US President Donald Trump has announced that Israel and Hamas have "both signed off" on the first phase of a peace plan for Gaza.

"This means that ALL of the Hostages will be released very soon, and Israel will withdraw their Troops to an agreed upon line as the first steps toward a Strong, Durable, and Everlasting Peace," Trump wrote on Truth Social.

The announcement comes after three days of indirect talks in Egypt - mediated by officials from Egypt, Qatar, Turkey and the US - aimed at bringing an end to the two-year conflict.

Both Israel and Hamas also confirmed an agreement had been reached.

• Follow the latest updates here

However, Trump's post did not provide clarity on other known sticking points in negotiations - notably the disarmament of Hamas and the future governance of Gaza.

In a post on X, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called it a "great day", adding that he would "convene the government tomorrow to ratify the agreement and bring all of our precious hostages home".

Hamas confirmed that the agreement included an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and a hostage-prisoner exchange.

The group also called on Trump, the guarantor countries and other Arab states to compel Israel "to fully implement the agreement's requirements".

A senior White House official told CBS, the BBC's US news partner, that "our assessment is that hostages will begin getting released on Monday".

Qatari Foreign Minister Majed al-Ansari said more details would be announced later, adding that the agreement would "lead to ending the war, the release of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners, and the entry of aid".

Earlier on Wednesday, expectations that a deal could be imminent were heightened after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio entered an event with Trump and handed him a note.

The message appeared to ask that Trump approve a Truth Social post about Gaza so that "you can announce first".

Trump said that note informed him that "we are very close to a deal". He exited the room shortly thereafter, saying he had to focus on the Middle East.

Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry said on Wednesday that Israeli fire had killed at least eight people over the previous 24 hours – the lowest death toll it has reported in the past week.

Hospitals said two people had been killed on Wednesday while trying to collect food from aid distribution centres in central and southern Gaza.

The Israeli military, meanwhile, said its troops had killed "several terrorists" who attempted to attack their position in Gaza City.

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people and took 251 others as hostages.

At least 67,183 have been killed by Israeli military operations in Gaza since then, including 20,179 children, according to the territory's health ministry. Its figures are seen as reliable by the UN and other international bodies, although Israel disputes them.

The ministry has said another 460 people have died from the effects of malnutrition since the start of the war, including 182 since a famine was confirmed in Gaza City in August by the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC).

Netanyahu has repeatedly denied starvation is taking place in Gaza and said Israel was facilitating deliveries of food and other aid.

James Comey, the former director of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation, has pleaded not guilty to making false statements to lawmakers and obstructing a congressional proceeding.

Mr Comey's lawyer entered the plea on his behalf in a federal court in Alexandria, Virginia, on Wednesday morning.

Patrick Fitzgerald said he would seek to have the case dismissed for several reasons including that his client, a critic of President Donald Trump, was being targeted.

Mr Comey was indicted a few days after Trump urged his attorney general to take action against him.

A judge set a trial date of 5 January after Mr Comey's lawyers requested a speedy trial.

Both the prosecution and defence expected the trial to last just two to three days.

In court on Wednesday, Comey's lawyer Patrick Fitzgerald told the judge they planned to file several motions to dismiss the case before a trial, arguing the prosecution was vindictive and that a US attorney was unlawfully appointed to take over the case.

Mr Comey's case was originally overseen by Erik Siebert, a Virginia prosecutor who resigned under pressure from Trump after his investigation into another political adversary - New York Attorney General Letitia James - failed to bring criminal charges. Trump then appointed Lindsey Halligan to replace him.

Mr Comey appeared in good spirits as he entered the courtroom on Wednesday, chatting with his attorneys and making jokes. He was joined by his wife, Patrice Failor and daughter Maureen Comey, a federal prosecutor who the Trump administration recently fired.

• What is Comey accused of?

After listening to the judge read his rights and the two counts against him in court on Wednesday, Mr Comey was asked if he understood the charges.

"I do your honour. Thank you very much," he told the court.

US District Judge Michael Nachmanoff said the two charges each carry a penalty of up to five years in prison and a fine of up to a $200,000 (£149,442).

Representing the government, Ms Halligan took over the role of top federal prosecutor in Virginia's eastern district in September.

In less than a week on the job, she secured a grand jury indictment against Mr Comey after prosecutors before her had declined to take on the case due to a lack of evidence.

The hasty turnaround was reflected in Wednesday's court proceedings, when defence lawyers complained they did not have access to classified documents that prosecutors intended to submit as evidence.

"We feel the cart has been put before the horse," Mr Fitzgerald said.

Judge Nachmanoff warned the government: "I will not slow this case down because the government does not promptly turn over information."

Mr Comey was the FBI Director from 2013 to 2017 and was fired about four months into Trump's first term as president. At the time, Mr Comey was leading an investigation into Russian election interference and whether there were any links between Moscow and Trump's campaign.

During his tenure, Mr Comey sparked a backlash from Democrats when he announced just days before the 2016 presidential election that he was investigating Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server. Charges against Clinton were never brought, leading to criticism from Republicans as well.

Since leaving government, Mr Comey has been an ardent critic of the Trump administration.

The federal government alleges Mr Comey lied to Congress during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in September 2020 when he was being questioned about both the Clinton investigation as well as the Russia election probe. They say he misled the Senate by saying he had not authorised someone at the FBI to leak to news outlets information about the FBI investigations.

Prosecutors also accuse Mr Comey of "corruptly endeavor[ing] to influence, obstruct and impede" the panel by making false statements to it.

In a video Mr Comey posted to his Instagram after he was indicted, he said he was innocent and accused Trump of acting like a "tyrant".

"My family and I have know for years that there are costs to standing up to Donald Trump," he said. "We will not live on our knees."

"I'm innocent," he added. "So let's have a trial."

The charges against Mr Comey came after Trump posted on social media demanding his attorney general, Pam Bondi, prosecute Mr Comey and others.

