Jonathan Gornall

The writer is a British journalist, formerly with The Times, who has lived and worked in the Middle East and is now based in the UK, Syndication Bureau.

Stifling debate on Israel will only hold back peace

A clue to the disingenuous nature of the highly successful efforts of the global pro-Israel lobby to conflate any criticism of the behavior of the state with antisemitism can be found in an extraordinary statement issued by the chief executive of an organization called UK Lawyers For Israel.

The UK should look east for radical health care solutions

On May 24, 1948, my maternal grandfather, Herbert Johnson, died suddenly in bed, the victim of a cardiac arrest. He was just 50 years old.

Climate change, energy, and a question of leadership

The consensus among climate-change activists and many commentators is that the decision to put the head of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) in charge of this year’s COP28 climate talks in the United Arab Emirates is akin to appointing a fox as head of security on a chicken farm.

Is it appropriate to appropriate?

If you are a fan of yoga but can’t lay claim to Indian heritage, you should roll up your mat and slink away in shame, never to do downward dog again.

Christmas shoeboxes of love or a fundamentalist Trojan horse?

Every November, thousands of schools in Western countries take part in Operation Christmas Child, during which young children and their families are encouraged to pack shoeboxes with toys, personal hygiene items, and school supplies for less fortunate children around the world.

Britain’s misplaced immigration anger and the vestiges of empire

Every 10 years, a census is carried out in England and Wales by the Office for National Statistics. Its purpose is to paint an accurate demographic picture of the population, to help with the planning, funding and running of public services.

The ‘loss and damage’ climate agenda will sink us all

Throughout COP27, which ended on Friday, there was the usual juvenile sniping at the engagement in the climate-change mitigation process of the oil-producing countries, as if anything could possibly be achieved without their collaboration.

Will Sharm El Sheikh be another COP-out?

It is 28 years since the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change entered into force, with the simple but fantastically complex ambition of “preventing dangerous human interference with the climate system”.

To save the planet, follow the Gulf’s lead on nuclear power

There is a delightful irony in the fact that, even as the sun sets slowly on the era of fossil fuels, two of the countries with oil and gas reserves that have powered the global economy for decades are now at the cutting edge of the nuclear-power renaissance.