Kemi Badenoch also used her Today interview to defend her argument that pro-Palestine marches should be banned because they platform antisemitism, but that marches organised by the far-right activist Tommy Robinson should be allowed.When it was put to Badenoch that the Robinson marches were a platform for anti-Muslim hate, Badenoch said that the marches were “different”, and that two Jewish men were killed at Heaton Park synagogue last year and that another two Jewish men were almost killed in Golders Green last week.When it was put to her that Muslims might feel threatened by some of the things said at a Robinson event, she insisted that the two sorts of marches were “not the same”.She went on:double quotation markCriticism of religion is allowed in this country.We mustn’t mix the two things.

I am talking about the attacks on Jews.It’s not the faith that’s being attacked, it’s the people.And I do have to ask, why is it that whenever we’re talking about Jewish hatred, we always have what about, what about?When something happens to black people, no one does the whataboutery.When something does happen to Muslims, we don’t say what about antisemitism?Why do we have this double standard that, whenever there’s an issue with antisemitism and Jews being attacked, we have to broaden it out all the time.The former Green leader Caroline Lucas has called for the party to take immediate action against candidates who have made antisemitic comments or posts, following a series of cases before Thursday’s elections.

Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, has defended her argument that that pro-Palestine marches should be banned because they platform antisemitism, but that marches organised by the far-right activist Tommy Robinson should be allowed,(See 12,57pm,) She was speaking in an interview on the Today programme where she also questioned whether the undisclosed £5m donation given to Nigel Farage by a crypto billionaire meant that he has been “bought” (see 12,33pm), and described Donald Trump as ‘very erratic” (see 12.

40pm).Badenoch also criticised Trump for not having a plan for Iran.Responding to her comments about Trump, Calum Miller, the Lib Dem foreign affairs spokesperson, said:double quotation markThis is the height of hypocrisy from Kemi Badenoch, who was only too happy initially to cheer on Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu’s idiotic war.She only highlights her own lack of foresight when she was a cheerleader for a conflict, and now expresses concern about the lack of a strategy once the consequences become politically inconvenient.Labour should not be “doomscrolling” through leaders like the Conservatives, the communities secretary, Steve Reed, has said, urging MPs not to move against Keir Starmer after the May elections.

For a full list of all the stories covered on the blog today, do scroll through the list of key event headlines near the top of the blog,This is from Stephen Bush, the Financial Times political commentator, on the Keir Starmer antisemitism speech this morning,double quotation markKeir Starmer’s response is almost everything I feared, just a big list of “things have never been worse,Time to press the same buttons as yesterday”And here is an extract from Bush’s FT column this morning, where he suggests what a whole-of-society approach to tackling antisemitism should look like,double quotation markWhat defeats racism is the willingness of civic society and the state to proselytise against it.

It is weakened when people feel ashamed to express racist statements in public.And what strengthens racism is an erosion of the general principle that you cannot or should not punish individuals for the real or perceived crimes of an ethnic or religious group, and the creation of an environment where racist statements are aired without embarrassment.It was not an accident that the religious intolerance that saw Catholic Europe launch crusades against Orthodox Christianity and the Muslim world coincided with a decline in the condition of Jews in Europe.Similarly, the emboldening of racism of all stripes in the UK today has gone hand in hand with the rise of specifically anti-Jewish racism.The lesson of the past is clear: seeing racism as the reaction to events overseas, or to economic dislocation, is wrong-headed.

Such events only trigger increases in racism if societies haven’t done enough to stamp out and condemn its latent appeal,From my colleague Peter Walker on Blueskydouble quotation markAt a No 10 briefing today we heard about the government’s commitment to “a whole-of-society response to antisemitism”,Asked if this might involve the government leaving X, where antisemitism is not only rife but monetlised, we were told it is “something we always keep under review,” So: no,Jewish News has published the full text of the speech given by Louis Danker, president of the Union of Jewish Students, at the No 10 antisemitism summit this morning.

Here is an excerpt.double quotation markI’ve been reassured this past week by the non-Jewish family friend who asked how he could do a CST security shift, by the online influencers eating at Jewish-run restaurants in Golders Green, and by the university leaders asking what more they can do to support their students.These small acts need to be scaled up.What we need is leaders of our institutions publicly standing by us, committing to tangible action, turning permissive environments into zero tolerance for hate, and showing real bravery with the full force of government behind them.For Jews, antisemitism has become suffocating.

It is making us shrink inwards.Every one of your Jewish staff, clients, customers, friends – whatever sector you’re in – is going through this.We all make calculations about hiding our Jewishness because it might literally save our lives.Libby Brooks is the Guardian’s Scotland correspondent.With two days of campaigning left before the Holyrood elections, Scotland’s political leaders have been appearing across the country to punt their core messages to voters.