Five months after 10 inmates broke out of a Louisiana jail, the last escapee has been captured, Louisiana State Police confirmed on Wednesday.

The escaped inmate, 28-year-old Derrick Groves, was taken into custody in Atlanta, Georgia, after a brief stand-off, police said.

Police released several gas canisters into a house where Groves was believed to be hiding, and then found him hiding in a crawl space, CBS News, BBC's US partner, reported.

The 10 inmates, including Groves, had fled the Orleans Parish Justice Center in May by ripping a toilet from the wall and breaking metal bars around the hole in the wall before climbing down a hall and running across a highway.

The inmates had scrawled a few messages into the wall above the hole, including "To Easy LoL", a smiley face with its tongue sticking out, and another that appeared to tell officers to catch them if they can.

The inmates' escape was made easier by a "perfect storm" of staffing issues and building design flaws, Orleans Parish Sheriff Susan Hutson told CBS News in August.

Three were found within 24 hours of their escape and several others were captured in the following weeks.

Deputy US Marshal Brian Fair, of the Eastern District of Louisiana, told CBS News that a tip led investigators to track Groves to the Atlanta area.

When police first approached the home, it appeared that there was no one there, he said.

"We did have concerns maybe he wasn't in the house," Fair told CBS. "But ultimately, they found him hiding in a crawl space. I believe that crawl space was in the basement … and he had put some thought and work into the hiding space he was in."

Groves was convicted of second degree murder in October 2024 after he fired an assault rifle into a Mardi Gras block party, killing two adults, CBS reported.

He was also convicted of attempted murder and a federal firearms charge, and had been sentenced to life imprisonment, according to the Atlanta Police Department.

Now, Groves faces additional charges for his role in the escape, Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill said.

"I will ensure that he is prosecuted to the full extent of the law," she added.

Groves will be extradited to Louisiana for processing, Atlanta police said.

It was another busy day at work.

Russian forces had attacked my home region of Zaporizhzhia again: a region in the south of Ukraine, split between the Russian invaders, who claim it all as theirs, and the defending Ukrainians.

Sitting in my office in central London, I was feeling nostalgic. I decided to take a quick look at the latest satellite images of my childhood village - the poetically titled Verkhnya Krynytsya (or Upper Spring in English), in the Russian-occupied part of the region, just a few kilometres from the front lines.

I could see the familiar dirt tracks, and the houses drowning in lush vegetation. But something caught my eye.

Amid all the apparent quiet of a small village that I remember so well, a new feature had appeared: a well-used road. And it led right to my childhood home.

Satellite images show a path first appearing in the summer of 2022, four months after the occupation began. Images from winter showed it reappearing and a car making use of it in January 2023.

I could think of only one group of people who could be using the path in an occupied village so close to the front line: Russian soldiers. Only they have reason to be out and about in a war zone.

Verkhnya Krynytsya

The truth is that my childhood village is not quiet anymore. Verkhnya Krynytsya was occupied by Russia shortly after the start of the full-scale invasion in February 2022.

By that point, my old house was likely vacant. My family had sold it long ago, but I visited Verkhnya Krynytsya at least once a year before it was occupied, and saw the house sitting apparently abandoned, its garden overgrown.

It was hardly surprising: the village was small and sleepy at the best of times, and for anyone still under retirement age, looking for work meant moving elsewhere.

But many stayed, and more than a thousand people were still there when Russia launched its invasion. Two days later, Ukrainian authorities handed out 43 Kalashnikov rifles to help the villagers fight off the Russians.

At a community gathering, residents decided not to use them against the invaders. A month later, village head Serhiy Yavorsky was captured by the Russians, who beat and tortured him with electricity, needles and acid, according to testimony given in a Ukrainian court.

The Russians also targeted a sewage treatment works outside the village and set up a command post there once the Ukrainians had abandoned the facility.

Even the village's surroundings have changed irreparably.

Before Russia's full-scale invasion, Verkhnya Krynytsya sat on the beautiful Kakhovka reservoir, which was so vast we used to call it "the Sea".

You could see it from pretty much anywhere in the village. It's where locals went swimming in the summer, and where visitors from across the region came in the winter to go ice-fishing. One of my earliest memories is of local women singing Ukrainian folk songs as the sun was setting into the Kakhovka on a warm summer evening.

The Sea disappeared after the Kakhovka dam was destroyed in June 2023, leading to devastating floods that ruined homes and farmland.

To find out what conditions in Verkhnya Krynytsya are like now, I tried reaching out to locals.

Predictably, obtaining answers was very difficult.

Many have left, and those who are still in the village - as is the case in the other occupied parts of Ukraine - are afraid of speaking to the media. Frontline locations are particularly lawless places, where retribution from Russian forces can be swift and brutal.

Social media groups about Verkhnya Krynytsya went silent after it was occupied, and the questions I posted there were left unanswered.

Asking someone to go and have a look at my house was out of the question. What used to be a peaceful, sleepy village has turned into a zone of fear.

The danger in Verkhnya Krynytsya also comes from the sky. The village's proximity to the front line means it is a dangerous location, exposed to frequent aerial attacks from the Ukrainians.

One acquaintance told me that locals preferred to stay indoors for fear of being hit by drones. "It's very dangerous there," I was told. "They are active, and they can target you, your house or your car. Our village has changed a lot, Vitaly."

New residents

So, given the danger and devastation caused to Verkhnya Krynytsya by the war, who could have possibly made the track marks leading to and from my old home?

It is highly unlikely anyone would choose to move to the village now - with the exception of Russian soldiers.

Many of them moved into vacant houses after capturing Verkhnya Krynytsya. In June 2022 authorities in Zaporizhzhia said they had information that Russian troops were staying in the village. This is when satellite images first show signs of the path at my old home.

To check if I was right in assuming that Russian soldiers had likely moved into my old house, I approached the Ukrainian 128th Detached Heavy Mechanised Brigade, which is involved in operations in the area.

