Table of contents for 1497 in The Week

What happened Donald Trump officially secured the Republican presidential nomination this week, days after surviving an assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania. Appearing at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee with a bandage on his bullet-grazed right ear, Trump announced his choice of running mate as the 39-year-old Ohio senator J.D. Vance. The author of a bestselling memoir about growing up in rural poverty, Vance was once a fierce critic of Trump, but is now a leading backer – and a prominent opponent of military aid to Ukraine. The gunman was identified as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, who lived 43 miles away and worked in the kitchen of a care home. Crooks was a registered Republican voter, but had, in 2021, donated $15 to a liberal campaign group. He…

Controversy of the week “It is not an announcement that any sane politician would wish to make, or member of the public to hear,” said The Times: “that thousands of prisoners will be released early in their sentences because jails are full to bursting and the space is urgently required for those guilty of more heinous crimes”. Yet this was the message that Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood had to deliver last week, just days into her new job. The prison estate in England and Wales is “failing”, and Labour has been “handed a poisoned chalice of rare toxicity”. Of the nearly 84,500 places in men’s prisons, all but some 700 are full. If prisons were to run out of capacity, “police cells would fill up, courts would stop cases, and…

Vaughan Gething announced his resignation as First Minister of Wales this week, days after four members of his government resigned in protest at his leadership. Gething (pictured) made history in March, when he was elected leader of Welsh Labour, and so became the first black leader of any European nation. But from the moment he took office, he was dogged by questions about his decision to accept a £200,000 donation from a businessman who’d been convicted of environmental crimes, and about how WhatsApp messages he’d sent during the Covid pandemic had come to be deleted. In May, he sacked one of his ministers, Hannah Blythyn, after messages that seemed to undermine his version of events, appeared in the press – though she protested her innocence (and the news site in…

Washington DC Biden respite: Joe Biden’s campaign team has suspended a planned $50m advertising campaign in swing states that would have depicted Donald Trump as a would-be “dictator” and a threat to democracy. In the days following the attempted assassination of the former president, Democrat campaign staff were also told to avoid directly criticising him, and Biden and his VP, Kamala Harris, pulled out of planned campaign speeches. The pause in campaigning gave Biden a respite from the weeks of bruising questions he has faced about his fitness for re-election. The 81-year-old’s mental acuity had been challenged by reporters at last week’s Nato summit in Washington, where he introduced Ukraine’s President Zelensky as President Putin (he corrected himself), and referred to Harris as “Vice President Trump”. The day before, George…

“When England returned home from the 1990 World Cup in Italy, the crowd that had assembled at Luton Airport to greet them was vast. There were 100,000 people around the airport and 250,000 on the streets. Yes, fourth-placed England were given an open-top bus reception. We were more easily pleased then. Indeed, it has got to the point where we are not happy unless England win. Nothing but a trophy is good enough, now. That is where Gareth Southgate has taken this team, to a place where second against Spain wasn’t good enough. This is a reflection of his success. It may be a curse for his successor, but it pays a direct compliment to his achievements.” Owen Slot in The Times…

How Nato failed Ukraine… and itself Simon Tisdall The Observer Did last week mark the moment Vladimir Putin won the war in Ukraine? Looking at the way Nato leaders meeting in Washington stuck to “a route map to defeat”, it could well be the case, says Simon Tisdall. Yes, “repulsing” Moscow was vital for Europe’s future security, they all agreed; yes, Ukraine must be offered a “bridge” to “irreversible” Nato membership; yes, Nato would supply new air defence systems and planes. But all too little, too late. Chancellor Olaf Scholz, “the ultimate Ukraine foot-dragger”, was adamant he would not send German Taurus missiles. Keir Starmer said Kyiv could use UK-made Storm Shadow ones defensively against Russia, but only in Crimea. And Joe Biden still refused to let Kyiv use US-supplied…

