, and now annual feature of Venice’s arts bonanza). In a talk to mark this anniversary, current artistic director Wayne McGregor was joined by four former directors to discuss their aims for the event. The question of “what dance is” kept arising as the ongoing line of inquiry, a question “so ordinary that it is still necessary somehow”, said choreographer Marie Chouinard.

A new film, Life Lines, put together by McGregor and filmmaker Ravi Deepres, compiles archive clips from festivals past, showing that the range of dance here has been vast and multifarious, from the fairly conventional to the theatrically wild. There’s clearly no single story of contemporary dance’s development, and McGregor’s theme for this year’s festival is Time Does Not Exist. Influenced by physicist Carlo Rovelli and the theory of quantum gravity, his is not a linear view of time, and without doubt, in dance (and in life), we carry our embodied pasts constantly into the present. That’s no more evident than in Soa Ratsifandrihana’s piece Fampitaha, Fampita, Fampitàna (meaning “comparison, transmission, rivalry” in Malagasy, the language of Madagascar, from where the choreographer is from). It’s a piece about living in the diaspora and concerned with the sometimes joyful, sometimes painful, memories that link back home – especially the memories stored in our bodies, in songs, stories and dance steps. It’s a gentle piece, conversational between the three dancers and fabulous guitarist Joël Rabesolo, in the sense that like many conversations it meanders, then touches on the profound, then gets self-absorbed, connects again, tails off. But it has its moments.

Transfer roundup: Barcelona sign Adeyemi, Monaco’s Bamba set for Newcastle

• Karim Adeyemi moves from Dortmund in £19m deal

• Newcastle close on £34m Aladji Bamba from Monaco

Barcelona have signed German winger Karim Adeyemi from Borussia Dortmund ⁠on a deal until 2031 while Newcastle are set to make Aladji Bamba their fourth summer signing.

The La Liga club will pay around €22m (£19m) plus add-ons for the Germany international ⁠and the package includes a sell-on clause.

Gold from Byzantium shipwreck and a pub-serving PM: photos of the day – Thursday

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

Two Russian men jailed in Angola for terrorism and spying

The men were convicted over alleged plan to stage coup and organise deadly demonstrations over fuel prices last year

Two Russian men have been found guilty by an Angolan court of terrorism and spying, after being accused of planning a coup and helping to organise deadly demonstrations in the southern African country last year.

Lev Lakshtanov and Igor Ratchin were sentenced to eight and 11 years in jail respectively. They had denied the charges, claiming they were in Angola for cultural and business activities.

Police admit ‘missed opportunity’ before Manchester synagogue attack

Greater Manchester chief constable says crucial data on phones seized from Heaton Park synagogue attacker was not examined

Greater Manchester police have apologised for a “missed opportunity” to act before an attack on a synagogue.

The force’s chief constable, Sir Stephen Watson, said the phones of the Heaton Park synagogue attacker Jihad al-Shamie were seized by officers but crucial data was not examined.

Zelenskyy warns Russia could step up Black Sea attacks and hints at more US talks – Europe live

Ukrainian leader says his country’s grain corridor could be targeted as he hosts Ireland’s Micheál Martin on visit on Kyiv

EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas has offered a bit more detail on the new package of sanctions, saying they are “the largest round in four years,” and will “hit Putin where it hurts most.”

In a statement, she said:

“We have agreed on the 21st sanctions package against Russia.

It delivers sweeping measures targeting Moscow’s financial system, its military-industrial complex and energy sector, that keep Russia’s war economy running.

‘Unbearably sexy in his rodenty way’: Benedict Cumberbatch’s 20 best films – ranked!

To mark the two-time Oscar nominee’s recent 50th birthday, we rate his finest screen roles – from hyper-British patricians and seething serpents, to ghastly Yanks, tragic codebreakers and sci-fi scoundrels

Benedict Cumberbatch does his considerable best opposite the equally prestigious Olivia Colman in this souped-up marital-breakdown dramedy, essentially remade from the 1989 movie with Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner. This time, though, it’s all about the Britons – indicating the supposed classiness of the affair. But the film is overwrought and unconvincing; it never convinces us that the couple were once passionately in love and now passionately in hate. The below-par script has the effect of bringing out an unrewarding kind of coldness in Cumberbatch, technically assured though he always is.

‘Why do I feel crappy?’: women are learning about their luteal phases - and Maha is weaponizing it

People have found language for moodiest part of their menstrual cycles, and the right has seized on it

Emily Rae Detrick, a health coach, wants women to be more in touch with their menstrual cycle in its entirety. This, she said on an October episode of Culture Apothecary with Alex Clark, a podcast popular among “Make America Healthy Again” (Maha) adherents, is “a way that you honor God and the way we were created”. It also serves her self-assigned mission to help “make America fertile again”.

In the episode and on social media, Detrick speaks at length about the luteal phase, the 14-ish days between ovulation and menstruation when women are more likely to experience irritability, bloating and food cravings. If a woman does not get pregnant after ovulating, or so Detrick’s line of thinking goes, her body becomes upset. “During the luteal phase, the reason why your stress threshold is so much lower is because this is the time your body would be incubating a potential baby,” she said. No baby, and you might turn into a frazzled, nagging shrew.

‘Barbecue plus one’: My friend’s genius solution for feeding the masses without sweltering next to the coals

Throw one thing on the grill and serve with a huge bowl of something else – from spicy roasted aubergines to a Greek salad

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While I am glad to be home in Rome, it was particularly hard to leave England this year. After a few days in London, we spent two weeks between Dorset and Devon, in gardens or on the pebble beaches of West Bay, Lyme Regis and Branscombe. Thrashing around in the sea has never felt so necessary. There was also plenty of good eating, the air filled with suggestive scents – of fat dripping on to hot coals, sun cream, insect spray and lavender. Which brings me to the theme of this newsletter: a barbecue plus one.

