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‘Shameful’: UK, Australia and Canada criticise Israel over Gaza aid convoy killings decision

Britain, Australia and Canada have called the decision of the Israeli military authorities not to open a criminal investigation into the April 2024 airstrikes that hit a convoy of aid vehicles in Gaza “shameful”. The strikes killed seven humanitarian workers from the US-based World Central Kitchen (WCK) organisation. WCK staff from the three countries were among the casualties of the attack, which prompted global outrage. “This decision is both too little, and too late. The victims of this incident and their families deserve justice and accountability, and we will continue to seek answers on their behalf. The World Central Kitchen attack is one of countless incidents in Gaza where there has been no accountability,” the countries’ joint statement said. It continued: “In Gaza, humanitarian workers continue to work tirelessly to support civilians in desperate need, risking their lives whilst working in the most perilous conditions. Yet despite the fragile ceasefire, Gaza remains the deadliest place to deliver aid, with 186 humanitarian workers killed in 2025.” On Thursday, Australia’s government expressed “outrage” over the decision, while relatives said that Zomi Frankcom, the Australian among those killed, deserved more than an “internal, opaque process that ends with a short statement by the Israeli military absolving their soldiers of criminal wrongdoing.” Israel’s ambassador to Australia, Hillel Newman, defended the decision. The Polish government said on Thursday it was “very disappointed” and called for Israeli authorities to cooperate with Polish investigations into the incident. Damian Soból, a volunteer from Przemyśl, was also among the casualties. In London, the Foreign Office said the UK was “appalled and angry” for the families of John Chapman, James Henderson and James Kirby, three British citizens who were killed in the attack. WCK, which distributed food in Gaza throughout the war, said immediately after the lethal attack that it had coordinated with the military over the movement of its cars, which had the group’s logo on their roofs visible from the air. “There has never been any excuse or justification for the attacks, and there is nothing in this account that does so. The decision is inconsistent with the full truth and deeply offensive,” it said in a statement. The IDF said on Wednesday that it had mistaken several individuals in the vehicles for armed Hamas military operatives, and that the WCK convoy had deviated from the previously coordinated route. But it concluded that “the decisions of the commanders did not raise reasonable suspicion of criminal misconduct”. Two officers were removed from their positions at the time and three others reprimanded. One of the officers who was dismissed had reportedly signed an open letter earlier that year calling for Gaza to be deprived of aid. Israel imposed strict restrictions on the entry of humanitarian assistance during the conflict in Gaza, where experts declared a famine in August 2025. The Israeli military admitted on Wednesday that its troops had opened fire on a car carrying five-year-old Hind Rajab and six family members in Gaza in 2024, saying it had ordered a criminal investigation into the killing, as well as into the fatal shooting of 15 paramedics in 2025. Hind Rajab died after a desperate three-hour phone call to the Palestinian Red Crescent on 29 January 2024 in which she pleaded for rescue. The family’s Kia Picanto car had been hit as they sought to flee a new Israeli offensive into Gaza City. All the other passengers were also killed. The IDF repeatedly denied its troops had been in the area near the incident, but investigations by media and others found evidence that strongly suggested nearby Israeli tanks were responsible. The IDF said that as part of the its obligations under international law and Israeli domestic law it examined “exceptional incidents that occurred during combat”, but experts said criminal misconduct investigations into Israeli troops over the killing of Palestinians very rarely lead to convictions.

From the classroom to the locker room: nine days of ‘deeply disturbing’ sexual assault allegations shake Australia

