The Fourcast

It’s seven days since America and Israel launched a war against Iran - the Middle East is on fire, the Qataris are warning of a global economic disaster and Donald Trump’s White House is pumping out propaganda clips of their airstrikes spliced with Hollywood memes. So what kind of world do we now live in? And what could come next? 
On the latest episode of The Fourcast Krishnan Guru-Murthy is joined by General Sir Richard Shirreff, Nato’s former Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Europe, Chimène Keitner, who was a legal advisor in Obama and Trump’s administrations, and former CIA analyst Fred Fleitz, who worked in the National Security Council in Trump’s first administration and is now vice-chairman of the America First Policy Institute.

The war in the Middle East is rapidly expanding. Azerbaijan is now the latest country reportedly hit by Iranian drones while another missile barrage struck Tehran and Beirut overnight. The seas aren’t immune either: Iranian warships have been sunk, and a US oil tanker is reportedly on fire in the Gulf.
Now there are signs a land war could be beginning, with reports Kurdish fighters may have crossed into Iran - though commanders deny it, saying they would need US air cover first.
So can anything stop this bloody conflict from spiraling out of control?
On this episode of the Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy speaks to Channel 4 News correspondents at the heart of the story: Foreign Affairs Correspondent Secunder Kermani in Tel Aviv, International Editor Lindsey Hilsum in Beirut, and US Editor Anushka Asthana in Washington.

The war launched by the United States and Israel against Iran has already rattled the global economy. Gas prices have jumped 30% to a three-year high, oil is surging, tankers are stuck in the Strait of Hormuz and refineries across the region are under attack. Stock markets from London to Tokyo are tumbling, and hopes of interest rate cuts in the UK and US are fading fast.
So how serious is this economic shock? What happens if the conflict lasts weeks, as Donald Trump has suggested? And is Rachel Reeves’s newly claimed fiscal headroom about to disappear as energy prices spike?
Matt Frei speaks to our economics correspondent Helia Ebrahimi, and to Dr Neil Quilliam, a leading Middle East energy policy and geopolitics specialist at Chatham House. They explain how this war is reverberating through global markets, the risks to supply routes, the inflation threat, and how governments and central banks might respond.

The crisis in the Middle East is deepening by the day. The killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader has triggered a regional shockwave, from missile launches to unrest in neighbouring states. But what does this moment really reveal about the Iranian state, its capacity for survival, and the calculations being made in Washington, Jerusalem, and Tehran?
In this episode of The Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy speaks to journalist Anshel Pfeffer and peace advocate Sanam Naraghi-Anderlini about the limits of decapitation strategy, why Western governments have so often misread the Islamic Republic, and the competing endgames now in play.

'Something massive is happening.' The words of the Green Party's new MP Hannah Spencer after her decisive win in the Gorton and Denton by-election. Is she right? Labour came a distant third and neither the Conservatives nor the Liberal Democrats managed to get even two percent of the vote. Arguably none of that was unexpected. But Reform UK, up until now seen as the populist insurgents ready to replace the mainstream parties, fell short by over 4000 votes. Not nearly the knife-edge result predicted. So is Nigel Farage in danger of running out of steam after diluting his party with Tory defectors? Could the Greens offer white working class voters a left alternative to kick the establishment? And is Labour going to have to move left, whether to take on the Green threat or their unhappy backbenchers?On this episode of the Fourcast, Krishnan Guru-Murthy speaks to Zack Polanski after his win, and is joined by the ex-Tory now Reform commentator Tim Montgomerie, Sam White, who is a former Chief of Staff to Keir Starmer, and Natalie Bennett, one of two Greens peers in the House of Lords.