The term is actually borrowed from an Australian friend. It is her solution to feeding lots of people well without too much work or clearing up: one thing on the barbecue (be it sausages, chicken, slices of cheese, kebabs or vegetables) plus one enormous bowl of something else. The solution came about after a particularly chaotic afternoon when her kids were all young, for which she made loads of dishes and compromises, and still didn’t manage to make everyone happy. Clearing up, she thought: “Thats it – next time it is going to be one or two things on the barbecue plus the biggest bowl in the house, filled with one substantial dish.” If I am being precise it should be ’barbecue plus one’, plus pitta bread, so helpful people can stuff the item from the grill, plus the bowl ‘thing’ into a pitta pouch, avoiding the need of a plate, plus sauces in squeezy bottles.

American Airlines slashes 2026 earnings outlook as fuel costs spike

American Airlines further cut its 2026 earnings outlook, citing higher fuel costs.

China's Geely to make EVs at Ford plant in Spain under new joint venture

Ford and Geely plan for the joint venture will begin operations in the first half of 2027, with the first new vehicles scheduled to roll off the line in 2028.

More than 20,000 evacuated after intense wildfire in France

Reception centres open to thousands of evacuees after blaze begins in pine forest 45km west of Bordeaux

• Europe live – latest updates

More than 20,000 people, including thousands of tourists from campsites and other holiday accommodation, have been evacuated as a “particularly intense” wildfire advances on the Atlantic coast of south-west France, authorities have said.

The blaze, which began in dense pine forest near the village of Saumos about 40km (25 miles) west of Bordeaux and just north of the bay of Arcachon, a popular tourist destination, had burned 2,400 hectares (5,928 acres) in less than 24 hours, firefighters said on Thursday.

Manchester United consider Camavinga and Berge as midfield overhaul continues

• Real Madrid and Fulham players on club’s radar

• United have already signed two midfielders this summer

Manchester United have identified Real Madrid’s Eduardo Camavinga and Fulham’s Sander Berge as midfield signings to further strengthen Michael Carrick’s squad.

United have already signed two midfielders this window: Andrey Santos in a £48m deal from Chelsea and Youri Tielemans for £35m from Aston Villa. But with Casemiro having departed and Manuel Ugarte ruled out for what may be a prolonged period due to knee ligament injury, the club is considering moving for another midfielder.

U.S. signs nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia. And, Nolan Wells' independent autopsy results

The U.S. has signed a nuclear cooperation agreement with Saudi Arabia. And, the independent autopsy results of Nolan Wells fuel more questions surrounding his cause of death.

This AI tool promises a 'second sight of eyes' to clinicians. Did patients benefit?

Medical workers in a Nairobi clinic used an AI tool to check their work. A new study evaluates the result.

‘My life’s work was being delightful. That really hurt me’: breakout Americana star Brennan Wedl on freeing herself through song

​With her roots stretching from the Catholic church to riot grrrl, the US singer-songwriter explains how sobriety and self-analysis powered her classic new Waxahatchee-produced album

The songwriting on Brennan Wedl’s new album is so ironclad that I kept checking the credits to see if any of its songs were actually covers of peak Lucinda Williams tracks that I’d somehow missed. Nope: all originals by a 29-year-old songwriter whose radiant, hooky, tough Americana puts her toe-to-toe with genre godheads such as Williams circa Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, or Sheryl Crow had she grown up playing church basement punk shows; also, a vision of Courtney Love in cowboy boots.

“I love Lucinda’s very earnest way of looking at daily life, and I hoped to achieve that on this record,” says Wedl, calling from her Nashville home, surrounded by vintage magazines and tchotchkes. Wedl is warm and dudely; she answers almost every question with an exuberant “toootally!”. She cites her favourite of her new songs, the absurdly immediate Just Another Daddy Who Did Me Wrong, a bittersweet number that questions her self-destructive appeal. “It’s a very harsh look at reality, but also about how our minds can create so much fantasy around reality. I’m working on not projecting too much on reality these days.”

Dubai offers £600 rewards to residents who lure friends to visit as tourist numbers plummet

Residents eligible for dining and hotel packages if they can persuade family and friends to city spurned by visitors amid Iran war

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Dubai is offering to pay residents who attract family and friends to visit the emirate in an effort to revive tourist numbers that have plummeted since the city was drawn into the US-Israel war on Iran.

The Dubai Invite scheme, an initiative of the department of economy and tourism, allows residents of the United Arab Emirates to nominate friends and relatives and then to receive benefits worth more than 3,000 UAE dirham (about £610) if they visit.

Houthis claim strikes on Saudi oil tankers as Rubio says Iran not ready to make a deal

Yemen's Houthis said they had targeted two Saudi oil tankers with drones and missiles for allegedly violating its maritime blockade.

Why health officials do not have a good handle on the current Ebola outbreak

To get slightly ahead of the virus, health officials need to quickly identify people at risk of infection, a practice known as contact tracing. That's a challenge in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Senate panel advances China auto bill that could bar Mercedes-Benz from U.S.

Mercedes-Benz’s largest individual shareholder is Chinese state-owned BAIC. Cruz warned the bill could hurt Mercedes and accused GM of backing it.

Tropical Storm Bertha moves off Louisiana, heads for Texas. See its path.

Tropical Storm Bertha is the second named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season.

Moonshot AI accessed Nvidia's chips despite Chinese export ban, White House official says

A White House official said Moonshot AI, which released the powerful Kimi K3 model last week, accessed Nvidia's GB300 chips in Thailand.

A grief therapist told me I should live to honor my son. How would I do that?

After my 22-month-old child died, music and poetry brought catharsis and comfort

The day Renzo had his aneurysm, in the afternoon before it happened, I distinctly remember telling him that it was going to be a pleasure to watch him grow up. It seems ridiculous to write that here, the foreshadowing so on the nose as to be unbelievable. But it’s true. To him and my wife Allegra, I said, “I love our little family.” After the struggles around his birth, job loss, the pandemic, it felt, finally, like we had made it to the other side. We had, I suppose, just not how I envisioned it.

