USA - New York elected its first Muslim mayor, setting up a clash with Donald Trump and giving hope to divided Democrats. Zohran Mamdani, a pro-Palestinian socialist, beat establishment candidates with a string of populist Left-wing promises. He stood up to Mr Trump, who has threatened to pull funding from the world’s financial capital, as a result of the election. In his victory speech, the 34-year-old said: “If anyone can show a nation betrayed by Donald Trump how to defeat him, it is the city that gave rise to him. “And if there is any way to terrify a despot, it is by dismantling the very conditions that allowed him to accumulate power. This is not only how we stop Trump, it’s how we stop the next one.”

USA - Zohran Mamdani’s ‘socialism in one city’ will crush the metropolis he has promised to save. The trouble is, he will have to make a success of running New York, and that will prove far harder than his supporters imagine. To start with, his brand of socialist economics has been tried and failed repeatedly in the past. Back in the 1970s, the Swedish economist Assar Lindbeck memorably described rent controls as “the most efficient technique presently known to destroy a city – except for bombing”, and endless attempts since then have simply proved the truth of that observation.

UK - The Left is using bad data to normalise unprecedented levels of savagery on Britain’s streets. Last year, a mere 6.3 per cent of “victim-based offences” resulted in someone being charged. This means that the vast majority of crimes are not punished. The police do a little better with firearms and knife offences, but in both cases only one in nine crimes result in a charge. What this means in practice is that much crime is functionally legalised. Naturally, this emboldens criminals and contributes to a growing sense of lawlessness in Britain.

USA - Stock markets plunged in South Korea and around the world as concerns deepened over AI company valuations. The global rout in stock markets deepened as more than $500 billion (£384 billion) was wiped off the value of artificial intelligence (AI) chip makers. The bosses of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley both suggested a correction was imminent over the next one to two years. Chris Weston, head of research at Pepperstone Group, said: “It’s a sea of red across broad markets, and one that offers a gloomy and damp portrayal of risk. We need to remain open-minded to the possibility that this could still further build. Simplistically, there aren’t many reasons to buy here.”

UK - Now we have the evidence. The BBC knowingly helped spread Hamas lies and hate. The leaked Prescott Report is a devastating document. It is an insider’s account of serious and widespread failings of impartiality, systemic bias and activist journalism spanning years of BBC news coverage. It lays bare for the first time how senior BBC executives repeatedly tried to dismiss, downplay or excuse these failings in a total abdication of their responsibilities. In doing so, they failed to uphold the highest standards of public service journalism we must expect of the BBC.

FRANCE - The country has no stable government, no coherent strategy and a president whose approval rating has plunged to a record low. The aviation metaphor was apt given that 24 hours earlier Michael O’Leary, the chief executive of Ryanair, had said France, particularly its air traffic controllers, was “the byword for inefficiency and incompetence”. Why would anyone wish to invest in France right now? The country is on its fourth prime minister in a year and the National Assembly resembles what one MP described recently as a “psychiatric hospital”. France’s business leaders are in despair. Dozens signed an open letter at the weekend begging the political class to show some leadership, and not just simply impose more taxes. Robberies against commercial targets have increased by 15 per cent in the last four years. Most crimes are on the up in France, including assault, rape and attempted murder. There is a power vacuum in France. The country has no stable government, no coherent strategy and a president whose approval rating has plunged to a record low of 11 per cent. France’s criminal fraternity knows that there is no pilot in the cockpit.

UK - The White House slammed the BBC after an internal report revealed that the broadcaster doctored Donald Trump's speech on January 6. Michael Prescott, who spent three years as an independent adviser to the corporation before leaving last June, sent a dossier to its board last month after repeated warnings to the standards watchdog were 'dismissed or ignored'. The 19-page document, obtained by the Daily Telegraph, has sent shockwaves through the highest levels of British politics. The BBC, which is funded by the UK taxpayer, is also accused of widespread bias in its coverage ranging from anti-Israeli commentary on the Gaza war to 'censorship' of the transgender debate.

USA - Broadcaster should brace itself for US president’s retaliation to ‘doctored’ footage. If Donald Trump’s recent tangles with the media are anything to go by, the US president will already be plotting his retaliation on the BBC for “doctored” footage of his January 6 speech. The US president has famously become more aggressive towards what he calls the “fake news media” during his second term. Members of the press who have crossed him have been stripped of White House access or sued for millions of dollars.

