Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Tom Gillespie @t-a-gillespie.bsky.social · 1d

The current establishment campaign to demonise and criminalise anti-genocide protest must be understood in the context of record UK arms exports to Israel

caatuk.bsky.social @caatuk.bsky.social · 8d

According to new research by Channel 4's FactCheck, Britain sent a record number of military cargo to Israel in June 2025.

Starmer's government can try to hide it all it wants, but we know that Britain is arming Israel's genocide.

ARMS EMBARGO NOW!

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

The Associated Press @apnews.com · 4d

Over 2 million people across Italy have rallied in more than 100 cities for a one-day general strike.

2 million rally in Italy for Gaza as general strike halts key services

Over 2 million people across Italy have rallied in more than 100 cities for a one-day general strike.

bit.ly

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Defend Our Juries @defendourjuries.bsky.social · 4d

BREAKING: Over a thousand people gather in Trafalgar Square to oppose genocide and the Palestine Action ban.

Police have already started arresting peaceful protestors under the Terrorism Act for silently holding signs which say "I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action"

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Saul Staniforth @saulstaniforth.bsky.social · 6d

Al Jazeera reports that its possible one boat from the Global Sumud Flotilla has broken through the Israeli blockade and is now in Palestinian territorial waters off the coast of Gaza.

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

caatuk.bsky.social @caatuk.bsky.social · 8d

According to new research by Channel 4's FactCheck, Britain sent a record number of military cargo to Israel in June 2025.

Starmer's government can try to hide it all it wants, but we know that Britain is arming Israel's genocide.

ARMS EMBARGO NOW!

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

David Wearing @davidwearing.bsky.social · 8d

This is not a peace plan. It's a colonial mandate whereby Israel’s allies will rule Gaza on terms acceptable to Israel, with no Palestinian consent or agency. It was presumably "offered" to Hamas in the hope (at least on Israel's part) that it would be rejected.

www.theguardian.com/world/2025/s...

Trump and Netanyahu to Hamas: accept Gaza peace plan or face consequences

Pair say proposal represents new chapter but Israeli PM threatens to ‘finish the job’ if Hamas officials fail to agree

www.theguardian.com

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Jim Pickard @pickardje.bsky.social · 8d

the idea of Blair acting alongside Trump in a peacemaking role in the Middle East surprised some in his Labour party

One UK minister said: “It’s like a mini-series where the scriptwriters have lost the plot. It has jumped the shark and should be taken off air.”

www.ft.com/content/527b...

Tony Blair set to serve on Trump’s ‘Board of Peace’ for Gaza

Some in former UK prime minister’s Labour party react with surprise at his proposed role in Palestinian territory

www.ft.com

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

caatuk.bsky.social @caatuk.bsky.social · 9d

Over the past 5 days, more than 57,000 Palestinians have been forcibly displaced from northern Gaza.

Israel is ethnically cleansing Gaza in real time - with the support of the British government.

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Saul Staniforth @saulstaniforth.bsky.social · 12d

Mass walkout to clapping and cheers as Netanyahu takes to the podium at the UN general assembly. The chair calls for order in the hall several times.

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Finance & Space @financeandspace.bsky.social · 14d

How is debt reshaping African cities?

In Malawi, the bond financing of roads in Lilongwe challenges the idea of African cities as “unbankable.”

👉 Matthew Lane, Evance Mwathunga & Jennifer Robinson in Finance & Space: doi.org/10.1080/2833...

Browse all journals

doi.org

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Tom Gillespie @t-a-gillespie.bsky.social · 16d

Taken together, these papers offer new ways of thinking with the concept of the frontier that encompasses revisions to established urban theory ('the rent gap'), new concepts from beyond urban studies ('articulation'), new materials (sand), and new geographies (the coast)

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Tom Gillespie @t-a-gillespie.bsky.social · 16d

Niranjana R extends theories of agrarian urbanisation to the oceanic in order to critically reflect on representations of Chennai’s coastline as an urban frontier, arguing that fishing can be understood as an agrarian activity that disrupts rural/urban binaries

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Ecologies of alterity: rethinking the coastal frontier

The urban seashore is often seen as a natural frontier, its sands and seawater deemed an exceptional geography to be made productive through industrialization and urbanization. The coastline of Che...

www.tandfonline.com

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Tom Gillespie @t-a-gillespie.bsky.social · 16d

Situating the case of Singapore within the global geographies of sand extraction, William Jamieson's paper identifies three 'granular frontiers' that demonstrate how sand constitutes a critical but understudied 'outside' of the capitalist urban process

doi.org/10.1080/0272...

Demarcating the granular frontier: planetary urbanization without an inside

In its age of global crisis, sand has acquired a conspicuous profile as an urban resource and undercover vector of statecraft. Amidst mounting reports of the disastrous effects of sand mining stoke...

doi.org

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Tom Gillespie @t-a-gillespie.bsky.social · 16d

Drawing on Staurt Hall to discuss agrarian urbanisation in Gurgaon, @termcern.bsky.social argues that the agrarian world operates as an 'articulating principle' that structures capitalist urban expansion 'without guarantees'

doi.org/10.1080/0272...

Urbanization without guarantees: articulation, rentier capitalism and occupancy on the agrarian urban frontier

This article engages with the work of Stuart Hall to examine conditions of agrarian city-making on India’s urban frontier. The article draws on Hall’s writings on articulation and marxist method to...

doi.org

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Tom Gillespie @t-a-gillespie.bsky.social · 16d

In their contribution, @angrygeographer.bsky.social and Michael Janoschka rethink rent gap theory through an ethnographic case study of frontiers of resource extraction and extended urbanisation in the Ecuadorian Amazon

doi.org/10.1080/0272...

