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@JenniferJJacobs
Hamas says it has approved "the release of all occupation prisoners — both living and the remains of the deceased — in accordance with the exchange formula set forth in President Trump’s proposal, provided that appropriate field conditions are ensured for the exchange process" and agrees to "hand over the administration of the Gaza Strip to a Palestinian body."

Really? That's a bit of a turn-up for the books.

Good news, however, I note the detail at the end, which Netanyahu might veto. This is quite an unusually politucally smart move by Hamas, though, because it makes it politically harder for him to do that than usual.

The US and Israel won’t agree to that because they will see it as Hamas still there and not forced to dis-arm . Admittedly as you said it’s a good move politically.

Trump's proposal was he would run the Gaza Strip with Tony Blair helping him with some of the erm detail wasn't it?

Understand Gordon Brown is asking Tony Blair 'when will you hand over to me?' all over again.

Starmer: Palestine protesters should ‘respect the grief of British Jews this week’

‘Peaceful protest is a cornerstone of our democracy – and there is justified concern about the suffering in Gaza – but a minority have used these protests as a pretext for stoking antisemitic tropes’

https://www.thejc.com/opinion/starmer-palestine-protesters-should-respect-the-grief-of-british-jews-this-week-gouq2cg9

Good tweet. He’s better at that sort of thing, and foreign policy, than the cheesier party political stuff.

Notable that based on my Embassy chats last night the French seem to rate him a lot. The classic dilemma: the politician who’s more popular abroad than at home. Gorbachev, Blair, Macron, Varoufakis, probably Khamenei. As opposed to the politicians more popular at home than abroad (Trump, Hitler, Stalin, Erdogan, Xi, Modi, Lula, Putin…)

OT. It so happens that my sister and her vast family are members of the Heaton Park synagogue in Prestwich where the killing took place. They were there yesterday but thankfully undamaged. Indeed the last time I visited that synagogue was for the wedding of one of her children about five years ago.

I'm really not interested in getting into this anti semitism discussion particularly when it is as full of ignorance as it so often is on here when the leading racists take the stage.

But how is it after the wanton killings of newsmen babies small children photo journalists doctors nurses and at least 60,000 non combatents we know no details whatsoever about the life stories of any of them yet we are told out of respect for the synagogue attack all demonstations against the Gazan genocide should stop. Just don't offend Jews?

Does Netanyahu answer for anything? He is a proven liar and a butcher yet not a word from the Board of Deputies against him except that trying to charge him with genocide is an outrage.

Reflections on the Bucket lady.

It must have been so strange being born British in the 1920s.

You are born into the global hegemon. An industrial juggernaut. The world's reserve currency. The largest empire ever known. The undisputed ruler of the waves.

And your entire adult life sees it all drift away.
https://x.com/tomhfh/status/1974058116095373361

R3 had a recording of her performing in some Broadway musical. Decent contralto, if rather warbley.

This narrative from young rightwingers is becoming increasingly common. It misses out just how many people of thar generation enjoyed the 60s and 70s, like many relatives of mine, as a huge relief.

Oh, I'm sure that's true.

But either way the culture shock must have been considerable.

I often think the sweet spot was someone born in the late 30s. That does presuppose that you didn’t suffer loss in the war, but you’d be generally too young to remember much of it. Teenager in the relative stability of the 50s. Still young enough to enjoy the 60s.

Men, yes.
Women perhaps not so much.

Dad was born in 1939. Remembers snippets of the war but not much. Served in the guards rather than national service then straight into Wiltshire Police for 30 years. Retired at 56 with a huge pay off (restructuring) and has now been retired as long as he served.

Pretty sweet spot.

I was born in 1943.
I thoroughly enjoyed the sixties, married in 1968. Three kids and five grandsons all living within walking distance of me.
Fired in 1995 (long story) with big pay off and large fully inflation protected pension.
I'm extremely lucky. In good health. Skiing next year.
And I'm still alive to see the fantastic AI revolution.
What a time to be alive! I think I hit the sweet spot.

Head of the Signal app threatens to withdraw from Europe

The head of the Signal app has criticized plans in the EU that would allow messengers to have backdoors to enable automatic searches for criminal content. Signal is considered one of the most secure messengers.

"If we were faced with the choice of either undermining the integrity of our encryption and our data protection guarantees or leaving Europe, we would unfortunately make the decision to leave the market,"

For “allow”, read “forced”

Signal are one of the few outfits that I have respect for in this space.

Their code is open sourced - both client and server. You can download the code and build it yourself. A number of people do.

They really work to make their service secure. They are owned by a non-profit (aka charity) that specifically is constituted to forbid selling data.

It’s notable that taking a fork of their code is nearly the standard for building a custom, ultra secure messaging app. In fact I’ve suggested in the past the U.K. government should do exactly that.

It looks like quite a 'hoolie' is about to arrive in the North of Scotland so I wish everyone to stay safe including all our family members

Indeed I have just received an alert from our energy supplier and that we are apparently on their vulnerable list

Getting pretty wild here in south west

We had the very heavy (even for us) rain. The the rain stopped and the wind died down. Just as I thought it wasn’t going to be as bad as forecast, the wind rose again and it’s now blowing a hoolie. It nearly always seems to be the first weekend of October that brings the first serious storm of the autumn. Perhaps the meteorologists can confirm.

There's something I've been meaning to follow up on about a jet transition in September that was mentioned in a paper that was defining seasons objectively in the Mediterranean.

Storm Amy is ex-Hurricane Humberto, and so I think there's definitely something about the interaction between the hurricane season, the start of the Polar night, and the enduring heat in the oceans that lays the groundwork for strong mid-latitude storms in October.

Storm Amy is ex-Hurricane Humberto

Even storms are Trans now?

Ben Zaranko
@BenZaranko

There are some eye-popping stats in this new report from my @TheIFS colleagues.

Here's just one: 10% of teenagers now receive child disability living allowance (CDLA), up from 5% a decade ago. Just a remarkable change.

https://x.com/BenZaranko/status/1974040804386562488

The three year old data is particularly worrying and is a bit of a canary in the coalmine that this is NOT a covid cohort phenomenon and will in fact be ongoing. Gov't needs to get a grip on this, badly.

I suspect it’s driven by the increase in mental health claims

It is driven by free largesse, amazed to hear you can self diagnos and claim benefits. Guy on LBC the other day , earning 65K a year and got 54K grant by self diagnosing an illness. magic money tree in place here right enough.

You can’t claim benefits merely on a self diagnosis.

You can, however, hire a private doctor/psychologist who will write pretty much what they are asked to after an online consultation. Which amounts to the same thing.

Are you suggesting we ban private medicine as an wholly unscientific scam?
Or only for people on benefits who don't deserve it?

I'm suggesting that, when someone applies for PIP, a doctor working for the government should assess them. Waving a note from a rent-a-quack shouldn't suffice.

It doesn't. A government employee is always involved. PIP assessments are detailed at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/personal-independence-payment-assessment-guide-for-assessment-providers/pip-assessment-guide-part-1-the-assessment-process

If you can successfully complete all the forms, your mental capacity is too good to justify being paid PiP. Sorted.