My friends Jayson and Stacy recommended I get to know David Kessler’s work. According to Harvard Business Review, Kessler is “the world’s foremost expert on grief”. He’d worked closely with Elisabeth Kübler-­Ross, who was the reigning expert on grief before her own death in 2004. A large part of Kübler-­Ross’s legacy is her classification of what she calls the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance, as described in her 1969 book On Death and Dying. After you experience a death, she wrote, these stages can occur in any order, with one or more possibly not occurring at all. Just weeks after Renzo’s death, I’d tricked myself into thinking I had jumped all the way to acceptance when really I was trying to outrun anger and depression. Bargaining hasn’t been a big one for me, nor has denial. The facts have been pretty hard to ignore.

‘Don’t become the protagonist’: Andoni Iraola on the secret of Spain’s success and his role at Liverpool

Liverpool’s new head coach is settling into the pre-season tour in Chicago as he begins to reshape the Reds’ identity

Over coffee in Liverpool’s plush hotel in Chicago, Andoni Iraola presents his theory for the phenomenal success of Basque and Spanish coaches. It is a theory that will shape his entire approach to life as the Liverpool head coach and his attempts to bring the connection, the joy and the belief back to Anfield. It centres on the power of the collective.

The Champions League, the Premier League, the Europa League, the FA Cup, the League Cup, the European Championship and, as of Sunday, the World Cup: all currently in the hands of Basque and Spanish coaches, even if Pep Guardiola has since taken his leave from Manchester City. Next season, four men from the small Basque region of Gipuzkoa will manage four of the Premier League’s main contenders, Iraola included. There is, he believes, a simple explanation for the rise of the guys from Gipuzkoa and for Spanish dominance across a global stage.

‘Everyone is hooked on football’: Indian league seeks to ride World Cup wave

Club chiefs hope that a revitalised setup can help huge interest in this summer’s tournament translate into growth of the Indian domestic game

India was not at the World Cup, but the tournament drew huge interest from within the country. This has happened before but now comes with significant, and necessary, changes in the domestic game that could transform a quadrennial passion into perennial interest.

After more than a year of negative headlines regarding the Indian Super League, the country’s top tier will kick off on 4 September. “The timing couldn’t be better,” says Ravi Puskur, chief executive of the ISL’s FC Goa who last season won the Super Cup, India’s top knockout competition. “A World Cup that was not ideal in terms of viewing times has drawn strong interest and support from the Indian market. It does something a domestic league alone can’t do; it puts football at the centre of the conversation.”

IRS chief Frank Bisignano may have misled Congress, Democrats say

The IRS alone hemorrhaged more than 31,000 employees as of January in President Trump's government cuts, according to the agency's inspector general.

Google slapped with $1 billion fine under landmark EU digital law

European regulators fined Google 890 million euros ($1 billion) alleging the company gives preferential treatment to its own services.

U.S. nuclear power deal with Saudi Arabia faces criticism in Israel

The nuclear power deal between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia was met with alarm in Israel as it deepened concerns that Israel, a major American ally, and Trump are increasingly diverging on foreign policy and security.

Eli Lilly says it will file for approval of next-generation obesity drug in 2027 as it clears two more trials

There are now positive results from five late-stage trials on retatrutide, which Lilly is positioning as the next pillar of its obesity portfolio.

Murders continue historic decline despite spikes in a few cities, study finds

Violent and property crime categories were also down, new analysis shows. But reported drug crimes were up when compared to the same period last year.

‘Cockroach’ protests: India’s Modi promises to punish officials over exam leaks

PM says ‘those who try to harm the future of our youth will not be spared’ as scandal spirals into widespread anger

Narendra Modi has vowed to set up “fast-track courts” to speed up the punishment of officials accused of leaking examination papers, as the Indian prime minister seeks to quell a youth-led “cockroach” protest movement that has rocked Delhi and posed one of the biggest challenges to his government.

In his first public remarks on the movement, Modi posted on X: “Nothing is more important than the welfare and future of our youth … Those who try to harm the future of our youth will not be spared.”

US senator accuses Barclays of ‘failure’ to investigate ex-CEO’s ties to Epstein

Exclusive: Elizabeth Warren claims bank did not ‘meaningfully investigate’ Jes Staley’s links with sex offender

The leading US senator Elizabeth Warren has called for urgent answers from Barclays over what she claimed was its “apparent failure to meaningfully investigate” ties between the bank’s former boss, Jes Staley, and the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

In a letter sent privately to Barclays’s chair, Nigel Higgins, and seen by the Guardian, Warren – the most senior Democrat on the US senate banking committee – said it was “deeply unclear how Barclays, supposedly investigating Staley’s connection to Epstein, failed to uncover this decades-long relationship”.

EU fines Google €890m for competition breaches over search and apps

Firm told to treat third-party services that appear in its results in ‘fair and non-discriminatory manner’

Google has been fined a total of €890m (£760m) by the EU for breaches of online competition laws by its search and app store services.

The European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, said Google had broken the Digital Markets Act by giving priority to its own services, such as shopping and hotel deals, in search results over those of its rivals.

Legal logging and soaring saplings: the ‘green islands’ bucking the deforestation trend in central America

In Guatemala’s Maya biosphere reserve local people are making a living from trees at the same time as increasing forest cover, showing nature is best protected by those who depend on it

The low rumbling grows louder until a huge harvester crashes into the open, dragging a 15-metre trunk of mahogany in its wake. The tractor manoeuvres before releasing its load and shovelling it like a matchstick on to a growing pile of lumber at the edge of the clearing. Then, with a crunch of gears and a belch of diesel, it turns and lurches back into the forest.

This is sustainable forestry at its most brutal, yet in a few weeks’ time silence will return to this pocket of tropical forest in Guatemala’s Maya biosphere reserve (MBR). Nature will be left to reclaim the land and chainsaws won’t return for at least four years, as part of a strict management plan that is helping to buck the trend of rampant deforestation.