Pollution’s impact on reproduction Exposure to air pollution before the retrieval of eggs can cut women’s chances of having a live birth after IVF by approximately 40%, an Australian study has found. The research was based on some 1,836 women who had frozen embryo transfers. The team looked at the air quality in the weeks and months before their eggs were collected, and found that greater exposure to particulate matter pollution (PM2.5 and PM10) correlated to a lower chance of a successful birth. The women who were exposed to the highest levels in the two weeks prior had a 38% lower chance of having a live birth than those with the lowest levels. Those exposed to air pollution in the months before embryo transfer were also less likely to have…

In Keir Starmer’s “first appearance on the world stage” as Prime Minister, at the Nato summit in Washington last week, he was keen to proclaim Britain as a “major” military power, said Con Coughlin in The Daily Telegraph. Starmer declared that security was his “first priority”; reiterated his firm support for Ukraine; and called on all Nato nations to increase their spending on defence from a minimum 2% of GDP, the current commitment, to 2.5%. “The only problem” with Starmer’s otherwise laudable ambitions is that Britain’s Armed Forces are currently “small and under-equipped”, and that he and his new Defence Secretary, John Healey, seem to have “little idea when, if ever” their own Government will actually meet that 2.5% target. Furthermore, there will be no extra spending in the near…

“One more” was Gareth Southgate’s rallying cry when England beat the Netherlands to reach their second successive Euros final. But four days later in Berlin, “one more” was what his team notably lacked, said Jonathan Northcroft in The Times. And now, three days after losing to a fearless and vibrant Spain, Southgate has resigned. Many of the players wanted him to stay on, but whether that would have been the best thing for England is another matter. It’s undeniably true that on the basis of their squads, England should have been at least Spain’s equal, said Michael Cox on The Athletic. In the most recent Ballon d’Or, only one Spanish player (Rodri) featured on the 30-man shortlist (whereas Jude Bellingham, Harry Kane and Bukayo Saka all did). In Phil Foden,…

Hardbacks The Sleepwalkers by Scarlett Thomas Scribner 304pp £16.99 (£13.99) Thomas’s 14th novel is an “ambiguous chiller worthy of Patricia Highsmith”, said The Daily Telegraph. It is set in an exclusive Greek resort, to which “absurdly ill-suited” newlyweds Richard and Evelyn have come for their honeymoon. With its “highly original” narrative (one chapter is an AI-generated audio transcript), this is an “unpredictable and unputdownable summer holiday read”, said the FT. The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden Viking 272pp £16.99 (£13.99) In a small Dutch town, 15 years after the end of WWII, the solitary life of 30-year-old Isabel is interrupted by the arrival of her “debonair” brother and his “vivacious” girlfriend Eva, said The Observer. When her brother is called away, Isabel is left alone with Eva. What begins…

Dorothy Lichtenstein, the widow of the great Pop artist Roy Lichtenstein, died earlier this month at her home on Long Island. “An elegant and engaging woman who did not claim to have any artistic talent, Ms Lichtenstein redefined the image of the ‘artist’s widow’, a relentlessly maligned art-world type,” said The New York Times. Far from being controlling and grasping, as the cliché suggests, she gave most of her husband’s work away: “paintings and sculptures, piles of sketchbooks, file drawers bulging with correspondence, and even the building in Lower Manhattan in which Mr Lichtenstein’s last studio was located”. The main beneficiary was the Whitney Museum of American Art, which in 2018 received a gift of some 400 works. She also supervised a catalogue raisonné of the artist’s 5,500-work opus. Most…

Alistair and Denise have a romantic day out on the lake; Denise knows she needs to tell John their marriage is over. George is anxious to hear that Chris was asking about the fruit cider bottle in Alice’s car; meanwhile, Neil advises Chris to move on. George films the haymaking for his social media. With the strangles cases cleared, The Stables’ temporary manager Carlotta helps Lilian plan the reopening. There’s an awkward moment for Alistair as Paul talks about his parents’ great marriage. Denise finally tells John the truth. John walks off, saying he won’t see Paul tonight as planned – Denise can explain why. As they enjoy a beer, Neil and Ben hand George a fruit cider; paranoid George storms off, leaving them wondering why. After a tough first…

