Afternoon music
Battles past
Saturday quiz
Well, this week I beat political journalist John Rentoul again. He scored 4 and two-thirds out of 10; I scored 6 and two-thirds. I suspect we both knew only (the same) two out of the three jazzmen in question 5. I did not know the answers to questions 4, 6, and 8 (though I came close on question 8).
Tweets seen
Why does some American patriot not do what has to be done?
At first, the rockets sent by the Palestinian resistance were little more than fireworks, but over the years and decades the technology has improved. It seems that now at least some of those rockets are quite powerful.
Israel, for all its military might, and for all its money, and its control/influence in other countries, is doomed in the long run. Demographics alone, in the region as a whole, would seem to indicate that.
Israel may have powerful weapons, including nuclear ones, but those weapons may not be enough to save it, in the end.
Perhaps a foretaste of what will eventually happen on a far bigger scale.
Cleverly, with all the erudition and wisdom of his “McDegree” in Hospitality Management, explains that firing rockets etc at civilian habitations is “terrorism”. Unless, of course, the shooters are British or American (or Israeli), and the civilians Palestinian Arabs, Iraqis, Afghans, Serbs or (in WW2) Germans etc…
I have to admit that I would never have guessed that the Arabs would be able both to co-ordinate such attacks and also keep the date and time of them secret. Presumably, the Israelis were also not expecting this.
Quelle surprise…
Again, quelle surprise— Israel almost always hits civilian targets.
In one or two decades, something a hundred times greater will probably happen, whatever Israel now does. Israel is doomed.
If the Palestinian Arabs were to create very deep tunnels, coming to the surface somewhere in Central Israel, it might be a gamechanger.
I seem to recall that the KGB had a directorate mainly tasked with digging tunnels. I wonder where those people are now.
Maybe the 15th? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KGB#Directorates.
Possible/plausible “conspiracy theory”: the Israeli ruling circles knew of the Hamas plan, but allowed it to happen, “throwing under a bus” their own Jewish inhabitants, in order to be able invade Gaza as a form of “self-defence”. That is what, mutatis mutandis, Roosevelt did before and after Pearl Harbor.
More music
More tweets seen
The Israeli population must be panic-stricken.
If the term “war criminal” means anything, here it is. Untermensch.
Look at the Old Testament. They started ethnic cleansing that long ago.
What is important about the events of the past 24 hours is not the statistical rate of attrition, not the damage done, and not even which side eventually “wins” in the short term (bearing in mind Israel’s huge military superiority, that can hardly be in doubt), but the fact that an incursion like that seen has happened at all.
Hamas has broken something now— the sense of effortless Israeli military might, and the idea that any invasions or incursions into Israeli territory will be slight, only in one area, and easily repulsed.
In the longer term (i.e. after 2023), that may prove to be the most significant fact about these events. The Palestinian Arabs now know what is or might be possible, no matter what Israeli/Jewish repression follows the current events.
This may just be the beginning of the end for Israel.
Late music
Ian Robert Millard 
I go with the theory that Israel knew about this beforehand. They could possibly even be behind it. Mossad helped create Hamas to begin with, and i fail to see how such a build up by them would go unnoticed. Basically every inch of Gaza is surveilled 24/7. The famous Mossad motto comes to mind. And of course all of these CONservative types, who’ve been pretending to be world peace advocates over Russia-Ukraine, are now back to being bloodthirsty warmongers, who’ll fanatically defend any war crime/atrocity the IDF will no doubt commit.
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EnglishBrit89:
You may be right, of course. It may be (speculating) a plan to wipe out both Gaza as a semi-independent entity, and also a plan to repress Hamas completely. A kind of “Battle of Algiers” on a much larger and more bloody scale.
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Lord Halifax, Anthony Eden, Lord Carrington (who was one of the last government ministers to resign voluntarily over something that was arguably not something he should have felt accountable about ie the Falkland Islands’ invasion in 1982 and who was a classy and honourable man), David Owen and Robin Cook ie men of intellectual stature and considerable ability then we come to James Cleverly!
God Almighty! How this country has degenerated even since the 2000’s let alone the 1980’s and before!
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John:
For Britain to have been represented by Foreign Secretaries as poor as “Boris”-idiot, Liz Truss, and now Cleverly, says something about the kind of “nation” (if “nation” is any more the bon mot) “we” have become.
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Go get yourself a decent wet shave, Mr Cleverly, and show some decent respect for the formerly prestigious post you hold.
Your attempt to look like your typical Premiership footballer is unbecoming for His Majesty’s Secretary of State for Foreign And Commonwealth Affairs.
He is a right scruff. We may as well have an unkempt dog or David Beckham as Foreign Secretary! Come to think about it even Beckham might well have a greater grasp of the realities of the Palestine-Israel conflict and other world affairs than Cleverly does.
This government is so utterly useless even its senior ministers have to be told how to manage their dress sense and personal appearance in an appropriate way.
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I wonder what the Right Dishonourable Member for Holborn and St Pancras (or is it Tel Aviv Central?), Keir Stsrmer, has to say about this state of affairs?
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John:
You can be sure that Jewish-lobby Starmer will come out with some pro-Israel statement soon, no doubt mixed with a fake “pro-peace” message.
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Yes, I will expect that to happen. Apparently, Starmer has banned any debate about the Palestine-Israel situation at their conference this week.
Starmer showing his impeccable democratic credentials again!
Why don’t they just rename themselves Likud and be done with it?
The defence and advancement of Israel and its interests is Starmer’s only real principle. He flip flops on everything else.
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John:
We have been proven correct already…
“Labour Leader Sir Keir Starmer said: ‘I utterly condemn the ongoing attacks on Israel and her citizens.
‘There is no justification for this act of terror which is being perpetrated by those who seek to undermine any chance for future peace in the region. Israel has a right to defend herself.'”
[Daily Mail]
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Starmer has banned the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign from having a stall at the Labour conference as they use the word Apartheid in connection with Israel.
This has more than a degree of accuracy but Starmer doesn’t want to know. I wonder if Starmer in the 1980’s was to the forefront of people in this country who critized white minority-ruled Apartheid SA? I suspect he was. What is the difference between the two situations?
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