Apr 29th 2023

Survivor nation: Israel at 75

The world this week

Leaders

Keir thinking

Is Keir Starmer ready for office?

Britain’s Labour leader has made his party electable again. But there is more to do

Survivor nation

As Israel turns 75, its biggest threats now come from within

The country needs a new political settlement that diminishes the power of extremists

The war in Ukraine

The West should supply Ukraine with F-16s

Or Russian fighter jets may win control of Ukrainian skies

Heavy lies the crown

The power and the limits of the American dollar

The greenback is still king. But those who want to evade it are finding ways to do so

Private’s progress

Private markets remain attractive, even in a higher-rate world

Private credit, not buy-outs, is stealing the limelight

Letters

On the IMF, liberal-arts degrees, housing in London, woke history, politicians, the OECD

Letters to the editor

By Invitation

Israel at 75

Avi Shlaim calls for critical reflection

Israel at 75

There is much to celebrate—and worry about—says Yair Lapid

Briefing

Military-industrial complexity

Russia’s economy can withstand a long war, but not a more intense one

Its defences against Western sanctions can only stretch so far

Asia

Asian geopolitics

South Korea has America in its face and China breathing down its neck

Sikh splittism

Amritpal Singh, self-declared leader of Sikh separatism, is arrested in India

My ball, my rules

Cambodia is about to host arguably the world’s biggest sporting event

Protection by projection

Fearing China, Australia rethinks its defence strategy

Banyan

On China, Japan’s PM wants diplomacy, not war

China

Xivilisation

China’s latest attempt to rally the world against Western values

Love elderly

The novel ways old people try to find love in China

First contact

At last, Xi Jinping calls Volodymyr Zelensky

Chaguan

China’s rulers play the law-and-order card, and lose

United States

Take four

Joe Biden fires the starting gun on the presidential race

Later, Tucker

Fox News shows that not even Tucker Carlson is bigger than the network

Lookback in anger

A New York jury will be asked if Donald Trump is a rapist

Classroom politics

Why Republicans are giving huge pay rises to teachers

Lexington

Why Israel is becoming a partisan cause in the United States

Middle East & Africa

A contentious birthday

Israel’s angsty 75th anniversary

How Zionism has changed

How Zionism has evolved from a project to an ideology

Burkina on the brink

Rampant jihadists are spreading chaos and misery in the Sahel

Ghost town

The battle for Khartoum is just the beginning of Sudan’s nightmare

The Americas

A sticky dictatorship

Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s autocrat, is winning

Europe

War in the skies

Ukraine’s top guns need new jets to win the war

After-hours war

Ukrainians have grown used to living with curfews

Late sun

Spanish renewable-energy development is waking from its siesta

No sharp tacks

A post-Erdogan Turkey would only partly change its foreign policy

Pulling them in

Romania’s hot economy is attracting foreign workers

Charlemagne

A spat over farming bodes ill for Ukraine’s future European prospects

Britain

Opposition research

Sir Keir Starmer on “Starmerism”

Green loots

Labour’s green industrial policy will not cure Britain’s economic ills

A Laborious read

To understand Labour’s shadow cabinet, read its books

Inhabited by spirits

How Campbeltown has responded to the boom in Scottish whisky

An organisation in crisis

The scandal at the Confederation of British Industry may be terminal

Girl power

How one of Britain’s oldest youth clubs is trying to stay relevant

Bagehot

Would Labour turn to the left in office?

International

Criminal underworlds

How the war split the mafia

Business

A new breed of unicorn

How to make it big in Xi Jinping’s China

Fragged

Britain shoots down Microsoft’s $69bn Activision deal

Deutsche dilemma

The conundrum of Germany’s business ties with China

Drama series

The battle to control Mexican telecoms

Bartleby

If enough people think you’re a bad boss, then you are

Schumpeter

Is mining set for a new wave of mega-mergers?

Finance & economics

The buy-out business

Welcome to a new, humbler private-equity industry

Banking chaos

First Republic Bank is on the edge of a precipice

Crossed wires

Why commodity-trading scandals are multiplying

Money to burn

Patriotic Ukrainians are rushing to pay their taxes

Priceless recovery

If China’s growth is so strong, why is inflation so weak?

Asian commerce

Indian firms are flocking to the United Arab Emirates

Buttonwood

Investors have reason to fear a strong economy

Free exchange

Economists and investors should pay less attention to consumers

Science & technology

Overprescribing drugs

Too many people take too many pills

Harsh lessons from a harsh mistress

After half a century, there is a commercial market for Moon missions

Tackling global warming

How to make low-carbon concrete from old cement

Culture

Film on the front line

Ukrainian film-makers are capturing the realities of war

Home Entertainment

Psychedelic music by an Australian nun is an uncanny pleasure

Fiction from Japan

Readers in the West are embracing Japan’s bold women authors

European history

“Revolutionary Spring” brings to life the drama and daring of 1848

Finance and society

Asset managers control a growing share of society’s essentials

Johnson

ChatGPT raises questions about how humans acquire language

Economic & financial indicators

Indicators

Economic data, commodities and markets

Graphic detail

Film with Chinese characteristics

Hollywood is losing the battle for China

The Economist explains

How a 19th-century law could upend abortion access in America

The Economist explains

Why India’s population is about to overtake China’s

Obituary

Two lives entwined