Wine Club by Majestic has an educational element, with tasting materials and expert advice via webinars. You get four cases a year, based around a different region, country or grape, to refine your knowledge (from £99/quarter; majestic.co.uk). Savage Vines aims to introduce subscribers to new wine regions and grape varieties. It handpicks wines from small wineries with a focus on the organic and bio-dynamic (from £35/month; savagevines.co.uk). Wine Unpacked lets you try before you buy. Its tasting kit has 12 mini bottles, to build a taste profile with your preferences. Its wines, from small, independent producers, have tasting notes and pairing suggestions (from £39/two months; wineunpacked.com). Corkk Club focuses on English wine, championing independent vineyards. You can customise your subscription, with still, sparkling or mixed cases available in different sizes,…

The Emory London London’s priciest hotels generally occupy solid old buildings of brick or stone – but not The Emory, says Toby Skinner in Condé Nast Traveller. The capital’s first all-suite hotel sits in a sleek “glassy box” overlooking Hyde Park – one of the late Richard Rogers’s final projects. Inside, however, it offers the same “quiet luxury” as its rivals – from its groundfloor restaurant (overseen by the chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten) to its 360-degree glass rooftop bar. The suites are all “soft-coloured” and “soft-edged”, and there’s a “gorgeously marbled” subterranean spa, with a 22-metre pool and a hyperbaric chamber. Suites cost from £1,800; the-emory.co.uk.…

Trump Media & Technology Group: a post-shot surge Shares in Donald Trump’s Truth Social media company surged by nearly 37% in early morning trading in New York, following the assassination attempt on the Republican presidential candidate, said the FT. The price of bitcoin also jumped – reflecting the market’s view of the “shortening odds on a second Trump presidency”. Trump is seen as the more “pro-crypto candidate”, having voiced enthusiasm for bitcoin mining; “his campaign has also accepted cryptocurrency payments, a first for a major US party”. Some of the shine later wore off Trump Media, which was taken public in March in a merger with a blank cheque company, on fears of “share dilution” after the company struck a “financing pact” with Yorkville Advisors, said Bloomberg. But the choice…

Last July, the Financial Conduct Authority brought in new rules, known as the Consumer Duty, to improve standards for people looking for financial advice. Beware good intentions, said Moira O’Neill in FT Money. Research from The Lang Cat suggests numbers getting professional help have actually fallen (from 11% in 2023 to 9%) because advisers have responded to the extra regulatory cost by tightening their “client profiles”. To qualify, you typically need £100,000 to invest; in 2019, £50,000 was enough for many. If a financial adviser is prepared to take you on with £50k now, be wary. “He or she might be ‘bottom fishing’ – maybe the business is struggling or the quality of advice is low.” Another reason for the thinning of the sector is that firms struggle to recruit.…

The week’s best shares Bloomsbury Publishing The Times A powerful combination of romance, fantasy and dedicated TikTokers is boosting the Harry Potter publisher. Highly cash-generative, with improving margins in its digital-focused academic and professional arm. Buy. 664p. Build-A-Bear Workshop The Times The stuff-your-own teddy bear outfit is seeing new-found success thanks to partnerships with brands such as Pokémon and Disney. Shares, which fell after revenues slipped, are “too cheap, given growth potential”. Buy. $25.33. Bunzl The Times “Boring is beautiful” for this distributor of packaging, cleaning services and personal protection kit to the food, grocery and safety sectors. Shares have wobbled, but it has a history of maintaining growth and divis. Buy. £31.16. Glencore The Daily Telegraph The mining giant is set to capitalise on the net-zero aim given its…

THE WEEK CROSSWORD 1423 Two Connell Guides and three Week-branded items will be given to the sender of the first correct solution to the crossword and the clue of the week opened on Monday 29 July. Send it to The Week Crossword 1423, 121-141 Westbourne Terrace, London W2 6JR, or email the completed grid/listed solutions to crossword@theweek.co.uk. Tim Moorey (timmoorey.com) This week’s winner will receive Week-branded items including a notebook, coffee mug and tote bag, as well as two Connell Guides (connellguides.com). ACROSS 1 IT expert breaking the ice (6) 4 What’s left of lunch? Goodness! (6) 10 Children’s author managed to an extent (7) 11 Trainees sent in wrongly to catch Republican (7) 12 Nick is apt to follow Mishal’s lead (14) 13 Those unlikely to write memoirs? (9)…

