Monday: Hili dialogue

June 10, 2024 • 6:45 am

Photo of the Month:

Welcome to Monday, June 10, 2024, and National Black Cow Day (that’s a root beer float: root beer with ice cream), a good drink and also a song by Steely Dan. Here’s a good photo from Wikipedia:

Arnold Gatilao, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

It’s also National Frosted Cookie Day, Ballpoint Pen Day (it was on this day in 1943 that “László Bíró applied for a patent for his pen,”, National Iced Tea Day, National Egg Roll Day, and World Art Nouveau Day.  I love Art Nouveau, and if you want to see the good stuff, go to the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, on the first floor east. Here’s the quintessence: the Sagrada Familia cathedral in Barcelona, where I was the only American to have been stripped nude by the Spanish police (but that’s another story. . )

By C messier – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0

There’s also a Google Doodle today (click to go to site), honoring the Dragon Boat Festival this year, in which, yes, they race dragon boats, but, better yet, everyone eats sticky rice dumplings.  It looks from the top like a truncated millipede:

Here’s a real Dragon Boat from the Wikipedia page, labeled “Dragon boat of the team Lapátolók on River Danube, Budapest, Hungary. 10th of July, 2010.

By Lajos.Rozsa – Own work, Public Domain

And a sticky rice dumpling (zongzi). I love these things!

Oiginal uploader Allentchang at English Wikipedia., CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the June 10 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*The rescue of the hostages by the IDF special operations branch, Yamam, was clever, but not all details have been disclosed, presumably to protect future operations. What we know is described in a WSJ article, and it’s extremely complex, like the famous Entebbe rescue operation of 1976.  (See also this site for a minute-by-minute account.) Just a bit here:

For months, a small team of U.S. military personnel has been helping the Israeli search for hostages, using drones. Before Saturday’s raid, 120 people taken on Oct. 7 remained captive in Gaza; many are believed to have died.

In May, Israel located the female hostage Noa Argamani in a low-rise apartment block in Nuseirat, central Gaza, and three male hostages in another building about 200 yards away: Almog Meir Jan, Andrei Kozlov and Shlomi Ziv.

The Gazan families residing in the apartments were present there, together with the Hamas captors and their prisoners, Hagari said.

Raiding only one building would alert captors at the other location, so the Israelis decided to raid both buildings simultaneously, he said.

The Israeli police’s counterterrorist unit, Yamam, trained for the raid on models of the two buildings, Hagari said. The unit reached central Gaza from Israel, he said, and denied rumors that it had arrived via the U.S.-built pier designed for aid delivery.

Hagari declined to say whether the officers were disguised as Palestinian civilians, a tactic that Israeli special forces have previously used.

Once the order to proceed was given, the Israeli air force struck a preplanned list of Hamas targets in Nuseirat, creating cover for the rescue raid. Ground forces from Israel’s paratroopers division stood ready to support the operation.

The Yamam commandos reached the apartment entrances undetected, the families of the hostages told Israeli TV later.

One Yamam team stormed the first-floor apartment where Argamani was held and took the captors by surprise, according to the military.

On the third floor of the other building, a gunfight with the guards broke out. The Yamam squad leader, Arnon Zamora, was hit and later died of his wounds.

But the hostages were alive. “We have the diamonds in our hands,” the commandos radioed to the command center.]

Leaving the buildings, the teams came under fire from Hamas fighters armed with rocket-propelled grenades, Hagari said. He accused Hamas of deliberately firing at the Israelis from streets full of civilians.

Israeli airstrikes and ground forces hit the militants. The many dead likely included both fighters and bystanders.

Video footage shared by the military showed a CH-53 Sea Stallion helicopter loading soldiers and hostages before whisking them off the beach. Tears and relief awaited them in Israel. In Gaza, more anger and smoldering rubble.

What does Hamas expect when they guard the hostages with gunmen and fire rocket-propelled grenades at the IDF when it’s evacuating the hostages?  As for those killed, we still don’t have a definitive total, as estimates range from 50 to nearly 300. And among those, we have no idea how many were terrorists and how many were innocent civilians. And among the latter, how many were killed by the IDF versus Hamas, which, after all, was firing RPGs.  The Western media, of course, don’t seem to be asking these questions, but couch the figures as if they were all civilians killed by IDF fire.

*Apparently Jews are not only NOT allowed to defend themselves, but aren’t allowed to rescue their hostages. This Honest Reporting piece analyzes the media coverage of the IDF’s rescue of four Israeli hostages, which instead of being seen as something to celebrate, becomes just another reason to criticize Israel.