For the fourth time that week, youth advocate and educator Daniel Principe stood in a classroom and asked the same question: Are female teachers respected as much as male ones? “The boys unanimously said no,” Principe says. “If that is the case, why is this rewarded in some pockets of boy culture? Being callous and cruel and intimidating to women is being rewarded.” From primary schools to universities, he steps into a classroom every day to have conversations about respect and violence. When he asks the boys if they’ve seen content that says degrading things about women – that they’re gold diggers, that they should be in the kitchen, that they all cheat – 90% of them put their hands up. Sign up for the Breaking News Australia email “Some of these social norms and gendered stereotypes have, of course, existed prior to this moment, but they’re just inflamed right now,” he says. “There is more social reward for acting this out.” Outside the classrooms, five Sydney Swans players might have been in the spotlight, but they were far from alone this week. Across the nation, a series of high-profile sexual assault cases has put allegations involving teenagers, professional athletes and men in the centre of a storm. In the past nine days alone, three Scots College students were charged over the alleged sexual assault of a 14-year-old girl in Sydney’s eastern suburbs, and in another instance in Sydney, three 17-year-olds were charged over the alleged group sexual assault of a 17-year-old girl. In Melbourne, a 13-year-old boy was arrested over an alleged attempted sexual assault of two women; in Brisbane, a 32-year-old man was charged with allegedly raping a young woman walking her dog; and in Perth, two men, 30 and 25, pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl and were jailed. The Swans players are not accused of sexual assault, and it is reported that none have been formally interviewed by police. No one has been arrested or charged in relation to the alleged incident. The culture goes beyond private schools and sporting clubs, and its prevalence is hard to track. While many people do not report sexual assault, the most up-to-date data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed the number of sexual assaults recorded by police in 2024 exceeded 40,000 – over 100 a day nationwide and an increase of 10% or 3,735 victims, from the previous year. Nationally, around two in five victim-survivors were aged between 10 and 17 years old at the time of incident, and 81% were female. The majority of sexual assaults occurred in homes. Patty Kinnersly, the CEO of Our Watch, says the country has seen “some deeply disturbing, high-profile allegations of sexual violence” this week, but the increase in reporting shows more women are coming forward. “Police-recorded sexual assault increased by around 67% between 2014 and 2024, with 2024 the highest rate recorded since the national series began in 1993,” Kinnersly says. But the population-level picture is more complex, she says, with personal safety survey data showing recent sexual violence towards women has risen from 1.2% in 2012 to 1.9% in 2021/22, while the long term rate remained broadly stable. She says the number of police reports and the volume of media coverage can’t paint an accurate picture of whether sexual violence is increasing, but that it is encouraging more women to speak up about sexual violence. For Principe, there’s a clear connection between some of the attitudes he sees in schools and the violence directed toward women. “When heterosexual men are socially conditioned to see sex and relationships as a conquest, that’s where a lot of this stuff goes awry,” Principe says. “When it’s not seen as something that should be mutual, but instead something to be taken from women, that is where it gets really troubling.” Teachers and other educators who work in schools – and who could only speak on the condition of anonymity – told Guardian Australia a similar story: in class, male students will bark at female teachers, and the boys will laugh. They’ll post degrading content on Snapchat, knowing there are no repercussions because no one can trace it back to them. Covid has supercharged their views. And the government’s internet ban has all but failed. This week, a first-of-its-kind report, Misogyny, Online Radicalisation and Youth Extremism in Australia, surveyed 3,429 Australians, including more than 1000 people 13 to 17, to compare attitudes on women and gender equality. About one in three teen boys expressed misogynistic attitudes, mistrust of women, and a belief in traditional gender roles, according to the University of Melbourne research, with Gen Z more likely than men in other generations to endorse traditional or hostile attitudes towards women. At the same time, Gen Z girls were twice as likely as millennial women to believe marriage entitled a husband to sex even if his wife did not want intercourse. Sociologist Michael Flood says research in the US across male-dominated spaces like the military, sporting codes and fraternities shows there are consistent indicators for sexual violence to be more prevalent. “There are risk factors in any setting that make sexual violence perpetration and victimisation more likely,” the professor at the Queensland University of Technology School of Justice says. “Where there’s strong codes of loyalty and bonding between men, where there’s strong norms of sexism and sexual objectification, high levels of alcohol and drug consumption, high levels of pornography consumption.” Flood says research across sporting codes shows there are higher rates of sexual assault among men who play team-based contact sports, such as NRL and AFL, than those who play individual non-contact sports like tennis or swimming. “But further research has found that it’s not just the nature of the sport,” he says. “It’s also the particular character of the clubs and communities associated with that sport or that setting.” He says the key problem is there has not been “enough effort to change”. Even when institutions like the AFL or NRL tried to shift the culture in the mid-2000s, it was not enough. “It takes comprehensive effort in a sporting code or in a school to really shift the cultures of sexism and objectification that feed into sexual violence,” Flood says. “And if our efforts are only piecemeal or tokenistic, then they won’t shift the problem.” Flood says there is a growing body of research that shows multi-session programs that focus on the key drivers of sexual violence can help to bring the number of assaults down. “Well-designed prevention efforts in a school and in a sporting code, in the military and other contexts, can make change,” he says. “The question is, are they being implemented? Are they being supported comprehensively?”

Tiananmen Square vigil organisers in Hong Kong found guilty of ‘inciting subversion’

