Meanwhile on the International front....

Worth asking if Israel eventually pulls Biden under.

Voters Broadly Disapprove of Biden’s Strategy on Gaza

https://www.timesofisrael.com/blink...ckly-as-possible-top-priority-for-us-in-2024/

 

Big tobacco, menthol and . . . Hezbollah.

https://www.motherjones.com/politic...how-big-tobacco-is-stoking-opposition-to-ban/

 

My rabbi during Shabbat services last week attended a meeting of clergy, government, and military and law enforcement officials that day where they viewed raw GoPro footage of the Oct. 6 terror attacks by Hamas. Visibly shaken, he wouldn't describe it in detail but said he did it to bear witness, and to note the joyful celebration of the Hamas terrorists while horrifying rapes and brutality were taking place on camera. He added a relative of a congregant was confirmed to have been murdered by Hamas terrorists while in captivity.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...ual-violence-rape-hostages-oct-7/71917113007/

 

I half expect (hope?) this coming Oscar’s telecast replaces the In Memorial segment with that video.

 

ok

Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner Visit Hamas Attack Site in Israel

 

A Times Investigation Tracked Israel’s Use of One of Its Most Destructive Bombs in South Gaza

During the first six weeks of the war in Gaza, Israel routinely used one of its biggest and most destructive bombs in areas it designated safe for civilians, according to an analysis of visual evidence by The New York Times.

The video investigation focuses on the use of 2,000-pound bombs in an area of southern Gaza where Israel had ordered civilians to move for safety. While bombs of that size are used by several Western militaries, munitions experts say they are almost never dropped by U.S. forces in densely populated areas anymore.

The Times programmed an artificial intelligence tool to scan satellite imagery of south Gaza for bomb craters. Times reporters manually reviewed the search results, looking for craters measuring roughly 40 feet across or larger. Munitions experts say typically only 2,000-pound bombs form craters of that size in Gaza’s light, sandy soil.

 

https://wapo.st/41OgrUR

More than 20,000 people have been killed in the Gaza Strip in the war between Israel and Hamas, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

Hamas militants led an attack on Israel on Oct. 7 that killed more than 1,200 people, according to Israeli officials. Israel’s response — an all-out bombardment of Gaza and a ground invasion — has killed almost 1 in 100 people in the Strip.

The Gaza Health Ministry said early Friday that 20,057 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes since Oct. 7.

The number of deaths is far higher than in any conflict in Gaza in recent history. And it is higher than the estimated 15,000 Palestinians killed in the violence that followed the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. Palestinians call that mass displacement the Nakba, or “the catastrophe.”

 

https://wapo.st/4794UjR

For Palestinians in Gaza, there’s nowhere left to go.

They were already packed tightly before the war, hemmed in by a years-long Israeli and Egyptian blockade. During the current conflict, few parts of the enclave have been spared bombardment, and Israel’s often haphazard and confusing evacuation orders have pushed the displaced into ever-shrinking “safe” areas.

 

Israel-Gaza war live: Israel broadens ground offensive ahead of UN security council vote | Israel-Gaza war | The Guardian

Israel broadens Gaza assault ahead of security council aid vote
Israeli forces signalled they were widening their ground offensive with a new push into central Gaza on Friday, as the UN security council was expected to vote on a resolution to increase humanitarian aid to stave off the threat of famine.

As hopes faded for an imminent breakthrough in talks this week in Egypt aimed at getting warring Israel and Hamas to agree a new truce, air strikes, artillery bombardments and fighting were reported across the Palestinian territory.

Israel’s military on Friday ordered residents of Al-Bureij, in central Gaza, to move south immediately, indicating a new focus of the ground assault that has already devastated the north of the Strip and made a series of incursions in the south, Reuters reported.

 

"While bombs of that size are used by several Western militaries, munitions experts say they are almost never dropped by U.S. forces in densely populated areas anymore."

Hmmmm ... this could mean a number of very different things.

 

The question about war that's most important to answer isn't "is this justified?" it's "will this achieve our goals. Will it work?" The bloodlust after 9/11 led us into Iraq, a cosmic failure for the US. The Afghan War didn't exactly have a happy ending either. In two-plus months of war, Israel has killed many civilians without apparently weakening Hamas' control of Gaza. If the people of Gaza didn't all hate Israel now, they'd be saints, which they aren't because saints are uncommon in our species. Israel has seen that walls and guards don't necessarily keep it safe. We all know Hamas' goal of destroying Israel is irrational and impossible. Israel is too strong. But we don't even know if the government of Israel has a goal beyond blood right now -- aside that is from the continued political survival of its despicable leader. Since the rest of the world has no desire to impose a solution, logic suggests that Israel will move, sooner rather than later, to ethnic cleansing of all Palestinians in what it deems as "its" territory. This will turn a pretty good country into a friendless perpetual garrison state.