"You're not wrong. It's extremely likely," its spokesman Oleksandr Kurbatov told me.

As locals have been fleeing frontline areas, they are being replaced with Russian military, he said.

"If there are not enough empty houses, demand is running high. Of course, it's usually military personnel from the occupation army," he told me.

Because nobody in the village was willing to take the risk of having a look at my house, I asked my BBC Verify colleague Richard Irvine-Brown to obtain and analyse recent satellite images. They showed a pattern of movement around the house where I grew up.

There was no sign of a path to the property in March 2022, a month into the invasion.

Aside from the faint path seen in two satellite images in June, the property seemed ignored. Then the path reappeared in December, and a car was seen using it in January 2023. We don't have any images for the property again until August, by when the track had become well established.

The path fades and reappears with the seasons, showing that whoever is using it only does so periodically.

It seems the property is being used during the winter - and likely by Russian soldiers, who have been moving into vacant properties. This is plausible, as biting Ukrainian winters can make it too cold for men or their supplies to stay in trenches, makeshift dwellings and storage.

The truth about what happened to my house may not become known for a long time yet - certainly not while the village is under occupation.

For now, it seems that my old home has become a tiny cog in the wider machine of Russia's war in Ukraine.

Additional reporting by Richard Irvine-Brown

For more on this story listen to Vitaly Shevchenko on Ukrainecast

"It's not about him, it's about me," declares Victoria Beckham ("him" being her husband Sir David Beckham).

And that's exactly what we get in a new three-part documentary, which drops on Netflix on Thursday.

The former Spice Girl and fashion entrepreneur, 51, is determined to tell her own story – two years after former England captain Sir David, 50, released his own, hugely successful TV series.

The episodes take us inside Victoria's pop career, family life, struggles to reinvent herself and preparation for a major show at Paris Fashion Week.

We also learn about the serious financial troubles her fashion business faced, and how she feared she might "lose everything".

There are contributions from famous friends including Eva Longoria, and fashion titans such as Dame Anna Wintour and Donatella Versace.

Here are our main takeaways from her documentary.

Before the Spice Girls, Victoria was 'not cool'

Lady Beckham achieved dizzying fame in the Spice Girls, so it's hard to believe that at school, she was "that uncool kid" who didn't fit in.

"I was definitely a loner at school", she says, explaining she was bullied.

The Spice Girls came together in 1994, after Mel B, Mel C, Emma Bunton, Geri Halliwell and Victoria responded to an advert for candidates.

After the release of their chart-topping debut single Wannabe in 1996, "Spice mania" swept the planet, with their self-styled "Girl Power" mantra - a brand of female empowerment that made them a global pop culture phenomenon.

Lady Beckham credits her bandmates for making her "more lighthearted, more fun" and says it was the first time she felt popular.

She still had to face negative headlines about her weight, and discusses having an eating disorder. She says she never talked about it publicly, or even very much with her parents, but that it made her become “very good at lying".

But Lady Beckham says the other Spice Girls made her "feel good enough" about being herself. It's a message she continues to instil in her daughter Harper, 14.

"I tell Harper every day, be who you are," she says.

What was buried in Baden-Baden?

Geri Halliwell left the Spice Girls in 1998 and the group split up in 2001.

Lady Beckham says she found the transition "really, really difficult".

She carried on making music, but the criticism she received "really hurt".

Then came the infamous WAG period. Pictures of Victoria and other wives-and-girlfriends supporting their footballer partners in the German town of Baden-Baden in 2006 were plastered all over the tabloids.

"It was fun," says Lady Beckham of that time in her life.

But she now concedes there was an "element of attention seeking" to it all. "I was trying to find myself, I felt incomplete, sad, frozen in time maybe," she says.

After the family moved to the US, Lady Beckham decided she wanted to work in fashion.

But to do that, she knew she had to shed her other personas – the Spice Girl, the WAG. "I buried those boobs in Baden-Baden," she says.

Victoria 'almost lost everything' in struggles with fashion business

Lady Beckham is strikingly honest about the struggles her fashion business faced.

She says people didn't see her as "cool at all", and that a lot of people refused to take her seriously.

And Vogue giant Dame Anna cements that view, when she says of Victoria's fashion aspirations: "I thought maybe this was a hobby. I didn't quite believe it."

We see the growth of Victoria Beckham Ltd but also the serious financial troubles it faced. Sir David says he didn't think her business would survive, while Lady Beckham agrees.

"I almost lost everything and that was a dark, dark time," she says. "I used to cry before I went to work every day because I felt like a firefighter."

She says her firm was "tens of millions in the red".

In a later scene, her voice breaks, and she wells up in tears, when she recalls how Sir David stepped in to help her business out.

But the series also shows her turn things around, and we see her pull out all the stops in the run-up to her triumphant Spring/Summer show at Paris Fashion Week in September 2024.

Supermodel Gigi Hadid walked for her, wearing a striking emerald green gown. Dame Anna is shown in attendance, and, in an earlier clip, says Lady Beckham "totally proved us wrong".

Today, Victoria's business has offices in London and New York, with its flagship store in Mayfair, London. The brand's products are in 230 stores across 50 countries around the world, according to the company's website.

Family life carries on, amid reports of feud with Brooklyn

The couple's eldest son, 26-year-old Brooklyn, gets a few mentions in the show and appears briefly. Lady Beckham brings him up in conversation, when discussing the morning sickness she faced while pregnant with him and performing with the Spice Girls.

But for the past few months, much of the online interest around the Beckhams has focused on reports that Brooklyn and his wife Nicola have fallen out with the rest of the family.

The couple were absent from David Beckham's 50th birthday celebrations and did not post a birthday message online, fuelling the intrigue.

Nicola has in the past denied there was a feud in the family. Sir David and Lady Beckham have never acknowledged the rumoured rift, and declined to comment when asked by BBC News.

• Can the Beckham brand survive reports of family feud?

