Yom Shleeshee
Tuesday
12 Av 5782
August 9 2022
The News on the Israeli Street
The media does its best to bolster Lapid . . .
As expected Israel’s left-wing media has been gushing all over PM Lapid’s performance in the 66 hour war. Photos of him staring down Netanyahu in a joint meeting, “commanding” in the war room, and looking like a prime minister have been replayed countless times on Israeli television.
The new Lapid: now a hard-nosed leader instead of a aimless playboy. This photo was taken at a security briefing two days ago (Photo: Haim Zach/GPO).
And as expected, polls that came out last night were all quick to point out how the Netanyahu bloc has fallen to 59 seats.
Except that it is not clear that it has. In some of the polls, Ayelet Shaked’s Zionist Spirit Party now passes the 3.25% threshhold, but instead of adding the 4 resulting seats to the Netanyahu block, the media is now listing them separately in the same manner as they do the Joint Arab List.
The media will simply do everything it can to throw the November election to Lapid and Gantz.
It didn’t take long . . .
Yesterday we wrote about how Israel is now in bed with Hamas: “Obviously, the IDF worked with Hamas which will now want ever more concessions from Israel.”
It took less than 24 hours for that to happen.
Almost immediately after the ceasefire took place, senior Hamas terrorists in Judea and Samaria (Yosh Mustafa Elshanar and Omar Elhanbali) were transferred out of prison and into administrative detention. They will be released in six and three months respectively.
Why was Operation Dawn suddenly able to take place? . . .
Former PM Netanyahu had this to say yesterday: “I congratulate the government, the Shin Bet and our beloved IDF soldiers for another successful operation against terrorism in Gaza. In the fight against terrorism we are all united, there is no opposition and no coalition. It should also be said that only after this government with Raam fell and after the Knesset disbanded was it possible to launch this operation.”
Absolutely correct.
In the neighborhood . . .
Six Iranian and Lebanese “advisors” (aka terrorists) were killed in Yemen yesterday when their weapons production line blew up. It was the second such explosion in a week.
Said Al-Assos, the senior Palestinian official in the “Palestinian National Security” organization in Lebanon, was assassinated in the Ain al-Khilwa Palestinian settlement in Lebanon yesterday.
The U.S. desperately wants to sign with Iran . . .
The U.S. State Department announced yesterday: “For our part, our position is clear: we are ready to quickly conclude an agreement based on the European Union’s proposals.”
The operative words are: “quickly conclude“.
TODAY’S BLOG
Lapid and Gantz’s Nauseous “Victory” Press Conference Yesterday
The joint victory press conference by PM Yair Lapid and “Defense” Minister Benny Gantz yesterday evening was nothing short of nauseous.
For his part, Gantz crowed that Israel met the three main goals of the operation:
*Removing the immediate threat from the border towns
*Maintaining operational freedom of action on all fronts
*Maintaining deterrence while sending a clear message to our enemies on all fronts that Israel is determined to defend its sovereignty and its residents
Let’s take these absurdities one by one.
First, no threat was removed from the border towns. What we are seeing this morning are playgrounds, homes, and businesses riddled with shrapnel from some of the 1,200 missiles that were launched by Islamic Jihad against these communities in less than 3 days. Missiles were still falling by the dozens in the hours before the ceasefire. Children, women, and men were traumatized by 66 hours of constant bombardment.
Second, how could “maintaining operational freedom of action ever been a goal of the operation”? Have we reached such a sorry state of affairs under Lapid and Gantz that the government and the IDF feel that they don’t have freedom of action to defend Israel?
Third, what deterrence and what determination to defend our residents? 1,200 missiles and already this morning, Islamic Jihad is threatening to open fire again unless Islamic Jihad terrorist detainees are released in Judea and Samaria.
As for Lapid, what we had was a replay of Gantz’s infamous anemones speech in 2014 with the former boxer and newscaster waxing metaphorical about “another way”. As other leftist politicians before him, he cast the Palestinians as unable to take care of themselves and wholly dependent on Israel: “. . . we also know how to give work and a livelihood and a dignified life to anyone who wants to live peacefully beside us.”
Your humble servant has written on numerous occasion about how the Palestinians have responsibility for their own lives. Why is it Israel’s responsibility to give them a dignified life? Or anything else? There is no occupation of Gaza–the last Israeli left there 15 years ago. The simple fact that everyone wants to avoid saying is that Gaza is a Palestinian country.
And so it goes in Israel this morning . . .
A student from Malawi, who had worked with an Israeli health volunteer in his country battling AIDS, came up to us as we walked down the street in the UC-Davis Picnic Day Parade and wanted to carry the Israeli flag.