Media outlets went out of their way on Saturday (June 8) to make Israel’s heroic rescue of four Gaza hostages look tainted or even immoral, with a reframing that served Hamas’ strategy.

Instead of simply reporting the news — that Israeli hostages Noa Argamani, Almog Meir Jan, Andrey Kozlov, and Shlomi Ziv had been rescued in a rare and complex operation in the heart of Gaza — media outlets chose to label it as one of the “bloodiest” raids of the war.

They used three tactics to achieve that goal, which effectively turned justice into injustice:

  • Minimizing the achievement by using the term “freed” instead of “rescued” to describe the hostages
  • Emphasizing the Palestinian death toll based on Hamas figures
  • Whitewashing the terrorists’ use of civilians as human shields

The Washington Post, for example, committed two of these journalistic crimes:

Its headline led with the number of Palestinian casualties (without questioning how many of them were terrorists), its sub-header called the operation “brazen” and the lead paragraph labeled the operation “one of the bloodiest raids of the war.”

The fact that the hostages were rescued alive is mentioned only in the second paragraph. And the word “Blitz” is casually thrown into the fifth paragraph, evoking comparisons to Nazi warfare.

But what’s hidden in plain sight is the complete whitewashing of Hamas’ strategy of using civilians as human shields. The article simply mentions that the hostages had been held in “buildings,” omitting the fact that they were kept in families’ homes in the crowded multi-story structures, amid the civilian population.

NPR‘s coverage has similar faults: The Palestinian death toll is used to frame the hostage rescue with descriptions like “the streets were…covered in blood,” and the sites of the hostage captivity are called “locations in Nuseirat in central Gaza” — which could mean anything from tunnels to military compounds.

Did the Washington Post or NPR journalists independently verify whether the blood in the streets belonged to terrorists or innocent civilians? Or is blood used here — as in ancient times — to demonize Jews?

Either way, their coverage whitewashes the terrorists.

Reuters, which also called the operation “one of the single bloodiest Israeli assaults of the eight-month-old war,” used another tactic while focusing on the Palestinian casualties.

One of its headlines used the vague term “freed,” which can be attributed to the goodwill of the terrorists, instead of the value-laden word “rescued” that may paint Hamas as bad:

There’s a lot more in the article, but I’ll just give their conclusions:

The underlying premise of such biased coverage is that Israelis should not fight for their lives because it comes at a cost. They should just sit back and let terrorists slaughter and kidnap their brethren because they run and hide among innocent people.

But media should stop ignoring the increasing evidence of Gazan civilian complicity with Hamas, as well as the fact that Hamas bears responsibility for putting the entire Gazan population in danger since its October 7th attack on the Jewish state.

Some other chiding that I found:

Even the NYT is sour about this (click to read):

And the UN special rapporteur for Palestine accuses the Israelis of “perfidy” because they were “hiding in an aid truck” (the IDF denies this).  And even if it was an aid truck, I really can’t see why that’s morally wrong, for the consequences (getting closer to the hostages, meaning fewer deaths overall) don’t seem to be worse than hiding in, say, a soap truck.

But this may be the worst one, which I retweeted with a quote:

I’ll add this here to raise my spirits after the world’s usual onslaught on Israel (h/t Rosemary).

*In the NYT, Nicholas Kristof explains “Why Biden is right to curb immigration.”

I don’t think the solution is to swing the doors open.

Too often, we Americans approach immigration as a binary issue. We’re in favor, or we’re against. In fact, immigration should be seen as a dial we adjust.

However much we believe in immigration, we’re not going to welcome all 114 million people around the world who have been forcibly displaced, not to mention perhaps one billion children globally who are estimated to suffer some kind of severe deprivation. We must settle for accepting a fraction of those eager to come, and determining that fraction is the political question before us, with many trade-offs to consider.

Immigration overall offers important benefits to the country, and employers and affluent people are particular winners: Immigrants reduce labor costs for people hiring gardeners or caregivers. But poor Americans can find themselves hurt by immigrant competition that puts downward pressure on their wages, although economists disagree on the magnitude of that impact.

I’m influenced in my thinking by a terrific book by my Times colleague David Leonhardt, “Ours Was the Shining Future,” which examined many studies on the impact of immigration on wages. Leonhardt concluded that immigration wasn’t the primary reason for income stagnation among low-education workers over the last half-century, but that it nonetheless was a significant secondary factor.