We did get a hint on the topic recently from Victoria, who told the Sunday Times how she felt Liam and Noel Gallagher's reconciliation must have made their mother "so happy".

"As a mum, that must be... she must feel so happy to see her boys getting on," she said.

Showbiz reporter Catrina Rose notes there was “no hint” of any alleged feud in the series.

"Victoria's setting a lot of records straight here, but she's not being drawn on this particular topic."

There's a good explanation for why she doesn't smile

Lady Beckham's pout became her defining look in the 1990s. But in the new series, she admits there's a deeper reason as to why she never smiles.

"The minute I see a camera, I change," she says.

"The barrier goes up, my armour goes on, and that's when, you know, the miserable cow that doesn't smile - that's when she comes out. And I'm so conscious of that."

She adds that she would "rather not be that person" and wishes she had the confidence to walk out in front of cameras and smile.

Elsewhere, she insists that she does actually smile.

"I've looked miserable for all these years because when we stand on the red carpet, this guy has always gone on the left," she says, gesturing at Sir David.

"When I smile, I smile from the left, because if I smile from the right, I look unwell. So consequently I'm smiling on the inside, but no one ever sees it, so that's why I look so moody."

That's one use of a noisy kitchen blender

The programme is filled with small details about the Beckhams' relationship – many of which we didn't know before.

For example, Sir David starts a blender when he doesn't want to listen to Victoria (so she says, anyway).

The pair have fond memories of their whirlwind romance in the 1990s, which led to them getting married and having a baby within two years.

Sir David reflects that his parents - and his manager - would have preferred him to marry a local girl who stayed in Manchester, where he was playing for Manchester United. "But I didn't want that," he says, opting instead for globe-trotting celebrity Victoria.

"I was so excited, I wanted everyone to know I was dating Posh Spice," the former England captain says.

Lady Beckham, for her part, says she was never a young girl dreaming of getting married or becoming a mum. "It wasn't until I met David that those things even occurred to me," she says.

There won't be another Beckham baby

In the final episode, which was filmed before Sir David's 50th birthday this year, the pair get reflective about everything they have achieved, and what lies ahead for them.

"Success, it feels good, I'm not going to lie," says Victoria. "I've still got a lot that I want to do."

Sir David, for his part, seems to have something else on his mind.

"Now we're both, well I'm almost 50, you're 51, what's next? Another baby?," David asks his wife.

Victoria laughs. "Another baby? My God. No."

Victoria Beckham, a three-part documentary series, is available now on Netflix.

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Something has shifted in Scotland.

The saltire, which was long embraced by supporters of Scottish independence, has now been unfurled for a different cause.

Up and down the land, the blue and white of St Andrew is fluttering from lampposts and being waved alongside the union flag at anti-immigration protests.

Until recently those two standards were more often seen on different sides of the debate about Scotland's future.

Now the saltire's presence is generating controversy of its own at demonstrations from Perth to Aberdeen and from Glasgow to Falkirk, where the latest rally was held on Wednesday evening.

This battle for Scotland's flag is also a battle about what it means to be a patriot in modern Scotland - a battle of competing nationalisms.

Steven Rennie is one of the prominent figures in these recent protests.

He blends opposition to independence and immigration with sharp criticism of the Scottish National Party - which is in favour of both.

I stood within a few feet of Mr Rennie as he addressed hundreds of supporters in the centre of Glasgow in late September.

With his shoulders wrapped in the red, white and blue of the union flag, he spoke of the saltire.

"They claimed our national flag as their own and for 12 long years we've allowed them to wield it as a weapon of division and hate.

"But no more. We have reclaimed our flag, our identity, our pride and also our resolve," he said.

The crowd - separated from hundreds of counter-protesters by a line of police officers - cheered the denunciation of the SNP whose leaders, in a referendum 11 years ago, failed to persuade a majority of Scottish voters to opt to leave the UK.

"The SNP has wreaked havoc on our nation, dismantling our prosperity and our potential at every turn, replacing us with new Scots and putting our own people at the bottom of the pile," said Mr Rennie.

"New Scots" is a welcoming term used by Scottish government ministers who are keen to attract more foreign workers to help grow an economy which is challenged by a record low birth rate.

The SNP has run the devolved government in Edinburgh since 2007 but immigration remains the responsibility of the UK government in London - and it has rejected calls for a separate Scottish visa system.

Migration is a thorn in the side for Labour Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and appears to be rising up the agenda ahead of the Scottish parliamentary elections next spring.

The small boats crisis and the accommodation of asylum seekers in hotels, which Sir Keir has promised to phase out, have fuelled demonstrations around the UK.

That includes protests in Falkirk, where a building which was once a three-star hotel is being used to house migrants.

One protester, who gave his name as Mark, held a union flag emblazoned with "Stop the Boats".

He said politicians should be fixing ailing public services, not spending taxpayers' money on medical and dental care for asylum seekers.

"We're sick of these people rolling up in boats, getting four-star hotels," he told me.

"They're getting their three meals a day while Britain's services suffer. We're just sick of it and Starmer is not doing enough to try and stop it."

Minutes earlier one of the speakers had shouted: "Keep Britain white. Keep Scotland white. Keep Scotland Scottish."

Mark insisted the man did not speak for him, and that the protest was "nothing to do with racism".

Outside the hotel a group of counter-protesters, including many trade unionists, had gathered.

They too were critical of the prime minister – but for different reasons. They accused him of pandering to the far right.

The two camps appear to share a sense of disgust about the UK's ailing economy and the poor state of public services - although they do not necessarily agree on the causes or the solutions.

"The real issue in our society is the people in government who aren't tackling these issues head on, not people fleeing persecution trying to find a better place to live," said a counter protester in Falkirk, who gave her name as Sage.

Referring to the anti-asylum seeker protest across the road, she said: "I don't blame these people for falling for these narratives, because everyone is suffering.

"It doesn't matter what side of the political spectrum we're on, everyone is going through it."