The real aim of Trump’s New York Times leak investigation is to punish reporters | James Risen

A decade ago, experts said I’d be the last reporter to face a subpoena in a leak investigation. How wrong they were

In 2015, after I won a seven-year battle with the federal government and refused its demands that I reveal my confidential sources for a story I wrote about a botched CIA operation, many media experts predicted that I would be the last journalist ever subpoenaed by the government in a leak investigation. They argued that new surveillance technology made it possible for the government to more readily identify sources inside the government without having to rely on the testimony of reporters. There was no longer any need for the government to go through the lengthy and bitter legal process of trying to haul reporters into court and threaten them with jail if they refused to reveal their sources.

Fast forward more than a decade, and it is obvious that those predictions from the experts were wrong. The notion that leak investigations are primarily designed to find leakers now seems quaint.

James Risen is a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist

Tesla and Alphabet shares slump as AI spending concerns spook investors

Both Tesla and Alphabet signaled higher spending as they invest in artificial intelligence.

Russia’s Amazon-style retail giant Wildberries is now in Ukraine’s crosshairs. Here's why

Ukraine has ratcheted up its attacks on Russia's Amazon-style retail giant Wildberries, signaling a new phase in the war.

‘He’d lie down in front of the moving ship’: a fresh look at Ernest Shackleton’s Endurance expedition

Shipwrecks, ice football and igloos for dogs … the digitisation of Frank Hurley’s photographs shows the heroic trek more clearly – and unlocks some remarkable new details

Blow for Manchester City with Rodri out for extended period due to back injury

• Spain’s World Cup-winning captain may require surgery

• Leeds in advanced talks with City to sign James Trafford

Rodri could face an extended period of time out with a back injury, which may require surgery.

The 30-year-old Manchester City midfielder returned to his finest form at the World Cup following two injury-plagued seasons. Having captained Spain to Sunday’s 1-0 final win over Argentina in New Jersey, Rodri was awarded the Golden Ball as the tournament’s best player. Yet he may now require an operation on a back issue that is set to rule him out for the start of the season.

The music in Nolan’s Odyssey is as well-crafted – and bloodlessly forgettable – as the film itself

Ludwig Göransson’s meticulous score uses instruments of the era to create an earthy, raw and bleak soundscape, but it merely supports the portrayal of an uncomplicated hero

A few weeks ago I came across a video of Professor Armand D’Angour, associate professor of classics at Oxford university. He explained how, through groundbreaking research involving fragments of melody and rhythms found on papyrus and stone and the reconstruction of ancient instruments, it is now possible to hear for the first time in 2,000 years what ancient Greek music would have sounded like.

Given Ludwig Göransson’s beautiful theme for the aulos (an ancient double-barrelled flute) in Christopher Nolan’s latest blockbuster, The Odyssey, and his reputation for dedicated research into his subject matter, it seems very likely that he too has heard these calls from the ancient past.

The end of Heartstopper is a bittersweet loss – it’s never felt scarier to be young and queer | Alim Kheraj

The gay Netflix romance maintained a political edge despite rollbacks to queer and trans rights

After six books, three seasons of television and a film-length finale, Heartstopper has come to an end. Often dubbed the most wholesome show on TV, Netflix’s adaptation of Alice Oseman’s young adult LGBTQ+ graphic novel series, which itself began life as a web comic, is a legitimate cultural phenomenon, turning its two leads – Kit Connor and Joe Locke – into household names, while racking up tens of millions of views. In print, meanwhile, the Heartstopper series has sold over 10m copies worldwide, including about 1.3m in the UK alone.

Yet these figures only tell one side of the story of Heartstopper’s impact. At the queer and feminist bookshop where I work part-time in Sheffield, the young people who come in are immediately drawn to copies of Oseman’s books, and often take pictures of the now permanent window display depicting Nick and Charlie, the couple at the story’s heart. I see young queer people’s faces light up when they see we have the book in stock, even though they probably already have a copy at home.

Who is Miatta Fahnbulleh, the radical-thinking new UK energy secretary?

Selection of economist formerly at helm of green thinktank marks continuation of decarbonising Miliband era

In her first 48 hours as energy secretary, Miatta Fahnbulleh was left in no doubt about the thorny policy decision at the top of her in-tray. Protesters from Fossil Free London met her outside her new offices dressed as firefighters holding placards reading: “We’re already putting out fires, don’t start new ones.”

The MP for Peckham – a radical economist who is outspoken about the climate crisis – is a surprising choice as secretary of state for energy and net zero for those who believe the speculation in Westminster that Andy Burnham wants to approve new oil and gas drilling in the North Sea.

Why would Trump agree to the absurd Saudi nuclear deal? | Kenneth Roth

The agreement offers the Saudis the same options Trump has sworn Iran will never have

The stark contrast between Donald Trump’s nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia and his nuclear demands for Iran would be comical if not so tragic. Trump has handed the Saudis the same nuclear options he swore Iran would never have.

To make matters worse, Trump seems to have offered the Saudis this sweetheart deal to make amends for his disastrous war of choice with Iran. Meanwhile, he continues to bomb Iran in a push to open the strait of Hormuz, which was not closed until Trump launched his counterproductive war.

Meet the man whose groundbreaking book is being devoured by the left

Anton Jäger has been lauded for his exceptional ability to make sense of these strange political times – and he’s only 32. The writer and academic explains why we’re living in an age of hyperpolitics

‘I am acutely conscious,” said Andy Burnham outside 10 Downing Street on Monday, “that I am the sixth person in the last 10 years to walk up this street.” It was good to hear him say it because, beneath all the cabinet gossip and rune-reading, there is a feeling of terror about the immediate future and also about ourselves, the electorate. Is this who we are now? Wildly enthusiastic one minute, seething the next; as passionate about the change we want as we are convinced that those who promise it are incapable of enacting it?

It is perhaps not surprising that Anton Jäger’s recent book, Hyperpolitics: Extreme Politicization without Political Consequences, is being read by Labour watchers and leftwing thinkers. As the New York Times wrote, it’s “among the best and most dazzling efforts to model the political present in all its maddening strangeness”. Still, I think Jäger was surprised to have his honeymoon interrupted so I could interview him about it. Life comes at everyone quite fast in a hyperpolitical age.

