Snowmail: impotent in Gaza
Updated on 05 January 2009
A journalist missing a night's sleep is nothing compared to what Gazans and Israelis are going through, writes Alex Thomson.
Sleepless night, but tonight we are live from Jerusalem. Though a journalist missing a night's sleep is as nothing compared to what Gaza's residents are going through - and yes, those Israelis too, threatened by Hamas rockets.
It's all continued apace again today, 10 days in now. Still the pounding continues, still civilians amongst those maimed horribly and killed. This afternoon Israel's foreign minister Tzipi Livni was clear about the cause, saying that's what happens when Hamas shelters in civilian areas - that's war.
And speaking of the foreign minister, she really gave it both barrels to the EU today. Catch it tonight: extraordinary tirade full of George Bush rhetoric. She must have used the phrase "War on Terror" half a dozen times in her short speech.
And you know what? The more she did so, the more sick to their boots the EU foreign ministers, flanked alongside her, looked. Javier Solana later told me this was "unsophisticated". When I waylaid Sweden's Carl Bildt and said, "This just isn't European language, is it?", well, he just winked, said, "We've all been in elections" and walked off.
You can shrug it off, you know, if you're an EU foreign minister. More difficult by far, though, if you're living in Gaza or under attack from Hamas.
So tonight, with key guests here in Jerusalem, Ramallah and the United States, we assess just where Israel is going with all this and how the Arab world seems as impotent as both the EU and UN try to bring either side to end their war.
And one more thing before I sign off. We have more harrowing material from inside one of the main Gaza hospitals. I guess I need say no more.
From Samira Ahmed in London
David Cameron has unveiled plans to cut tax on savings for basic rate taxpayers and pensioners. A welcome targeting of a forgotten class of Britons, or (as Labour and the Lib Dems claim) a slight of hand with the numbers for minimal benefit?
With interest rates as low as 0.1 per cent, 20 per cent back off savings interest won't be very much for basic rate taxpayers. The plan is to reduce growth in public sector spending sooner than the government had planned.
But while education, defence, health spending and international development aid have been ring-fenced, a list of other categories that Mr Cameron listed as priorities (crime, welfare, housing, local government and transport) are not.
So do the numbers add up? And is there a moral principle here about supporting those who live off savings, who were prudent during the boom years? I'll be interviewing shadow chancellor George Osborne.
2009 should have been a year of celebration for the Waterford Wedgwood company - it is 250 years since Josiah Wedgwood launched his fine china business in Stoke-on-Trent in the heat of the industrial revolution.
And Stoke boy Arnold Bennett chronicled its prime in his novels and stories set in the Potteries. "The Grim Smile of the Five Towns" might be an apt headline for events today, as the firm went into administration as it searches for a new owner willing to pump in more money.
The economic downturn has compounded problems for the company as it deals with the shift away from fine dining and high tea. And for Stoke-on-Trent, it will further compound a dramatic decline from Victorian magnificence to inner-city breakdown and social deprivation.
