'UK Gaza protests going ahead' and 'Romp in Peace, Jilly'

Jilly Cooper, wearing a light blue jacket, sits on a beige chair at a book event.Image source, PA Media
  • Published

Most of the papers mark the two-year anniversary of the deadly attack on Israel by Hamas. The Guardian's coverage includes an interview with a man whose brother is one of the hostages still being held in Gaza, external. Gal Gilboa-Dalal tells the paper he still feels as though he is living "the agonising, endless day" when his brother Guy was kidnapped.

The front pages of The i Paper, external and The Times, external focus on the planned pro-Palestine rallies set to take place at some UK universities today. Both say the prime minister and the home secretary called for the demonstrations to be postponed but the organisers insisted they should go ahead because the attacks on 7 October triggered the fighting in Gaza.

The Daily Telegraph reports that the Home Office and MI5 were "blindsided" by the collapse of a Chinese spying case, external last month. Downing Street has dismissed suggestions of any government interference in the case, after it was reported that senior Whitehall officials met to discuss the trial early last month before the charges were dropped.

The front page of The Guardian says nurses' leaders fear the government's proposed new rules on foreign staff could cause a crisis in the NHS and social care, external. The Royal College of Nursing has warned the health service could "cease to function". The paper says it has contacted the Home Office for comment.

A few of the papers highlight the empty seats seen at some of the key speeches at this year's Conservative Party conference in Manchester. The Telegraph says it may have been a mistake for shadow chancellor Sir Mel Stride to make his address trying to reassert the Tories' economic reputation, external early on a Monday morning, as the hall was half-empty. The i says there is "no mood of despair" at the conference, "more one of emptiness".

Almost all of the front pages feature photographs of the Queen of the Bonkbuster, Dame Jilly Cooper, whose death was announced yesterday. She was 88. "Romp in peace" is The Sun, external's headline. "The one and only" says The Daily Mirror, external. The Express , externalsays Dame Jilly "revolutionised reading habits" with her saucy page-turners. The Guardian, external says "most of all Jilly made being a grown-up look fun".

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