Israel Invades Gaza: What You Need to Know

WHAT'S GOING ON?

Hamas (which does not equal "the men, women and children of Gaza")... piss off Israelis with their evil terrorist tactics and they tell the people who are walled into the ghetto and getting the crap blown out of them by Israelis that it's the Zionists who are killing and starving their kids. When your kids all die while they are sitting in geography class because an Israel shell blew the flesh off their bones, that's a fairly plausible take on things. So Palestinians rally round Hamas. What conceivable reason have they to trust Israelis?

Mark Shea
Catholic and Enjoying It!, 6th January 2009

WHAT DOES ISRAEL REALLY WANT?

Does it really believe it can stop the rocket fire from Gaza when previous Israeli governments have tried and failed, using every military means?

[...]

Israel's politicians are pursuing a parallel campaign, too - an electoral one... The Israeli public has a generally low opinion about how their government has handled what they call "Hamastan" - Hamas-controlled Gaza. Until it started talking tough, the hawkish opposition leader, Binyamin Netanyahu, was leading in the polls. Now the gap has narrowed.

Katya Adler
BBC News, 27th December 2008

WHAT WILL HAPPEN?

What we’re talking about here, what the IDF has in mind, is more what the Romans called “decimation”: killing enough of the right people to make Hamas weak for five or ten years, which may, just may, be long enough to give Israel’s allies the PLO/Fatah the edge in the Palestinian Civil War. That’s what this is about, getting your guys to win that war.

Will it work? Depends on the time frame. For a few years, yes; in the long run, Hell no. But if you’re the IDF, there are no good options in the long term. Demographics, dude; no way out of that spiral. The short term is all you’ve got, and in the short term Hamas is going to find out why it’s not a good idea to pretend you’re Hezbollah when you can’t back it up.

The War Nerd
Hamas Ain't No Hezbollah, 6th January 2006

WHAT ABOUT AMERICA?

Americans shouldn't be in the position of endlessly debating Israel's security situation and its endless religious and territorial conflicts with its neighbors. That should be for Israeli citizens to do, not for Americans.

Glenn Greenwald
George Washington's warnings and U.S. policy towards Israel

I TAKE IT YOU DON'T SUPPORT THE GAZA OFFENSIVE?

The Israelis don't want to exterminate the Palestinians; they just want to occupy the land they stole from them, fair and square, by killing 2550 Palestinians for the 17 Israelis killed in the past eight years.

It's eye-opening to see what a Qassam Rocket really looks like. (Not that I'd want one aimed at me, but let's have some proportionality for G-d's sake.) I was imagining V-2s, not what I used to make as a kid when model rocketry was my hobby.

Joshua Snyder
The Western Confucian, 6th January 2006

Qassam Rocket

US-Made Weaponry

WHEN WILL IT END?

The Israelis in Gaza, like the American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, are foolishly breeding the next generation of militants and Islamic radicals. Jihadists, enraged by the injustices done by Israel and the United States, seek to carry out reciprocal acts of savagery, even at the cost of their own lives. The violence unleashed on Palestinian children will, one day, be the violence unleashed on Israeli children.

This is the tragedy of Gaza. This is the tragedy of Israel.

Chris Hedges
Party to Murder, 30th December 2008

Cheating at Confession

"This was my mother, when she was growing up, her experience of confession.

Small town Pennsylvania - Pennsylvania has lots of small towns - and she was born in the 20s, so this was probably in the 30s - the 1930s - and at that time people went to communion and confession once a year; they went during Great Lent.

So in that little town that had lots of kids of Russian immigrants, had a church - the Russian church, that was called so anyway. Those kids got out of school early that Friday afternoon because they were all going to communion the next day, on Saturday. So that Friday afternoon, they were dismissed early, they all went up to the church and got in line for confession. Problem was, the priest was not English-speaking and the kids didn't know how to speak Russian because at home they spoke a dialect, like from the Ukraine and Poland and so on. So you have a communication problem.

So they put one of the older girls first, who understood Russian - who really understood Russian - and they would listen to her answers. So the priest would say, did you this, did you do this, did you do this, and they were listening.

