Knowsley is a Labour stronghold. But judging by the polls and the people I spoke to, the messages of the right are truly cutting through

At the weekend, I took the well-worn journey from London to Knowsley in Merseyside. I’ve made this trip so many times that I can execute it with military precision, arriving just in time before the train doors close, even with a toddler in tow this time around. My uncle picked us up from the station and as we turned on to the motorway, I saw St George’s flags hanging over us from the sides of bridges. Union jacks circled the roundabout just before we turned off to go to my auntie’s house. Knowsley is Labour’s fourth-safest seat in the UK, but it felt like a newly minted Reform constituency.

It was a Friday evening, so we opened a bottle of wine and put pizzas in the oven. I was updated on various family milestones – a house sale had gone through, a baby bump was starting to show, the poor dog was on its last legs. My daughter entertained everyone with an energetic rendition of Sleeping Bunnies. Behind her, the BBC News at Six played images of migrants huddled on inflatable boats sailing across the Channel.

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In 2020, after spending half his life in the US, Song-Chun Zhu took a one-way ticket to China. Now he might hold the key to who wins the global AI race

By the time Song-Chun Zhu was six years old, he had encountered death more times than he could count. Or so it felt. This was the early 1970s, the waning years of the Cultural Revolution, and his father ran a village supply store in rural China. There was little to do beyond till the fields and study Mao Zedong at home, and so the shop became a refuge where people could rest, recharge and share tales. Zhu grew up in that shop, absorbing a lifetime’s worth of tragedies: a family friend lost in a car crash, a relative from an untreated illness, stories of suicide or starvation. “That was really tough,” Zhu recalled recently. “People were so poor.”

The young Zhu became obsessed with what people left behind after they died. One day, he came across a book that contained his family genealogy. When he asked the bookkeeper why it included his ancestors’ dates of birth and death but nothing about their lives, the man told him matter of factly that they were peasants, so there was nothing worth recording. The answer terrified Zhu. He resolved that his fate would be different.

Keir Starmer will have to choose how to spend limited political capital, with most pressing issues ones UK and US do not agree on

Donald Trump has repeatedly described Keir Starmer as a “good man”, distancing himself from the attacks on the UK prime minister mounted by other figures on the US far right such as Elon Musk.

One of the many known unknowns, however, of a Trump state visit is what kind of Trump will show up when a microphone is placed in front of him.

The cuddly chatbot Grem is designed to ‘learn’ your child’s personality, while every conversation they have is recorded, then transcribed by a third party. It wasn’t long before I wanted this experiment to be over ...

‘I’m going to throw that thing into a river!” my wife says as she comes down the stairs looking frazzled after putting our four-year-old daughter to bed.

To be clear, “that thing” is not our daughter, Emma*. It’s Grem, an AI-powered stuffed alien toy that the musician Claire Boucher, better known as Grimes, helped develop with toy company Curio. Designed for kids aged three and over and built with OpenAI’s technology, the toy is supposed to “learn” your child’s personality and have fun, educational conversations with them. It’s advertised as a healthier alternative to screen time and is part of a growing market of AI-powered toys.

Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook on storytelling, their strangest interactions with fans and bonding over The Lord of the Rings

How does one measure success? For Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook, the historians behind the hit podcast The Rest Is History, it could be the number of unexpected and overly familiar conversations with strangers. On a holiday high up in the mountains of Bulgaria, Holland was wandering around a secluded monastery when someone called out, “Love the podcast!”

Sandbrook, meanwhile, is used to getting weird looks from fans who find it hard to compute that the man in front of them is one half of the soundtrack to their dog walks and commutes. “The weirdest thing that people say – which I’ve heard more than once – is, ‘My wife and I listen to you in bed every night,’” he says, looking mildly appalled.

Who showed up for the biggest far-right rally in British history? Ben Quinn reports

Two weeks before the Unite the Kingdom rally in central London, Helen Pidd attends a demonstration outside an asylum hotel in Stockport, Greater Manchester. As people there explain their grievances, it is clear that many reject the label of ‘far right’.

Ben Quinn, a senior reporter for the Guardian, explains to Helen what exactly is meant by the term ‘far right’, why so many people find it toxic, and the particular ways it is and is not useful in this moment.

Overnight advance towards city centre aimed at ‘dismantling Hamas’s grip’ as Israel accused of genocide in human rights report

Israel has launched its long-threatened ground offensive into the densely packed streets of Gaza City, military officials have confirmed.

One Israel Defense Forces (IDF) official said that troops had begun what he called the “main phase” of the offensive, with an overnight advance from the outskirts towards the city centre.

Caulfield says ‘the future is Reform’ as second Conservative MP in a week leaves for Nigel Farage’s party

Maria Caulfield, a former Tory health minister, has joined Reform UK, GB News reports. They say she is the 13th former Tory MP to switch, GB News says.

Caulfield told the broadcaster:

If you are Conservative right-minded, then the future is Reform. The country is going to change a lot. The same people who thought that Brexit would not happen think that Reform will not happen. They are in for a shock.

In an email to supporters, the party said it would open membership applications by the end of September, ahead of the conference two months later.

But it did not give precise dates for the conference, saying only that it would see “thousands” of delegates “chosen by lottery to ensure a fair balance of gender, region and background”.

Labour MPs talk openly about replacing PM, as third senior ally in two weeks departs after publication of messages

The crisis engulfing Keir Starmer has deepened on the eve of Donald Trump’s visit to the UK after the resignation of a third senior ally in two weeks raised further questions about the stability of his government.

Paul Ovenden quit as the prime minister’s director of political strategy after the publication of old messages in which Ovenden relayed lewd jokes made at a party about the Labour MP Diane Abbott.

US president announces defamation action, accusing title of being ‘virtual mouthpiece’ for Democrats

Donald Trump has filed a $15bn defamation lawsuit against the New York Times in his latest use of legal action targeting a major media outlet.

The US president accused it of being a “mouthpiece” for the Democratic party and of “spreading false and defamatory content” about him.