After deadly shootings, police experts question how well ICE officers are vetted

The recent fatal shootings by ICE officers in Texas and Maine come at a time when the federal agency has hired a huge number of officers quickly. Some law enforcement experts worry that this kind of a hiring spree can lead police agencies to cut corners in vetting new hires.

FDA panel considers easing peptide restrictions

Advisers to the Food and Drug Administration are weighing the evidence for seven different peptides. Favorable votes would pave the way for easier access.

Palestine Action barrister’s prosecution criticised as ‘chilling’

CBA chair says contempt charge over closing speech by Rajiv Menon KC has left lawyers fearful of doing their job

The prosecution of a leading human rights barrister for contempt of court over his closing speech during a trial of Palestine Action activists has left lawyers fearful of doing their job, the chair of the Criminal Bar Association (CBA) has said.

Rajiv Menon KC, who was acting for the defence, is due to stand trial next week, accused of breaching the judge’s directions in the trial of six people for a direct action protest at an arms factory of the Israeli subsidiary Elbit Systems UK in Filton, near Bristol, in 2024.

Pride organisers vow to march in Romanian city that has blocked event four years in a row

Oradea is only major city in EU where local authorities have repeatedly blocked Pride plans

Campaigners in a Romanian city have vowed to go ahead with a Pride march after local authorities denied permission for the fourth consecutive year.

Since 2023, campaigners in the western city of Oradea, which has a population of about 180,000, have sought permission to hold Pride events. However, each year they have faced opposition, making Oradea the only major city in the EU where local authorities have repeatedly blocked Pride marches.

Pauline Hanson says domestic violence prevents police from dealing with ‘real crime’ in unearthed interview

One Nation leader labels family violence leave ‘ridiculous’ and decries ‘woke’ support of women’s rights in November podcast

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Pauline Hanson has described paid leave for those experiencing family and domestic violence as “ridiculous”, and suggested the issue is taking police away from “real crime”, calling for the family law system to be “wound back”.

In an unearthed interview, the One Nation leader said the advancements of women’s rights in the family law system over the decades had become “broken” because they favoured women and were now “suppressing the males all the time”.

Business rates to be cut by 20% for pubs, clubs and music venues in England

Burnham says relief for vape shops and other ‘non-positive’ businesses to be reviewed as part of £100m plan to fund cut

Pubs, clubs and live music venues in England will receive a 20% cut to their business rates bills from April under plans unveiled by Andy Burnham as part of a £10m package aimed at supporting high streets and easing cost of living pressures.

The prime minister said the package would be fully funded, including through a review of relief for businessesdeemed not to make a positive contribution to communities, such as vape shops.

Scottish police officer was rapist who attacked women over 14 years

Alan Greer, who killed himself after officers visited his home, could be ‘Police Scotland’s Wayne Couzens moment’

A police officer who took his own life in May was a rapist who attacked at least nine women over 14 years.

PC Alan Greer’s offending came to light when his first known victim, a woman he raped in her home in Glasgow in 2012 after she had called the police to report being the victim of a crime, reported the attack late last year.

How LNZ Cherkasy become a wartime success story with few modern parallels

Ukrainian club were in fourth tier in 2021 but, despite war with Russia, will contest European qualifiers for first time

It is time for set-piece training at LNZ Cherkasy’s smart, shiny training facility. “Arsenal!” one player says with a laugh as the grappling at a corner begins, the joke spreading among others clustered in the six-yard box. That is a level everyone here must aspire to but they are edging nearer. This week a club from what used to be one of Ukraine’s football backwaters will make its European debut in a wartime success story with few modern-day parallels.

“We are making history,” the LNZ striker Mark Assinor says after the jostling has stopped and the session wound down. “But there’s been a change in mentality here and I think this is only a starting point for the club.”

Don’t like the result? Don’t worry, sport no longer ends on the field of play | Jonathan Liew

From the wrong headset in an F2 garage to Fifa overturning a red card, we are in a landscape where fairness is the enemy

A funny and very small thing happened at the Formula Two race at Spa on Sunday. Noel León, of Campos Racing, carved his way through the field to finish seventh, earning himself six points in the drivers’ championship, and promptly left the circuit to go and do whatever it is Noel León likes to do after a race. Take a nap, hit the Belgian brews, congratulate himself on his palindromic name – whatever. Anyway, while he was doing that, more than three hours after the chequered flag, the FIA governing body called a meeting and decided to disqualify him.

The reason: a serious breach of appendix 5 and article 21.5 of the F2 Sporting Regulations – and assuming you don’t have those to hand, it’s the rule governing the use of headsets. During the race, a guest of León had been spotted in the Campos garage wearing what was deemed the wrong type of headset. According to the aforementioned appendix 5, only listening devices may be used by non-team personnel. This headset had a microphone, albeit upturned and unused.

Ken Turner, the 100-year-old artist who flattened a Tesla with a tank: ‘I’m not a revolutionary, I’m a simple rebel’

The painter, sculptor and performance artist has devoted his life to making art available to the masses. Now with a new exhibition, the centenarian discusses inequality, inspiration, and why he won’t be stopping any time soon

‘Life is short, art long,” says Ken Turner, reading from a book of aphorisms by ancient Greek physician Hippocrates. And he’s half right, really, because at 100 years old – and very possibly the world’s oldest performance artist – art might have been long, but life hasn’t been all that short for him, either. And he has filled those years to the brim with radicalism, experimentalism and a singular dedication to pushing ideas as far as he can make them go.

In the 1960s, Turner moved from painting towards a socially conscious form of public art, creating giant inflatable sculptures that visitors could inhabit and interact with decades before immersive art became a thing. He was taught by Fernand Léger, he was mates with John Berger, he made frames for Frank Auerbach and Leon Kossoff. Last year, he drove a tank over a Tesla in a performance meant as a damning indictment of corporate greed and rising fascism. His has been a life of rebellion and revolution, of obstinately following his own artistic path no matter what obstacles he encounters, no matter how much easier it would have been to walk down a more well-trodden one.

You be the judge: should my girlfriend stop insisting we queue for hours at concerts?