Two Hong Kong activists who organised annual vigils marking China’s deadly Tiananmen crackdown in 1989 have been found guilty of “incitement to subversion” in one of the most high-profile cases in Hong Kong since Beijing imposed its national security law in 2020. Lee Cheuk-yan, 69, and Chow Hang-tung, 41, “incited other persons to organise, plan, commit or participate in acts by unlawful means with a view to subverting the state power”, a press summary handed out to reporters said. The defendants each face a maximum penalty of 10 years in jail, with sentencing expected at a later date. Lee and Chow’s trial began in January and took place over 24 days. A third defendant, the 74-year-old former lawmaker Albert Ho, pleaded guilty in January. Chow, who represented herself, told the court in May that the law itself was on trial. France and Germany said on Friday they “deeply regret” Chow’s conviction. “Peaceful advocacy for human rights does not constitute a crime,” the countries’ foreign ministries said of the activist, who was awarded the Franco-German prize for human rights in 2023. Lee and Chow were leaders of the now-disbanded Hong Kong Alliance, which organised the city’s annual vigil in memory of those killed in the crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing in 1989. In court, Lee and Chow waved to supporters from the dock, where they were surrounded by correctional officers. Lee appeared solemn as the judge handed down the verdict. He made a heart-shaped gesture with his hands and waved to supporters before being led out of the court. Hong Kong and Macau were formerly the only places on Chinese soil that permitted public vigils to mourn those killed on 4 June 1989, when China sent troops and tanks to crush protests calling for political reform in and around the capital’s Tiananmen Square. However, public commemoration has in effect been banned since Beijing imposed a national security law on Hong Kong in 2020, after huge and sometimes violent pro-democracy protests the year before. The Alliance’s leaders were charged in 2021 and have been imprisoned since. Ahead of the verdict, Chow wrote a message from prison, seen by the Guardian, addressed to the UK prime minister, Andy Burnham: “They are trying to rewrite Hong Kong history … they certainly want to erase some memories, or memories of some chapters in our history.” The Cambridge-educated barrister added in the letter: “Britain has a non-delegable duty to adopt a more robust stance in the face of the growing threat from a totalitarian and aggressive China.” The case centred on the Alliance’s slogan demanding an “end to one-party rule”. The court found that the defendants “intended to cause others to lose confidence in the Chinese Communist party by stirring up hostility and causing division”. The defence argued that the Alliance was exercising its freedom of speech. The rights group Amnesty International has said the case against Lee and Chow “relies on vague, overly broad and arbitrary definitions of ‘subversion’”. The UK Foreign Office’s Indo-Pacific minister, Rosie Winterton, said: “This verdict is a further demonstration that even peaceful acts of remembrance in Hong Kong are now treated by the authorities as threats to national security. The extensive use of Beijing’s national security law to punish and restrict peaceful expression undermines the commitments China made to Hong Kong under the 1984 Sino-British joint declaration. We reiterate our call for the national security law to be repealed, and for rights and freedoms to be respected in the Hong Kong special administrative region.” Dozens of police officers gathered outside the courthouse and ushered reporters away as they stopped to film audience members queueing outside before the hearing began on Friday. Members of the public had queued for days to secure a seat in the Hong Kong court. “To me, this case illustrates the absolute power of Beijing in reshaping Hong Kong’s civil society through the national security law,” one supporter told the Guardian. Another supporter said: “This outcome highlights the central government’s total control regarding national security enforcement in the region.” Hong Kong was promised certain political freedoms not granted in the rest of the country when it was returned to China in 1997. Critics say the national security law has decimated civil society. Most of the city’s opposition leaders have been detained or have fled. Authorities say the law was needed to restore order after a year of protests rocked the international financial hub in 2019.

Strangers in their own land: Mexicans deported from Trump’s America find refuge in ‘Little LA’

