Written By:
notices and features - Date published:
5:30 pm, May 14th, 2024 - 14 comments
Categories: Daily review -
Tags:
The server will be getting hardware changes this evening starting at 10pm NZDT.
The site will be off line for some hours.
If your not seeing this government as engaging in open class warfare, then you're the problem.
A couple of questions about the war in Gaza.
If Hamas etc stopped attacking Israel, what would happen to Palestinians?
What was Hamas' strategy in attacking Israel in October 2023?
Most Palestinians do not support a two state peace.*
The PLO supported the Oslo Accord Peace process (which led to the formation of the PA and the peace talks which were not successful in 2000 – Arafat required right of return for 1948 refugees and control of borders.
Hamas is now in talks to join the PLO. Which could/would signal an end of their independent actions from out of Gaza. However this might be a temporary strategy – while the IDF is in Gaza.
But if a longstanding change in strategy, then …*.
And meanwhile in Israel things have changed to the Likud perspective (Netanyahu has always opposed the Oslo Accord peace process, wanting permanent IDF occupation of the WB – presumably with some sort of Gaza or Jordan Palestinian citizenship passport that Arabs not part of the 1949/67 border state can use.
FACTS ON THE GROUND
Polls of Israelis now show an end of support for a two state peace.
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/09/26/israelis-have-grown-more-skeptical-of-a-two-state-solution/
https://news.gallup.com/poll/547760/life-israel-oct-charts.aspx
https://www.politico.eu/article/why-pretend-anymore-two-state-solution-dead-israel-gaza-palestine-war/
For now its either UN control of the gun in Gaza and the WB, or failing that, more critical US management of their relationship with Israel.
The Question and Answer
BN told his caucus he used Hamas as a way to discredit Palestine. Hamas attacked to discredit him and Likud as champions of Israeli security and do the harm to Israel that he claimed they had done to Palestine.
I agree with a lot of what SPC has written below, with the following thoughts:
1. I understand what Hamas have claimed about the October attacks, but I don't buy it. My view is that the October attack was calculated to solicit exactly the type of reaction from Israel that eventuated, and thereby to engender international opprobrium. If I'm correct, they succeeded.
2. Israel is now hell bent on the destruction of Hamas as a political entity. IMHO, they will succeed, but the human cost will be unthinkable.
3. If Hamas stopped attacking Israel, nothing would change. The election of Hamas by the people of Gaza in 2007 set in train a sequence of events that was as inevitable as it is tragic. The only way for there to be meaningful change is for Hamas to be obliterated, and for there to be fundamental regime change in Israel.
Rinse and repeat of events since Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated.
My reckons from last year.
Hamas and it's patrons took a punt that the red mist would descend, Israel would go all in with such ferocity that global sympathy for Israelis and the 7 October victims would evapourate and be replaced with outrage and sympathy for the plight of Gazans, the IDF ground invasion of Gaza would become Israel's own Iraq disaster, and moves to normalise Israeli relations with Arab states will be set back years if not abandoned altogether.
is anyone asking Palestinians how they feel about that?
The problem or the Palestinians in Gaza is that since 2007, they have not been allowed an election, and "only a fraction of the territory’s current population ever cast a ballot for Hamas." The 2006 election that led to Hamas taking over Gaza – The Washington Post
In Gaza itself, some Palestinians have spoken up about life under Hamas. What's life like under Hamas? 'Whispered in Gaza' offers unique, courageous testimony | The Times of Israel.
It is the same on the WB, protest occupation policy go to an Israeli prison, protest about the PA, go to one of their prisons.
Yes. Is there an end to this? I doubt it.
Yes, I agree, Exceot for "the IDF ground invasion of Gaza would become Israel's own Iraq disaster". I'm not sure it will become a disaster; I suspect Israel will elminate any semblance of Hamas leadership. However it may only be for a time, and then, rinse and repeat.
Someone's done something to them.
May 14, 2024
By Reuters
An unknown number of orcas have sunk a sailing yacht after ramming it in Moroccan waters in the Strait of Gibraltar, Spain’s maritime rescue service said on Monday, a new attack in what has become a trend in the past four years.
The vessel Alboran Cognac, which measured 15 metres (49 feet) in length and carried two people, encountered the highly social apex predators, also known as killer whales, at 9 a.m. local time (0700 GMT) on Sunday, the service said.
The passengers reported feeling sudden blows to the hull and rudder before water started seeping into the ship. After alerting the rescue services, a nearby oil tanker took them onboard and transported them to Gibraltar.
The yacht was left adrift and eventually sank.
https://www.nbcnews.com/science/science-news/orcas-sink-sailing-yacht-strait-gibraltar-rcna152093?
Yes. They are intelligent creatures. The word has gone around. Now they are having their revenge for whatever was done to them. My bet is too many of their number have been killed or maimed by passing boats.
How much money, time, court and government resources were spent when the government supported the Children's Minister against appearing before the Waitangi Tribunal?
The case then went to appeal.
How much did all that cost? Was that wise and justifiable expenditure of public funds, you know, our hard-working taxpayer's dollar?
Yip all because a spinless minister doesn't have the guts to show up and defend their policy.