My mother would say, simply and unmelodramatically, to anyone she knew well, that she wanted to die: ‘I’ve had enough’; ‘I’ve had a good life’; ‘It’s enough now.’ We watched the first Commons debate on the Assisted Dying Bill introduced by Kim Leadbeater last October. It was a strange experience. And even though the bill in its current form didn’t apply to my mother and she knew it, it allowed me to say uncomplicatedly that I knew what she wanted, that I thought she should have the right to die, and that I would probably want the same thing in the same circumstances.
Five hundred years ago this week, the rebels of the German Peasants’ War, or Bauernkrieg, were defeated in a series of battles. Somewhere between 70,000 and 100,000 peasants were killed. Everywhere in Germany this event is being commemorated. There are TV programmes, an opera, magazines, plays, readings and art works. Even places with barely a walk-on part in the Peasants’ War are doing something: Pfeddersheim in Baden is hosting a summer wine festival with medieval market to remember a battle in which thousands died in a place now known as Bluthohl (‘blood hollow’).
Twice already during this war, the people of Gaza have pulled back from the brink of categorical famine – both times after warnings from the IPC – but the recovery has been momentary before another plunge. Few humanitarian workers believe this cycle of deprivation followed by partial respite can continue for much longer before there’s rapid and uncontrollable collapse.
The monument to the Duc de Richelieu, Odesa’s first governor, under wraps at the top of the Potemkin Steps. Photo © Nataliia Mykhailenko
Odesa is mostly Russian-speaking and sometimes thought to be more pro-Russian than other parts of Ukraine, but there isn’t a straightforward link between language and loyalty. When I raised the question of a potential backlash against Ukrainisation in Odesa, a Belgian diplomat was reminded of the way the French talk about Belgium. ‘There is something about multilingual countries that eludes the imperial mindset,’ he said, ‘French, British or Russian.’
Hugh Roberts has died from cancer at the age of 76. Among his books were a collection of penetrating articles on Algerian politics, The Battlefield; a meticulous historical study of Kabyle society, Berber Government; and a monograph on the Arab Spring, based on pieces he’d published in the LRB. To read Hugh’s writing – whether in his books, his articles or the analyses he wrote for the International Crisis Group – is to encounter a thinker of unusual rigour, seriousness and daring.
Months before the Trumpist onslaught on higher education, US universities were rushing to prohibit protest encampments. Why do some ramshackle tents on lawns present such a threat to authority – as opposed to demonstrations and marches, which remain generally permitted, subject to certain regulations?
The Trump court is a royal progress that moves between Palm Beach and the White House, for the most part in private planes. But the interests of the US government require that at least some of its members be willing to travel farther afield than Florida. Trump talks of putting the US economy behind a great tariff wall, but he also wants deals, which means he needs dealers. America’s official chief diplomat is the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, but so far his activities have been fairly limited. Instead, the role of principal US emissary is currently filled by the unlikely figure of the property developer Steve Witkoff.