The real problem, insisted Sage, was billionaires making record profits and not paying enough tax.

"We know who is underfunding our services. It's not migrants and refugees," she said.

One recurring complaint among protesters is about the number of migrants being housed at local authority expense.

The issue is most acute in Glasgow, which has the UK's highest number of refugees in council accommodation.

Asylum seekers are housed by the UK Home Office but, after they are granted leave to remain and become refugees, that support quickly expires.

At that point, many become homeless and, because Scottish councils have a statutory duty to house all homeless people, they must step in.

"Essentially, we have run out of temporary accommodation," said Glasgow City Council leader Susan Aitken.

"We don't have anywhere to put all of these people who are now declaring themselves homeless in the city, and we're having to put them up in hotels, and that's very, very expensive."

The SNP councillor for Langside wants the UK government to step in but is at pains to stress that refugees do not have priority over anyone else.

Aitken added: "Anyone who is telling you that asylum seekers and refugees are prioritised by the SNP, by the Scottish government, or by this council is lying to you. It is simply not true."

Still, some hostility to immigrants persists and migration has risen up the list of Scottish voters' concerns as flags have appeared on lampposts around the country.

Hundreds of saltires have gone up in working class communities such as those in north and east Glasgow; Sighthill in Edinburgh; and Falkirk's Westfield.

Shawn, a refugee who lives in north Glasgow, believes the saltire usually represents peace, harmony and inclusion - but says it is now being flown "for the far-right and racism".

The former police officer and his mother Mala successfully sought asylum in the UK after they fled their South East Asian homeland in circumstances they asked not to discuss in public for their own safety.

Shawn, who runs a community organisation called the Springburn Unity Network, said he had been subjected to racist insults in Glasgow and knew immigrants who were afraid to leave their homes because of the recent protests.

Debates about flags are not just raging in Scotland's big cities and working class towns.

In the prosperous Renfrewshire village of Bridge of Weir, the hoisting of saltires has led to a row on the local Facebook group.

In the middle of the village, Dougie Moore told me he approved of the flags because they sent a message to immigrants that "they should be coming to enjoy our country the way that we enjoy it rather than changing things".

Bunty Singh, who owns a local café and delicatessen, said he had no issue with anyone flying a national flag but also insisted there were no problems with immigration in Bridge of Weir.

"It's a peaceful, lovely village," insisted Mr Singh who was born in Glasgow to parents who were originally from India.

"We're happy to be here and we are welcomed here."

But at a local community hub Ian Gillies was concerned about the saltires, which he regarded as unwelcoming and divisive.

"I think it's in keeping with the spirit of the age," he said.

"'Every man for himself and we don't want anybody else coming our way.' I see the same trend in the States and elsewhere in the continent. It's sad to see it coming here."

Mr Gillies is not the only person to note an Americanisation of politics on this side of the Atlantic in the age of Donald Trump and social media.

At the protest in Glasgow where Steven Rennie spoke about the saltire, there were chants, calls and placards in support of right-wing American influencer Charlie Kirk, who had been shot dead days earlier.

Later the crowd chanted "Oh Tommy, Tommy", in tribute to the convicted criminal and far-right activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, who uses the name Tommy Robinson and has been supported by Elon Musk.

Matthew Feldman, a visiting professor at Liverpool Hope University and leading expert on the radical right, said he was concerned that extremism was bleeding into mainstream political debate because overt racism and the glorification of terrorism were "being given a pass" on US-owned social media platforms.

At the anti-migrant protest in Falkirk, one banner referenced former SNP first minister Humza Yousaf's calls for greater ethnic diversity in Scottish public life in a speech which had been highlighted and criticised by Musk and Reform UK leader Nigel Farage.

The same banner went on to quote a white supremacist slogan known as the 14 Words: "We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children."

"The 14 Words actually comes from the eighth chapter of Mein Kampf," explained Prof Feldman.

He said the slogan was "a translation of Hitler's sense of Aryan supremacy" and was popularised in the US in the 1980s by the late white supremacist David Lane.

"It is inconceivable to me that somebody that is writing out that phrase doesn't associate it with white supremacism and, more importantly, with a sort of an anti or racist view towards ethnic and religious minorities," added Prof Feldman.

It was not the only extreme language on display in Falkirk.

Another sign read "Kill 'Em All. Let God Sort 'Em Out," a phrase originally associated with a 13th Century Catholic crusade.

While not defending the placards, many of the protesters we spoke to insisted they had genuine concerns about the safety of women and children.

They pointed to the conviction of an Afghan asylum seeker for raping a 15-year-girl in the town and the arrest of a resident of the asylum hotel on sexual indecency charges, which he denies.

Farage has also suggested sexual assault by asylum seekers is a particular problem, a claim described by Glasgow City Council leader Susan Aitken as one of history's oldest and nastiest racist slurs.

When I spoke to Farage on a visit to Aberdeen earlier this year he insisted that Reform UK was now a serious contender in Scottish politics.

"I've spent a year going around England campaigning ahead of the English local elections, and perceptions of me and the party have changed over that last year, and I intend to make that happen in Scotland over the next year," he told me.

That claim may be bolstered by Reform's strong third place in June's Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse by-election, which Labour won.

On Wednesday, Scotland's First Minister John Swinney said arguments about immigration were being "fanned by a wider debate" going on in the UK and around the globe.

The SNP leader told me he believed in a Scotland that was "tolerant, welcoming and inclusive" and urged people "to avoid us being swept down a route of a relentless rightward direction in the United Kingdom".

Swinney added: "I don't think that's where Scotland wants to be. I don't think that's how Scotland feels. And I want to make sure that people in Scotland realise that there is a danger that we will be carried down that route if we don't take a different course."

Polls ahead of May's Holyrood election suggest a big lead for the SNP, with Reform potentially overtaking the Conservatives to challenge Labour for second place, despite never before having won a seat at Holyrood.