"Da, da, nyet, da, da, nyet."

So they eavesdropped and they go back and send it to each person in the line, "2 das and a nyet. 2 das and a nyet!"

So everybody memorised the answers to confession."

Mother Christophora, abbess of the Orthodox Monastery of the Transfiguration in Ellwood City, Pennsylvania, speaking at the Orthodox Christian Women’s conference in Montreal in March 2008.

I Don't Understand the Economy

The creator of 'Dilbert', Scott Adams, wonders about on the current state of the US economy:

As a general rule, wherever you find a large group of people who are baffled by complexity, you will find a smaller group of people making a good living screwing them. It's true with all complex things: insurance, cell phone plans, legal stuff, technology, you name it. But it has never been truer than with the mortgage backed securities that are currently crapping down the throat of the global economic system.

As I understand it, a bunch of geniuses used something called math to make it seem like a good idea to loan money to people who are unlikely to pay it back. But here's the part I don't understand: Who invested in these risky securities?

According to a recent piece on 60 Minutes, there might be $50 trillion invested in these exotic financial vehicles. So why didn't anyone ever offer those investments to me? And why don't I know anyone else who invested in them? And why haven't I seen a crying widow on TV who wishes she hadn't invested her life savings in them?

As I understand it, banks and mortgage brokers offloaded their crappy mortgages to these investors, thus transferring the risk from the system that makes loans to a bunch of confused people who apparently ran out of regular things to invest in. So why is the banking system in trouble if they moved their worst loans to other people? And who are these other people?

Do you personally know anyone who invested in these exotic securities? And if not, how did we watch so much coverage of the economic crisis without learning such a basic fact?

Orthodoxy Arrives in Cuba

...most astonishingly, as a gift from the Communist state:

What Russia Wants

...is perfectly natural:

Russia’s actions in Georgia are not much different from the typical conduct of other great powers—including the United States—in their neighborhoods. A few weeks before the onset of the fighting, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice asserted that the notion of "spheres of influence" in world affairs was obsolete. That argument was either naïve or hypocritical. Certainly, Washington’s conduct in the Western Hemisphere suggests that U.S. officials have not abandoned their belief in an American sphere of influence. Since World War II, the United States has invaded and occupied the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Panama, and Haiti. Washington orchestrated a successful coup against the government of Guatemala and tried to do the same both to Fidel Castro’s regime in Cuba and the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. It is a bit much for American leaders to admonish the Russians not to molest small, hostile neighbors.

Moscow is also increasingly angry at the West’s repeated disdain for Russian policy preferences—indeed, core Russian interests—in Europe. The insensitivity of the United States and its allies was already apparent in the mid-1990s, with the effort to expand NATO by adding Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. That move violated assurances given to the Kremlin when Mikhail Gorbachev’s government agreed to the reunification of Germany and continued German membership in NATO. Secretary of State James Baker assured Russian officials that the alliance would not expand eastward from Germany.

Not content with that provocation, in 2004 the U.S. pushed through NATO’s incorporation of Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania, entities that had been part of the Soviet Union. And NATO expansion is not the only manifestation of contempt for Russia’s interests. So is Western policy in the Balkans, traditionally a key region for Moscow. In 1995, NATO forces intervened in Bosnia’s civil war to undermine the Serbs, Russia’s coreligionists and longstanding political allies. Then in 1999, the United States and its allies waged an air war against Serbia, ultimately wrenching away its province of Kosovo. They bypassed the UN Security Council to do so, thereby evading a Russian veto.

Not Pictured: Reality

Russia may be capable of establishing a modest sphere of influence along its perimeter, but it does not have the strength to reconstitute the Soviet empire—much less pose an expansionist threat to the heart of Europe as the USSR did during the Cold War. American opinion leaders need to curb their alarmism. Moscow’s conduct in Georgia may have been brutal, but it is not out of the norm for a great power to discipline an upstart small neighbor. There is no credible evidence that Moscow has massive expansionist impulses. And even if it did, Russia lacks the power to achieve such goals. Russia is not the Soviet Union, and it certainly is not the equivalent of Nazi Germany.