Relatively recent immigrants may also be hurt by newer immigrants — which may help explain why Pew found that three-quarters of American Latinos believe that the increasing number of people seeking to enter the country via the southern border is a “major problem” or a “crisis.”

Some working-class voters feel betrayed by Democrats who pushed to open borders, and there may be an element of xenophobia or racism in this anger — but also an element of truth. The United States makes it difficult for foreign doctors to practice in America, protecting physicians from competition. But the United States makes it relatively easy for low-skilled immigrants to work here and push down wages of our most vulnerable workers.

. . .Politics is of course a central reason Biden has acted on this issue, but that doesn’t mean he’s necessarily wrong. Plus, frustration at immigration makes it more likely that Trump will win the White House and that Trump Republicans will dominate Congress and the Supreme Court. That’s something the left should consider a disaster worth trying hard to avert.

One way or another, an angry public will force change on immigration.

. . . Are we, the people of an immigrant nation, pulling up the ladder after we have boarded? Yes, to some degree. But the reality is that we can’t absorb everyone who wants in, and it’s better that the ladder be raised in an orderly way by reasonable people.

Yes, doing it for political reasons doesn’t make it wrong, it just makes it mendacious. Do we want a President whose policies increasingly seem to be guided by what will get him reelected? (Do I need to add here that Biden is still a far better choice than Trump, for whom I’ll never vote?) Biden was elected promising to put Kamala Harris on the “border problem”. She didn’t do squat, and Biden waited until the last minute.

*Why is the India/Pakistan cricket match, held in New York as part of the Men’s T20 World Cup, like a Taylor Swift concert? Answer: ticket prices become stratospheric.

Probably the most-watched sporting event on Earth in the year 2024 plopped down here Sunday morning in the gigantic Long Island park named Eisenhower, and some early drama happened outside the gates upon phone screens. Here came one of those rare India-vs.-Pakistan cricket colossi, this one in the group stage of the men’s T20 World Cup being held in the Caribbean and the United States, and as droves filed in wearing India blue or Pakistan green (or more intricate attire), some fans stood and scrolled like addled day traders as they managed agonizing ticket crises while staring at pulverizing ticket prices.

The match would happen in a pop-up stadium seating 34,000 and set for post-Cup disassembly and departure, at the sporting wee hour of 10:30 a.m., in a park bigger than Central with two golf courses and an outdoor concert venue named for Harry Chapin and a New York Islanders training facility. It would happen in a map dot of fervor surrounded by the American general obliviousness. Yet as the world’s largest (India) and fifth-largest (Pakistan) populations set to watch from afar, two Indian men from Ahmedabad now based in Brandon, Manitoba, Canada, had a reading of global mania in their hands.

It read $1,636 Canadian dollars each (about $1,187 U.S.)

Don’t forget the service fee.

How about $4,183 (Canadian) for two?

. . . They have tickets for other matches here, but India vs. Pakistan in the world’s second-biggest sport never falls into any category resembling “other matches.” Its allure owes heavily to its rarity, and its rarity owes heavily to the hard feelings and harder border between two governments. The two generally need something like a World Cup to get together. When tickets opened for sale, tickets closed for sale two minutes thereafter as screens froze around the globe.

And the winner. . . .Jai Hind!

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is fussy:

Hili: You’ve just changed the water in this bowl and something fell into it.
A: Try to take it out with your paw.
In Polish:
Hili: Dopiero co wymieniałeś w tym pojemniku wodę i już coś do niej wpadło.
Ja: Spróbuj to wyciągnąć łapką.

And a picture of the uber-affectionate Szaron:

*******************

From img.flip:

From Science Humor:

From Wrinkle the Duck and reddit:

 

From Masih, listen to her video if you have time.  One of the three pillars is “compulsory hijab”.

UCLA made a stupid decision: that moving events from in-person to virtual, when the speaker is controversial, was GOOD. FIRE strikes back.  UCLA needs this explanation?

From Bob. I’m sure I’ve posted this before, but we can’t see too many duckling rescues:

From Jez; Male fun:

From Barry, who says, “The cat has to be thinking, ‘What the hell is wrong with you, man?'”

From the Auschwitz Memorial, one that I retweeted

Two tweets from Dr. Cobb. Matthew says “Poor Anders,” but I’ve put the Earthrise photo below. Other transcripts have “(joking)” after Borman’s comment!

Beautiful!

Dave is higher!

45 thoughts on “Monday: Hili dialogue”

  1. Good Hili Dialogue

    Wondering what leaf is used for the dumpling.