What happened King Charles set out the new Labour Government’s legislative plans on Wednesday. At the State Opening of Parliament, the King unveiled 40 bills that Keir Starmer said would “take the brakes off Britain”. The package included a raft of planning reforms aimed at accelerating the building of houses and infrastructure, and a bill to allow VAT to be charged on private school fees. There were also bills paving the way for the launch of GB Energy (a state-owned energy firm) and a Border Security Command to crack down on people smugglers. Other bills will strip voting rights from hereditary peers; stop people who were born after 2009 from ever buying cigarettes; beef up workers’ rights; toughen penalties for shoplifting; and gradually renationalise rail services. Separately, ministers used Labour’s…

Wimbledon is hosting its first e-sports tennis tournament in an effort to attract more young fans. Qualifying rounds involving players from all over Europe, the UK and North America began this month; those who get through will be invited to compete in in-person finals at the Wimbledon Media Theatre in September. The e-champion will win a gold-plated PS5 etched with their name by Wimbledon’s official engraver. Britain has elected the most irreligious parliament in history, according to analysis by the group Humanists UK. It found that about 40% of MPs chose to make a secular affirmation rather than take a religious oath on being sworn into the Commons this month, up from 24% in 2019.…

Water bills in England and Wales will go up by an average of £94 over the next five years, under plans set out by the regulator Ofwat. The rise is less than a third of the amount the water companies requested, and is equivalent to £19 per household, per year (see page 36). This week, Ofwat announced it had opened enforcement cases into four more water companies. This means that all 11 companies in England and Wales that have a waste-water component are now being investigated over potentially illegal sewage spills.…

A 90-year-old woman in rural China found a hand grenade in a field and unwittingly used it as a makeshift hammer for two decades. The woman, identified only as Qin, mistook the grenade for a “metal lump” when she happened upon it on her farm in Huangbao county. “I’ve been using it to pound red pepper, crack nuts and hammer in nails,” she said. Last month, workers at her home noticed the grenade, which was dented from use and had its fuse exposed, and alerted the authorities. They dispatched a bomb unit, which confirmed it was a grenade and destroyed it. A German police officer who bears a striking resemblance to Gareth Southgate was serenaded by England fans attending the Euros semi-final in Dortmund last week. Clips shared online show…

VENEZUELA High noon for the man who bled the nation Clarín (Buenos Aires) Whisper it quietly, but Venezuela’s dreadful president, Nicolás Maduro, may soon be on the way out, says Ludmila Vinogradoff. The rotten regime he leads has clung to power for more than two decades by rigging elections. Last year, when the opposition united behind the candidacy of María Corina Machado, Maduro had a court disqualify her. But his ploy has failed. Machado may not be running in this month’s election, but her proxy, former diplomat Edmundo González Urrutia, certainly is, and he is polling 30 points ahead of Maduro. Opposition rallies are drawing vast crowds; Maduro’s are deserted. To regain a foothold, Maduro has resorted to detaining activists and setting up roadblocks to stop his rivals travelling. But…

Before moving into TV, the comedy producer John Lloyd worked for BBC radio. Among other things, he co-wrote The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; and yet the Beeb refused to promote him. Finally, when he was 26, he tendered his resignation. “Don’t be a young fool!” the BBC’s head of radio comedy told him. “Why, in seven-and-a-half years you could be deputy head of this department!” Jacob Rees-Mogg (pictured) may have been ejected from the Commons – but he will still be in the public eye. He and his family are to star in a five-part “fly-on-the-wall” documentary on Discovery+ that promises to “lift the lid on the man behind the public image”. Writing in the Daily Mail, Amanda Platell offered the former MP a “cautionary word”. In the 1980s,…

“Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result.”Winston Churchill, quoted in The Wall Street Journal “An actor’s a guy who, if you ain’t talking about him, ain’t listening.”Marlon Brando, quoted in the Daily Mail “We cannot build the future by avenging the past.”T.H. White, quoted in The Times “There is always time for a magnum of champagne between the revolution and the firing squad.”Central European saying, quoted in The Spectator “Never miss a chance to have sex or appear on television.”Gore Vidal, quoted on Forbes “He who cannot dance puts the blame on the floor.”Hindu proverb, ibid. “War hath no fury like a non-combatant.”C.E. Montague, quoted on The Browser “It is not easy being a mother. If it were easy, fathers would do it.”Dorothy Zbornak…

“Is London ready for Slave Play?” runs the tagline for the biggest US import of the season, said Dominic Cavendish in The Daily Telegraph. Having been garlanded with awards on Broadway, Jeremy O. Harris’s play about the legacy of slavery arrives in the West End on a wave of hype, owing to its challenging themes, “risqué” content – racial slurs, nudity, simulated sex acts and violence – and its producers’ decision to hold “Black Out” performances for “black-identifying” theatregoers, “an initiative seen by some as divisive”. With a strong cast that includes Kit Harington and Olivia Washington, the evening is not short of “arresting theatrics”, especially in the first act; but it suffers from a “long, sedentary” middle act, some declamatory writing, and a lack of characterisation. Perhaps, then, to…

The Little Women books by Louisa May Alcott, 1868-1886 (Vintage £7.99 each). Not so much the best-known first one, but the follow-ups, in which Jo sets up a school with her husband, and Alcott charts the lives of the boys who come there. I loved the entire quintet through my teenage years. The Wandering Falcon by Jamil Ahmad, 2011 (Penguin £12.99). This can be seen as a novella or a series of linked short stories, but either way it’s a poignant portrait of life in the border region between Pakistan and Afghanistan. There are age-old customs, social mores and privations, as well as conflict with nation-state ideology. The “falcon” of the title is actually a little boy, struggling to survive. The Past Is Myself by Christabel Bielenberg, 1968 (Penguin £10.99).…

Programmes Love & Death True-crime drama starring Elizabeth Olsen and Jesse Plemons. In 1970s Texas, Candy starts an affair with a member of her church, leading to a brutal murder. Sat 20 Jul, ITV1 22:00 (55mins). Britain Behind Bars: A Secret History Rob Rinder presents a three-part history of Britain’s prisons, and meets former inmates who describe their experiences. Sun 21 Jul, C4 21:00 (60mins). The Battle to Beat Malaria Documentary following scientists on four continents as they work to develop malaria vaccines. Mon 22 Jul, BBC2 20:00 (60mins). Hell Jumper A powerful first-person account of the young volunteers – from Britain and elsewhere – who risked their lives to rescue strangers from Ukraine’s warzones. Wed 24 Jul, BBC2 21:00 (90mins). Olympics 2024: Opening Ceremony Clare Balding presents the BBC’s…

Shelley Duvall 1949-2024 Rake thin, with wide eyes, “a Modigliani face and tremulous, broken-doll voice”, Shelley Duvall would have been a striking screen presence at any point in cinema history, said Ryan Gilbey in The Guardian. Even so, it was fortunate that she began acting in the 1970s, when the “unorthodox and the eccentric” were briefly embraced by Hollywood; and luckier still that she fell into the orbit of the director Robert Altman, who spotted her talent and enfolded her in his “unofficial repertory company”. Duvall, he said, could “swing all sides of the pendulum: charming, silly, sophisticated, pathetic – even beautiful”. He cast her in seven of his films, including McCabe and Mrs. Miller, Nashville and Thieves Like Us, and helped turn her into one of the biggest stars…

