Nerys Avery

The Desire for Terror And the defense of democracy

A purpose of the war on Iran might well be to provoke a terrorist attack inside the United States. This would provide Donald Trump with a pretext to try to cancel or “federalize” the coming Congressional elections.
snyder.substack.com/p/the-desire...

The first lesson of war is ‘know your enemy’ – and Britain’s enemy now is Donald Trump | Simon Tisdall As the Iran disaster escalates, the US president should be seen as an enemy whose actions threaten the lawful, democratic way of life everywhere, says Guardian foreign affairs commentator Simon Tisdal...

This is Trump’s war of choice. But Britain has choices, too. Two hundred and fifty years after the American colonists broke free of empire, it’s time for a British declaration of independence. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Telegraph censured for story of fictional family’s struggle to pay school fees Watchdog upholds complaint it breached code with article about impact of VAT on banker who did not exist

So Axel Springer, which is paying £575mln for the Torygraph group says the Telegraph provides “quality British journalism” … www.theguardian.com/media/2026/m...

Wealthy Dubai residents race back to UAE to avoid tax bills Some risk spending too few days in the emirate and too many in the UK

Tax exiles stuck in London desperately trying to get *back* to Dubai to avoid becoming tax resident in the UK? Just great stuff. giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

What privacy? Meta's smart glasses are filming unwitting naked people Meta's Ray-Ban smart glasses are a privacy nightmare, with footage of naked people, sensitive information, and violent acts captured and seen by Meta's AI and an army of employees.

Buried lede: Meta sends all your nudes to Kenya where humans annotate it and feed it to AI

"People migrate - one of the most normal human behaviours in history, for millenia.

What isn’t legitimate, however, is spending years building a media career on contempt for the country you left while simultaneously expecting that country to bail you out when things go sideways."

🤦‍♀️

An incompetent buffoon. bsky.app/profile/atru...

London landlord begins evictions ahead of new renters’ rights law Asif Aziz’s Criterion Capital owns several apartment blocks in capital as well as Trocadero centre in Piccadilly

Asif Aziz evictions story is going mainstream. Telegraph and Independent have covered in recent days. Now the FT has done a brilliant piece - including finding another property affected, where a Ukrainian refugee and their disabled son are being evicted by Aziz. giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

🤣👇

Donald Trump has explained that the attack on Iran was necessary to protect US citizens from the dangers of paying too much attention to the Epstein files.

lol BBC’s Nick Robinson says #Reform did “pretty well”. They LOST despite fighting hard to win, and have gone pretty quiet since losing, apart from blaming others.

Exactly but BBC R4 Today prog is having wet dreams over what this means for Starmer. They haven’t even mentioned what the loss means for #Reform after Caerphilly (yes I know it was for Senedd but still a loss)

Drop in overseas workers is ‘car crash’ for UK hospitals and care homes, say experts Care roles hit particularly hard by UK’s lurch to the right on migration, according to analysis of Home Office data

This is extraordinary. Surely we are heading for a crisis. Where’s the plan to replace them? www.theguardian.com/society/2026...

“Musk has, at this point, openly embraced white supremacy, funded an authoritarian insurrection, converted the nation's top social media platform into a nazi propaganda safe space, and killed hundreds of thousands of people through his mindless decimation of government.”

PM tells Sir Jim Ratcliffe to apologise for saying UK 'colonised by immigrants' Sir Keir Starmer said comments by the businessman and Manchester United co-owner were

The 1958 Group of Manchester United supporters described the comments as "very ill-advised", and criticised Sir Jim for "commenting on the issues of our country while living in Monaco to avoid paying tax". www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Gallup will no longer measure presidential approval after 88 years

seems almost certain we’ll later find out they were coerced

thehill.com/homenews/med...

Rarely mentioned but about much of Ratcliffe’s business ‘success’ is based on draining public money (very common among these ‘self made tycoons’)

Eg democracyforsale.substack.com/p/ineos-set-...

There is a lot of convenient amnesia about Peter Mandelson’s New Labour days. Let’s jog some memories | George Monbiot Yes, he betrayed the national interest in his dealings with Jeffrey Epstein – but also in his sanctioned role as enabler of corporate power, says Guardian columnist George Monbiot

Some uncomfortable truths for Labour and UK government in general. Who are they really serving www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

The government is spending tens of billions of pounds on net zero! The government is softening Brexit! The government is consulting on getting every business to do ethnicity pay gap reporting!

Tomorrow's front page 📰

In the public interest

It just keeps on coming… 👇

BREAKING: McSweeney’s think tank paid PR firm to investigate journalists Labour Together put private investigators onto journalists writing about its funding. Starmer's right-hand man knew.

🔴 BREAKING: Labour Together paid controversial PR firm £30k to investigate journalists who were digging into how its undeclared funding

Reporters from Sunday Times, Guardian and other outlets targetted

*And* Morgan McSweeney knew about it

Full story:
democracyforsale.substack.com/p/exclusive-...

Calls to halt UK Palantir contracts grow amid ‘lack of transparency’ over deals Opposition MPs urge Labour to pause public contracts with the US tech firm after attempts to examine deals blocked

What is the govt trying to hide? The government has for months blocked attempts by MPs and campaigners to scrutinise Palantir’s deals. Requests for information about meetings with Keir Starmer and former PM Boris Johnson were among those that have been refused. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Labour is creating a vulnerable migrant underclass Chasing Reform on immigration will only entrench an unequal system and increase resentment

📢"Creating a poorer, more vulnerable migrant class of workers who have no long-term stake in our society worsens wages and conditions for everyone, and increases resentment towards migrants."

@zoejardiniere.bsky.social on what Labour can do to change direction.

www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk-...

The Home Secretary's view is that if a care worker & spouse come to the UK in 2022 and have a kid in 2024, then it's fine for that (British-born) child to stay in poverty until 2037 *even if their father/mother stays in work throughout*.

Jeff Bezos’s wealth has increased an average of $70 million every day of 2026, meaning that he could have offset The Post’s losses with what he’s made since Monday.

The one crucial point that is missing from commentators on Palantir is that Peter Thiel is an all-out financial backer of Free Cities.
These are private, segregated enclaves where big government can no longer intervene.
Thread
substack.com/@europeanpow...

It has the potential to be if it brings down Starmer and draws others in. I'd say expenses and partygate were, so far, more consequential.

Spotlighting The World Factbook as We Bid a Fond Farewell Somewhat devastating news today from the CIA: One of CIA’s oldest and most recognizable intelligence publications, The World Factbook, has sunset. There's not even a hint as to why they …

The CIA just stopped publishing their World Factbook and took every page, including the archived copies of previous versions!

This sucks. It was public domain, so I recovered the 2020 edition (the last one published as a zip file) and shared it to GitHub simonwillison.net/2026/Feb/5/t...