Posts Tagged ‘Israel Hamas war’

The Real Conundrum In Gaza

Posted: December 14, 2023 by datechguy in Israel, Israel vs Hamas, Uncategorized
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It’s very much looking like Israel has decided that the left in the west rants are going to be ignored and that the Jewish state is going all in on destroying Hamas, damn the torpedoes full speed ahead. Hamas leaders have fled Qatar and the rats seem to be abandoning the sinking ship even to the point of floating albeit briefly recognizing Israel’s right to exist.

Granted it’s still going to take several months of mopping up but the real question is: what happens next?

The citizens of Gaza might not like the destruction that’s been wrought against them thanks to Hamas’ actions. They might even be pissed about their taking the aid sent to them to build a terror infrastructure, but this doesn’t translate into liking Israel or even not wanting Jews dead, they just doesn’t like the consequences of the various attempts to kill the Jews..

The problem is that no only do polls show that the Palestinians overwhelmingly support the attacks and atrocities of October 7th but better than two out of three want a return to the good old days of suicide bombings and buses full of Jews blowing up.

Remember these aren’t polls of Hamas members these are pols of Palestinians.

I submit and suggest that’s it’s impossible for Israel to allow Gaza to govern itself if the population is simply go back to killing Jews under their own banner rather than under the Hamas banner. Furthermore you can’t make peace with people determined to kill you, you can impose peace, you can as General Sherman put it make war so horrible that it will be decades before they consider turning to it.

So what is the solution? What should be done with Gaza when the last member of Hamas is sent to get his virgins? Feel free to put your suggestion in comments and next week I’ll give you mine.

I think this Video Should be Shown at Every Campus Anti-Israel Protest

Posted: December 6, 2023 by datechguy in culture, middle east
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I think if the woke students saw this their jaws would drop off and roll under a car somewhere.

Now I will give this guy 10 out of 10 for actually believing his religion and making the argument that “sin” is not justified by a “good cause” and noting that obeying God is more important than advancing any cause, even a good one. But note what he is defining as sin:

  1. Free mixing with women
  2. Prayer time that is missed
  3. Muslim woman coming out without wearing “at the very least a jibab”
  4. Standing next to a guy taking it up the arse (vs ‘ass’ as this is British English) at night

And note what this Islamic scholar asks at the end: “Is Allah going to give victory to people who are disobeying him outright?”

Even better maybe we should play it for those Ivy League president and watch them dissemble in their reactions.

Terror for Fun and Profit

Posted: December 5, 2023 by datechguy in economy, Israel, Israel vs Hamas
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Had a different topic in mind until I saw this:

Five days before the deadliest attack in Israel’s history, a warning may have appeared on stock exchanges.

A study by researchers from Columbia University and NYU called “Trading on Terror?” suggests that a trader may have been aware of the coming attack, bet against the Israeli economy and walked away with a profit by short selling on the U.S. and Israeli stock exchanges.

Short selling is a trading strategy aimed at making a profit off an asset that is expected to drop in price; the seller “borrows” a security and sells it on the open market with the goal of buying it back later at a lower price and pocketing the difference.

The study looked at the Israel Exchange-Traded Fund, a common way for people to make investments in Israel, which on any given day has around 2,000 shares shorted. On Oct. 2, that number shot up to over 227,000 shares. 

According to Columbia Law School Professor Joshua Mitts, one of the authors of the study, “that’s extremely unusual.” It was also profitable: the shares sold short for one Israeli company alone yielded a profit of nearly $900,000.

Imagine, 1400 were killed, hundreds were kidnapped and women were assaulted and raped and babies beheaded and burned. That’s horrific enough even if you consider that you have a group of people who were since childhood taught that Jews were not due any consideration as human beings.

But the idea that there were people who KNEW this was coming and rather than doing something to prevent it decided it was an excellent chance to make a large profit. That brings obscenity to a whole new level.

Now in fairness the people who did this might well be the same as the folks who did the attacking, as Stephen Green put it:

Underground rocket factories don’t pay for themselves, you know.

So to them it might be the same ideology but for me this is so beyond the scope that it becomes very hard to see Christ in such people rather than recommend a generous use of hemp.

Closing thought: If I’m Israel from now on I’m monitoring stock markets for this type of activity in the future.

The bumpy road ahead in Israel

Posted: November 28, 2023 by chrisharper in Uncategorized
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By Christopher Harper

After reporting on the Middle East for many years, I realize how difficult it is to find any lasting solutions. Also, predictions about the region are about as accurate and useful as those of the talking heads paraded on national television.

But here are some background and thoughts about the road ahead.

Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which control Gaza, are vicious organizations. The Palestinian Authority, which rules part of the West Bank, is corrupt. The government of Benjamin Netanyahu is inept.

The leadership of all three governments must go.

Hamas came to the forefront in 2006 when it split from the Palestinian Authority, which was formed in the 1990s to rule over parts of the West Bank and Gaza. Many Palestinians voted against the leadership of the PA, which was controlled by the Fatah branch of the Palestine Liberation Organization, because of widespread corruption. Yasser Arafat, the leader of both the PLO and Fatah, had died two years earlier, and no one could manage the Palestinian factions. Since 2006, no elections have happened as the rift between the West Bank and Gaza widened.

How to get rid of Hamas and Islamic Jihad? The Israeli armed forces have pushed through northern Gaza, and most of the Palestinian leadership has fled to southern Gaza on the border with Egypt. As part of the hostage and prisoner exchange, Israel must insist that the Palestinian leaders leave Gaza for other Arab countries. That happened, for example, in 1982 after Israel forced the PLO leaders to leave Lebanon for Tunisia. After that, the people of Gaza must have an internationally supervised election to choose a new government.

How to get rid of the current leadership of the PA? Again, internationally supervised elections may be the answer. Although Arafat had many detractors, he was able to keep the diverse Palestinian groups going in roughly the same direction for more than 30 years. Part of the problem with the PA was that much of the power rested with those Palestinians who lived outside of Israel and returned in the 1990s while those inside Israel’s boundaries held little influence.

Unfortunately, democracy isn’t a mainstay of Palestinian philosophy. But the current leaders have failed to improve the lot of the average Palestinian and should be held accountable.

Then there’s Netanyahu, who has been prime minister three times for 16 years, bringing a hardline attitude toward Palestinians, ignoring most of the agreements made in the Oslo Accords in the 1990s, and increasing tensions within Israel itself. Moreover, his government’s failure to anticipate the Hamas attacks on October 7 should make all Israelis doubt his leadership.

Unfortunately, Israel’s electoral system favors small groups of voters who hold extreme views on both the right and left. Citizens vote for their preferred party and not for any individual candidates. The 120 seats in the Knesset are then assigned proportionally to each party, provided that the party vote count meets the 3.25% electoral threshold. As a result of the low threshold, a typical Knesset has 10 or more factions represented. With so many parties, it is nearly impossible for one party or faction to govern alone, let alone win a majority. In the government before the war, Netanyahu had to woo the conservative religious factions, for example, to create a coalition.

With the ongoing war, the government has the support of nearly all parties. But that support will quickly dissolve when Israeli citizens and politicians look more closely at the once-vaunted intelligence agencies that missed the Hamas strategy. Fortunately, Netanyahu will likely be sent packing.

Neither Hamas nor the Israeli government will be seen as victors in the current war. That’s usually an opportunity for some serious peace negotiations, as happened after the 1973 and 1982 wars, but all sides will need new leaders and fresh ideas to create significant changes.

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