Whatever flags are waved by whichever party in the campaign, immigration appears likely to take its place alongside the economy and public services as a big issue.

It's a very long way - in every possible sense - from Deir al-Balah in the centre of the Gaza Strip to Durham in north-eastern England.

"It's another planet, not just another world," says Sana el-Azab, who arrived in the cathedral city late last month after being evacuated to the UK with 33 other students.

"No-one can understand what I lived through in Gaza."

In June, the 29-year-old former teacher was awarded a scholarship at Durham University to study educational leadership and change.

Weeks of uncertainty followed, as British politicians and academics lobbied for her - and dozens of other Gazan students with fully-funded places - to be allowed to come to the UK.

But in the dead of night, on 17 September, "the big moment" that she'd been waiting for finally arrived and Sana left her home first for Jordan, for biometric tests, and then for Durham.

This is the first time that she, and other Gaza students who have been brought to the UK, have spoken publicly.

"There's no chance to continue your higher education in Gaza," she told me. "All the universities are destroyed. There's no education system at all anymore."

The main campus of Al-Azhar University – one of the biggest and oldest Palestinian academic institutions, where Sana did a BA in English literature - is now reported to have been reduced to rubble by Israeli bombardment and controlled demolitions.

For two years, all formal face-to-face education has been on hold, with the UN warning of a "lost generation" of children.

Schools were turned into shelters for displaced people.

And 97% of them have sustained some level of damage from the war, according to the Global Education Cluster, a partnership of UN agencies and NGOs.

Many were directly hit by air strikes which the Israeli military said targeted operatives of Hamas and other armed groups.

Almost 660,000 children remain out of school. About 87,000 university students have also been affected.

In June, a UN independent international commission of inquiry said Israel had "obliterated Gaza's education system".

"My six-year old niece asked me what it's like to be in school," Sana says. "She doesn't know. Imagine what they've all missed out on. This is now the third year."

In April last year, Sana set up her own makeshift school in a roof-less building at her home in Deir al-Balah. Twenty girls between the ages of seven and 12 usually attended class. At times, she had up to 50 students.

"I saw displaced children just spending their time in queues for food and water - not having a childhood, and I wanted to do something, for them," she says. "There were drones overhead 24 hours and bombing around us."

But the children were keen. "I wanted to give them a little normalcy."

She taught them English at first, adding a bit of maths, at the children's request.

There were weekly art classes to allow the girls to express their trauma. "No parent had time to talk to their children about their feelings," she says.

And there was a simple daily meal because: "It's not easy to teach hungry kids."

She says she also taught them "survival skills" – including how to filter water with charcoal to make it safer to use.

Leaving them and her extended family behind was a tough decision. For her, and all the students who have arrived in the UK, there's a mixture of pride and guilt.

"I left with just my mobile phone and the clothes I was wearing - that's all I was allowed to take," she says. "I'm so proud that I made it here. But it's very complicated. I can't process everything. It's overwhelming.

"I'm relieved and grateful and happy that I got out but I feel sorrow at leaving behind my precious siblings, and nieces and nephews, and elderly parents in that dire situation."

In all, 58 students from Gaza have now arrived to take up scholarships at more than 30 universities around the UK. After the first group of 34 arrived last month, another group of 24 came last week. Twenty more are waiting to come out of Gaza.

"It's been a relentless and very, very difficult process, when it should have been much easier," says Nora Parr, an academic and researcher at Birmingham University, who has co-ordinated the educational evacuations.

"These are the people who are going to rebuild Gaza," she says. "They want to do everyone proud and learn as much as they can. I wish they could have come a week or two before their courses started to help them settle in."

She adds: "But I hope this is an opportunity that can be built on because the needs are massive."

A UK Foreign Office spokesperson said the evacuation had been a "highly complex process" and that more students were expected to arrive in the coming weeks.

For Sana, leaving Gaza to study in Durham was an unmissable chance.

Education has always been a sanctuary for her and a bridge to the future. But she says she is struggling to concentrate.

"It's hard to go from survival mode to learning. Half of my mind is in class and the other half is still in Gaza.

"I'm still discovering Durham. It's a beautiful place that's safe and small and there are a lot of supportive people. It's like therapy for me just to walk around."

During her first trip to a supermarket, she was unable to tear herself away from the bread aisle - and the sights and smells of so much plenty. But she still can't eat or sleep properly.

She wants to gain all that she can from the experience in the UK.

"And then I want to go back to Gaza and bring the change," she says.

There is a higher risk of a serious fall in US stocks than is currently being reflected in the market, the head of JP Morgan has told the BBC.

Jamie Dimon, who leads America's largest bank, said he was "far more worried than others" about a serious market correction, which he said could come in the next six months to two years.

In a rare and wide-ranging interview, the bank boss also said that the US had become a "less reliable" partner on the world stage.

He cautioned he was still "a little worried" about inflation in the US, but insisted he thought the Federal Reserve would remain independent, despite repeated attacks by the Trump administration on its chair Jerome Powell.

Jamie Dimon was in Bournemouth, where he was announcing an investment of about £350m in JP Morgan's campus there, as well as a £3.5m philanthropic investment in local non-profits.

Commenting on the investment, Chancellor Rachel Reeves said: "As one of Dorset's biggest private sector employers, JP Morgan Chase expanding their Bournemouth campus is fantastic news for the local economy and people who live here."

Ahead of the interview, Dimon appeared before a town hall on the campus - cutting a figure more akin to an off-duty rock star than bank CEO - wearing an open-collar shirt and jeans, and high-fiving staff on his way to the stage.

Opening with his take on the UK's economy, Dimon said he felt Rachel Reeves was doing a "terrific job", and he felt optimistic about some of the government's attempts to boost innovation and cut regulation.

However, in the broader economic picture, he felt there were increased risks US stock markets were overheated.

"I am far more worried about that than others," he said.

