IISS predicted/warned–time and time again–that a major strategic fiasco over Gaza was imminent (see below). Sadly, these warnings were never heeded. Help IISS gain more traction by supporting its incisive and insightful work.
Israel’s stark option: Arabs in Gaza or Jews in the Negev?
If back in 2005, on the eve of the “disengagement,” some far-sighted individual had predicted that reality would be as it is today, his caveats would have been disdainfully dismissed as unfounded scare-mongering.
Gaza: Delaying the inevitable again…
Israel has surged from success to success in virtually every field of human endeavor except in what might turn out to be the most vital: securing its long-term survival as the nation-state of the Jewish people
Imbecility squared: Israel’s incomprehensible policy of sustaining the enemy in Gaza
The policy of trying to placate Hamas with enhanced humanitarian aid is sadly no less farcical than trying to convert a man-eating tiger into a cuddly bunny rabbit by offering it a diet of premium carrots.
Deadly detriments of a doctrine of defense
Unless the violence in Gaza is terminated permanently, Israel may face the grim prospect of the Negev being depopulated by Jews who will abandon the region for safer locations.
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Hi Felix, I’m glad to see you appreciate but to be honest the brainwashing of the last 30 years has created a whole generation which has no clue of what is the nature of this conflict . Their mindset is ” cost-reward / management – seamless endless arrangements – everything is for sale – Buy Peace now , the next generation will pay the blunder 10 times more …etc… ” Wishful thinking x 10 …After the snake moults, he still remains a snake …
Hello, Edgar
I’m glad you noticed that exception. Actually, that was a rather important part of Israeli history, by my reckoning. As I recall reading, the “sincere atheists” of the time were swallowed up by the earth.
Evre
The way you quoted Isaiah was fine and note how it followed good analysis
By the way this was classic Pogrom and followed Ukraine Lithuania Latvia Byelorussia etc almost exactly
Dinaster that is a BRILLIANT comment. Write much more on this.
Evre
What’s the problem? You are a person who writes well about the issues and personally I agree a lot with you. And…I am sure they loved and treasured the boy very much. I wish people would stop making problems where there may be none.
Worth to know Ronen Bar, head of Shabak declared in July 23 that the main danger for Israel were the violent jewish settlers in YeSha. With such frame of mind , Ronen Bar could disregard the report from Egypt- 3 days before the attack – that something big was brewing in Gaza. And when alerted on early morning october 7th, he dipatched a team of 10 agents in two cars who died fighting . Ronen Bar didn’t call the Air Force to send a few choppers nor he made a call to warn the kibbutzim . Totally clumsy and disconnected ; same with General Aharon Haliwa head of AMAN . These people must pay for their gross negligence.
EvRe1
I just read your most interesting post. My candid, very strong opinion is that prayer, in itself bestows a vicarious benefit on he/she who prays, but nothing else. Religious lunatics obsessed into quoting reams of Torah at every opportunity(given or taken) get the same (uplifted)_ feeling.
We have one on this site. We also have a sincere truthful avowed Atheist.
There has not been a single recorded instance in History where prayer was actually answered , except in rare instances by coincidence.
“The parting of the Red Sea” notwithstanding.
This is a well known fact. but the massive trillion dollar prayer industry is too powerful to admit this.
The sole benefit prayer serves, added to its vicarious benefit, is that it binds communities together, and in that way, can unify a People.
I still pray, because I was brought up that way by religious parents my beloved late father straight from the shtetl, and my saintly mother 1st generation from the same environment.
My dear mother’s very last words were, (and even as an old man, tears are spilling from my eyes now) “I don’t want to go but G-D wants me”….
Dear Stiffnecked, Hard-headed Felix Quigley,
You said
I’m surprised to see you referring to the Bible, but even more to see that Trotsky believed in it:
Deut.7
[1] When the LORD thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and hath cast out many nations before thee, the Hittites, and the Girgashites, and the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than thou;
[2] And when the LORD thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them:
[3] Neither shalt thou make marriages with them; thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son.
[4] For they will turn away thy son from following me, that they may serve other gods: so will the anger of the LORD be kindled against you, and destroy thee suddenly.
[5] But thus shall ye deal with them; ye shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and cut down their groves, and burn their graven images with fire.
[6] For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God: the LORD thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth.
[7] The LORD did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people:
[8] But because the LORD loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath the LORD brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
[9] Know therefore that the LORD thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations;
[10] And repayeth them that hate him to their face, to destroy them: he will not be slack to him that hateth him, he will repay him to his face.
[11] Thou shalt therefore keep the commandments, and the statutes, and the judgments, which I command thee this day, to do them.
Dear Felix Quigley,
Thank you very much for explaining that rule about quoting scripture to me. I did not know the rule, so I apologize.
In my post on this article, I focused my attention on Hamas because the Israeli leadership had focused their overt first efforts on dealing with Hamas. So I was following the train of reporting from multiple Israeli news sources in focusing on Hamas.