The big bill for Miliband’s North Sea raid Oliver Shah The Sunday Times Ever since Shell sparked outrage in 1995, when it tried to scuttle the redundant Brent Spar oil-storage buoy off the west coast of Scotland, there has been a ban on the “at-sea burial of installations”, says Oliver Shah. Dismantling them on land costs perhaps ten times more and, under rules dating back to 1975, taxpayers pick up roughly half the cost. The North Sea Transition Authority reckons the Exchequer is on the hook for around £20bn. “That bill will start arriving a decade sooner than it might have done” if the new Energy Secretary, Ed Miliband, gets his way, and knee-caps the North Sea oil and gas industry with a swingeing rise in windfall taxes to fund…

A lost slice of Celtic rainforest in Pembrokeshire is to be replanted and restored to its ancient glory. The 146-acre site, set around two standing stones and an abandoned farmhouse near Fishguard, is now mainly grassland, but will be planted with an array of broadleaf and other species as part of a project by the Wildlife Trust. “The aim is somebody walking through the site in 30 to 50 years’ time won’t say, ‘I wonder who planted this.’ People will say ‘what a lovely place,’” said a spokesman. Britain’s oldest surviving recipient of the Victoria Cross – and the last person alive to have been awarded it during the Second World War – was honoured with a flypast of his nursing home in Aberdeen this week, to mark 80 years…

Jack Black, the actor and musician, who was forced to cancel his comedy rock band’s world tour after his bandmate made a joke about the attempted assassination of Donald Trump. On stage in Australia with Tenacious D, Black presented Kyle Gass, 64, with a birthday cake and asked him to make a wish. “Don’t miss Trump next time,” Gass replied. He has since offered a profuse apology and been dropped by his talent agency. Ford, which enraged fans of retro cars with its revamped Capri. The “legend is back”, it had proclaimed. But those expecting an update on the low-slung, two-door coupé that was loved by boy racers in the 1970s and 1980s, were appalled to find that the new Capri is a four-door SUV. “Stop ruining iconic cars just…

Paris Seine swim: As the Olympic torch arrived in Paris this week, the city’s mayor, Anne Hidalgo, made good on her long-standing promise to take a dip in the Seine, to show that its water is clean enough for the open swimming events. Since 2015, $1.5bn has been invested in cleaning up the river, including the construction of a huge basin, capable of storing 50,000 cubic metres of water, by Austerlitz station. Dubbed Paris’s “underground cathedral”, this will store untreated wastewater and storm water that would otherwise spew into the Seine when Paris’s sewers are overwhelmed by heavy rain. Potentially harmful levels of E. coli were still being detected in the Seine in early July. However, officials said that, with dryer weather, acceptable standards should be reached before the start…

1 Symphony No. 7 in A major, Op. 92 – IV: Allegro Con Brio by Beethoven, performed by André Previn and the LSO2 Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, performed by Ella Fitzgerald3 L’Oiseau de feu (from The Firebird) by Stravinsky, performed by the Bergen Philharmonic (cond. Andrew Litton)4 I Am Sitting in a Room, written and performed by Alvin Lucier5* Concerto for 2 Violins in D minor, BWV 1043. II. Largo ma non tanto by Bach, performed by Itzhak Perlman, Isaac Stern and the New York Philharmonic (cond. Zubin Mehta)6 Signed, Sealed, Delivered (I’m Yours) by Stevie Wonder, Lee Garrett, Syreeta Wright, Lula Mae Hardaway, performed by Stevie Wonder7 What’s up Doc, written and performed by Errollyn Wallen8 Peter Grimes, Op. 33, Act III, Scene…

Hosting the Games is eye-wateringly expensive. The London Olympics in 2012 cost $17bn, the Rio Games in 2016 $20bn (and led to 60,000 people being displaced from their homes). The main costs are the creation or upgrading of stadiums, and facilities for sports such as cycling and swimming, as well as extra housing and transport infrastructure. The legacy is often a series of white elephants. Sydney’s stadium costs $30m a year to maintain. The $3bn costs of Athens 2004 contributed to the country’s debt crisis; almost all the facilities built for it are now derelict. These problems – known as the “winner’s curse” – have a long history. Debts from the 1976 Montreal Olympics were only paid off in 2006. Revenues do not cover spending: Tokyo made $5.8bn in 2020,…