With its wide avenues lined with tall palm trees, its quaint cafes and old-school cantinas, as well as the mix of English and Spanish spoken on the street, the Tabacalera neighborhood in downtown Mexico City has a certain US feel – so much so that it is has become known as Little LA. The nickname is about more than appearances, however. In recent years, this corner of the metropolis has become a haven for many Mexicans deported from the US, particularly those who spent years or decades living across the border and for whom Mexico feels like a foreign country. In Little LA, they have found a more familiar place to belong. With the Trump administration embarking on a massive anti-immigrant crackdown, deportations to Mexico are expected to surge. Since taking office for the second time in January 2025, Trump has deported roughly 145,500 Mexican nationals. Christopher Gil Ortíz was one of them. He was on his way to work in Los Angeles in June this year when Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents stopped him, handcuffed him and threw him in detention. After months of living in constant fear as an undocumented immigrant in Trump’s US, Ortíz said that when the detention finally happened he felt relieved. “At this point I was like, OK, that’s it, I’m going back,” he recalled. “It’s like they took a weight off my shoulders.” More than 30 years since he had left as a child, Ortíz was sent back to Mexico, leaving behind his wife and two young children. Dumped in the resort town of Tulum, he made his way to Cancún, only to have all his belongings stolen from his hotel room. Eventually, he ended up in Mexico City, where he had family. “I was nervous,” he said. “Even though I was born here, I have very vague memories of the city itself.” He was also facing the many challenges of being a deportee: getting his birth certificate, ID and finding a job. His sister sent him a TikTok post from an organization called New Comienzos (New Beginnings). Based in Little LA, it was set up to help returnees reintegrate. When he saw the post, Ortiz decided to check out Little LA for himself. “Seeing the palm trees, it kind of does make you feel like you’re in LA,” he said, adding that he was grateful to New Comienzos. “There’s a lot of people that are going through what I’m going through and I’m pretty sure there’s going to be more.” The New Comienzos founder and executive director, Israel Concha, said he was preparing for exactly that. “The atmosphere [in the US] right now is one of humanitarian crisis and panic. People no longer even want to take their children to school,” Concha said. “You’ll probably start seeing mass deportations in a few months.” Concha founded New Comienzos when he witnessed first-hand how little support the Mexican government was offering recent arrivals. In 2012, he was living in Texas with his pregnant wife and had started a successful private transport business. He had lived in the US for 30 years. “I wanted to try to achieve that American dream, and I think I succeeded,” he said. Then one day he was caught speeding on his way to pick up a client. While in detention, he fought his case for two years but was deported in 2014. On his first day in Mexico, he was kidnapped by a criminal gang working with local police. “That was my welcome to my native country,” he said. After being severely beaten, Concha escaped to Mexico City, where he found a job at a bilingual call centre – one of several starting to pop up in the Tabacalera neighborhood, attracting young returnees who spoke fluent English. Less than a year later, he started New Comienzos to address the challenges faced by people like himself. “People didn’t just need a job; many of them needed emotional support because they had just lost everything following a deportation,” he said. The organisation offers legal support and free English certification and classes, as well as mentorship for recent arrivals. Little LA remains the organization’s center of operations. “A community reintegration lab,” said Concha, “that’s what we’ve created there in Little Los Angeles.” Sergio Aaron Pérez, 36, said the area felt like home. Wearing a Los Angeles Lakers jersey and baseball cap, his face and arms covered in tattoos, Pérez looked as though he had just stepped off the plane from the US. In fact, having lived in the US for more than 30 years, the former California resident was deported in 2011 for doing what he calls “bad things”. In Little LA, he found work at call centers. “If you speak English there’s a lot of money,” said Pérez. “I love my city. There’s a lot of community.” Ortíz, for his part, had little interest in a call center job. He has applied for a job at a glass-making factory – work he used to do in the US. Next on his agenda: bringing his wife and children to Mexico. “My kids are OK with it,” he said. Referencing a local Mexican custom, he added: “My daughter told me that she was already practising drinking soda out of a plastic bag.”

Israeli settler attacks shift focus to West Bank areas under direct Palestinian rule

