FEARLESS, INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM ON CULTURE, POLITICS AND TECH

WEEKEND EDITION

The Palantir pipeline: how Peter Thiel's surveillance firm hired more than 30 senior UK officials

Apr 24, 2026

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8 min read

The Palantir pipeline: how Peter Thiel's surveillance firm hired more than 30 senior UK officials

The AI company holds £670m in UK government contracts. It has also hired dozens of senior officials from the departments awarding them – raising what transparency experts call an 'acute' corruption risk, write Charlie Young, Carole Cadwalladr and Ian Tucker

Charlie Young, +2

Palantir's social media manifesto is a blueprint for technofascism

Apr 24, 2026

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5 min read

Palantir's social media manifesto is a blueprint for technofascism

The surveillance firm’s viral X post calls for hard power, conscription and the end of pluralism. AI expert and academic Mark Coeckelbergh on what happens when technology becomes the gateway to authoritarianism

Wael al-Dahdouh: ‘Gaza's journalists are forced to tread on our pain, and go out and report’

Apr 21, 2026

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7 min read

Wael al-Dahdouh: ‘Gaza's journalists are forced to tread on our pain, and go out and report’

Al Jazeera’s Wael al-Dahdouh, who returned to work within days of his family being killed by an Israeli strike, recalls his grief, determination and sense of isolation at covering a war while being personally attacked

Stewart Lee: Epstein’s evil legacy destroys everything it touches. Everything except Palantir

Apr 24, 2026

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5 min read

Stewart Lee: Epstein’s evil legacy destroys everything it touches. Everything except Palantir

Mandelson, and by extension Starmer, are tainted by proximity to the abuse scandal. But the paedophile was a close associate of Peter Thiel too. Why don’t we talk about that?

Richard Gadd’s new show Half Man is hard to watch. But does it have anything to say?

Apr 24, 2026

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4 min read

Richard Gadd’s new show Half Man is hard to watch. But does it have anything to say?

The acclaimed new drama from the creator of Baby Reindeer doesn’t ‘expose’ toxic masculinity so much as simply make a spectacle of it, writes Julia Raeside

Apr 24, 2026

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3 min read

The Recommender: Gwenno

The Welsh-Cornish singer, whose summer tour starts next month, picks her current cultural favourites

Apr 24, 2026

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3 min read

Review of the Week: Rose of Nevada

Cornish auteur Mark Jenkin’s drama about ghost ships and gentrification, all shot on 16mm film, is eerie, disorienting and his most audience-pleasing film to date, writes Ellen E Jones

The Nerve Weekend Dish: Georgina Hayden’s spring meatballs, pasta and peas

Apr 24, 2026

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2 min read

The Nerve Weekend Dish: Georgina Hayden’s spring meatballs, pasta and peas

The bestselling cookbook author shares a light and fresh pasta dish that's packed with flavour

PALANTIR SPOTLIGHT

Revealed: Palantir deals with UK state total at least £670m – including £15m contract with nuclear weapons agency

Jan 27, 2026

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13 min read

Revealed: Palantir deals with UK state total at least £670m – including £15m contract with nuclear weapons agency

EXCLUSIVE Nerve investigation finds Trump ally Peter Thiel's surveillance firm has won at least 34 contracts, including management services for Britain's nuclear deterrent, with MPs warning of 'gaping vulnerability' as US president threatens Nato allies. By Carole Cadwalladr, Charlie Young and Max Colbert

‘It beggars belief’: MoD sources warn Palantir’s role at heart of government is threat to UK’s security

Mar 13, 2026

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10 min read

‘It beggars belief’: MoD sources warn Palantir’s role at heart of government is threat to UK’s security

Experts say that claims UK data remains under government ownership miss the point that the company has the capability to build its own detailed picture of the British population, and even infer state secrets. Report by Charlie Young and Carole Cadwalladr

Charlie Young

Mar 19, 2026

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10 min read

Is Palantir in your pension? UK institutions have over £5bn invested in US tech corporation

Research reveals size of investment by UK organisations – including some of Britain’s biggest retirement providers – in Silicon Valley’s most controversial technology company. Carole Cadwalladr and Ian Tucker report

Ian Tucker, +1

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POLITICS & INVESTIGATIONS

The five ways Trump could attempt a coup, by fascism expert Timothy Snyder

Apr 12, 2026

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9 min read

The five ways Trump could attempt a coup, by fascism expert Timothy Snyder

Despite the debacle in Iran, a president at war has several pressure points at his disposal to postpone, restrict and ultimately cancel democracy, writes the historian

Timothy Snyder

With Orbán gone, has the British far right lost its magic money tree?

Apr 14, 2026

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7 min read

With Orbán gone, has the British far right lost its magic money tree?

Hungary’s new PM has described his predecessor’s funding of propaganda bodies as criminal and vowed to investigate. This could be bad news for ultraconservatives in the UK – and around the rest of the world, writes Alice McCool

Alice McCool

The billionaires' eugenics project: how Epstein infiltrated Harvard, muzzled the humanities and preached master-race science

Feb 13, 2026

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14 min read

The billionaires' eugenics project: how Epstein infiltrated Harvard, muzzled the humanities and preached master-race science

Edge - Jeffrey Epstein's favourite intellectual salon - was sold to me as a gathering of the world's finest minds, writes Virginia Heffernan. The files reveal it was something far darker: a decades-long project that cloaked eugenics, race science and sexual misconduct in Ivy League respectability

Virginia Heffernan

Nigel Farage wants to build a British ICE. Keir Starmer may have handed him the tools

Apr 8, 2026

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11 min read

Nigel Farage wants to build a British ICE. Keir Starmer may have handed him the tools

Reform’s proposed "Deportation Command” would integrate NHS, police and financial data into a single surveillance database. Meanwhile, Palantir has signalled it won’t stand in their way, and campaigners say Labour’s new data law opens the door. By Rei Takver

Rei Takver

CULTURE

Apr 17, 2026

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5 min read

Stonehenge, carnival, folk and fascists: how Zakia Sewell went in pursuit of the real story of Britain

The 6 Music DJ and writer, whose new book explores her mixed-race heritage and the ancient myth of ‘Albion’, tells Michaela Makusha everyone has a stake in a complex, nuanced country

Michaela Makusha

Apr 21, 2026

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5 min read

The Nerve Hotlist

This week’s top cultural picks – from Deborah Levy’s elusive new book to rapper Loyle Carner's acting debut in Mint – as seen and enjoyed by our team of editors and writers

Crop tops and thongs: how Epstein's friend Les Wexner sexualised children's fashion

Apr 17, 2026

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6 min read

Crop tops and thongs: how Epstein's friend Les Wexner sexualised children's fashion

The paedophile’s close professional relationship with clothing billionaire Les Wexner coincided with a dark, Lolita-like period in fashion when girls were invited to age up and women to age down, writes Deborah Frances-White