- The American Conservative, September 22, 2008 Issue

The myth of Russia is built on an expansive foundation of many half-truths and hidden facts. It is a neoconservative creation. It was shaped by them to serve as an "enemy" for America, to provide some variation to the Islamic terrorist threat. Picking up from the heady days of the Cold War, American officials made the decision to fabricate the tale of a mythical totalitarian monolith that threatens the very peace and stability of the world itself.

The tense drama that was planned for this region, dreamed-up by the sick mind of Dick Cheney and his pals from the dark side over at CIA, is over. For now.

But the neoconservative remains restless, and many American pundits have plans for the Georgians, brilliant schemes designed to get Georgia into a big war with the Russians. Take this cheery article from the neoconservative Weekly Standard, for example.

The insane notion of turning Georgia into the Black Sea Hezbollah to fight the evil Soviets Russians is a continuation of the same tragedy that has played out in various accursed regions for the past half century or so.

But Russia is not interested in seizing Georgia, and US politicians need to accept that 1) the Cold War is over and 2) Russia has returned to the world stage as a great power. The US can no longer afford to ignore, much less trample, on core Russian interests.

[via The Young Fogey]

Gains from Trade

I don't normally post anything about the economy (a topic I have little interest in), but this has proved to be a most fascinating read. James Fallows on who benefits most from China's manufacturing boom:

Has the move to China been good for American companies? The answer would seemingly have to be yes—otherwise, why would they go there? It is conceivable that bad partnerships, stolen intellectual property, dilution of brand name, logistics nightmares, or other difficulties have given many companies a sour view of outsourcing; I have heard examples in each category from foreign executives. But the more interesting theme I have heard from them, which explains why they are willing to surmount the inconveniences, involves something called the “smiley curve.”

The curve is named for the U-shaped arc of the 1970s-era smiley-face icon, and it runs from the beginning to the end of a product’s creation and sale. At the beginning is the company’s brand: HP, Siemens, Dell, Nokia, Apple. Next comes the idea for the product: an iPod, a new computer, a camera phone. After that is high-level industrial design—the conceiving of how the product will look and work. Then the detailed engineering design for how it will be made. Then the necessary components. Then the actual manufacture and assembly. Then the shipping and distribution. Then retail sales. And, finally, service contracts and sales of parts and accessories.

The significance is that China’s activity is in the middle stages—manufacturing, plus some component supply and engineering design—but America’s is at the two ends, and those are where the money is. The smiley curve, which shows the profitability or value added at each stage, starts high for branding and product concept, swoops down for manufacturing, and rises again in the retail and servicing stages. The simple way to put this—that the real money is in brand name, plus retail—may sound obvious, but its implications are illuminating.

At each factory I visited, I asked managers to estimate how much of a product’s sales price ended up in whose hands. The strength of the brand name was the most important variable. If a product is unusual enough and its brand name attractive enough, it could command so high a price that the retailer might keep half the revenue. (Think: an Armani suit, a Starbucks latte.) Most electronics products are now subject to much fiercer price competition, since it is so easy for shoppers to find bargains on the Internet. Therefore the generic Windows-style laptops I saw in one modern factory might go for around $1,000 in the United States, with the retailer keeping less than $50.

Where does the rest of the money go? The manager of that factory guessed that Intel and Microsoft together would collect about $300, and that the makers of the display screen, the disk-storage devices, and other electronic components [in Malaysia, Korea, and elsewhere outside China] might get $150 or so apiece. The keyboard makers would get $15 or $20; FedEx or UPS would get slightly less. When all other costs were accounted for, perhaps $30 to $40—3 to 4 percent of the total—would stay in China with the factory owners and the young women on the assembly lines.

Other examples: A carrying case for an audio device from a big-name Western company retails for just under $30. That company pays the Chinese supplier $6 per case, of which about half goes for materials. The other $24 stays with the big-name company. An earphone-like accessory for another U.S.-brand audio device also retails for about $30. Of this, I was told, $3 stayed in China. I saw a set of high-end Ethernet connecting cables. The cables are sold, with identical specifications but in three different kinds of packaging, in three forms in the United States: as a specialty product, as a house brand in a nationwide office-supply store, and with no brand over eBay. The retail prices are $29.95 for the specialty brand, $19.95 in the chain store, and $15.95 on eBay. The Shenzhen-area company that makes them gets $2 apiece.