Violent Israeli settler attacks in the two areas of the occupied West Bank under direct Palestinian rule have almost doubled since 2025, as settlers pursue a self-proclaimed “great settlement revolution” in the very heart of the territory earmarked for a Palestinian state. According to a report by the Israeli human rights organisation Yesh Din, shared with the Guardian, data shows that almost two-thirds of incidents of settler violence so far in 2026 have taken place in the so-called Areas A and B – placed under Palestinian Authority governance in the 1995 Oslo accords. The report, The Next Frontier, Violence by Israeli Civilians in Areas A and B, describes the “rapid shift” in “violence and pressure exerted by the government, military and settlers on Palestinians … from Area C into Areas B and even A”. While all three designated administrative areas on the West Bank were intended under the Oslo peace deal to encompass the shape of a future Palestinian state, successive Israeli governments, driven by the settler movement, have pursued a long-term policy of undermining Palestinian claims. In Area C, accounting for 60% of the West Bank, Israel was initially given what was supposed to be temporary responsibility for all civil and security affairs pending a final status agreement for a Palestinian state. This arrangement was exploited for settlement. All government-approved Israeli settlements (regarded as illegal under international law) are located in Area C, as are the main roads and traffic arteries of the West Bank. In Area A, which makes up about 18% of the West Bank and includes the major Palestinian cities, the Palestinian Authority became responsible for civil affairs and internal security. In Area B (22%), which includes the built-up areas in Palestinian rural spaces, the PA became responsible for civil affairs and public order. Since 2024, Israel’s settlement movement has explicitly and violently expanded its efforts by establishing new farming “outposts” in areas A and B. Settler leaders have said openly that these are designed to “gain a foothold” in “very strategic” Palestinian locations. As the report says: “Most Palestinian daily life occurs in these areas.” According to the report’s analysis, the percentage of violent West Bank incidents taking place in Area B stands at 55% so far this year, compared with 25% last year, while attacks in Area C declined in the same period from 67% to 37% of the overall figure, indicating a deliberate change in strategy. “As settler and state violence against Palestinian communities in Area C has intensified in recent years, Palestinians have been forcibly pushed into Areas A and B, making these areas increasingly critical for maintaining safety and a semblance of normal everyday life,” said Yesh Din, which has been documenting settler violence for more than two decades. A map posted earlier this summer in the WhatsApp group of the Hilltop Foundation, an organisation that supplies equipment, support and funding for the establishment of Israeli outposts in the West Bank, showed 16 outposts between the major Palestinian cities of Ramallah and Nablus alone. The map was accompanied by text boasting of “the great settlement revolution under way in the Oslo areas” and pledging the foundation’s continuing support for the establishment of outposts in Area B. The Yesh Din report said that “the successful establishment of so many outposts in obvious violation of Israeli law, demonstrates that Israel is deliberately choosing not to effectively address the issue and that the settlers’ openly declared goals align with government policy”. “Senior ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich [who have both called for the cancelling of the Oslo accords] openly speak of their ambition to gain control of Area B and abolish the division created under the Oslo accords.” There is increasing international concern over the escalating pace of settler violence on the West Bank. Sanctions have been placed in the US and Europe on settlers and pro-settler figures, including Ben-Gvir, Israel’s national security minister. Announcing France’s sanctions against Ben-Gvir on Wednesday, the French foreign, minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, said what was happening on the West Bank was “ utterly disgraceful and should fill us all with revulsion”. According to the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, as of 20 July, 18 Palestinians had died during attacks involving settlers, of whom 12 were killed by settlers and three by Israeli forces. Responsibility for the remaining three deaths was disputed, OCHA said. According to the UN agency, there were about 190 attacks a month in the first four months of 2026, putting the West Bank on a trajectory to reach more than 2,000 attacks by the end of this year. Yesh Din concludes: “This Israeli strategy, implemented in part through the expansion of outposts and the settler violence launched from them into new areas, pushes Palestinian residents into the centres of towns and villages and empties surrounding areas of Palestinian presence. “In doing so, it advances Israel toward the realisation of a policy, already reflected in ministers’ public statements, that seeks to annex as much West Bank territory as possible with as few Palestinians as possible living there. “The path to this goal is paved with systematic, organised criminality, backed and supported by state institutions, revealing a clear intent: to make the area Palestinian free, in other words, to carry out ethnic cleansing.” The Israeli military has been approached for comment.

