Noel Satchell

Tree of the Day

@Peston Waiting game

Hours after President Trump announced a two-week cessation of hostilities against Iran, I travelled to the Gulf with the prime minister and his team, in the official government plane. We have just landed in Saudi Arabia. For diplomatic and security reasons, I have been asked not to disclose our itinerary or Starmer’s schedule of meetings with government heads. But it does not take enormous intellectual effort to deduce that the first set of talks will be with arguably the most powerful of the Gulf leaders, Saudi’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman. The most pressing question in all Starmer’s meetings, including with MBS, is whether the ceasefire between Iran and America and Israel can endure long enough for there to be meaningful talks on a sustainable peace - which are scheduled to start on Friday in Pakistan. According to British sources - and frankly this won’t surprise you - the ceasefire is real, holding so far and very unstable. One source of anxiety is Israel’s somewhat ambivalent commitment to it - and notably that Netanyahu is explicit the hiatus does not restrict the Israel Defence Forces’ aggression in Lebanon. Another is that the devolved structure of Iran’s military, the IRGC, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and the absence of a centralised power structure in Iran brings the risk of continued sporadic and unlicensed attacks by Iranian militia on Gulf countries - and also means that very few shippers of oil, gas and other vital commodities will yet take the risk of moving their tankers and ships through the precarious Strait of Hormuz. As one intelligence source put it to me, Israel’s assassination of so many Iranian leaders makes it incredibly difficult to know who is in charge in the country, if anyone. On the more positive side though, there may be a little more underlying common ground between Tehran and Washington than their public positions on their “non negotiable” aims for any peace settlement would suggest - though I don’t have a clue how their respective positions on Iran’s nuclear ambitions or Iran’s determination to be turnpike keeper of the Hormuz Strait can be bridged. Because the Hormuz Strait is the supply route for a fifth of the world’s carbon energy, and therefore a kind of oesophagus for the global economy, much of Starmer’s focus in talks with Gulf leaders will be a continuation of British diplomatic activity with 40-odd other nations in recent days, namely whether there is any practical way to make the Strait safe for commercial traffic. But his other message is bound to be along the lines of “when this chaos is finally over, don’t forget who your true allies and friends are.” The point is that - like Starmer - none of the Gulf states wanted Trump to attack Iran when he did. And although the UK’s military has been exposed by both the Ukraine and Iran conflicts as depleted and unequipped for this era of drone wars, the UK has been deploying planes and weapons to protect the region from Iran’s assorted uncrewed aerial threats. In the eyes of Gulf leaders, the UK - and Europe more widely, including Ukraine with its formidable drone capabilities - presumably looks a less intimidating friend than either America or China. They have a material interest in strengthening ties with Britain. This is important because Trump’s Iran war is re-configuring the global balance of power in a fundamental way. For Starmer and the UK there are risks, especially if the US were to precipitously withdraw its military umbrella from our continent. And to be clear, there is no sign of Starmer unilaterally abandoning the UK’s historic entente with America, even if Trump is an unreliable, and sometimes abusive, friend. 1/2

@Peston Waiting game

2/2 But in this dangerous world, a medium size nation like the UK needs as much goodwill as it can muster in the international community. In the coming days I will try to gauge whether the leaders in this region are simply going through the motions in seeing Starmer or whether he can recreate some of the warmth - and significant commercial advantage - that was generated and enjoyed by Thatcher.

I knew I heard something

GM

The London Eye. Stunning!

Nathan Cullen on Trump's Iran ultimatums: "I've come to assume that all of this is about insider trading at some point or another ... it's laughable if it weren't so incredibly dangerous and deathly to the people that are implicated."

This is Specialist James Douglas Ross—who served in Iraq as a military intelligence officer (82nd Airborne Division)—in his barracks room He is now back in the USA And there's thousands more like him Full story here: orbooks.com/catalog/irregu…

@TheTweetOfGod Two-factor authentication is free, my Dude.

@TheTweetOfGod Barron Trump own a piece of that exchange?

Update: After full KYC, origin‑of‑funds explanation and multiple document requests, @ChangeNOW_io has now classified my friends case as a “limited” AML case. They’re refusing both to complete the exchange and to refund, saying they can hold the funds indefinitely with no ETA while an “investigation” is ongoing, unless my friend can provide a perfect, multi‑year fiat/source‑of‑funds trail that simply does NOT exist! It is extremely sad that these multi‑million dollar entities can scam hard‑working people by leveraging broken, outdated policies that let them effectively “police” users. How is it considered normal and legal for an offshore company to control someone else’s money and hold it indefinitely on vague excuses, with zero real transparency?

Sickening what finance and "decentralization" has come to, fraud has essentially become legal, Outrageous! x.com/smitemenow/sta…

Is it time to ban balaclavas? A mum has started a petition to ban people from wearing them after her seven-year-old son was injured in a moped hit and run by a rider who had their face covered. Is this a slippery slope? Or is it time to crack down?

@GMB Ban Kanye West don't give him a visa

@GMB Ban kanye West

BREAKING: Kanye West has published a letter addressing the controversy surrounding his planned appearance as the headline act at this year's Wireless Festival.

@GMB Don't give the doctors no more

'There has been plenty of goodwill from this government,' says Health Secretary Wes Streeting. The six-day doctors’ strike begins as the NHS reveals that walkouts have cost £3billion.

The truth of Christ will always set you free.