MIDDLE EAST - Hamas has said its “armed resistance” will continue until an “independent, fully sovereign Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital” is established. Hamas has today responded to Sir Keir’s announcement – and the request of Arab states including Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Egypt that Hamas disarm – by responding to the offer that if they refuse a cease fire they can have a state by saying, quelle surprise, that their “resistance” will continue. Today’s statement by Hamas is not in any way revealing. There is nothing that would surprise anyone who has any understanding of who and what Hamas is. It merely underlines the madness of treating Hamas as some sort of negotiating partner, rather than as a terrorist organisation which must be destroyed.

GERMANY - Soaring migration figures are a common theme across Europe, yet one country is leading the way on reducing spiralling numbers. While previous German governments had a softer approach to the issue, Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s hard-line stance has cut asylum seeker numbers down drastically. "Germany is leading in some of these very important talks," Denmark’s immigration minister Kaare Dybvad said. The EU country’s Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt recently hosted government officials from several countries with a similar tough stance on migration, such as Poland, Denmark and Austria. "We want to make it clear that Germany is no longer in the brakeman’s cab when it comes to migration issues in Europe but is part of the driving force," the minister said.

UK - The number of foreigners in prisons for serious violent, sexual and theft offences has surged over the past year, according to official data published for the first time. Some 1,731 foreign criminals are in prison in England and Wales for sexual offences, one in eight of the foreign ­offender prison population and 10.6 per cent of all sex offenders in prisons. This number has risen by nearly 10 per cent in the past 12 months, a rate of increase nearly three times higher than that of British people imprisoned for sexual offences. Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary, blamed “uncontrolled immigration” and called on Sir Keir Starmer to introduce emergency measures to deport the entire foreign prisoner population by threatening to suspend visas from countries that refused to take them back.

UK - The air traffic control company responsible for Britain’s skies embraced home working in a drive to “go green”, The Telegraph can disclose. Many staff at National Air Traffic Services (Nats) have been allowed to work remotely after managers decided it would help the organisation reduce its carbon footprint and cut car journeys to reach net zero carbon dioxide emissions by 2035. The “agile working” policy does not include air traffic controllers themselves, as those people all still work inside secure control centres. However, it extends up to board level including chief executive Martin Rolfe, and also allows some operations staff to work from home. They are allowed to do so despite Nats being criticised for an air traffic control meltdown in 2023, which lasted for four hours in part because an on-call engineer who could have fixed a malfunctioning computer system was working from home and unable to gain full access. A subsequent failure for around half an hour on Wednesday triggered more than 150 cancellations and disrupted tens of thousands of holidaymakers.

GERMANY - Railways in Germany have experienced days of “massive” disruption after a track bottleneck on the national network was found to have been sabotaged two days in a row, with a post-left ultra-anarchist group taking responsibility for what they called a strike against the global industrial economy. Thousands of international, intercity, and regional trains were disrupted, and many tens of thousands of passengers and freight consignments were hampered after a fire was set in the cabling trough that runs beside the mainline on Thursday, rendering the signalling and safety system inoperative and trains totally unable to run.

UK - Encouraged by an activist judiciary and a Government determined to increase the rights of workers, Britain’s “something for nothing” culture is spiralling out of control – and that is crippling the economy. Cases such as this one may be just the tip of a very large, and treacherous, iceberg. Britain has developed a troubling culture of entitlement that seems to be escalating. We can see that in the rising number of employment tribunal cases. In the latest year for which we have figures, there was a 23 per cent increase in both single and multiple claims; 42,000 single claims have been lodged over the last twelve months. Add it all up and one point is clear: we have developed a culture in which getting something for nothing is not only tolerated but increasingly encouraged. Britain is well on its way to becoming a second world country, and ultimately the only way to fix that will be for everyone to work harder. The trouble with this is that it is bankrupting the country.

USA - President Donald Trump said Thursday that the best and fastest way to solve the humanitarian problems facing Palestinians in the Gaza Strip is for Hamas to surrender and to release its remaining Israeli hostages. He posted on Truth Social: “The fastest way to end the Humanitarian Crises in Gaza is for Hamas to SURRENDER AND RELEASE THE HOSTAGES!!!” Trump posted his statement as his administration slapped sanctions on the Palestinian Authority and the Palestine Liberation Organization for seeking statehood outside the process of negotiations with Israel.

ISRAEL - The 140 heads of state threatening to recognize or ones that have already recognized a Palestinian state “can’t even tell you where this Palestinian state is,” US State Secretary Marco Rubio said in an interview with Fox News’ Brian Kilmeade on Thursday. “They can’t tell you who will govern it. And I think number three, it’s counterproductive,” Rubio continued. Rubio called the decisions irrelevant, saying that “it doesn’t mean anything.” “First of all, none of these countries has the ability to create a Palestinian state. There can be no Palestinian state unless Israel agrees to it.” He added that he wished there was more international attention paid to the Israeli hostages still in Hamas' captivity.

USA - President Donald Trump threatened trade consequences for Canada if it goes ahead with Premier Mark Carney’s plan to recognize a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly in September. As Breitbart News had reported, Canada announced that it would join France and the United Kingdom in recognizing Palestinian statehood — despite the ongoing war that Palestinian terrorists began; despite the fact that Hamas continues to hold 50 Israeli hostages, 20 of them living; despite the lack of borders for a Palestinian state; and despite the fact that even the “moderate” Palestinian Authority is a dictatorship. Trump has dismissed calls for a Palestinian state as a “reward for Hamas.” The families of the Israeli hostages agree, saying that giving Palestinians a state before freeing their loved ones rewards and incentivizes terror.

UK - Sir Keir Starmer has announced his plan for the UK to officially recognise a Palestinian state in September unless Israel meets a number of conditions. The Prime Minister laid out these terms in a speech at Downing Street. They include Israel agreeing to a ceasefire in Gaza and committing to a two-state solution. In a Telegraph poll, readers were overwhelmingly opposed to the decision, with 86 per cent of over 50,000 voters saying Palestine should not be recognised.