Today’s news summary – Paper Talk
Paper Talk: Hamas massacred babies and Sir Keir pitches a Labour Britain
Wednesday’s front pages continue to lead with Hamas attacks on Israel. Elsewhere, the Labour Party conference in Liverpool and TV presenter Holly Willoughby quitting This Morning also makes the front pages.
Hamas attacks
The Guardian says the bodies of victims are still being recovered, four days after the attacks began. The i newspaper reports on children being killed in the village of Kfar Aza, which headlined “massacre of innocents.”
“This was a holocaust pure and simple,” says the Daily Mail. The Express talks of “barbaric terrorists” from Hamas. The Times reporter Anshel Pfeffer, who visited the village, says the killings there are likely to be the greatest loss of civilian life in a terrorist attack in Israeli history.
“Israel prepares for ground invasion” is the headline in the Financial Times with news of a further 60,000 reservists mobilised. The paper reports on a warning from the UN of a “severe shortage” of water in Gaza which is under a tightened Israeli blockade. The Sun features a photo of devastated buildings in Rimal, Gaza, after Israeli air strikes with the headline “reduced to rubble”.
General Lord Dannatt has taken to the Telegraph to urge caution in Israel’s response. He says an Israeli ground assault could result in a large number of Palestinian civilians being killed and the destruction of much of the already impoverished infrastructure of Gaza. He says this would play into the hands of Iran.
Labour Party conference
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer’s speech at conference was interrupted after a protester threw glitter over him.
Several of the papers lead with the story.
“Starmer’s time to shine” says the Daily Telegraph, and “Starmer versus stormer” in the Metro.
The speech is likely Sir Keir’s last before the next general election and was his pitch for prime minister.
The Daily Mirror describes Starmer’s speech as “rousing”. In its leader column, it says he delivered a “stunningly compelling, persuasive, case for political change”. The Times describes him as “Steady Starmer”. It says he sounded like a prime minister-in-waiting, but adds there are still questions to answer about his party’s policies.
For the Mail, he was “Shallow Sir Keir..taking voters for fools”. “With an election in the offing”, the paper says, “voters deserve to know in specific detail how Labour would change their lives for the better”.