UK - An internal BBC whistleblowing report listed ways in which the corporation allegedly displayed anti-Trump bias during the 2024 US election. Aside from a Panorama documentary which “doctored” Donald Trump’s 2021 speech on the day of the Capitol Hill riots, the author of a letter sent to BBC Board members highlights nine other alleged examples. They include amplifying a “rogue” poll that favoured Kamala Harris, giving “excessive” coverage to Mr Trump’s comments about people eating pets, and dwelling too much on Harris campaign issues while failing to grasp issues that appealed to Trump supporters.

UK - After Panorama’s Trump distortions, how many other examples by the Corporation are waiting to be exposed? The Yiddish word chutzpah is sometimes defined as when a man who has killed both his parents pleads for mercy on the grounds that he is an orphan. The BBC has now given us a new definition, albeit unintentionally. You may have seen the ad boasting about its own brilliance that the BBC has been broadcasting since last month. It’s been difficult to avoid. Narrated by Clive Myrie, it begins with a compilation of videos of various stories that have been subject to disinformation, AI deepfakes and fake news.

NIGERIA - At least 17 Christians were killed in Nigeria hours after President Donald Trump designated the nation as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC) for ongoing attacks by radical Islamists, with local media reporting “fresh attacks by gunmen across communities in Plateau and Kaduna states.” A Friday evening attack in Kaduna claimed the lives of seven people and injured one more, with Nigerian outlet Punch reporting that the assailants “invaded” the Damakasuwa community in Chawai Chiefdom around 8:00 pm and began “shooting sporadically and forcing residents to flee into nearby bushes for safety.” In Plateau State, 10 more people were reportedly killed in separate attacks on Friday and Saturday, Punch reported.

NIGERIA - Nigeria said Sunday the country would welcome American intervention against Islamic extremist groups behind the massacre and persecution of Christians in the African nation. Daniel Bwala, advisor to Nigerian President Bola Tinubu, told Reuters Sunday the country would welcome US intervention to combat Islamic terrorists persecuting and massacring Christians within its borders, as long as Nigeria’s sovereignty was respected. President Donald Trump threatened Saturday on Truth Social to deploy US forces in Nigeria if the nation did not do enough to stop Islamic terrorist organizations like Boko Haram. “We welcome US assistance as long as it recognizes our territorial integrity,” the advisor told Reuters.

NIGERIA - Nigeria has rejected President Trump’s threat of military intervention to protect the country’s Christian population. As Christians continue to be massacred at the hands of Islamist militias in the northern region of the most populous African country, Trump has sounded the alarm and said he may even use military force to protect them. “If the Nigerian Government continues to allow the killing of Christians, the USA will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria, and may very well go into that now disgraced country, ‘guns-a-blazing,’ to completely wipe out the Islamic Terrorists who are committing these horrible atrocities,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. However, the Nigerian government has pushed back on this idea and denied that the persecution of Christians is even taking place. Nigeria, which is home to some 220 million people, is almost evenly divided between Muslims in the north and Christians who are concentrated in the south and central regions.

USA - On my first day @USDA, we told every state to send us their SNAP data so we could make sure illegal immigrants aren’t getting benefits meant for American families. 29 states stepped up. 21 blue states refused — and two SUED US FOR ASKING! And guess what? In just the states that cooperated, we’ve already uncovered massive fraud. The Democrat Party has turned its back on working Americans and built its entire strategy around protecting illegal aliens. They know if the handouts stop, those illegals will go back home, and Democrats will lose 20+ seats after the next census. There’s a new sheriff in town. @POTUS will not tolerate waste, fraud, or abuse while hardworking Americans go hungry.

ISRAEL - In the middle of the night, while most Americans were asleep, the Federal Reserve injected $29.4 billion into the US banking system. It was a “repo operation” — short for repurchase agreement — a mechanism the Fed uses to lend cash to banks in exchange for collateral, usually Treasury securities. The move didn’t make mainstream headlines, but it sent ripples through financial circles. A sudden infusion of this size often signals acute liquidity stress, the kind that central banks are usually desperate to conceal. The question is: why now? The banking system has been treading on thin ice for months. Bond markets remain unstable, commercial real estate is imploding, and deposit flight has quietly resumed among regional banks. The Federal Reserve has been walking a tightrope — raising interest rates to fight inflation while trying not to trigger another 2008-style collapse. Yet this $29.4 billion overnight cash injection suggests that pressure inside the system is reaching a point that requires emergency relief.