The supreme court’s power grab Ruth Marcus The Washington Post “Mission accomplished. Power grabbed,” said Ruth Marcus. When the supreme court overturned the decades-old precedent known as the Chevron deference last month, it achieved “a holy grail of the conservative legal movement”. The court’s 1984 ruling in Chevron v. Natural Resources Defence Council held that judges should defer to federal agencies when there are disputes over unclear language in laws passed by congress. It was “a sensible power-sharing arrangement”: every law has ambiguities, and the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration and others have the skills to address the “myriad intricate and technical questions that inevitably arise”. But conservative activists have long argued that this put excessive power in the hands of unelected bureaucrats, presumed to be their…

He says he’ll block the “Hijab and Chastity Bill”, which would bring in new penalties for women who fail to wear the hijab. He has slated the regime for its brutal crackdown of the “Woman, Life, Freedom” protests in 2022. He wants to relax the internet restrictions that shackle commercial and social life. He talks of reducing tensions with the West and restoring the 2015 nuclear deal with the US. The victory of the reformist Masoud Pezeshkian in Iran’s presidential election – called as a result of the death in a helicopter crash of the hardline president Ebrahim Raisi – has brought to an end “three years of conservative dominance over all branches of government” in Iran, said Sina Toossi in Foreign Policy (Washington). And if Pezeshkian makes good on…

The weight-loss wonder drug Ozempic has been associated with a rare eye condition that can cause blindness. Published in the journal JAMA Ophthalmology, the study found that people who are prescribed semaglutide (marketed as Ozempic and Wegovy) for diabetes were four times more likely to develop non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION) than diabetics who’d been prescribed other treatments; and that people who took it to lose weight were seven times more likely to develop NAION than those taking other weight-loss drugs. NAION affects two to ten people per 100,000. The vision loss progresses rapidly; it can be mild to severe, and is irreversible. The study, which involved nearly 17,000 people, was led by an ophthalmologist who had been surprised when three patients came to him with NAION in a…

It baffles me, said Harry Cole in The Sun, how anyone could look at the thumping just dished out by voters and think that “the answer is more Tories shouting at each other in public”. Yet since the election, a new round of infighting has already begun between senior Conservatives, as leadership hopefuls jostle for position. The former home secretary, Suella Braverman, didn’t even wait until the results were in on election night before slamming Rishi Sunak on TV; and she has repeatedly rubbished colleagues such as Robert Jenrick, another potential leadership contender. The bookies’ favourite to be the next party leader, Kemi Badenoch, also laid into Sunak about the election campaign in a shadow cabinet meeting – the details of which were soon leaked – and accused Braverman of…

A year ago, Carlos Alcaraz “snuck away” with the Wimbledon title when he beat Novak Djokovic in an “up-and-down five-set saga that lasted nearly five hours”, said Matthew Futterman in The New York Times. This year, the same match-up produced a totally different final: the 21-year-old Spaniard “hammered and danced and drop-shotted” his way to the title with a resounding 6-2, 6-2, 7-6 victory. The win not only gave Alcaraz his fourth grand slam, but earned him a place in one of tennis’s “most exclusive clubs”. Previously, in the open era, only five male players – Rod Laver, Björn Borg, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Djokovic – had ever won on the slow red clay of Roland-Garros in June and then on the “slick grass of SW19” in July. Now…

To the Financial Times Russia’s latest military gains in the Donetsk region reinforce the case for a negotiated settlement of the war in Ukraine. The US and its allies support Ukraine’s key war aim, which is a return to the 2014 frontiers, i.e., Russia’s expulsion from Crimea and Donbas. But all informed analysts agree that, short of a serious escalation of war, the likeliest outcome will be continued stalemate on the ground, with a not insignificant chance of a Russian victory. This conclusion points to the desirability, even urgency, of a negotiated peace. Reluctance by the West to accept this rests on the belief that anything short of a complete Ukrainian victory would allow Putin to “get away with it”. But this ignores by far the most important outcome of…