Fay likes to get a good spot and watch the support acts, but Odysseus would rather rock up for the main band. Who is hitting a false note? You decide

• Find out how to get a disagreement settled or become a juror

Fay likes to be on the front row but I think it’s overrated

Why Scotland’s cinematic Moray coast made it a perfect location to shoot The Odyssey

‘Legends cling like barnacles to these shores,’ says our local writer, who reveals how the lore of these craggy cliffs and beaches resonates with the Homeric classic

The incoming tide has made a labyrinth of the beach. As silvery rivulets spread across Culbin Sands to meet the mudflats, my walk becomes increasingly circuitous: weaving inland towards the pine forest, backtracking closer to the waves, skirting tidal pools and scaling dunes constantly resculpted by the North Sea breeze.

In this shapeshifting stretch of north-east Scotland’s Moray coast, there’s not another soul in sight, nothing to anchor me to the modern day. It’s easy, then, to imagine a longship bringing weary warriors ashore, or a band of man-eating giants marauding from the woodland. Which is exactly what happens here – on screen – in Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of The Odyssey.

Air by Christian Kracht review – a metaphysical jigsaw puzzle

A portal opens from our modern world of data centres and interior design into a medieval fantasy realm, in this playfully surreal tale from the author of Eurotrash

A reclusive interior designer named Paul travels from his home in Orkney to the Norwegian coastal city of Stavanger for a most unusual commission. A data­centre housing a vast internet server is located by a fjord on the outskirts of the city, and a prestigious arts magazine is paying him a large sum of money to give it a makeover. They want him to paint the interiors white – “not just any white, but the perfect white, the singular white”. Shortly after he arrives, a freak weather event causes a power outage, and Paul goes missing; meanwhile the magazine’s jaded editor, Cohen, takes an overdose of barbiturates.

In alternate chapters a very different tale unfolds, set in a distant medieval world redolent of Norse mythology. A man, referred to only as “the stranger”, is nursed back to health by a nine-year-old girl who has shot him with an arrow after mistaking him for a deer. He is being pursued by a vengeful duke, and persuades the girl to join him on the run. Together they leave their plague-ridden town, traverse a barren wasteland and discover a subterranean stone city whose inhabitants live a communal existence, subsisting on seafood and kelp.

Besieged by lobbyists, will UK ministers protect our ecosystems? No, they’ll chicken out | George Monbiot

Industrial poultry farming is killing our rivers. But rather than stop it, the government has been facilitating it. Will Andy Burnham end this ecocide?

There’s a slightly mean question I often ask British people with an interest in the living world: can you name the environment secretary? I don’t intend to show them up: it’s not them I’m testing. I watch the brows knit, a finger go up, the mouth open and close. “It’s, you know, the one who … no, they went, didn’t they? That other one …” It’s been like this for seven years.

Why? Because throughout this period, we’ve not had environment secretaries. We’ve had portals through which corporate lobbyists may pass. The last incumbent to represent the wider public interest (and I can scarcely bring myself to type these words) was Michael Gove. In his other roles, he’s widely remembered with loathing and disgust. Out of office, he continues to poison public life, as editor of the Spectator. But in this role, to general astonishment, he placed the public good above special interests.

George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist

‘Overdue reunion’: aviation hero’s long lost granddaughter uncovers secret past

Judy Bain, 81, spent most of her life unaware she was a direct descendant of the daring pilot Arthur Whitten Brown

In the spring of 1944, Elsie Barber, a member of the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force, had a fling with a Royal Air Force pilot named Arthur Brown, known as Buster. The liaison at the RAF base near High Ercall in Shropshire was clandestine. She was 24 and single, he was a recently married 21-year-old.

Buster died months later, on D-day, when his Mosquito fighter plane crashed in the Netherlands, leaving Elsie with a lonely dilemma. She was pregnant, and after giving birth to a daughter, made the decision to give her up for adoption.

Rachel Roddy’s ratatouille and potato gratin recipe

The classic Provencal stew, but with potato for ballast and topped with a cheesy herb crumb

We swapped the heatwave and melting pavements in Rome for a similar situation in London, which meant catching a train to Dorset felt something of a relief. Not that it wasn’t hot there too, but it was offset by the sea, a garden and a dark, cool house. The weather also meant that the always good July produce was superb and abundant: all the berries, cherries, peas, runner and french beans; but also potatoes, aubergines, courgettes, tomatoes and herbs – all of which go into this week’s recipe.

My template for ratatouille is a mix of Jane Grigson’s recipe in her Vegetable Book and Robert Carrier’s version in Great Dishes of the World, plus the advice from a French friend to cook the aubergine separately, either by deep-frying (by far the tastiest option), baking, or air frying. The benefit of this step is not just flavour; it ensures the aubergine holds its shape better, meaning distinct chunks in the final stew.

Total solar eclipse books out hotels two years in advance in New Zealand city

Dunedin will be the focal point, having last experienced such an eclipse in 1163 – before any humans reached New Zealand

Hotels are booking out two years in advance in the New Zealand city of Dunedin as it prepares for the region’s first total solar eclipse in more than 850 years.

At 4.17pm on 22 July 2028, the moon will pass in front of the sun, casting a roughly 100km-wide shadowy band across parts of southern New Zealand. Everywhere within that band – from tourist hotspot Queenstown in the west to Dunedin city in the east – will be plunged into daytime darkness for 2 minutes and 51 seconds.

What happened to Ryan Gosling’s ‘La La Hand’ on the La La Land poster?

After 10 years and much complaining from Gosling, ‘a minor adjustment’ has been made to the La La Land poster – but has film history been erased at the same time?

Emma, I have read a Vulture headline that says “Put Ryan Gosling’s Gay Little Wrist Back” but I forgot my password and I need answers.

Some La La Land fans are outraged at a new poster released to mark the 1oth anniversary of the film by Lionsgate, which has “corrected” Gosling’s bent wrist in his celebrated dance pose with Emma Stone.