Thursday briefing: What does the mass closure of charity shops tell us about Britain?

Good morning. I could mark the phases of my life through my charity shop purchases: the tweedy jackets of my student days, the nearly new hiking boots (a tenner!) I bought out of necessity when I first arrived back in Scotland, the battered guitar now re-strung for my son to practise Nirvana’s About a Girl. Since they became a fixture of high streets after the second world war, charity shops have rolled with the punches of wider retail trends. In the 80s, they were showered with tax breaks to take up vacant space as supermarkets put grocers and butchers out of business. At the end of the noughties, after the global financial crash, retail legend Mary Portas promoted charity shops as a vehicle for reviving the high street. And as awareness grows of the planetary penalty of throwaway textiles, next month heralds Second Hand September, Oxfam’s annual campaign to highlight fashion’s environmental damage. But recent headlines about shop closures – including the potential closure of 100 Oxfam outlets – and sustained pressures from the boom in secondhand selling online suggest a deeper crisis in the sector. For today’s newsletter, I spoke to Vicki Burnett, a charity retail expert who has volunteered in charity shops since the age of 15, about why community is key to the sector’s continued success. That’s after the headlines. Five big stories UK news | Racism and sexism have become normalised in Britain, the equalities minister has said, as she warned that young men were being sucked into violent misogyny by the “cesspit” of social media. UK politics | The government’s plans to make young people continue studying maths and English if they fail GCSEs could be demotivating and ineffective, according to education experts and school leaders after retake pass rates slumped this year. Israel | Far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has posted a video of a gallows complex where Palestinians convicted of terror offences will be hanged. US news | The United States sent 20 deportees to Liberia, who arrived on Thursday as part of 1,200 migrants that the African country will receive under a new deal. Climate crisis | Aerial footage of an estate in Somerset has revealed the benefits of rewilding land in the face of extreme weather brought about by the climate crisis. In depth: ‘With the glut of fast fashion quality donations have reduced’ When “Everybody’s Thrift Shop”, one of Britain’s earliest recorded charity shops, was opened at 79a Nicholson Street, Edinburgh, in 1937, the Scotsman reported queues outside and police on hand to manage restive shoppers. “One woman went off triumphant with a handsome suit once worn, it was whispered, by a professor. Another secured a real bargain: 10 shirts for half-a-crown.” The second world war spurred the popularity of temporary fundraising shops, and the escalating humanitarian crisis led to the formation of Oxfam, which opened its first permanent outlet on Broad Street, Oxford, in 1947. By the 1960s many other charities had done the same, as the demise of wartime “make do and mend” saw the secondhand clothing market expand, and over subsequent decades the sector was increasingly professionalised, with specialist shops opening for music and books. There are now 10,000 charity shops across the UK, staffed by about 223,000 volunteers and 24,900 paid employees, and raising over £300m profit in 2024/25. But their future is not secure. *** What are the pressures on charity retail? Oxfam is considering closing up to 100 of its 500-plus UK retail outlets, the Guardian reported earlier this week. In June, the British Heart Foundation announced plans to close about 150 stores over the next two financial years “to ensure our retail network remains commercially sustainable,” and last October, Cancer Research confirmed it would be shutting 90 shops across the UK. Costs have increased across retail in recent years. While charities don’t have to pay business rates, they are still hit by increases in national insurance and wage bills. The drop in town centre footfall, accelerated by Covid, is well documented. And indeed the decline of the British high street, with its dispiriting template of boarded up premises, betting shops and vape outlets, has become a political shorthand for a far wider malaise. An Oxfam insider told the Guardian that shops were facing a fall in donations, as well as competition from online sellers of secondhand goods such as Vinted, now the fourth largest clothing retailers in the country, eBay and Depop. This proliferation of alternative places to buy pre-loved fashion offers ease, often at a more competitive price point. With only a cameraphone and decent wifi needed to join the market, a public seeking to monetise every last unwanted item amid the ongoing cost of living crisis has become less willing to donate, particularly more profitable items. Charity shops are also facing a slump in recycling income. The price of “rag” – poor quality, unsellable clothing that is sold on in bulk for recycling to use as shredded fibres for mattress or insulation, for example – has dived in recent years, and a substantial source of profit has evaporated. *** How is charity retail evolving? Beyond these headline closures, those working within the sector suggest a more layered analysis. The Charity Retail Association reports an increase in overall sales space among its members – but a significant trend towards closing smaller shops in favour of larger stores, especially among bigger charities. With the glut of fast fashion, all across the sector agree that quality donations have reduced – but there has been no reduction in quantity. In fact, the advent of resellers – people who are coming to the shops to buy stock to resell themselves online at profit – is now providing charity shops with significant income and creating a virtuous circle: as outlets like Vinted normalise the secondhand clothing market, it encourages people to explore charity shops themselves. *** Communities offline and online The charity retail sector has faced tough times before, says Vicki Burnett, a senior consultant for the Charity Retail Consultancy, who advises clients of different sizes on how to go with the grain of evolving tech and remain rooted in local communities. All charities need to keep their retail entities under constant review, Burnett tells me, but assessing a shop’s contribution goes well beyond the financial, as communities themselves recognised during the pandemic. “People had really missed their charity shops. They don’t just bring in cash,” she says. When she moved from Leeds to Argyll, Burnett started volunteering in her local Oxfam “as a way to get myself into my community, to understand a bit more about it”. A charity shop is a place where youngsters struggling with fragile mental health and a brutal jobs market – who Hettie wrote about yesterday – can gain CV skills alongside some gentle interaction. Many charities now deliver an element of their service through their shops, whether that’s healthcare education or details of animals available for rehoming nearby, something that’s easier to do in the larger format “one-stop” stores that are now emerging. Charity retailers have been selling online for many years, Burnett reminds me. Ebay, for example, has mentored many charities through online selling and there’s the hope that Vinted and other commercial resellers will follow suit. What is new is the volume of resellers and content creators. There are now so many working semi-professionally that the Charity Retail Association is about to launch an expanded directory of hundreds of charity shop influencers based around the country ready to collaborate with retailers. One of them, Emily