In case the point isn’t clear: Chinese workers making $1,000 a year have been helping American designers, marketers, engineers, and retailers making $1,000 a week (and up) earn even more. Plus, they have helped shareholders of U.S.-based companies.

- China Makes, The World Takes, The Atlantic, July/August 2007

There's just one problem with this. The low-income class in America who aren't benefiting from this form the largest voter section, and I doubt they enjoy the fact that their richer peers are making more while they get nothing out this.

Just one of many reasons why democracy is something the majority can easily abuse.

"Do You Guys Have Any Short-Term Memory?"

The Daily Show's Jon Stewart takes on the American response to the 2008 South Ossetia war:

The 2008 South Ossetia War: A Guide

A disabled Georgian tank lies in Tskhinvali after a failed assault

WHO STARTED IT?

There are two basic facts to keep in mind about the smokin' little war in Ossetia:

1. The Georgians started it.

2. They lost.

[...]

They were doing something they learned from Bush and Cheney: sticking to best-case scenarios, positive thinking. The Georgian plan was classic shock’n’awe with no hard, grown-up thinking about the long term. Their shiny new army would go in, zap the South Ossetians while they were on a peace hangover (the worst kind), and then…uh, they’d be welcomed as liberators? Sure, just like we were in Iraq. Man, you pay a price for believing in Bush.

The War Nerd
South Ossetia, The War of My Dreams, 11th August 2008

A CLASH OF PRINCIPLES

Up until now, this war was framed as a simple tale of Good Helpless Democratic Guy Georgia versus Bad Savage Fascist Guy Russia. In fact, it is far more complex than this, morally and historically.

[...]

At the root of this conflict is a clash of two twentieth-century guiding principles in international relations. Georgia, backed by the West, is claiming its right as a sovereign nation to control the territory within its borders, a guiding principle since World War II. The Ossetians are claiming their right to self-determination, a guiding principle since World War I.

These two guiding concepts for international relations–national sovereignty and the right to self-determination–are locked in a zero-sum battle in Georgia. Sometimes, the West takes the side of national sovereignty, as it is in the current war; other times, it sides with self-determination and redrawing of national borders, such as with Kosovo.

In that 1999 war, the United States led a nearly three-month bombing campaign of Serbia in order to rescue a beleaguered minority, the Albanians, and carve out a new nation. Self-determination trumped national sovereignty, over the objections of Russia, China and numerous other countries.

The NATO bombing of Serbia

Why, Russians and Ossetians (not to mention separatist Abkhazians in Georgia’s western region) ask, should the same principle not be applied to them?

The answer is clear: because we say so. That sort of logic, in an era of colossal American decline and simultaneous Russian resurgence, no longer works on the field.

Mark Ames, The eXile
South Ossetia: The War We Don’t Know, 15th August 2008

THE MEDIA

Georgian forces in Tbilisi

What is troubling is the U.S. media's willingness to similarly toe the party line, but in the absence of any of the coercive measures, such as the state censorship, that the Russian press endures. There have been no William Dunbars on CNN, despite the fact that every report I've seen on the channel yesterday had been framed as 'Russian invasion,' with endless clips of Saakashvili alleging Russian crimes, etc., in a loop of totally pro-Georgian coverage. Georgia is a key U.S. ally, the 3rd largest troop contingent in Iraq, and occupies a strategic, oil rich zone. The self-policing in the U.S. media, which has basically been uncritically promoting government talking points, is very disturbing.

[...]

To the uninformed viewer, it was Russia, not Georgia, which used the cover of the Olympic games to invade; in reality, they both did. In addition, there have been several mentions of Georgia as a fledgling democracy, but no mention of Saakashvili’s recent crackdown on the media and civil society. The US media has been guilty of a procrustean tendency to distill a messy conflict between two flawed states into a Manichean struggle between good and evil.

