As Labour flounders and dabbles in the politics of hatred to gain a point or two, it is those far from power who will suffer most

In the days since the largest far-right rally in British history, I keep hearing the same phrase. Friends will talk about those scenes, how London was packed with more than 100,000 day-trippers chanting “send them back”. Then they’ll say: “It’s the 1970s all over again.” I can almost see their minds playing the old reels of Enoch Powell and the National Front.

Being of similar vintage, I too know about abuse in playgrounds and getting chased by skinheads and the house-warming gift of a brick through the window (which the police didn’t deem racist because the motive wasn’t sufficiently explicit – guys, next time wrap it in a memo!). We’re still some way from those days, thankfully, but one important aspect is much worse. Back then, racism was a furtive, guilty pleasure: deep down, even bigots knew their bigotry was ugly. No more.

Aditya Chakrabortty is a Guardian columnist

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© Illustration: Sebastien Thibault/The Guardian

© Illustration: Sebastien Thibault/The Guardian

© Illustration: Sebastien Thibault/The Guardian

A meat-free version of the classic layered pasta dish made with good strong cheese and a few essential details you may not have thought of

When I was writing a book about pasta, an acquaintance from Naples who lives in Chișinău, Moldova, with his Welsh wife suggested that the first step with lasagne is to approach it like a town planner. That is, first work out the size of the dish in relation to the size of the pasta sheets (this applies to both fresh and dried), then decide how many layers you want, not only to establish how many sheets you need, but also to proportion the various fillings accordingly. We also decided that the construction of a lasagne should be like that of a bricklayer combined with a Jackson Pollock approach to the sauces.

My ceramic lasagne dish is 30cm x 20cm, and three 10cm x 25cm dried lasagne sheets make a single layer in it, so a five-layer lasagne requires 15 sheets. Most dried lasagne sold today doesn’t require pre-cooking or soaking, but those sheets depend on the sauce being liquid enough to provide enough moisture to hydrate and cook them. Dry sheets also require a relatively long cooking time, so, in the case of today’s lasagne, which involves a dense and creamy, rather than a liquid sauce, I dip the sheets into boiling water for 30 seconds, then in cold water and then lay them on a tea towel to dry, which gives them a head start. It also reduces the total cooking time, which suits the delicate texture of the courgette and ricotta in the sauce.

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© Photograph: Rachel Roddy/The Guardian

© Photograph: Rachel Roddy/The Guardian

© Photograph: Rachel Roddy/The Guardian

Lawyers say pro-Palestinian activist remains protected from immigration enforcement while separate federal court case proceeds

An immigration judge in the US state of Louisiana has ordered the deportation of pro-Palestinian protest leader Mahmoud Khalil to Algeria or Syria, ruling that he failed to disclose information on his green card application, according to court documents filed on Wednesday.

Khalil’s lawyers said they intended to appeal against the deportation order, and that a federal district court’s separate orders remain in effect prohibiting the government from immediately deporting or detaining him as his federal court case proceeds. The lawyers submitted a letter to the federal court in New Jersey overseeing his civil rights case and said he will challenge the decision.

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© Photograph: Debra L Rothenberg/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Debra L Rothenberg/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Debra L Rothenberg/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock

About 800,000 people to demonstrate against budget plans, putting pressure on new prime minister

France is braced for one of its biggest strike days in recent years, as trade unions make a rare show of unity to put pressure on the new prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, to rethink budget cuts and act on wages, pensions and public services.

About 800,000 people are expected to take to the streets in marches across the country on Thursday, according to police, while schools, rail and air transport will all be affected. A total of 80,000 police will be deployed.

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© Photograph: Jean-François Badias/AP

© Photograph: Jean-François Badias/AP

© Photograph: Jean-François Badias/AP

In the 1970s, the radical leftwing German terrorist organisation may have spread fear through public acts of violence – but its inner workings were characterised by vanity and incompetence

In the summer of 1970, a group of aspirant revolutionaries arrived in Jordan from West Germany. They sought military training though they had barely handled weapons before. They sought a guerrilla war in the streets of Europe, but had never done anything more than light a fire in a deserted department store. They sought the spurious glamour that spending time with a Palestinian armed group could confer. Above all, they sought a safe place where they could hide and plan.

Some of the group had flown to Beirut on a direct flight from communist-run East Berlin. The better known members – Ulrike Meinhof, a prominent leftwing journalist, and two convicted arsonists called Gudrun Ensslin and Andreas Baader – had faced a more complicated journey. First, they’d had to cross into East Germany, then they took a train to Prague, where they boarded a plane to Lebanon. From Beirut, a taxi took them east across the mountains into Syria. Finally, they drove south from Damascus into Jordan.

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© Photograph: Dpa Picture Alliance/Alamy

© Photograph: Dpa Picture Alliance/Alamy

© Photograph: Dpa Picture Alliance/Alamy

For 25 years, Justin and Nichola were an essential part of each other’s lives. Then, one random Wednesday, came a terrible, wrenching phone call

Many lifelong alliances begin with a period of mild intimidation, and so it was with my friendship with Nichola. We were 18, in the first year at university, and shared a few French classes. I didn’t know her name, had never heard her speak in English but, with her voluminous curls and friendly, curious stare, she stood out. I assumed she would be too cool to hang around with someone like me.

One weekend, at a student social in the grotty union bar, booze acted as an icebreaker and the guardrails dropped. Nods of recognition in the corridor became cheery hellos, then toasties in the cafe, followed by nights out and nursing hangovers in front of the TV in our dilapidated student houses.