London, offers charity shops tours and second hand personal styling alongside her own online resale shop. “Influencers are a fantastic resource for charities and great advocates for pre-loved clothing,” says Burnett (If you’re looking for advice, then vintage maven and new Guardian style columnist Stephen Libby – might be worth a read). Burnett tells me a story: when she was deputy manager of an Oxfam shop in the early 90s, lads from the local school would shove each other over the threshold, such was the teenage shame of setting foot in a charity shop. “Now I see younger and younger generations 100% embracing secondhand clothing. It’s fantastic for charity shops and it’s great for the planet,” she says. What else we’ve been enjoying I appreciated this thorough investigation by Hannah Marriot on how fashion brands are scaling back plus-sizes, in the latest iteration of the body positivity backlash trigged by Ozempic. Libby I’ve been interested for a while in how the humble shipping container revolutionised global trade. This FT story (£) on how this network is now being pushed to its limits is fascinating. Michael Here in Glasgow, the schools are back and there’s a distinctly autumnal vibe, so I was glad to be taken through Zan Brooks’s top 20 summer movies. Libby This rundown of Women’s Super League club cashflow is a great insight into the finances of top-tier women’s football. How many clubs have a single male player who earns more than their entire women’s team …? Michael This is not something I “enjoyed”, but wanted to share anyway. Last week I wrote about the staggering increase in recalls to prison, reporting on a young man who was about to be released for the second time, having been recalled a mere six days into his first release due to a drug relapse. This week I learned he’s been recalled a second time. Libby Sport Cricket | England had four half-centurions on day two at Headingley but there were a few regrets on their failure to reach three figures. Football | Gianni Infantino wants to split the European and North American coalition that is seeking to oust him by attending a junior tournament in the Dominican Republic this weekend. Formula One | Max Verstappen has ended speculation about his future in Formula One by signing a new contract with Red Bull that will extend to the end of 2030. Something for the weekend Our critics’ roundup of the best things to watch, read, play and listen to right now TV Little Bird | ★★★★☆ Few dramas will enrage you as much as Little Bird. Not because it’s in any way hokey or problematic. On the contrary. Based on the real story of the Sixties Scoop – a period in Canada from the mid-1950s to the 1980s, when an estimated 20,000 First Nations children were forcibly removed from their families and adopted by non-Indigenous families – this heartbreaking tale is restrained and carefully measured. Melodrama is swerved, letting the injustice at this story’s core slowly metastasise. Little Bird is an impressive and heartfelt work, tender and moving. It cleaned up at the Canadian Screen Awards. For it to be ignored globally would be a crime. Patrick Smith Music Lambchop: Punching the Clown | ★★★★☆ Thirty-two years on from their debut album, Lambchop find themselves in a curious position. Their sole continuous member Kurt Wagner has displayed an admirable disinclination to rest on his laurels. Their last album, 2022’s The Bible, threw up everything from house music to glitchy rhythms to ambient drift to accompany Wagner’s pained ruminations on mortality and faith. Punching the Clown, pares back their sound to bare essentials: acoustic guitar and banjo and the very occasional deployment of bass or piano, the faintest smear of electronics on Weakened. Wagner’s voice appears stripped of Auto-Tune, distortion, even reverb: he sounds as if he’s singing directly in front of you. Alexis Petridis Film Over/Under | ★★★★☆ Practically any woman who had a best female friend in early adolescence will be able to relate to this fragile, thoughtful drama about two American children, Violet (Emajean Bullock) and Stella (Anastasia Veronica Lee), living through the ages of nine to 13. As the film starts, the two are nine-year-old besties, spending their summers together in New England where they go to camp. But when both girls go home at the end of the summer, Violet to Los Angeles and Stella to San Diego, life is not so dreamy and blissful. Violet is bullied at school. Plus, it looks like her parents’ marriage is on the rocks. Stella too has worries, especially around the survival of her mother (Madeline Wise) who copes throughout with breast cancer, while her father (Adam David Thompson) is contending with an off-screen mother with dementia. Leslie Felperin Game Agent 64: Spies Never Die (PC) | ★★★☆☆ In lieu of any high-budget flash, Agent 64’s big special effect is nostalgia. From the title onwards, this retro shooter is one long homage to nineties James Bond shoot-em-up GoldenEye, and to its un-Bonded successor, 2000’s Perfect Dark. Enemies have pinched facial features – a result of taking photographs of real people’s faces and wrapping them around diamond-shaped heads – and roll acrobatically from behind cover to take their next potshot, just as they used to. And yes, there’s a Big Head mode that swells those diamonds into enormous target-practice balloons. The fantasy on offer here isn’t really being James Bond. It’s being young again, with one illicitly acquired copy of GoldenEye to last you the summer and all the time in the world to pick the cartridge clean. For all its rough edges, that’s a mission Agent 64 pulls off with aplomb. Alex Spencer. The front pages “Racism and sexism normalised in UK, says equalities minister”, is the Guardian’s front page today. Prince Harry’s return dominates most titles, with the Telegraph writing “Harry hopes to win back King’s trust” and the Mirror splashing “No way back to royal life”. The Times leads with “King puts William first as Harry heads home”, the Mail has “Sussexes’ security could cost taxpayers £5M a year”, and the Sun says “Royal Harry summit at Balmoral”. The i Paper’s headline is “Sussexes fly back to UK without a deal for taxpayer funded security”, while the Express’s take is “Back in the fold but not in the firm”. Elsewhere, the FT has “US bonds slide after Bessent’s buybacks fail to calm jitters”, and Metro says “Hosepipe hero of fire ‘murder’”. The Latest Why are Prince Harry and Meghan moving back to the UK? The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are planning to return to live in Britain, six years after leaving for the US: a decision that was subject to intense media scrutiny. The couple and their two children are expected to relocate later in August to a non-royal residence. Nosheen Iqbal speaks to senior national news editor Aaron Sharp. Cartoon of the day | Rebecca Hendin The Upside A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad James Reed McGuire and Crystal Fritz were novice gardeners when they made the move from inner-city Chicago out to the Illinois suburbs. They knew one thing, though: that they didn’t simply want their front garden to be a piece of turf – so they set about transforming it through rewilding. What was once a boring lawn is now a thriving ecosystem that attracts and supports birds, butterflies, bees, rabbits, bats, foxes and more, while their efforts have been recognised by the National Wildlife Federation, who designated the space a Certified Wildlife Habitat. “It’s really a stunning environment,” says McGuire. “It brings us a lot of peace and tranquility in a very troubled world.” Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday Bored at work? And finally, the Guardian’s puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow. Quick crossword Cryptic crossword Wordiply

