Trump will never win New Jersey or New York but he’s still doing rallies in those places. Obviously, he has to hold the rallies there because he’s in court in New York and can’t leave but he’s still showing up. Still finding a way to campaign even when every possibility of actually campaigning has been taken away. I respect that.
I would respect that no matter who did it but if you react to the name “Trump” and can’t hear anything else that’s being said, it’s your problem.
Was surprised somebody thinks we’re winning in Gaza:
“Andrew Fox served as an officer in the British Army from 2005-21, retiring with the rank of Major. He completed three tours in Afghanistan … a lecturer at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.”
Israel Is Succeeding in Gaza
Western analysts think otherwise, because they are seeing Israel’s war through the lens of America’s own failed counterinsurgency doctrines
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/israel-middle-east/articles/israel-succeeding-gaza
If you look at what is possible, what the best version of “success” looks like, and what Israel is doing, I contend that in Gaza we are seeing a masterpiece of operational design within severe politically imposed limitations. The IDF is not trying to clear Gaza. With no ability to impose a political arrangement in Gaza, and a Gazan desire for continued Hamas rule, the IDF answer is: Let them have Hamas. But the version of Hamas that Gazans will get is one heavily degraded militarily, and, most importantly, with vast swaths of their tunnels and civilian-embedded infrastructure destroyed. In other words, the IDF aims to replace Hamas 3.0—the version that fought three wars against Israel and then launched the brutal Oct. 7 surprise attacks—with Hamas 1.0, which took over the Gaza Strip from Fatah in June 2007.
To accomplish that end, the IDF has methodically razed what Hamas infrastructure they could find in Gaza City, Khan Yunis, and now Rafah. They have secured the Netzarim corridor to control freedom of movement from south to north. It looks like they are trying to do the same thing along the Philadelphi Corridor and Gaza’s southern border with Egypt, to cut off the inflow of weapons and supplies to Hamas.
…
As things stand, the operational end state looks like significant Hamas infrastructure is destroyed, its fighting capability severely degraded, and the border secured, with the IDF retaining the capability to strike into Gaza at will. All of this has occurred while shifting hundreds of thousands of civilians out of harm’s way and minimizing innocent casualties (Hamas’ human shield tactics aside). As John Spencer, chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute at West Point, has repeatedly pointed out, the efforts the IDF has made to protect civilians is unprecedented in modern urban warfare.
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What are people in Israel saying? Do they think it’s not a win?
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I do not know what most think, but my coworkers don’t seem celebrating victory.
Each time we return to the places we previously left in Gaza, we lose soldiers.
We see horrifying videos of our female soldiers and other abducted and abused citizens, and IDF hasn’t released them yet and likely won’t be able too in the future either.
Our politicians don’t seem to have a coherent plan; some populists only hurt us every second time they tweet or post somewhere.
Our press reports on our losses on international arena. Palestinians openly talk how (only) Palestinian (and our) blood worked to move more European states recognize Palestine. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) moved against us.
“Palestinian (and our) blood worked to move more European states recognize Palestine”
There was a theory that Palestinians expected the muslim (or at least arab) world to rise up as one to remove Israel from the map after oct 7.
That was a bust… but apparently it’s unexpectedly kind of working with western countries (and universities) who are weirdly devoted to the idea of a Palestinian state and have no idea how unsatisfying that will be to them as long as Israel exists….
They are protesting for Palestine for the exact same reason they wanted lockdowns during COVID. They don’t like their lives. They want some huge change, hoping it will snap them out of the unhappy state they are in. Palestine is their new COVID. Their weed, their BLM, their polyamory, their insects for dinner.
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Forgot to mention one of the most important things re feeling victory.
Many teachers have children or other relatives fighting in Gaza. Those relatives are in Gaza, then exit Gaza, then prepare to re-enter it again, and so on.
At least two teachers (most likely more) had already lost a relative in this war.
Ditto about students, some of whom lost somebody close on 7.10
Imagine how victorious you would’ve felt had N, Klara or your sister’s kids been fighting…
We also understand there isn’t a good solution. At least, I hope most are smart enough to feel it despite various talks of winning, ending Hamas, may be even occupying Gaza again and rebuilding previously evacuated Jewish settlements …
You mentioned feeling normal while talking with Ukrainians instead of Right-wing in US. What is left to experience is talking with Israeli Jews and discover how extremely Left you’re. 🙂
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Trust me to be the person to miss reporting on most important things.
Some Right wing Israelis are against Netanyahu since he is seen as ‘Left-wing’, meaning not decisive enough to fight against our enemies with as much force as they wish. However, most (?) Right wing voters seem to support Netanyahu and are accused by Left-wing of having a personal cult thing of ‘Bibi the king’ going on.
Some Left wing voters say Netanyahu and his government have to go since 7.10 happened on their watch.
Meanwhile, anger and feeling of failer are intensified by expecting a war in the North and having displaced people from there:
Residents of northern Israel will mark Independence Day next week with marches, demonstrations and a symbolic secession from Israel (el: found the “State of the Galilee”) to protest the government’s inability to enable thousands of displaced citizens to return home, officials said Friday.