SNP leader John Swinney was in Fort William, pledging action to revive local high streets and no doubt relieved that the sentencing of convicted sex offender and former SNP council leader Jordan Linden has been postponed from this morning, when it threatened to dominate headlines.Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar donned his scrubs – he is a trained dentist – promising his party will save Scotland’s NHS.Reform’s Malcolm Offord was questioned on his party’s plans to locate immigration detention centres in areas that voted Green.When pointed out to him that the Scottish Greens may not win any constituency votes this election, and asked if this meant there would be no such centres in Scotland, he simply said “That’s a possibility, we’ll wait and see what the result is.”Britain has announced new sanctions aimed at Russian networks trafficking people from Africa and the Middle East to fight in Ukraine.

In a news release, the Foreign Office says:double quotation markThe UK has announced a raft of new sanctions to curb production of Russian drones and the nefarious networks that are exploiting vulnerable migrants from across the globe to support Russia’s illegal war in Ukraine.The latest action hits 35 individuals and entities, including those responsible for human trafficking networks, funnelling exploited migrants into Russia’s war machine.Networks sanctioned by the UK have been deceptively recruiting foreign migrants in search of a better life and either sending them to the front line as cannon fodder or putting them to work in weapons factories.This includes through schemes like Russia’s Alabuga Start programme for drone production at a UK-sanctioned entity.The Campaign Against Antisemitism has criticised the measures announced by Keir Starmer at his No 10 summit today as too limited.

The organisation, which is more confrontational towards government than some of the other groups campaigning against antisemitism, was not invited to attend.In a statement, it described the event as a “choreographed spectacle that puts words before action”.It said:double quotation markDays after we stood outside Downing Street calling on the prime minister to present a plan to tackle antisemitism, this is a start.We note that he has adopted some of our language and his acknowledgment that antisemitism comes not just from the far-right but also from the far-left and Islamism.But most of what is being announced is merely a programme of telling the authorities to do the jobs they were supposed to have been doing for years.

The police have had the powers to ban marches all along, and it should not have taken a spate of stabbings and arson attacks for the Charity Commission to act against extremist mosques or for the Arts Council to stop funding venues that spread hate.It is absurd that basic steps have still not been announced today.We all know that Iran is a malign influence in this country, so why hasn’t the IRGC been proscribed and its ambassador expelled? The prime minister has been in office for almost two years, and it’s been half a year since the Manchester terrorist murders so why is he merely pointing to ongoing reviews of indeterminate length, without taking obvious action right now, for example banning the Muslim Brotherhood?We suspect that avoiding these questions is why the prime minister did not invite the UK’s largest antisemitism campaigning charity to his event at Downing Street today.He probably knows that we would play no part in any choreographed spectacle that puts words before action.Now is not the time to be avoiding uncomfortable truths and hard questions.

The Board of Deputies and the Jewish Leadership Council issued their own joint statement (see 1,39am) also saying the measures announced today did not go far enough,But, overall, they were considerably more positive about what the summit achieved,Keir Starmer has posted this on social media about the cruise ship with a suspected outbreak of hantavirus,double quotation markMy thoughts are with those affected by the hantavirus outbreak onboard the MV Hondius.

We are working closely with international partners to support British nationals on board and we’re putting plans in place for their safe onward travel.The risk to the wider public remains very low - protecting the British people is our number one priority.Going to war in not a local authority responsibility.But, unusually for local elections, Labour has decided to put Iran, and in particular Keir Starmer’s decision not to give the US British military support, at the centre of its third and final party political broadcast (PPB) for England going out tonight.Summing up the message of the broadcast, Labour says:double quotation markBoth Nigel Farage and Kemi Badenoch initially wanted to throw Britain headfirst into war with Iran and have since u-turned on their position as the consequences of the conflict at home and abroad began to emerge.

On 2 March, after the US-Israeli action first began, Badenoch warned the government that there was “no point wanting action to make the world a safe place while being too scared to stand by and watch others”,Two days later, the Tory Leader told Labour MPs: “we are in this war whether they like it or not,What is the prime minister waiting for?”,Less than a week later, Badenoch shamelessly U-turned, saying she “never said we should join” the war,On 2 March, Reform Leader Nigel Farage said Britain should do “all we can to support the operation”, before undertaking a humiliating U-turn just over a week later, while appearing to criticise the state of British armed forces in the process, stating the military could not “offer anything of value” to the operation.