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© Photograph: Courtesy of Justin Myers

© Photograph: Courtesy of Justin Myers

© Photograph: Courtesy of Justin Myers

The two actors play brothers dragged into danger by gangsters, but are too stupid or poorly sketched for you to sympathise with them. It’s a relentlessly cheerless watch

Hard on the heels of the airless misery of Mark Ruffalo’s new venture, Task, comes Jude Law and Jason Bateman’s Black Rabbit, which has a bit more action but the same relentless, cheerless tone and even less forgiving lighting. One more entry and it’s officially a trend! We’ll all have to schedule recovery viewings of Brooklyn Nine-Nine, like winter vitamin D shots, to make it through unbowed.

Law and Bateman are working-class brothers Jake (Law) and Vince (Bateman) Friedkin from Coney Island. They grew up in what we assume from relatively early on was a violent home, dominated by an alcoholic father. They became a Nirvana-lite rock group – Jake the handsome lead, Vince the drummer and creative force – until the latter’s taste for drugs and mayhem put paid to their success. Jake pivoted into management, primarily of multihyphenate talent Wes (Sope Dirisu), and when Vince regained his sobriety and vision and found a building that seized his imagination they all went into business together as restaurateurs, creating the Black Rabbit – a three-storey clubhouse that soon became the toast of bohemian New York.

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© Photograph: Courtesy of Netflix

© Photograph: Courtesy of Netflix

© Photograph: Courtesy of Netflix

Weakened domestically, Emmanuel Macron wants an international legacy. Yet still, he does nothing to sanction Israel

When Emmanuel Macron announced that France intended to recognise Palestinian statehood, he drew a furious rebuke from Israel – and caused a diplomatic storm with the US. Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, wrote a letter accusing the French government of failing to “confront the alarming rise of antisemitism” in France, adding the harsh and unequivocal assessment: “Your call for a Palestinian state pours fuel on this antisemitic fire.”

In the same letter, he praised Donald Trump’s action to “protect the civil rights of American Jews”.

Rokhaya Diallo is a Guardian Europe columnist

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© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

© Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

Let’s not be too cynical about the US-UK agreement to build new power plants – but costs must fall if nuclear is to make headway

Presidential visits, like investment summits, involve a blizzard of claims about companies set to spend squillions in the UK. Some “commitments” are merely extrapolations of current trends. Some can be filed under “believe it when you see it”. Some involve throwing everything into the mix and producing an implausibly precise number for the “economic value” to the UK. A few pledges are genuinely new, but scepticism should be the default setting.

How to view this week’s “landmark commitments” by UK and US firms to build new nuclear power plants in the UK? Actually, this may be one of those rare occasions when one shouldn’t be too cynical.

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© Photograph: Rolls-Royce/Reuters

© Photograph: Rolls-Royce/Reuters

© Photograph: Rolls-Royce/Reuters

Mariam, Nasser and Ahmed were evacuated from the warzone but are now stranded in an Egyptian hospital that cannot treat their life-threatening injuries after Trump’s sudden ban on Palestinians entering the US

Mariam Sabbah had been fast asleep, huddled under a blanket with her siblings, when an Israeli missile tore through her home in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza, in the early hours of 1 March.

The missile narrowly missed the sleeping children but as the terrified nine-year-old ran to her parents, a second one hit. “I saw her coming towards me but suddenly there was another explosion and she vanished into the smoke,” says her mother, Fatma Salman.

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© Photograph: Hamada Elrasam/The Guardian

© Photograph: Hamada Elrasam/The Guardian

© Photograph: Hamada Elrasam/The Guardian

Bank has ‘no other realistic option but to leave’ to protect its competitiveness, says co-founder of investor

It’s not hard to see how so many came to worry about the issue. But the data isn’t there

US supermajors seek to emulate success of transatlantic peers such as Shell, BP and Total

Former 2GB and Sky News Australia broadcaster was not in court on Thursday when it heard 17 of previous 44 charges had been dropped

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Alan Jones faces 25 charges of indecent assault and two of sexual touching relating to nine complainants after prosecutors revealed two alleged victims would no longer be part of the case against the veteran broadcaster.

Jones was on Thursday expected to make his first appearance in court this year to be committed to stand trial on 44 charges of indecent assault against 11 victims aged 17 and older.

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© Photograph: Dan Himbrechts/AAP

© Photograph: Dan Himbrechts/AAP

© Photograph: Dan Himbrechts/AAP

Metropol, a massive banquet hall, is closing. It’s one of the last eateries in the city with chatty “aunties” peddling Cantonese delicacies from carts.

Kimmel said Monday conservatives were trying to ‘score political points’ from the fatal shooting of Kirk

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The glasses start at $799 and will be available on September 30 at limited stores

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Nato official says weapons 'already flowing' under new PURL initiative

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Kimmel said conservatives were trying to ‘score political points’ from Kirk’s assassination

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Fans and liberals expressed anger while conservatives hailed ABC’s decision to pull Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show off the air after comments about the killing of Charlie Kirk.

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America's reigning 5,000-meter track champion, Shelby Houlihan, is back from a four-year doping ban

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Trump said he will also be ‘strongly recommending that those funding ANTIFA’ be investigated

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For the fifth match in a row, the Reds scored a winner after the 83rd minute to see off Atletico Madrid in their Champion League opener at Anfield.

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Saudi Arabia has signed a defense pact with nuclear-armed Pakistan, pledging that any attack on either nation would be considered an attack on both

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