Around 60,000 residents of towns and villages along Israel’s northern border have been forced from their homes since October due to near-daily cross-border rocket and anti-tank missile attacks by Hezbollah and other terrorists in southern Lebanon. The attacks have persisted despite constant Israeli warnings that it could launch a war to push the threat away from the border and return normalcy to the region, with most evacuees facing the prospect of remaining homeless for the foreseeable future.
…the protesters were galvanized into action over reports that Netanyahu responded dismissively to concerns that northerners could still be displaced once the school year begins on September 1.
“So what if they return to their homes a few months after September,” Hebrew media quoted him as telling a recent cabinet meeting.
Meanwhile, the government plan for the rehabilitation of northern Israel is set to be voted on in the cabinet next week. However, Ynet reported Friday that northern residents are highly dissatisfied with the proposed resolution.
Some think we must have a war with Hezbollah to prevent a worse 7.10 coming from them, that we cannot rely on any agreements with Hezbollah to prevent this war.
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\ October 7 had russian fingerprints all over it…
Had never heard this, not even on Israeli telegram channels of old FSU immigrants to Israel.
Russia is not that powerful player in the Middle East.
Look at Iran and other Muslim nations / groups instead.
Btw, Russia was forced to stoop to buy weapons from Iran and North Korea, not the other way around.
Israeli news sites wondered about Iran’s involvement, but seemed to conclude Hamas acted alone on 7.10 w/o even warning Iran beforehand.
As for Hezbollah, it was founded by Iran, not Russia, so everybody would be right to suspect Iranian involvement in case of Hezbollah attack.
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“never heard this, not even on Israeli telegram channels of old FSU immigrants”
First, I don’t think a lot of old FSU immigrants are nearly as loyal to Israel as you are (let’s just say that’s a subject for another day and leave it there).
Second… neither Palestinians (nor any other local group) has been able to carry out anything like Oct 7 (putin’s birthday) before or since. A multi-directional complex multi-locational attack and the tactics were…. reminiscent of Vagner (to say the least).
Fortunately, Palestinians seemed to not have the discipline to hold to the original plan and just devolved into trying to kill random jews (like the guy who called his parents to scream that he’s killing jews at them and received their blessing). Had they actually carried out the original plan it would have been far… far worse I suspect.
And… russia and Iran are open allies…. how hard is it to imagine russia undertaking this as partial payment for Iranian weapons (or just to help cement the relationship) and to distract western attention away from Ukraine.
And there’s the question of cui bono (or кто кого?) russia has benefitted from the attacks far more than Palestine….
Are people in Israel just not systemic thinkers or what?
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FSU immigrants are overwhelmingly pro-Russian. Not just in Israel but in North America, too. And Israel has been so deeply in bed with Russia economically that it’s hard to relinquish that.
As for systemic thinking, I was just reading how Steve Sailer was shocked to see that Israel wasn’t a high-IQ country. He taught it was a mistake of testing. But reality is that in Israel, the high-IQ Ashkenazi Jews are kept down by the low-IQ Mizrahi. They have very little impact on anything and no economic power, so the country isn’t producing intellectually.
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\ the high-IQ Ashkenazi Jews are kept down by the low-IQ Mizrahi. They have very little impact on anything and no economic power, so the country isn’t producing intellectually.
Had you said that Ashkenazi Jews “have very little impact on anything and no economic power”?
How did you arrive to this conclusion?
If anyone mentions Ashkenazi vs Mizrahi in Israel, it’s always presented as the former’s history of discrimination against the latter.
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Oppressors posing as victims is not a new development.
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\ FSU immigrants are overwhelmingly pro-Russian.
Not true in Israel. Most FSU immigrants have been living in Israel for decades too. Some of recent arrivals from Russia may be pro-Putin, yes, but most?
Don’t know about North America and suspect people, who chose to immigrate there, are different from FSU Israeli Jews in many ways.
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\ how Steve Sailer was shocked to see that Israel wasn’t a high-IQ country.
20% are poor Arabs with lots of crime, illegal guns, etc
This year “Israel’s ultra-Orthodox population has risen to 1.28 million, or 13.5 percent of the 9.45 million total national population … poor, fast-growing, with exceedingly limited formal secular education, and with a strong sense of community and charity.”
Who needs to search for additional explanations when the truth is glaring?
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Poverty has no relationship to IQ. Neither has the choice to pursue formal education.
Israel is lower than the US on the IQ scale, and we have our own low-IQ minorities. So it’s got to be something else that washes out the impact of the highest-IQ group on the planet, which is Ashkenazi Jews.
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I was going to ask which ethnic group the ultra-Orthodox belonged to.
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\ First, I don’t think a lot of old FSU immigrants are nearly as loyal to Israel as you are
The ones I read are as loyal and more.
\ Are people in Israel just not systemic thinkers or what?
I understand Russia and/or Ukraine are more important to people here than Middle Eastern actors and it’s OK.
Yet, when I hear that Russia planned 7.10, it sounds like “натягивание совы на глобус”, wishful thinking as the kindest interpretation I can give.