Plunging Britain into the war in Iran could have deepened the consequences felt here in Britain on the cost of living – just at a time when too many families are feeling under real pressure.Many voters have also grown concerned over Green Party Leader Zack Polanski’s ambition for the UK to leave Nato, putting at risk Britain’s global alliances at a time when national security is of the upmost importance in the face of international volatility.The PPB will quote mothers of men serving in the armed forces as saying they are glad that Badenoch and Farage were not in power and able to send their sons to war.And it will feature Starmer saying:double quotation markNigel Farage and Kemi Badenoch wanted to jump into the war with both feet without thinking through the consequences.I did as I will always do – what is right for Britain.

The SNP is “within touching distance” of winning an overall majority at Holyrood, John Swinney insisted, as he called on Scots to “make it happen”,As the Press Association reports, the SNP leader made the plea as he urged people across the country to re-elect him as first minister in Thursday’s election, declaring that rival parties have “nothing to offer” the country,PA says:double quotation markPledging he would “get things done” if voted back into the post in Thursday’s election, the SNP leader also sought to contrast his leadership with that of Keir Starmer at Westminster,He condemned the prime minister’s government for having “done absolutely nothing to help” in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis that Mr Swinney said had left some Scots “really struggling”,The first minister pledged: “That is not the approach I will ever take.

”With food, energy and fuel prices all rising, he insisted an SNP government under his leadership would do “everything we can to support people through these tough times”.He made the direct appeal to voters in an open letter issued ahead of Thursday’s Scottish parliament election.Polls have suggested the SNP are on track to remain in the largest party – but Swinney is also seeking to win an overall majority in a bid to try to force a second vote on Scottish independence.He said: “I think that we are so close to doing that – it is within touching distance.But we have to make it happen.

”Caroline Lucas, who was the Green party’s only MP from 2010 and 2024 and who did three stints as co-leader, has posted this on social media about the revelations about some Green candidates making antisemitic comments.double quotation markStatements that have now come to light from a handful of @TheGreenParty candidates are totally unacceptable & require immediate action.There’s no place for anti-semitism or any hate speech in the party.This is a society-wide problem & needs to be rooted out wherever it’s foundThe party says it is taking these accusations seriously, and disciplinary action has been taken in some instance.But it has also implied that the problem is being exaggerated by the Greens’ opponents.

Lucas’s tone is different.Lisa O’Carroll is a senior Guardian correspondent covering trade and post-Brexit affairs.The UK’s relationship with the EU matters “more than ever” given the “global challenges” Europe as a continent is facing, the European affairs minister Nick Thomas-Symonds has said.As European leaders meet in Armenia to discuss the importance of beefing up the European arm of Nato and the withdrawal of some US troops from Germany and potentially Italy and Spain, Thomas-Symonds told EU ambassadors gathered in London they were the UK’s central priority.He said:double quotation markAs I stand here today, representing a UK government that has made reconnecting with our European partners a central priority, I feel the strength of that legacy, and believe in the importance of nations working together.

We passionately believe that a strong Europe is good for the UK – and a strong UK is good for Europe.We are neighbours by geography and partners by choice.As we look at the global challenges we face collectively – war on mainland Europe, war in the Middle East and the global structures we’ve relied on being tested – we believe that UK-EU relationship matters even more than ever.Thomas-Symonds was speaking at a Europe Day event in Smith Square hosted by the outgoing EU ambassador Pedro Serrano.Zack Polanski’s approval rating has fallen sharply over the past week, a poll suggests, coinciding with the controversy about his reposting a message suggesting the police used excessive force when they arrested the Golders Green stabbing suspect.

According to the More in Common figures, Polanski’s net approval rating, at -27, is still much higher than Keir Starmer’s, at -45.But it is lower than it has been at any point since he took over as Green leader in September, and over the past week it has plummeted.Polanski was at -13 a week ago.Commenting on the figures, Luke Tryl, director of More in Common UK, said:double quotation markJust looking over some data ahead of our elections webinar later and Zack Polanski’s net approval rating has fallen by a fairly chunky 14 points over the last week.Still far ahead of Starmer but also puts him now well below the top three of Badenoch, Davey and Farage.

double quotation markLooking at the numbers it’s both a rise in negatives and a fall in positives, in particular more young people seem to have shifted from “good job” to “neither good nor bad job”.So a mix of more disapproval and more uncertainty.At the Downing Street lobby briefing, the PM’s spokesperson did not deny a report in the Financial Times saying that Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, and Scott Bessent, her US opposite number, had a “fierce row” about the Iran war when they met in Washington last month.In their FT story, Jim Pickard, Sam Fleming and Claire Jones say:double quotation markWhen the pair met later that day [after Reeves told a CNBC event she did not know why the Americans started the war] Bessent berated Reeves over the remarks, according to people familiar with the situation.The Treasury secretary insisted the world was safer because of the US-Israeli war against Iran, even invoking the spectre of Tehran launching a nuclear attack on London