Palestinians cannot live as subjugated citizens, and what is happening in Gaza now is an overwhelming tragedy. - Hadley Freeman

I had a couple of reactions to hearing that my views about gender might be too controversial for Sting. The first was: "I reckon Sting, Mr Tantric Sex God himself, is pretty clear on what a woman is." The second was: "So Sting once played a concert for the daughter of the former Uzbek president Islam Karimov, who was accused of boiling his political opponents alive. But apparently he can't bear to be interviewed by me because of my 'controversial views'?" Incidentally, these controversial views are — and buckle up, folks, because they might shock you — that trans people deserve compassion as much as anyone else, and a man has a penis and a woman has a vagina. Sting, send me your mate's number because I deserve to be boiled alive!

But it turns out many who march for a free Palestine believe, as Hamas believes, that Israel shouldn't exist at all. They see Israelis as "colonisers and settlers". But do you know why they had to settle there? Because they had nowhere to go after the Holocaust achieved what centuries of persecution had failed to do and wiped out most of Europe's Jews. Many, like my Polish family, couldn't go back to their home country because there were still — even after the fall of Nazism — Jew-hatred and pogroms there. So they went to Israel. This is the context: the Jews are there because they needed somewhere safe to live, and now their grandchildren are being killed for it.

And speaking of wealthy, scary people, who should arrive but [Harvey] Weinstein himself. "Mr Weinstein, Hadley Freeman from the Guardian. What would you say are the essential ingredients of a good party?" I cry out like a drowning woman. Weinstein walks over to me and – slightly menacingly, one might say – takes my elbow.
"Hadley," he says, his voice heavy with condescension, "enjoy yourself."
The two men next to him laugh obediently. I decide to follow big Harvey's instructions. And so, with a final glimpse at the dancefloor, where Jessie J is dancing with one friend to Prince's Kiss, I take my leave and go home.