In my posts at Israpundit in response to other articles, I often grouped Iran and Hamas together.
I did not know that mentioning Hamas in the same post without also mentioning Iran constituted an elite position.
I am just an American Jew who loves Israel. I do not know what Israeli elites think. Maybe you can explain it to me.
As an outsider, it seems to me the Israeli “elites” were/are the people who can’t get elected anymore because their policies have been failures. That is, their policies regarding the Palestinians, Oslo, the TSS, as well as their economic policies have not brought security nor economic advance for Israel. Because of this they sought power through the Supreme Court which arrogated to itself powers never before recognized as judicial.
If my ideas in the above about the “elites” in Israel are incorrect I welcome your input.
By the way, while I am someone who has worked through my adult life to feel close to God, I was brought up by two atheist Communist party members. When, at age 5 I told my parents that I believed in God they laughed lightly and seemed amused. I didn’t know why they laughed, but I figured I probably should not talk about God anymore. To this day almost every member of my extended family are atheists, except for a nephew of mine who is an Orthodox Jew. I became a bat mitzvah at age 42.
When I went to visit Israel in 2006, I learned more about the tensions between the religious Jews and secular Jews. Every country has divisions and divisiveness until the country is attacked. Then, for survival itself, it is necessary to focus on the attackers and defeat them.
Every time I write in response here since the War began, I am mindful that some people reading my response are in the midst of a war that threatens their lives and their loved one’s lives every minute of the day. I think that motivated my prayer for Israel. From here on I will understand that prayer and quoting the Tanach are not helpful.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/08/world/middleeast/israel-hamas-attack.html
A fence is easy
So they broke through at will. Then open doors all the way.
Well armed. Could travel untouched fast.
The Times article still description is of Gazans.
This is the deception though.
To locate truth visit Nazis in the relevant history say LVIV Ukraine 1941and you have the key to what happened next.
(For modern day Nazis consult Yugoslav stage)
Facing these vermin a people overrun by false leaders.
And a rave party.
Defenceless in every way.
The rot started ages ago so need total reconsideration of everything
Sebastien
In short you lie and you slander
I wrote
Begin quote
“But I do object to this Israeli elitist narrative that only Hamas is the problem. I did deal with this yesterday.
The goal is to bring safety to Jews. So they must live alone in a very specific manner.
The whole system militates against that.
But anyway Edgar knows this.”
You engage in cut and paste but you chose what to leave out
As the above makes clear
4 paragraphs you leave out three of em
So it is not just Hamas. It is that Jews must as Trotsky said in 1937 LIVE ALONE
So I reject not just Hamas but Arabs being anywhere near to Jews.
Out of the whole Shebang. Right out.
A separation of population.
TROTSKY said that too.
But Stalinism murdered him most foul. In 1940.
You lie about me Sebastien and you have much lied about Trotsky. Where will your lies end?
Sebastien,
These are some emotionally-charged days, and there are carefully-orchestrated propaganda campaigns directed against everyone. Please bear this in mind.
I don’t know how much I am helping this situation, by publishing the following link to Zerohedge, which usually has a pro-Russian slanted editorial bent. In an article today, they shine light on the supposed “intelligence failure” the MSM attributes to Israel. Zerohedge correctly notes that Mossad is one of the foremost intelligence agencies in the world, and that Gaza is one of the most surveilled places on earth; and it suggests that Netanyahu and the Israeli Deep State may have left the door open for the HAMAS attack, in order to deflect attention from the Israeli government’s many internal problems.
IF this is true (which it MIGHT be) this puts Bibi in a similar situation Biden was in when he “left the door open” for the Russian attack on the Ukraine.
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2023-10-08/no-hamas-invasion-was-not-israeli-intelligence-failure
I frankly mistrust nearly everyone, nearly all the time.
This event teaches a key lesson Jews Must Live Alone
Lord Balfour may even have wished that but he was under “British” pressure
And rather soon he was sidelined.
Sebastien
It is hard for me to understand how you were not getting what I said.
Hamas is just a name .
The poison itself is Antisemitism.
This is the poison and the roots of Palestinian pass through the actual Holocaust because the Ukrainian Bandera movement was absolutely central to the Holocaust and that TODAY is dynamite Information.
But there is more because as Bandera did, just 200 miles away was the founder of the Palestinians Haj Amin el Husseini setting up the WAFFEN SS there in Yugoslavia which is very relevant. And in the exact time frame. The unity of Banderism and Palestinians.
I’m the first to mention this for a particular reason and that reason is that big swipes of history are being kept hidden.
And you know quite well it is all pervasive in the Left even among acute thinkers like Caitlin Johnstone.
It is the same weird as in the Jeremy Corbyn affair.
Socialism has always fought this and …
“”Antisemitism is the socialism of fools” is a statement regarding the idea that Jewish “wealth” and “power” is the source of social injustice. Wikipedia”
It’s a very long story
So anyway the Barbarians move again in ways that remind me of what Jews felt when the avalanche hit them in the Pogroms of 1918 to 1919 and then in the same place Ukraine the Holocaust proper in 1941.
