Peace is Possible?

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“The Economist” magazine thinks peace is possible. Their theory is that October 7 shook things up enough that both Israel and the Palestinians want things to change. October 7 and events since then have shaken me up, but I’ve come down on the opposite end of the teeter-totter. I see the end of Israel, and the increasing likelihood of another Holocaust. Perhaps the writers at the Economist don’t think pessimism sells as well as optimism? 

Here’s my reasoning: 1) Peace is unknown in the Middle East since the demise of the Ottoman Empire; 2) The two-state solution was conjured by the British in the 1920s and 30s, but it was never the preferred solution of either the Zionists or the Arabs/Palestinians. (In early iterations, Britain assumed it would be staying in the Middle East and could referee the unfriendly neighbors on occasion.) 3) Like it or not, Gaza voted for Hamas in 2005 just as Israel, through it multi-party system, voted for Netanyahu (many times over). Both want a single state solution (their own state). Israel has citizens who would opt for a two-state solution if it would bring peace, but they are currently not the majority. 

After WW II, when Britain could not get agreement on a solution, and everyone just wanted the Brits to go home, it placed the problem on the doorstep of the United Nations and left. The UN offered a two-state solution, which the Israelis reluctantly accepted. The Arabs and Palestinians rejected it, declared war when Israel declared independence, but lost the war. Jordan annexed the West Bank, Egypt took over Gaza, and Israel began governing the rest of Palestine. Many Arabs lost their homes during that war and continue to demand the “right to return.” Jordan accepted some of these as temporary refugees, but later sent them packing when they tried to take over Jordan. Meanwhile, Jews were purged by every Muslim country in the Middle East, but were accepted in Israel. 

The US tried carrots and sticks to push through a two-state solution in the ‘90s (Oslo Accords), but no deal was acceptable to all. And today, we have a horrendous situation. Currently, it seems the Palestinians are winning the PR war, at least with the “elite” members of European society and the Anglo-sphere. We are, it seems, unable to favor a winner and must always side with the underdog. For sure, the situation in Israel/Palestine is a long-standing, murky feud in which sad stories abound, and there is plenty of blame for all parties. 

But seriously, Israel has done some things right that seem to be ignored by those determined to commit both-sides-ism. Primary example: Arabs living within Israel, i.e. not in the West Bank or Gaza, are citizens, can vote, have representatives in the Knesset and on the Supreme Court. If Muslim or Christian, they can practice their religion unimpeded. Bedouins fare better within Israel than within the territories. 

Israeli citizens can and do protest, argue (eternally), speak and write of their concerns about every issue under the sun. No Arab country boasts such freedom. Who knows what the people of Gaza actually think of Hamas which has not held elections since it was voted into power in 2006. Do you ever wonder what improvements people might have enjoyed if all the money that has been poured into Gaza had gone for improved schools, hospitals, and other infrastructure rather than the immense network of fortified tunnels that shield their fighters? What if Hamas stopped firing rockets into Israel and focused on building an economy and Palestinian culture? 

The militant Islamists who run Gaza teach children every horrid prejudice of history about the Jews next door. They do not hate Zionists. They hate Jews. Honest. It’s that simple. There used to be Arabs who differentiated Zionists, who wanted a Jewish State, from Jews who simply wanted to live in their historic homeland. There were and still are Jews who are anti-Zionists, including a few in Israel. And I believe there are some Arabs who could still accept Jews as a minority population in a country run according to Sharia law. But I fear that most protesters who prance about shouting “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be Free!” haven’t bothered to even wonder what plans Hamas has for their Jewish neighbors living in Israel. Protesters may envisage a happy place where Jews, Muslims, Christians, atheists and others will live peacefully side by side. I don’t for a single minute believe that that is what Hamas envisions. 

If you read some history of the pre-WW II era and then the role of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem during the War, this scenario is not what was envisioned. And no one really presses Hamas to describe what would happen to the Jews of Israel if Hamas succeeded in extinguishing the State of Israel. Given recent events, what’s your guess? 