Foreign Policy Association
The CNN Effect: A Tale of Two Wars, 13th August 2008

To sum it all up, the War Nerd concludes:

The bottom line will be simple: the Georgians overplayed their hand and got slapped, and we caught a little of the follow-through, which is what happens when you waste your best troops - and Georgia’s, for that matter - on a dumb war in the wrong place. We detatched Kosovo from a Russian ally; they detached South Ossetia from an American ally. It’s a pawn exchange, if that. If it signals anything bigger, it’s the fact that the US is weaker than it was ten years ago and Russia is much, much stronger than it was in Yeltsin’s time. But anybody with sense knew all that already.

Why the West Reveres the Dalai Lama

The Dalai Lama has effectively been turned into a cartoon good guy. In America and western Europe, where backward anti-modern sentiments are widespread amongst self-loathing sections of the educated and the elite, the Dalai Lama has been embraced as a living, breathing representative of unsullied goodness. Despite the fact that he advertises Apple, guest-edits Vogue and drives a Land Rover, he is held up as evidence that living the simple eastern life is preferable to, in the words of Philip Rawson, westerners' "gradually more pointless pursuit of material satisfactions". Just as earlier generations of disillusioned aristocrats fell in love with a fictional version of Tibet (Shangri-La), so contemporary un-progressives idolise a fictional image of the Dalai Lama.

- Brendan O'Neill, 'Down with the Dalai Lama', guardian.co.uk, Thursday May 29 2008

Lord Have Mercy

Serb anger has finally boiled over.

Police are using tear gas to disperse crowds of rioting people who have been attacking embassies in Belgrade. The closed US embassy building has been set on fire. The Turkish, Croatian and Bosnian legations have also come under attack. More than 30 people have been injured.

Why America Supports Kosovar Independence

TO CONTROL CASPIAN OIL

Is this another Guantanamo in the pristine mountains of Kosovo? What's the 21st Century term for "gunboat diplomacy?"

In June 1999, in the immediate aftermath of the bombing of Yugoslavia, US forces seized 1,000 acres of farmland in southeast Kosovo at Uresevic, near the Macedonian border, and began the construction of a camp.

Camp Bondsteel is known as the "grand dame" in a network of US bases running both sides of the border between Kosovo and Macedonia. In less than three years it has been transformed from an encampment of tents to a self sufficient, high tech base-camp housing nearly 7,000 troops - three quarters of all the US troops stationed in Kosovo.

Exposing the War on Terror™

ARUSHA, Tanzania - President Bush on Monday hailed Kosovo's bold and historic bid for statehood, saying "The Kosovars are now independent."

[...]

"It's something that I've advocated along with my government," Bush said in an interview on NBC's "Today."

- Yahoo! News, Mon Feb 18, 11:06 AM ET

We've long known US President George W. Bush's War on Terror™ to be nothing more than a sham, serving only to justify unilateral preemptive war, perpetual war, human rights abuses, and other violations of international law, but this takes the cake.

In an interview two years ago, Gore Vidal rightly pointed out, "It’s like a war against dandruff. There’s no such thing as a war against terrorism. It’s idiotic. These are slogans. These are lies. It’s advertising, which is the only art form we ever invented and developed."

American recognition of Kosovar "statehood" is proof yet again that America is not the least concerned with curbing violent extremism, but with furthering its quest for global hegemony.

As with American foreign policy since the Second World War, Washington continues to arm and support known terrorists today for no explicable reason other than to "contain" Russia, now but a shadow of its former self. As it trained and armed Osama bin Laden in the 80s, so it recognises Kosovar statehood today.

The politicians of America have learned nothing from the past. They have funded terror in the past, and they continue to do so today.

It is a state governed by the political arm of the terrorist UÇK (the deceptively named Kosovo Liberation Army), and ruled by Hashim Thaçi, a convicted criminal and known organiser of the Drenica Group, which has been involved in the smuggling arms, stealing cars, oil and cigarettes as well as with prostitution, the establishment and maintenance of connections with the Albanian, Czech and Macedonian mafia.