Did Russia also plan Yom Kippur War in 1973 , in which Israel was also taken by a huge surprise and suffered more than 2500 killed in action and 293 Israelis captured?
OK, that was war with Arab states, lets go to terrorist attacks. Was Russia responsible for the massacre at the 1972 Olympic Games by the terrorist group Black September?
The world doesn’t revolve around Russia. Believe me, Palestinians and Arabs and Iran know how to nurture terrorism and murder people w/o Vagner or Putin.
Putin is the one who has a lot to learn from them.
We know and I even posted a link here that 7.10 attack had been planned for years by Hamas since around 2021 in great secrecy.
Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’s leader, and Mohammed Deif, the head of the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, decided to launch this attack, not Putin.
“As the overall commander of the Qassam Brigades Deif is thought to be the main organizer of the daring and successful raid into Israel that killed two IDF soldiers and captured Gilad Shalit in June 2006, as well as the five-year operations to deceive Mossad and Shin Bet about Shalit’s location in Gaza.”
“As of October 2023, Deif has survived at least seven Israeli assassination attempts”
“Deif has been credited with transforming the al-Qassam Brigades from a cluster of amateur cells to organized military units, described as an ‘army,’ that are capable of invading Israel.”
Do those men sound like needing Prigogin to teach them how to murder?
“A multi-directional complex multi-locational attack” — the attack wasn’t that great, btw. Our response was horrible, slow, etc. That’s why terrorists could do what they did.
In any decades-long war, even the stronger side gets badly hurt from time to time. 7.10 was one of those times.
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“Yom Kippur War”
You can’t compare war with governments with organized (after a fashion) armies with Palestinians… who are noted for their disorganization especially Gaza which was run by Hamas – essentially a mafia operation disguised as refugee relief…
“I understand Russia and/or Ukraine are more important to people here than Middle Eastern actor”
Quite the opposite, which is why I asked cui bono (or kto kogo?) In the US Israel takes up a lot more space in the public discourse than Ukraine ever could which is why Oct 7 benefitted russia by diverting attention and resources away from Ukraine. The US government is notorious for not being able to keep track of multiple foreign affiars….
\ “I understand Russia and/or Ukraine are more important to people here
By “here”, I meant “on this blog.”
// Hamas – essentially a mafia operation disguised as refugee relief…
In the Middle East, religious extremists backed by Iran play a role that is hard even to imagine in Europe or in USA. It is not like mafia imo, but rather a bit like (super)national/religious fascists movements.
Hezbollah controls parts of Lebanon. PLO with Yasser Arafat started as a terrorist group too.
Hamas is both a terrorist group and a political actor, the government of Gaza. We should not underestimate the danger and the ability to involve of those groups. Hamas a few years before and Hamas today are not the same.
“noted for their disorganization,” yet capable of building this: “Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar … bragged in 2021 that there are 300 miles of tunnels under Gaza – fully the length of the New York City subway system.”
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I meant “the ability to evolve”
Btw, just a few minutes ago I heard booms and checked news :
“Rockets fired on central Israel from RafahHamas claims responsibility Loud booms of interceptions heard in Tel Aviv, throughout the Sharon and Gush Dan areas; Four months since rocket fired on center “
If this is winning for us …
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One of my sources of info on both Ukraine and Israel is Yigal Levin (some Facebook but mostly Telegram). He is not implying Hamas is directed by Russia. But it enjoys Russia’s political support and yes, its behavior is beneficial to Russia. Russia also trains and arms Syrian army (which leaks into Hezbollah) and stationing of Russian troops across Syria interferes with Israel’s ability to hit Iran-related targets there.
el:
—You mentioned feeling normal while talking with Ukrainians instead of Right-wing in US. What is left to experience is talking with Israeli Jews and discover how extremely Left you’re.
And here you yourself provided an answer (other than “anti-Semitism”) for why Israel is enjoying less and less popular support in the West. Being significantly more right-wing than Clarissa, is, independently of anything Jews-related, considered extremist and fringe in the West.
v07
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That’s very interesting to me because I avoid Israelis over their annoying Leftism. :-))) I’d kill for a single right-leaning Israeli around me. Obviously, there are the Orthodox Jews but where would I cross paths with them?
How are Israelis right-wing if they are the kibbutz nation and the magnet of every hippie tosser before hippie tossers found themselves enamored of Arabs?
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\ How are Israelis right-wing if they are the kibbutz nation
Well, Americans have stopped being a nation of small farmers too 🙂
Besides, many of the first Ashkenazi Jews were inspired by socialist ideas and created kibbutzim, yes. However, they also recognized that the need to create a state meant wars with Arabs and conflict with Palestinians.
One can be left-wing in economics and embrace ethnic nationalism at the same time. The modern West assumes otherwise, yet weren’t nationalism and left wing ideas originally linked?
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What I don’t understand is why the original commenter says that the West is anti-Israel because it’s perceived as too right-wing when that same West is very pro-Palestinian when Palestinians are deeply more to the right than Israelis by every measure. Why does the Palestinian homophobia and horrible attitude towards women fail to repel anybody more than the clearly more liberal Israel? I don’t understand this logic at all.
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A conservative literary critic and college professor
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