You might share my concern about Jewish settlements in the West Bank. Many people do. But there’s actually a case to be made in support of the settlements (excluding those on land clearly owned by individual Palestinians). Yes, the settlements seem to be a thorn in the side of anyone who supports a two-state solution. But who is that today? Too few Israelis and certainly no Palestinians. In any event, I refer you to an intriguing explanation of why the settlements are legal.*

I have long been a fan of the two-state solution, but I now realize that no Palestinians support such a scheme. The optimists at the Economists think things are so bad right now that both Israel and Hamas need a way out, and a two-state solution might enable both to save face. I know they are way more informed than I am, and smarter too, but I think current circumstances only incentivize Israel to take over all of Palestine giving up all pretense of two states. Could some parts develop the level of autonomy of US states? Of Scotland? Of Cantons in Switzerland? I don’t know, but that’s the best outcome I can see. 

The other option I see is a second Holocaust, this one conducted by the Palestinians with the backing of Iran. Israel may use its nuclear weapons to try to forestall such an outcome, in which case, all hell breaks loose. Truly, that’s how worried I am. May I please be wrong.

Suggestions for further learning:
*Jesusalem and the Israeli settlements according to international law,
lecture by Natasha Hausdorff

Palestine 1936: The Great Revolt and the Roots of the Middle East Conflict, (readable book) by Oren Kessler, 2023

How’s Your Day Going?

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“How’s your day going?” So many friendly exchanges begin with this question. But today, I’d say, ask me anything else. I got up more or less on time even though my husband said up front that we were out of coffee. We had some ancient ground espresso in the freezer for our stove top espresso which is fifty miles away at our new digs right now. I figured that I would use that in our French Press. Desperate times call for desperate measures, right? 

Actually, no. Just do without the coffee until you can get out to a store or an espresso stand. That’s my advice after running this experiment. 

So we are moving. That’s great! But if I was ever in doubt about the wisdom of this move, this morning’s brief trip to the grocery store has removed that doubt. Sunday, 10:00 a.m., ought to be uneventful, right? My first stop at the store was the in-store coffee bar. As I got to the counter to order, the barista was just finishing up a sign that said, “Closed.” It seems that she was the only person who turned up for work today, and nothing was ready for customers. She was closing so she’d have time to put pastries and other food items in the display case and basically get the shop ready for customers.

Since I got there before she got the sign up, and I only wanted to buy beans that she could grind, she took my order. I reached for my phone, which has my coffee app, my wallet app, and my store card. Damn! I’d left my phone at home. Fortunately, I had my actual, physical wallet with the actual physical coffee card and another credit card. So I paid with real plastic, took my freshly ground coffee, and proceeded to look for the other items on my short list.

Croissants, check. Bananas, check. Ice cream, check. But where the heck are they hiding trash bags? I asked three people who guided me to various aisles that turned up empty. Fourth person, bless her heart, knew right where they were. So trash bags, check. 

Then, as I was making my way to the checkout counter, I saw a security guard closely following a bedraggled person with a handful of items. I’m guessing he recognized her because there are enough bedraggled people in my neighborhood that store security couldn’t possibly tail them all. In any event, she bypassed the checkout counter and headed for the door. She was told to either pay or leave her items behind, at which time she started screaming and accusing the guards of bad behavior, knocked over flowers on display thus creating a great pool of water in the entrance, and made a commotion that I’m sure you can picture. Hard to say if she was actually injured at any time in the process, but as I left the store a few minutes later, two cop cars and an aid care were at the entrance.

This is the same store, mind you, at which an assault on a employee about a year ago led her to transfer to a different location. I saw her at her new store one day and said I recognized her from my neighborhood store. She said she was still recovering from the assault there several months earlier. 

Nothing truly awful happened to me directly today, but there was one final bit of frustration: once I got home and opened a bag of coffee to make a new pot of actual French Press, the beans looked more like fine gravel than the usual somewhat coarse grind I’m used to. Good news, though. They work a lot better than the ancient espresso. So now I can chill for a few minutes with a decent cup of coffee – and then get busy packing again. 

How’s your day going?

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Israel Did What?