So it is not just Hamas, it is that the focus is taken off the whole history.
There is a telescoping of historical events in the present
But we are being led away from a sober understanding of the history.
Are we not Sebastien? I can refer to many sources like Ann Applebaum. Zelensky is another. But many.
What can I apologize for? The statement by Leon Trotsky in an interview in about 1937 was dead simple but got to the essence. “Jews must live alone”.
Now creatively apply that to today’s Jewish leadership.
One other thing, apart from Martin, the great thinkers on this have been from the left, Francisco, Jared, and Joseph and I am sure that’s the future.
People like Martin and Edgar are very valuable because they focus on the key factor JEWS MUST LIVE ALONE
ZORRN-
Felix is a personal friend outside this blog and he mentions me as a show of his friendship. And as it happens he doesn’t say much apart from just my name..
You and I are definitely not friends and if you continue , then I’m free to say what I really think about you.
Captain Nemo would be embarrassed, maybe stick you outside of the hatch.
Or just shove you off the edge of the Island.
What he said about Israel was correct, and I suppose much too “deep” for you to understand. He is totally committed to supporting Israel and is far more pro Jews than many who are actually born Jews.
@Edgar I will invoke your name if he invokes your name, as he did and it wasn’t a diatribe. How did you react to what he said as Israel is invaded and Jews murdered, kidnapped, injured, humiliated like the Jewish woman paraded naked on a truck by by the thousands right now by these sub-human vermin?
SEBASTIEN-
In your diatribe against Felix please do not invoke my name as a a veiled insult. If we get down to that level, I have a lot more ammunition that I would hate to use, and never will as Ted would cut up both off at the knees.
In other words, shut your damned mouth about me, unless you are directly speaking to me.
@Felix
You say this as they injure, slaughter and kidnap thousands of Jews in Israel unless it was the incredible bit about Banderism in Ukraine being, somehow, the biggest threat to Jews, when, despite being neo-Nazis, they haven’t started in on the Jews, yet, and there aren’t that many Jews in Ukraine, anyway, certainly compared to Israel, 45,000 versus 7 million, I didn’t see what you said yesterday but do you have a clue as to how offensive these words are? I think an apology is in order.
At this moment, the death toll is over 700, the injured over 2,000, and the kidnapped in the hundreds and climbing by the hour. In a country with a Jewish population less than the total population of New York City but the country with the largest Jewish population in the world which is the Jewish homeland. Between them, more than 80 percent of all the Jews in the world live in either Israel or the U.S. We are not living in the 1940’s. Are you trying to emulate Don Quixote? Do you see Edgar as your Sancho Panza? Who is in the role of Dulcinea?
Evri1
In answer
I am an atheist who defends Israel and there was on the start of Israpundit a rule that left biblical scripture out. It was certainly a good rule. The rule was overturned by the American army type guy Yamit82.
Note it’s not just you so don’t imagine I’m jumping at you
But I do object to this Israeli elitist narrative that only Hamas is the problem. I did deal with this yesterday.
The goal is to bring safety to Jews. So they must live alone in a very specific manner.
The whole system militates against that.
But anyway Edgar knows this.
Do you hold peace talks with a scorpio ?
Do you sleep at night with a scorpio under your pillow ?
You crush the beast once for all
The army failures are huge, but they were dictated from spineless politicians.
The gullible Israelis swallowed the hook and the line .
Ligne Bar-Lev , Clever Gaza Fence , Ligne Maginot; same defensive posture , same results.
By now there are multiple US journalists identifying the Biden Administration as the funder of this war on Israel.
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2023/10/bidenites_gaslight_about_where_that_6_billion_to_iran_went__and_get_debunked_handily_israel.html
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2023/10/joe_bidens_6billion_war_on_israel.html
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2023/10/its_still_early_but_there_are_patterns_to_whats_happening_in_israel.html
And of course the Mort Klein article written before the attack.
The fact that this attack was waged primarily against women, children, and families, in an effort to take as many hostages as possible and kill as many innocents as possible should make it clear to people who live far away from the Middle East, that this Yom Kippur War, in contrast to the last, is being fought by people who don’t know or care about any of the legal conventions about the treatment of civilians in war. They only know their goal which is the annihilation of Judaism and the Jewish State.
That is why this War will require Israel to respond with overwhelming power and destroy the Hamas and their terrorist haven. The world will be shocked, but they should not be. And anyone anywhere in the world who is against this, is on the side of genocide and the destruction of the Jewish people. You will begin to see which of them stand out as genocidal by their support of these butchers. Biden has proven himself to be one of the world’s outstanding supporters and funders of the Palestinians, of Hamas, and of Iran. Obama began the work of empowering Iran and continued it in this administration.
Isaiah 41:10: Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed,
for I am your God;
I will strengthen you,
I will help you,
I will uphold you,
with my victorious right hand.