There were a "lot of things out there" creating an atmosphere of uncertainty, he added, pointing to risk factors like the geopolitical environment, fiscal spending and the remilitarisation of the world.

"All these things cause a lot of issues that we don't know how to answer," he said.

"So I say the level of uncertainty should be higher in most people's minds than what I would call normal."

Much of the rapid growth in the stock market in recent years has been driven by investment in AI.

On Wednesday, the Bank of England drew a comparison with the dot com boom (and subsequent bust) of the late 1990s - and warned that the value of AI tech companies "appear stretched" with a rising risk of a "sharp correction".

"The way I look at it is AI is real, AI in total will pay off," he said.

"Just like cars in total paid off, and TVs in total paid off, but most people involved in them didn't do well."

He added some of the money being invested in AI would "probably be lost".

Bullets, guns and bombs

Global security has been a recent focus for the JP Morgan boss, with his letter to shareholders earlier this year warning the US would run out of missiles in seven days of a South China Sea war.

Reflecting on how the world could combat risk factors, he pointed to greater military investment.

"People talk about stockpiling things like crypto, I always say we should be stockpiling bullets, guns and bombs.

"The world's a much more dangerous place, and I'd rather have safety than not."

Another risk factor which many in the global economy believe the US could be facing is pressure placed on the independence of the Federal Reserve, America's central bank.

On this, he said he thought central bank independence was important - but was willing to take Trump "at his word" that he would not interfere in Fed independence, despite the president describing current Fed chair Jerome Powell as a "moron" and a "numbskull" for failing to lower interest rates more quickly.

Dimon acknowledged the US had become a "little less reliable" but said that some of the Trump administration's action had pushed Europe to act over underinvestment in Nato and its lack of economic competitiveness.

Dimon also shared insights into a potential breakthrough in trade negotiations between India and the US.

He said he wanted to "bring India closer" and he believed a deal was close to reduce additional tariffs on India, which were imposed as a penalty for its continued trade with Russia, particularly its oil purchases.

"In fact, I've spoken to several of the Trump officials who say they want to do that, and I've been told that they are going to do that."

Jamie Dimon's name has been frequently mentioned among the big financial players capable of making a transition into politics.

Ahead of Trump's re-election last year, influential investor Bill Ackman said he would be an "incredible choice" as treasury secretary, and he has also been the subject of speculation about a potential presidential run.

Asked about his political ambitions, Dimon said it "wasn't on the cards", and his focus was on keeping JP Morgan as a "healthy and vibrant company".

"If you gave me the presidency, I'd take it," he joked. "I think I'd do a good job."

Last week Kemi Badenoch announced that the Conservative Party would take the UK out of the European Convention of Human Rights if they won the next election.

"I have not come to this decision lightly," the Tory leader said. "But it is clear that it is necessary to protect our borders, our veterans, and our citizens."

Her words came on the eve of the party's annual conference, at a time when the Conservatives are under enormous pressure from Reform UK.

Nigel Farage's party also wants out of the ECHR, as well as other international treaties that he thinks stand in the way of curbing illegal immigration. Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey, meanwhile, has been just as strident the other way.

"Kemi Badenoch has chosen to back Nigel Farage and join Vladimir Putin," he declared - adding "this will do nothing to stop the boats or fix our broken immigration system".

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has weighed in, though he hovers somewhere in between. He told the BBC he does not want to "tear down" human rights laws, but backs changing how international law is interpreted to stop unsuccessful asylum seekers blocking their deportation.

But while strongly-worded opinions over whether or not to pull out of the treaty make for easy headlines, the consequences are deeply complicated. Even Badenoch acknowledged last year that leaving would not be a "silver bullet" for tackling immigration.

So how is it that such a nuanced issue has been reduced to a political hot potato?

Dodging political bullets

It was back in 2011 - not far into David Cameron's tenure as prime minister - that this issue came to the forefront of domestic politics.

It centred around the case of John Hirst, a man convicted of manslaughter, who argued the UK's blanket ban on prisoners voting in any circumstances was a breach of human rights. In 2005 Strasbourg had ruled in his favour. It essentially said the UK's policy was too black and white.

Cameron's Labour predecessors Tony Blair and Gordon Brown dodged the political bullet of being seen to give in to the court.

But when the relatively new Tory PM said he felt "physically ill" at the prospect of giving jailed criminals the vote, his soundbite propelled the ECHR to the heart of public consciousness.

The ECHR had been largely drafted by a British team and aimed to impose on post-fascist Europe a "never-again" package of legal rights.

Its content drew heavily on historic laws - for example the concept of Habeas Corpus (banning unlawful detention), can be seen in the ECHR's Article 5.

Officially, the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg polices those rights. And when it rules that a country is in breach, the member states come together to find a way of fixing the problem in the Council of Europe (nothing to do with the EU).

But in the UK, there is also the Human Rights Act, which means ECHR cases can be dealt with by its own judges.

Disputes between UK courts and Strasbourg can be worked through too - what happened following the John Hirst case is testament to this.

In 2017, ministers allowed offenders who had been released on licence the right to vote - but made clear that Parliament would never allow votes for criminals still in prison cells. The Council of Europe closed the case. And just weeks ago the Strasbourg court threw out a fresh attempt by a prisoner to re-open the issue.

Yet it was the original clash, together with Cameron's comments in 2011, that stuck in many minds.

Adding fuel to the fire that same year, Theresa May - home secretary at the time - shared a story during party conference about a Bolivian man who avoided deportation because of his pet cat.

This illustrated the problem with human rights laws, she argued.

Only the story, as May told it, wasn't entirely correct, according to England's top judges.

The Home Office indeed wanted to send the man home as an illegal immigrant. And the cat - called Maya - had featured in the man's appeal. But that was only a tiny part of the detailed evidence he provided.

A spokesperson for the Judicial Office at the Royal Courts of Justice, which issues statements on behalf of senior judges, said at the time that the cat was "nothing to do with" the eventual judgement, which allowed the man to stay.