Rethinking rent gaps from the Amazon: urban contestation and extractive frontiers in Ecuador

Contemporary postcolonial urban geographies aim to challenge dominant knowledge production by providing a more in-depth understanding of the frontiers of capital reproduction. This article explores...

doi.org

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Tom Gillespie @t-a-gillespie.bsky.social · 16d

In our introduction, @clairemercer.bsky.social and I:
1. Provide a critical overview of research on urban frontiers
2. Develop a new typology of urban frontier thought
3. Propose two principles for critical and reflexive frontier scholarship

doi.org/10.1080/0272...

New urban frontiers

The frontier is undergoing a resurgence as a productive spatial trope in urban geographical research. This article provides a critical overview of this “frontier moment” and contextualizes it withi...

doi.org

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Tom Gillespie @t-a-gillespie.bsky.social · 16d

'New Urban Frontiers'

This @urbangeography.bsky.social special issue edited by me and @clairemercer.bsky.social has now been published online: www.tandfonline.com/toc/rurb20/4...

A thread on the papers 👇

Urban Geography

New Urban Frontiers. Volume 46, Issue 8 of Urban Geography

www.tandfonline.com

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Prof Katherine Brickell @kbrickell.bsky.social · 16d

I hear 'unboxing videos' are a thing. Matilda decided otherwise.

It's really exciting as well as sobering to receive my new book (with Mel Nowicki) Debt Trap Nation: Family Homelessness in a Failing State.

Royalties to @seacharity.bsky.social

Please order!

www.waterstones.com/book/debt-tr...

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Brett Christophers @brettchristophers.bsky.social · 19d

"China is the only large country driving the energy transition at anything close to the necessary speed and scale."

It's also the only one whose energy transition is not hamstrung by reliance on the motive force of renewables profitability.

Coincidence?

I think not.

Chartbook 409 Beyond the "Marshall Plan": China's solar boom as world-changing industrial policy.

In the first six months of 2025 China installed more than 250GW of solar power capacity.

adamtooze.substack.com

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Gregk Foley @gregk.co.uk · 19d

The entire premise of Starmer's 'Sycophant's Bearhug' strategy was that it would allow him (and the UK) to bear the tumult of Trump 2.0 with dignity in tact, and this is the result: Zero progress on tariffs, a vague statement about Putin, and a right-wing press crowing about how he got dog-walked.

THE TELEGRAPH:

'Send in military to stop boats'

[Trump]

THE TIMES:

Immigration is destroying UK, Trump tells Starmer

DAILY MAIL:

TRUMP SHOWS PM WHO'S BOSS

- He urges Starmer to use the military to stop migrant boats
- Brands wind farms 'expensive' joke and praises North Sea oil
- But says he 'doesn't know' Mandelson and ducks Epstein question

DAILY EXPRESS:

KEIR GIVEN SOME HOME TRUTHS BY DONALD
Trump: Use Army to tackle migrant crisis and step up drilling in the North Sea

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

David Wearing @davidwearing.bsky.social · 22d

The leading, indispensable accomplice to this world historic evil will tomorrow be given all the honours of a state visit to the UK by one of the other key accomplices.

I know that reads as somewhat polemical but it really is just a bald statement of fact.

The Guardian @theguardian.com · 22d

Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, says UN inquiry

Commission’s 72-page legal analysis cites examples including scale of killings, aid blockages and forced displacement * Middle East crisis – live updates A UN commission of inquiry concluded on Tuesday that Israel had committed genocide in Gaza and that top Israeli officials including the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, had incited these acts. It cited examples of the scale of the killings, aid blockages, forced displacement and the destruction of a fertility clinic to back up its genocide finding, adding its voice to rights groups and others that have reached the same conclusion. Continue reading...

www.theguardian.com

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Urban Institute @theurbaninstitute.bsky.social · 23d

"The ‘Gaza Riviera’ is a fantasy plan that relies on urbicide and expulsion"

Jon Silver in the Conversation

theconversation.com/the-gaza-riv...

The ‘Gaza Riviera’ is a fantasy plan that relies on urbicide and expulsion

The leaked redevelopment plan pays homage to mega projects in the Gulf.

theconversation.com

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

The Conversation UK @uk.theconversation.com · 25d

The leaked redevelopment plan pays homage to mega projects in the Gulf.

The ‘Gaza Riviera’ is a fantasy plan that relies on urbicide and expulsion

The leaked redevelopment plan pays homage to mega projects in the Gulf.

tcnv.link

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 26d

we might actually make headway on this climate crisis thing

Albert Pinto @70sbachchan.bsky.social · 26d

4/ New study from my @nzpolicylab.bsky.social lab: @davidfickling.bsky.social covers our report on Chinese overseas green manufacturing FDI. We spent the summer painstakingly coding every single chinese green factory across the world. The results are striking:
bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

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Reposted by Tom Gillespie

Global Development Institute @globaldevinst.bsky.social · 28d

A hybrid lecture on Mon 15 Sep will focus on understanding the links between urban and infrastructural transformation and destruction in the face of the ongoing genocide in Palestine.

The session will feature presentations from Prof Haim Yacobi (UCL) and Chloé Chbat (UoM)

Register: bit.ly/46fwX2M

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