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Remember Bari Weiss? She left her job as a columnist for the New York Times, started her own Substack, then turned that venture into a new effort called The Free Press. She’s Jewish, somewhat conservative on some issues, so to some of you that will mean that you don’t have to pay attention to anything she says, especially about the Middle East. And it’s true that she is more likely to accept an Israeli version of events than the Hamas version of events. 

But then sometimes she reports some verifiable facts, like this story about the damage to a hospital in Gaza that was widely reported yesterday. 

Here are the images. Please read the article for the story behind these headlines. 

My thoughts: It’s not impossible that Israel could strike a hospital in Gaza. It’s just very unlikely that they would do so deliberately, while it is full of patients, without warning, and without evidence that it was being used as a cover for terrorists. I just trust Israelis more than Hamas and other Palestinians to report the truth.

No, I’m not so naive that I believe everything the Israeli government says. But a vibrant free press exists in Israel, and sooner or later the truth will emerge to clarify any government spin. These headlines all end with “Palestinians Say” which to me suggests that I best remain skeptical until more is known about the event. Why would the NYT be so gullible?

Odds and Ends, September 2023

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Why Not Trump?

I have a fun exercise for you today. Watch this video clip of Sharyl Atkisson interviewing Donald Trump on September 24, 2023. Why wouldn’t voters love Trump if this is their image of him? (No, I’m not persuaded, but I think this is a fascinating video. Some of her other programs are worth a look.) 

Don’ y’all have a backup camera?

Recently I drove a friend to the Department of Licensing. I had to parallel park when I dropped her off, and I didn’t start from the perfect position. So I struggled with much to-ing and fro-ing. And I backed into the parked car behind me. The driver got out, checked out his front end and my back end, and said, “Don’ y’all have a backup camera?” 

Well, yes, I do have a backup camera, and yes, I was seeing his car and hearing the beeps warning me that I was getting close. And I chose to keep going because I really, really wanted to fit into that space. And, as things turned out, I was fortunate that the person in the car I “touched” was a kind soul. He would have been correct if he’s said, “Damn! You hit my car.” And he could then have gone into a rant and a rave. But he didn’t. And, in fact, the “hit” was really a “tap,” and there really, truly was no damage. But I was just tickled by his questioning whether or not I had a backup camera. Thank you, kind sir, for not turning a tiny tap into a major incident. I’ll try to do better in the future.

Mariners vs Seahawks

I confess, I’m a terrible fan. I only watch games when my teams are winning. I got into baseball this season once the Mariners got their act together and started winning more often than not. Now that we’re down to the wire, I check online to see how the game is going before I turn it on. Honestly, why do I care? I don’t know, but I can definitely get into fan mode when they’re winning. I have to say, that the rules changes this year definitely make the game more watchable. So congratulations MLB on a good decision. Now, would you Mariners just please get into the playoffs!

And what about football? You know, that game where players occasionally die on the field and frequently get concussions and other injuries. What excuse can I offer for watching football? Despite all the rule changes meant to lessen the number of concussions players get, it seems that every game has one or more head on crashes that trigger a “concussion protocol.” That’s a set of checks to see if a player has an actual concussion. If so, he can’t return to that game and has to wait for the effects of the concussion to wear off. The reason being that additional concussions before the first one resolves is correlated with more long term brain damage. Which is a bad thing.

Again, why watch a game that has done so much damage to so many players over so many years? Sigh. Fact is that really good plays are very exciting. Some of the pass plays, especially those amazing catches in tight situations. I’m in awe. But again, I can’t bear the pain of watching my team make mistakes and lose. Yup, I’m just a fair-weather fan. Sorry, fellas.

Trump Vs Biden, 2024?

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Following the 2020 election, I made it a point to find some Trump supporters who would talk to me and help me understand why they voted for a man who, in my humble opinion, is unfit to be President. I expanded my list of people I follow on Twitter, clicked on links that led to other links, and eventually I found a little group that started having weekly conversations on Zoom. The group was quite heterogeneous at the outset, included some Biden voters with concerns about Wokeness, as well Trump voters, and I learned a lot. 