Yet the pet became a source of unintentional humour - and when a judge cracked a joke about the cat no longer needing to fear adapting to Bolivian mice, the case took on a life of its own.

By that autumn, a mood had begun to take hold about human rights that, 14 years later, has culminated in the Conservatives pledging to leave the ECHR.

'Open-ended and obscure obligations'

Richard Ekins KC, a professor at the University of Oxford, is a staunch critic of the ECHR on the basis that membership in his view compromises UK sovereignty.

"But there is a more fundamental problem," he argues. "And the fundamental problem can be observed by paying attention to what the court has been doing, which really is quite openly to expand the Convention's reach over time."

He references a case last year, where the court ruled that Switzerland had breached human rights by failing to tackle climate change.

The incredibly complex judgement was celebrated by campaigners as a game-changer - but a British judge, Tim Eicke KC, said the majority on the panel had "gone beyond what it is legitimate and permissible for this court to do".

"The judgment… imposes very far reaching, but also open ended and obscure obligations on member states," argues Prof Ekins.

"Domestic courts are going to be invited to apply the European Court's new approach to discipline, supervise [and] control climate policy, which obviously is a highly complicated and tangled set of considerations that intersect with social policy, economic policy, foreign policy."

This is the heart of his argument: a court completely divorced from the political will of the British people is now making the UK do things that are far beyond its original remit.

"It's incompatible - its intention at least - with parliamentary democracy," he argues.

Hijacked by the immigration debate

Nowhere is the allegation of overreach stronger in British politics than in Reform's claim that the ECHR is to blame for problems with the UK's migration system.

Yet the evidence supporting this claim is often anecdotal and complex - as was the case with Maya the cat.

A study of media stories about the ECHR by the University of Oxford's Bonavero Institute for Human Rights found that fewer than 1% of all foreign criminals who have appealed against their deportation in the UK have won their case on human rights grounds.

When cases went as far as Strasbourg, the court tended to throw them out.

That's not to say there are no issues at all.

Lord Jonathan Sumption, the former Supreme Court judge, believes that some decisions by immigration tribunal judges have become "extravagant" and far removed from the original boundaries of the right to family life.

"I have no problem about the text of the Convention," he says. "I do have a problem about the unlimited expansion which it's undergone at the hands of the Strasbourg Court.

"It's unfortunate that the whole issue has been hijacked by the question of immigration.

"I think that it will make some difference to the ability to keep people out or deport them if we are not members of the ECHR. But I think the extent that it will make a difference is not widely understood - and has been greatly exaggerated."

Would leaving the ECHR 'stop the boats'?

So, would leaving the ECHR really "stop the boats", to use Rishi Sunak's phrase?

"The number one problem about deporting illegal immigrants, first of all, is finding a place which will take them and which is not unsafe," argues Lord Sumption.

"And secondly, [there is] the Refugee Convention. It doesn't require us to take in asylum seekers. It does require us to adjudicate on their claims and give them certain rights once they've got here, even if they got here illegally.

"The ECHR is certainly an additional difficulty, but not as great a difficulty, as is suggested."

The UK government has already promised to devise clearer and stricter rules that will tell immigration officials and judges how to interpret the right to family life.

"I think it is a runner," argues Sir Jonathan Jones, who was the Treasury Solicitor until 2020. This, he believes, could be the best way forward - particularly around the definition of the ECHR's Article 8, which guarantees the right to, among other things, family life.

"It's legitimate for the government to say we will take a tighter view, as a proper, reasoned, good faith attempt to rein in what we think Article 8 covers and what it doesn't."

But Alex Chalk, the last Conservative Lord Chancellor before Labour won power, argues that the UK government needs to seek reform faster.

"The ECHR is not holy writ," he told the BBC during the Conservative party conference. "This government should be moving much more quickly to seek urgent reform. [It] should have been saying, look, we want to lead on this to do this in six weeks.

"The US Constitution was drafted in 15 weeks or so. This really can be done."

'Rights are going to suffer'

Human rights lawyer Harriet Wistrich is concerned about what could be lost if the UK does leave the ECHR. It has, she argues, been at the forefront of challenging the state's treatment of victims of awful abuses.

"We were able to hold Greater Manchester Police accountable on behalf of Rochdale grooming gang victims through civil [damages] proceedings.

"The Hillsborough inquests were possible by having Article 2 [the right to life] inquiries into deaths, where you want to examine what went wrong and what the state could have done differently.

"If we withdraw fully… it's those rights that are going to suffer," says Ms Wistrich, who is also the founder of the Centre for Women's Justice.

Beyond legal battles at home, there are big international questions too around leaving.

The 1998 Belfast Agreement, the cornerstone of peace in Northern Ireland, and the post-Brexit deal with the European Union placed respect for human rights law at their centre. Critics of withdrawing from the EHCR predict both could come crashing down.

But Professor Ekins believes that you can have human rights safeguards without a supranational court overseeing all nations.

He and colleagues wrote a detailed proposal on Northern Ireland that argue the historic arrangements don't require the UK to remain in the ECHR, providing it honours human rights and cross-community power-sharing arrangements by other means.

The issues in Northern Ireland and the Republic could, however, go deeper. Sir Jonathan Jones for one is sceptical about how leaving the ECHR would go down in both places - because the ECHR's role in the agreement was to demonstrate to a lot of people who do not trust the British state that there are laws in place to protect them.

"The thing about the Convention is that it constrains governments, and it constrains the way that governments can treat minorities and people it doesn't like," he says.

"If we were out of the ECHR, you wouldn't have that constraint."

Alex Chalk warns there could be an international price to leaving, too. There is value, he says, in sitting at the Council of Europe and raising issues with French and German counterparts at international conferences.

"You should try to reform before you yank your way out because inevitably there could be cost to doing so," he argues.

But ultimately, he adds, "this is a matter of politics more than it is of law".

Top image: Getty Images

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