Anyone heading to a music festival this summer should tune in to Sonic Fields, an “intimate” series exploring the history of festivals in the UK, said Miranda Sawyer in The Observer. It is the work of the producer Sam Tyler, who made the “endearing” five-part series There Are No Greater Heroes, about the “obscure psych-folk trio Tony, Caro and John”. Gentle as well as curious, Tyler is an excellent interviewer. From Ray Foulk, one of the organisers of the original Isle of Wight festivals, he discovers how Bob Dylan was persuaded to play there in 1969, though he declined to perform at Woodstock that year – and we also get the inside story of the 1970 Isle of Wight festival, which attracted a crowd of up to 700,000, making it…

Patricia Leite at Thomas Dane Gallery Patricia Leite (b.1955) is an artist deeply versed in the folklore of her native Brazil, who seems particularly fascinated by connections between this heritage and the country’s ecology – much of which is now menaced by climate change and human interference. The works in Paisagem de Lenda, this show at Thomas Dane Gallery – nine paintings on wood, plus a large, rug-like tapestry – are largely inspired by the story of a young girl transformed into a water lily by a indigenous South American Moon goddess. Most, also, are rather beautiful: in two cases, Leite paints the ribs and veins of a lily directly onto boat-shaped drinking vessels; Jaci – named for the goddess – is a monumental (if more conventional) view of the…

Unexpected ice cream pairings In recent years, foodies have become accustomed to chefs devising ever wackier flavours of ice cream, says Tomé Morrissy-Swan in The Observer. An early exemplar of the trend was Heston Blumenthal, who first served his legendary bacon and egg ice cream at The Fat Duck some 20 years ago. Among the oddities that have since followed are the Heinz Beanz and Sarson’s Malt Vinegar ice creams served at fashion brand Anya Hindmarch’s summer concept store, The Ice Cream Project, in central London. Now, it seems, chefs – and some non-chefs – are getting similarly creative. “Waitrose’s senior innovation chef, Will Torrent, said recently that he likes his scoop of sea salt and caramel ice cream with an added topping of stilton.” He also recommends pairing white…

If you can, fly on a Monday. Flights will probably be cheaper than at the weekend. Hotels should be too. Travelling at the end of August is often better value than the beginning, as most families want to go on holiday as soon as possible after the schools break up. If you’re hiring a car, don’t get the excess waiver from the rental firm. Buy an independent waiver policy online, where it will cost as little as £16. Which? suggests Cover4Rentals and ReduceMyExcess. If you want to move faster through airport security, many airports now offer fast-track passes allowing you to use a dedicated line (for around £7 per person). You’ll need to book through the airport’s site in advance. If your phone provider has reintroduced data roaming charges to…

Pål Enger 1967-2024 As a child, growing up on a rundown housing estate in Oslo, Pål Enger became obsessed by The Scream. He’d first seen Munch’s 1893 masterpiece on a school trip to the country’s National Gallery, said The Times, and he revisited it at least twice a week for years. The terrible, wordless anxiety on the figure’s face reminded him, he said, of how his violent stepfather made him feel. He determined that one day he would steal the painting, and, in 1994 he did steal it – albeit at the second attempt. On his first attempt, in 1988, he’d smashed the wrong window, and took Munch’s Love and Pain instead. He was caught, and used his four years in jail to plan his next raid. He timed it…

Donald Tang Since moving to the US aged 17, with $20 in his pocket, Donald Tang has been “a dish washer, an investment banker and a media mogul”, said the FT. But his latest role, as executive chairman of the $60bn fast-fashion group Shein, has propelled him onto the global stage. Described as “charismatic and intelligent”, Tang is “the face” of Shein, whose founder, Sky Xu, shuns the limelight. “A sharp dresser partial to snakeskin shoes”, he’s often seen with his dog, Saatchi. The Labour Government has indicated it supports Shein’s blockbuster London float, but the listing is contingent on approval from Beijing, where Tang’s efforts to “de-Chinafy” the group haven’t gone down well. If the IPO fails to materialise, this “master of reinvention” could soon be plotting his next…

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