#protests

#protests

After a summer of institutional mishaps to raise the pulse of the most hardened spin doctor, the Royal Ballet and Opera's new season was audible far beyond the venue. Shame on you, chanted protesters over a powerful PA system outside. Some, standing amid yellow and blue flags, simply held placards. Art is not neutral, read one. And indeed it isn't, though opera's entanglements in international geopolitics are rarely as visible as at Covent Garden in recent months.

Herzog's visit to London drew widespread criticism in the United Kingdom, with thousands demonstrating outside Downing Street for a second consecutive day, according to the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Protesters also gathered at the London-based think tank Chatham House, banging pots and pans as Herzog delivered a speech. There's a genocide happening and the president of that country is in our country and being welcomed here, when nobody is happy about it, a protester told Al Jazeera.

Herzog, speaking to the Chatham House thinktank immediately after the meeting, said he had offered the British government a fact-finding mission to look at the levels of aid entering Gaza. He denied there was any famine and blamed the high civilian death toll on Hamas placing missiles in living rooms. He offered no apology for the attack on Hamas's leadership in Doha on Tuesday, accusing Qatar of being allies of Hamas rather than mediators.

Jess, a 35-year-old hospital neurologist, had joined protesters attempting to stop traffic in order to show her anger at the French government. Inequality is rife in France and this is the only way to be heard, she said. Pushed back with teargas by riot police, Jess, who asked for her real name not to be published said she was scared by police tactics, but felt it was crucial to be on the streets.

Protesters near the Gare du Nord train station during a day of protests as part of a grassroots movement called Bloquons Tout (Let's Block Everything) Photograph: Benoit Tessier/Reuters Protesters raise their hands in unison Photograph: Christophe Simon/AFP/Getty Images Anti-riot police during clashes with Block Everything demonstrators Photograph: Ed Jones/AFP/Getty Images The annual Tribute in Light installation is tested before the 24th anniversary of 9/11, as viewed from Liberty State Park in Jersey City Photograph: Eduardo Munoz/Reuters

Starmer rolls out red carpet for genocide, reads the front-page headline of The National, a Scottish daily, as anger mounts over the British prime minister's meeting with Isaac Herzog, the Israeli president. Herzog is understood to have arrived in the UK on Tuesday. He will meet the premier, Keir Starmer, on Wednesday and is reportedly planning to speak at the Chatham House think tank later in the day. He is expected to leave on Friday.

Protesters burn tyres in protest at a curfew imposed after unrest over a social media ban and political corruption Photograph: Niranjan Shrestha/AP The Israeli military drops leaflets urging residents to leave their homes ahead of a planned offensive Photograph: Omar Al-Qattaa/AFP/Getty Images Palestinian women and children sit on a vehicle with their luggage as they flee following the Israeli evacuation order Photograph: Mahmoud Issa/Reuters Smoke rises from the house of Sabit Mesalme, a Palestinian prisoner, after the building was targeted by the Israel army Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

Donald Trump's second state visit to the UK will see a big policing operation led by drones in the airspace over Windsor, police have said. King Charles is to host the US president and his wife, Melania Trump, at Windsor Castle from 17 to 19 September, where they will be entertained with a ceremonial welcome and state banquet. A round-the-clock policing operation will be in place in the Berkshire town during the event, with a temporary order restricting the airspace from 16 September when the state visit rehearsal is to take place until 18 September.

Tens of thousands of Bolsonaro's supporters gathered in Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and the capital, Brasilia, on Sunday, waving the flags of Brazil and the United States, in an apparent nod to President Donald Trump, an ally of the far-right former leader.

Thousands of protesters marched across Washington, D.C., on Saturday in one of the largest demonstrations against President Donald Trump's federal takeover of policing in the nation's capital. Behind a bright red banner reading END THE D.C. OCCUPATION in English and Spanish, protesters marched over two miles from Meridian Hill Park to Freedom Plaza near the White House to rail against the fourth week of National Guard troops and federal agents patrolling D.C.'s streets.

Labor Day, which became a US national holiday in 1894, was once a very big deal. Photos such as this one taken in Buffalo, NY, in 1900 speak to the tens of thousands of workers who would march on Labor Day to be counted and to stand up for their rights.

Live updatesLive updates, US Congress returns to session amid renewed unrest.

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

As Labor Day rallies took place across the US, the Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson sharply denounced the Trump administration's threat to deploy federal troops to the city as part of an immigration crackdown. No federal troops in the city of Chicago, said Johnson on Monday to a gathered crowd at the Workers over Billionaires demonstration in Chicago's West Loop neighborhood. Johnson added: We're going to defend our democracy we're going to protect the humanity of every single person in the city of Chicago.

Parents, grandparents and others their age lined El Camino Real during Monday's 17×17 Labor Day rally - as in previous anti-Trump protests. But where were the younger people? At the protest, aiming to line up 17,000 people for 17 miles of El Camino Real in a safe, civil and welcoming environment, elders seemed to far outnumber teens and people in their 20s. Kristina Schmidt, 63, a bookkeeper from San Jose, said she was in attendance to defend several causes such as gay marriage, immigration and Medicaid.

In Makassar, the biggest city on Indonesia's central Sulawesi island, furious demonstrators torched vehicles and hurled rocks and Molotov cocktails, setting a local council building ablaze. What do we know about the deadly fire? Three people one civil servant and two council staff members perished after being trapped in the burning building while at least four others were injured. "This is beyond our prediction," council secretary Rahmat Mappatoba told the French AFP news agency.

Over the past nine months, Serbia has experienced more than 23,000 unauthorised rallies. Most were small, sometimes just a few dozen people, but they disturbed daily life, brought government to a halt, and recently turned violent. More than 170 police officers have been injured. Despite this, police actions have remained limited and restrained, and have targeted only those who damaged property or assaulted officers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: They say we don't need them. Freedom. Freedom. He's a dictator. He's a dictator. A lot of people are saying, maybe we'd like a dictator. So the line is that I'm a dictator, but I stopped crime. So a lot of people say, you know, if that's the case, I'd rather have a dictator. (END VIDEO CLIP) MELBER: Do you take it seriously? How would you fight that?

Nearly 1,000 worker over billionaire protests are being planned in all 50 states starting this weekend as part of a Labor Day week of action organized by labor unions and advocacy groups in opposition to the Trump administration's policies. The actions include marches and rallies in cities such as Chicago and Los Angeles, a Labor Day parade in New York City, rallies in Palmer, Alaska, Freeport, Maine, and a planned protest at the state capitol in Honolulu, Hawaii.

Affan Kurniawan was killed on Thursday after an armoured police vehicle ran into him outside Indonesia's House of Representatives, as riot police were dispersing crowds who had gathered to demand higher wages, lower taxes and the removal of allowances for politicians. Motorcycle taxi drivers gathered outside Jakarta Mobile Brigade Corps headquarters on Friday to protest against Kurniawan's death, and students urged protesters to rally later outside police headquarters in the capital city.