Russia’s missile tests around disputed islands anger Japan

Japan has criticised missile tests carried out by Russia’s navy around the disputed islands visited by Vladimir Putin last week amid continuing tensions between the two countries. Russia’s Pacific fleet said on Thursday that it had fired Bastion surface-to-ship missiles from Etorofu, the largest island in the disputed archipelago, simulating an attack on enemy vessels, hitting all of its targets approximately 300km away. Officials said the drills included a nuclear-powered submarine and a guided-missile cruiser, according to reports. Putin sparked a tit-for-tat summoning of ambassadors in Tokyo and Moscow with his first visit last week to Etorofu, the largest of the group of four islands. They are referred to as the Northern Territories or Four Northern Islands in Japan, and as part of the Kuril Islands in Russia. Toshimitsu Motegi, Japan’s foreign minister, said on Thursday during a trip to Oman: “We cannot tolerate moves to strengthen military power on the Four Northern Islands because they go against our country’s stance [on the territories].” Territorial rows over the islands go back to the 19th century. The Soviet Union seized them from Japan at the end of the second world war. Exercises by the Russian fleet began on 4 August and Japan was informed in advance that they would include live-fire drills. Japan lodged a protest against the large-scale manoeuvres on 5 August. According to the Russian news agency Tass, the drills involved “approximately 60 surface ships, submarines, and support vessels, about 30 aircraft, helicopters, and unmanned aerial systems of the Pacific fleet’s naval aviation, as well as over 13,000 service members”. Putin observed some of the exercises from the Varyag on 12 August as part of his trip to the disputed islands and to Sakhalin, the large undisputedly Russian island north of Hokkaido. “The region is unfortunately becoming increasingly prone to conflict, with Nato seeking to gain a foothold here and the emergence of new military and political blocs,” said Putin, speaking aboard the flagship. “There are efforts and plans to deploy new weapons systems here, which creates threats for our country.” The Russian drills are scheduled to continue through 29 August.

Python named Jodie Foster first snake to receive pioneering cancer treatment

A 15ft (4.5-metre) python is believed to be the first snake in the world to be given a pioneering, life-saving cancer treatment normally used on humans. The 50kg reticulated python, named Jodie Foster after the Hollywood star, has just turned 23 and lives at Chester zoo. Keepers first became concerned that she may be unwell when she began eating less and spending more time inactive in her habitat. She was diagnosed with a fibrosarcoma – a malignant tumour – in her jaw, which was removed with surgery but later returned and began to invade her jawbone. With her life at risk, she underwent electrochemotherapy. Now, months after the procedure, she is said to be eating normally and “back to her usual bright and feisty self”. Pythons can unhinge their jaws to swallow prey many times the size of their head, and in the months since her surgery zoo staff have observed that Jodie continues to strike, grip and swallow food without difficulty. Ian Ashpole, a veterinary officer at the zoo, said: “When the tumour came back and started destroying part of her jawbone, we knew more surgery on its own probably wasn’t going to be enough. “We were facing the possibility of losing her as the tumour made it more and more difficult for her to eat, so we worked with cancer specialists to see whether we could adapt electrochemotherapy for a snake. As far as we’re aware, this is the first time it’s ever been used in one.” Jodie, whose name derives from when she first arrived and staff noticed her paperwork was marked “JF” – shorthand for “juvenile female” – is so big that no single operating table would have been able to accommodate her. Two were pushed together, making a platform the size of a double bed. She was anaesthetised in her own habitat and carefully carried to the zoo’s veterinary centre where she underwent the 90-minute procedure. Ashpole first removed the tumorous mass as well as part of Jodie’s diseased jawbone, before electrochemotherapy was administered to target any remaining cancerous cells. Electrochemotherapy combines the cancer drug bleomycin with a series of carefully controlled electrical pulses delivered directly to the tumour site. The pulses temporarily make cancer cells more permeable, allowing the drug to enter more effectively. Jose Alvarez Picornell, of the University of Liverpool’s department of small animal clinical science, said: “Electrochemotherapy is an emerging treatment and this was the first time it had been used in a snake. The success of this treatment is a testament to the power of collaboration. By working closely with Ian, we were able to develop a plan that not only benefited Jodie Foster but will also contribute to the wider veterinary community.” A final check this week confirmed that Jodie remained free of any signs of the cancer returning. Picornell added: “We will be formally publishing details of the procedure so that veterinary colleagues around the world can learn from and build upon our approach. This has been a very special career highlight for me and a fantastic opportunity to expand the work we do within the department to support high-quality veterinary and translational research.”