This very UÇK, which NATO supported against the legitimate Serb authorities in Kosovo during the 90s with four months of continuous bombing, is, according to Human Rights Watch, "responsible for post-conflict attacks on Serbs, Roma, and other non-Albanians, as well as ethnic Albanian political rivals... widespread and systematic burning and looting of homes belonging to Serbs, Roma, and other minorities and the destruction of Orthodox churches and monasteries... combined with harassment and intimidation designed to force people from their homes and communities... elements of the UÇK are clearly responsible for many of these crimes."

These are the people the West hands Kosovo and Metohija to on a platter today.

So much for being the guardians of freedom and democracy.

Seven years ago, President Bush said in an address to Congress, "Our war on terror begins with al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated."

So much for "every terrorist group".

So much for the "War on Terror".

But we have hope.

Edward writes:
Remember, my friends - Kosovo remained Serbian during those five long centuries of Ottoman darkness, to be liberated in 1912. It is no less Serbian now, the ugly farce in Priština notwithstanding. It will be tangibly Serbian again when the current experiment collapses and when the very names of Bush, McCain and Clinton are rightfully consigned to the rubbish bin of history. Serbia has suffered worse, and she will emerge from this triumphant again - I have faith in the Serbian people, and in God, who sees and judges justly.

Archbishop Vsevolod of Skopelos (1927 - 2007)

Блажени, яже избрал и приял еси, Господи...

It is with a profound depth of sadness that we hereby inform you of the repose, this evening of 16 December 2007 in the 80th year of his earthly pilgrimage, of His Eminence Archbishop Vsevolod, Eparch of the Western Eparchy of our Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the USA and Titular Hierarch of Skopelos of the Holy Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople.

- The Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the USA

This beloved bishop - among this blogger's favourite - was a true ecumenist and bridge builder. As his brother bishops of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the United States of America have written:

"Archbishop Vsevolod is well known amongst the world’s ecumenical leaders and in particular the on-going dialogue between the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches. He has represented our Ukrainian Orthodox Church and the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople in all his ecumenical activities, in particular over the past ten years in repeated attempts to bring about ecclesiastical unity in his native Ukraine."

Ecclesiastical unity in Ukraine... may his efforts see fruition soon.

We'll miss you, Владыко Vsevolod.

Вечная Память!

Planned Parenthood's Own Statistics Prove Them Wrong

The Curt Jester posts a link to an article by Bill Beckman, current executive director of the Illinois Right to Life Committee:

A headline in the October 15th Chicago Sun-Times reads, 'Planned Parenthood is not the enemy in abortion fight.' Such a statement could have come straight out of Planned Parenthood's own marketing plan. Unfortunately, the facts do not support the perception Planned Parenthood wants to create with this marketing message.

In 2006, the Guttmacher Institute (research arm of Planned Parenthood) rated the states on the effectiveness of their state-funded birth control distribution programs. States such as New York and California were rated excellent while Nebraska was rated poor. Which of these states do you think have high abortion rates? Remember, Planned Parenthood claims that better access to birth control will reduce abortions. Well, New York and California are among the states with the highest abortion rates while Nebraska has low abortion rates. Thus, Planned Parenthood's own statistics demonstrate the failure to achieve their claimed results.

In 2005, the Guttmacher Institute, in a study on unplanned pregnancies, noted that 53 percent of women who have unintended pregnancies used a contraceptive method during the month they got pregnant. Of those unplanned pregnancies, 47 percent end in abortion, 40 percent are carried to full term, and 13 percent end in miscarriage. Whether this is due to usage failure or method failure, it shows that artificial contraception is largely ineffective in preventing unplanned pregnancy and abortion.

More "Tolerance" from America

"Mom and Dad" as well as "husband and wife" have been banned from California schools under a bill signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who with his signature also ordered public schools to allow boys to use girls restrooms and locker rooms, and vice versa, if they choose.

- WorldNetDaily, October 13, 2007

I am surprised - Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, should know better!

"Shame on Schwarzenegger and the Democrat politicians for ensuring that every California school becomes a homosexual-bisexual-transsexual indoctrination center," (Randy Thomasson, president of Campaign for Children and Families), said.

This demand for "tolerance" and "acceptance" is quickly evolving into a new mood of aggressive intolerance against accepted values. Perhaps this is what those who clamoured for "tolerance" wanted in the first place.