    BTW the grocery store can have a sort of paper wrap that should work – it is not parchment paper, it’s for tamales – pasilla something…

      1. Interesting – I looked up the paper – it’s called “papel para pasteles” – they are sometimes on peripheral shelves in the produce area – I made tamales with it once – I bet it’ll work for these dumplings … you see, they have to be steamed, so I think parchment paper is not going to handle the wet conditions – but I don’t know.

    4. Very likely a bamboo leaf – they are used to wrap rice dumplings (mochi) in Japan, and I would expect also in China.

  2. I second Nicholas Kristoff’s endorsement of David Leonhardt’s book, “Ours Was a Shining Future”. While I may be a simple, gullible, and (certainly) economics-ignorant retired engineer, Leonhardt’s story explained a lot of my (U.S.) experiences from my 50’s childhood through my late 20th and 21st century adulthood. I highly recommend it for other baby boomers like me, but also to younger people who might want to understand the U.S. that they were born into.

    I also would not mind seeing a critique from someone who is a subject matter expert in the area.

    1. Although it’s a door-stopper, Thomas Piketty’s “Capital in the 21st Century” did the same for me but on a longer time scale. Explained for me the context in which my parents and their parents lived and struggled or thrived, and why my circumstances (and my kids’) are what they are.

      1. It has been a year since I read Leonhardt, but I think Piketty is referred to several times.

    2. I am on the wait-list for that one at our public library. Looking forward to reading it.

  3. Regarding the BBC’s coverage of the conflict, I have complained about a story on their website about Biden’s ceasefire proposals, which referred to an “exchange of hostages”. Not only was that egregiously incorrect, but having followed the links in the story, I found they had misquoted Biden, who had said, “exchange hostages for Palestinian prisoners”. Unfortunately, I don’t have the URL of the story any longer, but a search on the BBC website shows that the one I think it is has been corrected.
    I haven’t heard the outcome of my complaint yet, it was only a week ago – I’ll keep you posted.

  4. The Israelis love their IDF, and for good reason. The rescue was an amazing achievement and shows just how much commitment Israel has to its citizens. Consider the commitment that Hamas shows to its citizens, for contrast.

    The press? Feh!

    1. +1 Norman! And in addition to successes, they take responsibility for Oct 7 failure.

  5. Thanks for the construction workers video. It made me laugh out loud this morning!

    The news about the hostages being released is outstanding, and the story of how the IDF accomplished it is incredible.
    Why is there no pressure on Hamas to release the remaining hostages (and the remains of hostages) to prevent further deaths of Palestinians? Why don’t the media provide “experts say” reports on how Hamas needs to release hostages NOW to prevent further bloodshed? “Experts say” reports are typically used by them to promote chosen ideological viewpoints, so why not in favor of releasing hostages?
    Hamas are in an unwinnable situation – if they kill the remaining live hostages, they will rightly be called butchers (not that that would stop them) and could possibly lose some of the left-wing support that they have in the media and amongst intellectuals in this country. If they continue holding them, the IDF will continue to hunt them down until they are found which will incur more loss of life, primarily on the Hamas side and which will also likely include many civilians.
    Are the media so evil that they wish to see more innocent Palestinians killed just to make Israel look bad?

    1. Hamas aren’t in an unwinnable situation: they’re fighting the war in the media and it’s going very well for them. The Arab press hails them, and our media isn’t far behind.

      True, things don’t look good on the ground but they firmly believe in Islamic martyrdom. Here’s hoping many more Hamas members achieve martyrdom!

    1. +1 Thanks for stepping up!

      That NYT crank opinion piece, combined with today’s piece slamming scientists for the distrust of public health was sufficient to tip me into canceling my subscription. For COVID origin, see, for example, E.C. Holmes & M. Worobey’s papers, references therein, and don’t forget the vast body or related literature on coronavirus and the human-animal interface. This will also apply, of curse, to influenza & other potential epidemic or pandemic viruses.

      I’ve been considering canceling NYT for quite some time (soft on Hamas, too quick to embrace trendy nonsense, etc.) It bothers me that they are considered a liberal voice. They are centrist at best, lab “balancing” their good content with tedious nonsense. And I don’t care about fashion or the overpriced restaurants.

      Looking for other good news sources. Economist?

    2. +1 on the TWiV link! The main push for lab leak seems to be the defense and intel agencies…the same folks who assured us of the existence of weapons of mass destruction some years ago. The subject matter experts and peer reviewed papers seem to support zoonotic spillover in wet-market area. Plus when I hear hooves, I think horses, not zebras FWIW.