Country diary: The eyebright paradox: a sunny healer and tiny parasitic thief | Paul Evans

The Marches, Shropshire: Eyebrights are ancient herbs used to cure eye problems, but they also penetrate grass roots to siphon off water and nutrients

A sight for sore eyes. Eyebrights flower in the short turf of Old Racecourse Common as sunlight burns a hole through rowan trees to cast sunset colours on the grass. The eyebrights are annuals with tiny flowers, 4mm-11mm long with a violet vibe, a white corolla with purple marks and a central flash of yellow.

There are about 20 British eyebright species, some of which are endemic. Their genetic complexity makes them an arcane group of plants and a taxonomic puzzle to all but their most dedicated acolytes. “Life’s too short to key out [make a precise identification of] eyebrights,” one botanist told me.

‘I would rather be poor’: man says money cannot compensate for partner’s death after failed cancer diagnosis

Exclusive: Darren Rosheski won NHS payout over partner Helen Dutton’s death from rectal cancer after GP misjudged her symptoms

“I remember the doctor, after he’d examined Helen and found a large lump in her colon, saying: ‘It’s very sinister – we need to bring you in to be investigated.’”

Darren Rosheski is recalling the moment a consultant doctor at Tameside hospital broke the news to his partner, Helen Dutton, that her symptoms – which also included back pain, passing blood and altered bowel habits – were so worrying that they needed further tests.

Iraq’s impossible predicament: why the country is trapped between Iran and the US

With the outbreak of this year’s war, Iraq’s balancing act between the two antagonists has collapsed, exposing a perilously fragile state

• The summer issue of the Long Read magazine is out now. Click here to order

One week after the United States and Israel killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and ignited a regional war, drones started flying over Basra in southern Iraq. They were targeting Iraq’s oil industry. They hit an oilfield operated by BP, as well as a cargo terminal at Basra airport and a large compound that houses foreign companies that service the oil sector. Another attack on 6 March hit the same compound, striking offices and warehouses used by Halliburton and KBR, two US companies that have been in Iraq since the 2003 invasion. The attack sparked a massive fire that lit up the night sky.

In the wider war, it was not a particularly notable day – but in Iraq the strikes laid bare just how weak the state had become and “how easily sovereignty could be violated”, as one senior Iraqi security official put it to me. For 40 years, the US, Iran and Israel existed in an uneasy equilibrium of neither peace nor war. As this has come to a sudden, dramatic end, Iraq finds itself caught in the middle.

‘We didn’t care what the client wanted!’: Sheffield’s Designers Republic on their art for Aphex Twin, Pulp … and Pringles

Their eye-popping designs burst out of Sheffield in 1986, making them the toast of the music scene. Founder Ian Anderson reveals why some fans think his art is worth remortgaging the house for

Forty years ago in Sheffield, Ian Anderson founded one of the most influential UK design companies by mistake. “The name the Designers Republic was a joke, because we weren’t designers,” he recalls. “Early on, everything we did was in black and white because we didn’t know how to make it colour.”

With co-founder Nick Phillips, The Designers Republic (TDR) quickly became synonymous with music, designing record covers, packaging, logos and campaigns for everyone from Aphex Twin to Autechre, Pulp to Nine Inch Nails. They worked on groundbreaking video games, such as Wipeout and Grand Theft Auto, collaborated with brand behemoths like Coca-Cola and Adidas, and their work is held in the MoMA and the V&A. There exist such obsessive collectors of their work that Anderson cites one person who remortaged his house twice to keep up with their output.

Pompeii: Out of Time With Tom Hiddleston review – you will cringe so hard you turn to cheese

The actor emotes his way through Vesuvius’s catastrophic eruption in a docudrama that is embarrassing and exhausting – but undeniably entertaining. Prepare to be Hiddlestoned!

There’s such a fine line between “cheese” and “cringe”, is there not? Come, walk it with me and Tom Hiddleston in Pompeii: Out of Time With Tom Hiddleston. Let’s see how many of us survive the eruptions of embarrassment that attend our journey!

This is a National Geographic documentary-drama, which means that even the factual bits are emotionally scripted and there’s CGI money and speaking parts for the re-enactments. And there is Tom (he has looked very deeply into my eyes throughout all three episodes, so I feel we are on first-name terms now), wringing every drop of feeling from every moment with the untrammelled appetite of a born actor.

House committee urges DOJ to charge former Trump prosecutor Jack Smith

The GOP chair of the House Judiciary Committee encouraged the DOJ to look into criminally charging Jack Smith, alleging the former special counsel who brought charges against President Trump lied to Congress.

Man shot and killed by police in Madison, Wisconsin, sparking protests

Madison's chief of police says an officer in Wisconsin's capital city shot and killed a man who had injured him with a knife while resisting arrest.

Amish Shah projected to win Arizona's 1st District Democratic primary

Democrat Amish Shah will be up against Republican Jay Feely in Arizona's 1st Congressional District in November.

Alphabet and Tesla test Wall Street's patience as AI spending overshadows growth

Shares of Alphabet and Tesla dipped after the companies reported massive spending increases in their quarterly earnings reports.

‘A statement of freedom’: T-shirt slogan goes viral and book sales rocket in Taiwan after Hong Kong raids

Taiwanese people look on with concern at fate of Hong Kong’s independent booksellers, after series of arrests in recent months

Walking out of one of Hong Kong’s last remaining independent bookstores, hands behind her back but head held high, the woman’s T-shirt was emblazoned with a simple slogan: “I am a bookstore employee”.

Escorted by police, the woman was among five people arrested during raids on two bookstores last week, suspected of displaying and selling publications with “seditious” content, a national security crime which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years.

National Guard deployed as flash floods hit West Virginia after 7 inches of rain

Torrential rains in West Virginia have caused flash flooding that inundated homes and businesses this week.

Mamdani says he won't try to arrest Israel's Netanyahu

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani conceded late Tuesday that the city does not have the authority to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

ICE detentions hit highest monthly total in June since crackdown began

More than 43,000 immigrants were arrested last month as DHS continues to detain people in less-publicized enforcement surges.