    3. I know it is late in the day, but Vince and the TWiV gang just today posted shorter TWiV Special on this deluded nyt coolumn taking 55 minutes of excerpts from the weekends full-length episode 1121. Jolene includes a pretty exhaustive list of links to previous TWiVs on the subject. Hard to imagine that an nyt writer could have missed or dismissed these over the past three years! Url is https://www.microbe.tv/twiv/ And open the special edition: “How the Pandemic Began in Nature, in five key points”.

      1. The excerpt is probably the entire NYT rebuttal segment from 1121 – it was just the first hour of that episode. I’m glad they did that, tho, because anyone opening 1121 might think the whole two hrs were devoted to that and not watch it.

        Also, to your comment that the intel community fosters the leak hypothesis, in the podcast they’re quite clear that they do not – or at least one unit of them does not. I don’t have any direct input on that, just relaying what they said.

        (Otherwise, from following TWiV since COVID started, I’ve learned that Vincent likes to go either by that or Vinny, but for some reason not Vince.)

  8. If the hostages were held in separate buildings by Gazan citizens, probably paid by Hamas to hide them, I wonder how many citizens in these buildings knew they were there.

    2. I have not been to Gaza but I have been to the slums of Beirut and I speak (admittedly now terrible) Arabic.

      All of them knew, Debra. All of them.

      D.A.
      NYC

  9. ” the Sagrada Familia cathedral in Barcelona, where I was the only American to have been stripped nude by the Spanish police (but that’s another story)”

    Please do tell!

    1. I’m with you on that! Please, PCC(E), tell us the story!

      And while I’m here, I teared up when I heard the news of the 4 hostages being rescued. I worry for each and every one of them and imagine how terrified (or sick) they must be. I’ll admit, though, I’ve been particularly concerned for the young ladies. I’ve read the synopses I found in some Jewish publication (can’t remember which one) given of each hostage and wondered about the individual hell each of them are enduring. Bravo IDF for rescuing these 4. Incidentally, I had the overnight BBC feed on when the story broke (Jerry is not the only one dealing with insomnia). I believe it was about 2am mst and I was immediately struck by the newscasters focus on “the bloody massacre”. What? They (the IDF) pulled off this incredible rescue in the middle of a densly populated urban center and the “story” is NOT that the rescue suceeded but that there was “the blood of innocent women and children in the streets”. Wow.

      1. Yes. The media’s negative slant is completely reprehensible. (What an amazing success story for the IDF.)

        And, yes. I’d also like to hear the story about the Spanish Inquisition.

  10. Here is the issue regarding the hostage rescue operation, at least from the perspective of this liberal, and not from a Hamasnik’s: Israel has a legitimate claim to rescue its captured civilians. I think that most liberals have an ethical framework that recognizes that. So Israel’s desire to rescue its civilians is understandable and can be ethically justified, but the large loss of Arab lives is ethically troubling. If the loss of life was disproportionate to the threat, and if less harmful alternatives were available, the operation would be hard to justify ethically, if you accept that the equal value of all human life should be a paramount consideration.

    It should go without saying that since the Arabs initiated hostilities by capturing Israeli civilians, they bear some moral responsibility for the death toll. However, this doesn’t justify disproportionality. The principle of proportionality doesn’t mean “death equity” or an exact numerical equality (it’s not “an eye for an eye”). Instead, it’s about using the minimum force necessary to effectively address a threat. It’s a way to balance the legitimate right to self-defense or rescue with an ethical imperative to minimize harm and respect the value of all human life.

    Now, as far as I can tell, Israel does attempt to respond proportionately to Arab hostility. But the large loss of life on their side makes it difficult to dispassionately assess this. Collateral damage is hard to process rationally for most people.

    1. But Emily what would be proportionate? According to the summary by Jerry and to other sources, many of the deaths among Gazans occurred in the fire fight between the IDF and Hamas *after* the hostages had been found but before they were evacuated by helicopter to Israel. At that point Hamas could just stand down and take the loss: “Oh well they found our hostages imprisoned in apartment blocks with hundreds of our innocent civilian countrymen.” Instead it’s bullets and RPGs, and of course Israel protects its soldiers and the hostages by pulverizing those Hamas soldiers and lots of civilians are killed alongside them. This seems right and just to me (but horrible for the dead civilians and the people who love them).

      1. “Instead it’s bullets and RPGs, and of course Israel protects its soldiers and the hostages by pulverizing those Hamas soldiers and lots of civilians are killed alongside them. ”

        This is precisely what Hamas was banking on when they put the hostages where they did. Those criticizing Israel for proportionality are either fooled by the disinformation in the media or have no moral compass themselves.

    2. Emily in the Middle East there is no “proportionality”.

      Did the raiders of the music festival think: “Well… maybe about 1,300 is about right.. let’s stop here.” ?

      In the Middle East and particularly the Islamosphere there is only defeat and death or victory and life. This is the binary they (not Israel) have selected since long before 1948.
      And I have no reservations as to which side I am on. I am on the side of civilization and not on the side of “mercy” towards an enemy who, given the opportunity would show me (or you, my friend) exactly none.

      “Proportionality” matters as little there as it did to us even in our grandparents generation. (Ask a citizen of Dresden, Berlin or Tokyo).

      D.A.
      NYC
      https://themoderatevoice.com/author/david-anderson/

    3. Emily, I know your heart’s in the right place. So I ask you to consider that the force being applied by the IDF perhaps just is the minimum required to destroy the existential threat that Hamas represents. Hamas operates in ways that all but guarantee that many (for the moment) non-combatants (who have not evacuated) will die when Israel attacks Hamas. There is no way, given the uncertainties of battle, to be sure that the force can be minimized but still sufficient to prevail against the enemy. Wasting soldiers by providing them with inadequate force is military incompetence.

      A nation at war is not obligated to consider only self-defence and hostage rescue but it can and should aim for the ultimate defeat of the nation that attacked it. This is a legitimate war aim for Israel just as it was for the Allies in the Second World War. Every war the West has been in since then (except arguably against ISIS) has not had that aim. We cut and run when things get uncomfortable because we don’t need to stick it out. We tell ourselves that the war has exceeded the limits of proportionality, which is a luxury belief. One of the things that make war Hell is that in an existential, WW2-style war that you must win, you do have to value the moral worth of the enemy, including his militarized civilians, as less than your own and even less than your own soldiers which are a scarce resource.

      Those who want Israel to use less force are really saying they don’t want Israel to win. Which is fine, but it means I can’t be friends with them because it means I can’t trust them to have my back when it’s our turn in the breach.

  12. Interesting that she chose the word “perfidy”. How likely is it that the highly educated Special Rapporteur is unaware of the centuries-old “Perfidious Jew” slur that was only expunged from Catholic liturgy during the Vatican II reforms?

    1. Actually, “perfidy” in this context is a legal term with a specific definition.

      Under the Geneva Convention, a combatant power is allowed to use deception — a “ruse”. However, there is an exception if the ruse constitutes perfidy. Perfidy is defined as taking advantage of one of the provisions of the Geneva Convention designed to protect innocent lives, such as the prohibition on firing on a vehicle marked with a red cross. If combatants hide in a vehicle marked with a red cross, that is generally perfidy.

      Pro-Hamas sources are claiming that the troops that rescued the hostages hid in an aid vehicle. Hence, the charge of perfidy.

      1. Other reports say the IDF rescue team was masquerading as Gazan civilians of both sexes using a regular lorry, not an “aid truck”, to move their personal belongings including mattresses from one apartment to another. They used this cover story to get past Hamas checkpoints and closer to the site where the hostages were. So no perfidy. That’s even assuming that using a truck that sometimes carries “aid” really would be perfidy in the Geneva Convention sense. If it wasn’t marked with a Red Cross or the UN insignia, I don’t see how it would be.

        Traveling in an aid truck wouldn’t make sense as Hamas would likely have hi-jacked it.

  13. As soon as the “Earthrise” photo became available as a poster pre-1970, I had it framed and hung where I lived — though I oriented it so that my perspective was in the orbital or equatorial plane of Earth & Moon (and the Solar System), with Earth coming out from behind the “left” side of the Moon rather than from above a “terrestrial” lunar horizon.

    I’m cleaning out my garage so that I can fit a Tesla into it. The last framed picture in storage that I will be liberating shortly is that one of “Earthrise” (Earthview?), and I look forward to having it visible on a daily basis again.

  14. Interestingly, Bill Anders died doing aerobatics in his T 34 Mentor aircraft.
    90 years old and still flying like that.

    And, congratulations to Israel and the IDF for rescuing the hostages. And I am certain they did everything they could to minimize casualties. I hesitate to say ‘innocent’ as I don’t think too many people in that area really are, really innocent.

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