IBM lowers full-year forecast after earnings warning

IBM is now looking to improve productivity with artificial intelligence, including with a new coding tool called Bob.

Climate change to obliterate $1.5 trillion in U.S. home values

More than 5 million Americans will leave areas being impacted by climate change this year, according to study.

How the New Bedford Whaling Museum turned a bad Google review into free marketing

The New Bedford Whaling Museum was hit with a Google review calling it the "worst aquarium ever." Then it turned it into marketing gold. Tony Dokoupil has the story.

Pastor sues OpenAI alleging ChatGPT's medical advice nearly killed him

The case accuses OpenAI of practicing medicine without a license and failing to safeguard users seeking health advice.

Increasingly common bear encounters cause fear across U.S.

Bear encounters are rising across the U.S. as the animals enter human spaces looking for food, often getting caught on tape. Mark Strassmann has the story.

US signs landmark nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia that could pave the way for domestic nuclear enrichment

Trump administration hails agreement, which comes as the US fights a war with Iran in part to prevent Tehran enriching uranium domestically

• What is the US-Saudi Arabia nuclear deal and why is it causing concern?

The US has signed a landmark nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia that could allow the kingdom to enrich uranium in the future.

In a statement on Wednesday, the US Department of Energy said its secretary, Chris Wright, and his Saudi counterpart, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, signed a “peaceful nuclear cooperation agreement”, along with a “bilateral safeguards agreement”.

How do Lime’s ebikes make money? Share market debut sheds light on finances

The firm’s public listing in June gives an insight into a question analysts have been wondering for years: how does this business stack up?

In April, Lime brought its green ebikes and e-scooters to Canberra. Before it had even arrived, the US micro-mobility firm had invested nearly US$2m.

Lime’s experience in Australia’s sprawling capital is emblematic of a broader problem at the core of a business heavy on capital outlay.

Trump attends dignified transfer of soldiers killed in Iranian attacks

President Trump attended a dignified transfer honoring the four U.S. Army soldiers killed in the Middle East in recent days during the ongoing war with Iran.

Possible bloodstains were detected at D4vd’s home, law enforcement testify

Gory details about tarp, mats and inflatable pool come to light during hearing over death of Celeste Rivas Hernandez

At singer D4vd’s former Hollywood Hills home, law enforcement detected possible bloodstains – invisible to the naked eye – on items including a green tarp, black rubber mats and a crumpled inflatable pool that had the odor of fresh laundry.

The gory details came to light on Wednesday, the second day of a hearing to determine whether there was probable cause for the musician, whose full name is David Anthony Burke, to stand trial for the murder and sexual abuse of Celeste Rivas Hernandez.

Southwest Airlines' third-quarter forecast falls short as fuel bill climbs

Southwest Airlines reported a more than 9% increase in second-quarter profit as higher fares are increasingly helping the airline cover its fuel tab.

Pauline Hanson’s comments about domestic violence are more than vile. They are dangerous for women | Nicole Yade

A woman in Australia is killed by someone she trusted every 11 days and misinformation about family violence does real harm to victims

On Wednesday, senator Pauline Hanson claimed domestic and family violence is “a two-way street”, blamed the cost of living for perpetrators’ actions, and suggested women experiencing abuse should simply “not put up with it”.

These comments are not an aberration. They sit within a broader political project that has, for decades, attempted to build support on the basis of normalising prejudice, particularly against migrants, Muslim communities and communities of colour. That same platform can also risk lending credibility to dangerous myths about domestic and family violence.

Secret Service warns of high threat levels before White House Correspondents' Dinner

Secret Service officials warned nationwide threats have reached an unprecedented level since January, nearly 40% higher than during the same period last year.

Tesla misses on earnings, as free cash flow turns negative and margins slide

Tesla's earnings report lands in the midst of a slide in the company's stock price even as its core auto business is rebounding.

7/22: CBS Evening News

Florida police spray bullets at homicide suspect's vehicle following car chase; rocket launcher hoax shakes LaGuardia Airport.

Council handpicked by Trump to gut review process of historic-preservation projects

The Advisory Council for Historic Preservation, whose members were mostly handpicked by President Trump, is poised to end mandatory state review and public comment on projects affecting historical properties.

Analysis: Iran war energy shock hits the U.S. economy as gas and diesel prices climb

A new asymmetry in the market means fuel prices won't fall quickly even if the shooting in the Iran war and Strait of Hormuz stops.

House GOP advances $95 billion plan to fund Iran war and SAVE America Act

House Republicans adopted a budget resolution that kickstarts the party-line reconciliation process. It now heads to the Senate, where it'll face an uphill battle.

First beluga whales from Marineland arrive in Texas as rescue underway

Two beluga whales settled into their new home at SeaWorld San Antonio this week following an international relocation mission from shuttered Canadian theme park Marineland.

California toddler bitten by rattlesnake ‘hiding under’ Amazon package

Three-year-old girl landed in ICU after snake bit her while grabbing a package outside her family’s Santa Clarita home

A three-year-old girl landed in the intensive care unit earlier this month after a rattlesnake bit her while she was trying to grab an Amazon package.

Addy, the young girl, ran out with her mother on 13 July to pick up a package dropped over the gate to their home in Santa Clarita, north of Los Angeles.

7/22: The Takeout with Major Garrett

Trump and Iran trade threats to attack energy infrastructure; Trump administration officially announces nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia.

House advances bill barring sitting Congress members from buying stocks

The House on Wednesday advanced a bill that would bar members of Congress from purchasing additional stocks while in office.

House passes bill to limit stock purchases by members of Congress

The Stop Insider Trading Act would prohibit members of Congress, their spouses and dependent children from purchasing publicly traded stocks.

What to know about Taylor Farms amid the cyclospora outbreak

The nation's largest recent cyclospora outbreak has put one of America's biggest produce suppliers under renewed scrutiny.

Taylor Farms pulls iceberg lettuce linked to cyclosporiasis outbreak

Taylor Farms said none of its branded salads or kits contain the iceberg lettuce associated with the outbreak.