Most of the Trump voters had leaned Republican over their voting careers, but some had gone back and forth between the Rs and Ds. The Biden voters in the group included folks like me who just couldn’t vote for Trump, but who were deeply concerned about everything that occurred in the summer of 2020 and responses in leftist cities. 

Some of the Trump voters could cite specific things Trump had done that they supported. But many just loathed Biden. Since I loathe Trump, that was a feeling I could relate to, even though I find it hard to attach “loathing” to Biden. He seems likable to me. My biggest gripe with Biden (at that time) was his treatment of Anita Hill during the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings. My primary favorites had been Michael Bennet and Pete Buttigieg, and I still love Pete. I’d probably still love Bennet if he were visible today.

The main thing I learned from those discussions is that whatever I thought about Trump, I could not apply that judgement to his fans. His fans in this little group were regular people who paid some attention to politics, voted regularly, and had justifiable concerns about voting for a Democrat. They either thought Democrats in general were too extreme about climate change or Covid policies or trans rights or too soft on crime and too hard on police. Whatever their hot-button issue, Democrats were on the wrong side of it, and Trump’s personal qualities didn’t frighten them.

I’ve had the good fortune to live where reasonable Republicans have held office in the past, so it’s hard for me to write off Republicans completely (even though the current iteration of the Republican Party leaves a lot to be desired). Also, during Trump’s term in office, I started listening to some “never Trump” Republicans online and found them to be a group I could relate to. Today, I consider myself to be politically homeless, but I doubt that I’ll veer Republican if things ever settle down again. Depends on whether or not the Democrats get reasonable again. 

The most troubling thing for me right now is how common it is to loathe a candidate we don’t like. Where did all this loathing come from? This is not normal, folks. I suspect it comes from the siloing we’re doing with regard to our media sources and friend groups. Years ago, I read a book called “The Big Sort,” by Bill Bishop. The full title is, “The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of Like-Minded Americans is Tearing Us Apart.” Published in 2008, it’s still worth a read. One point made by Bishop is that it’s so much easier to use harsher language if we’re talking within a group that mostly agrees with us. We might tone it down a bit if we know that some of our neighbors are not like-minded. 

I experience this today because some of my neighbors don’t know how far I’ve drifted from the current orthodoxy that pervades my neighborhood. People say outrageous things that only prove that they have failed to read or listen to any contrary opinions or even look for facts about the matter. And when someone says something I consider uninformed, others nearby will chime in with, “Absolutely,” and other supportive statements. Although there are times when it just doesn’t work for me to object, I do on occasion, and I come off sounding shrill and scornful, when I want to sound well-informed and articulate. That’s partly me, and partly how others hear me.

OK. So we have media silos and back-yard BBQs with like-minded neighbors. And now it’s looking like we might have a rematch of Trump and Biden with fear and loathing again the dominant mood. I want to cry. This really, truly makes me think that democracy is just not viable in the long run. 

Although I personally think that life under Joe Biden has been OK, and that his ability to manage the crisis in Ukraine is remarkably good, I don’t expect to convince anyone who thinks otherwise. But I absolutely hope to convince anyone and everyone that we can only vote for candidates who accept the possibility of losing without insisting that an election is rigged. 

Elections in America are reasonably well run. (Let’s just not talk about the Electoral College.) I love our mail ballot system in Washington even though people have tried to spread fear about mail ballots. Many states have a slew of volunteers who spend a very long day helping people sign in and cast ballots in person. Some of our voting machines in the past have not had a paper trail, and that needs to be fixed. A paper trail is essential to maintain confidence in machine voting. People who think our elections can be rigged have not spent time volunteering or even learning how many protections are in place to secure our ballots. 

No election, even in the US, is perfect. But there simply isn’t wide-spread fraud. The term used in the latest indictment of Trump is “outcome-determinative” fraud. I like this term because it allows for the possibility of anomalies that occur in most elections but don’t affect the outcome. 

I worry that if Trump were to become President again, Ukraine would vanish from the face of the earth and the US would become one of those “democracies” led by an authoritarian who stays in office forever, clamps down on dissent, installs cronies throughout the government, and forgets to help the people who supported him. You might view those outcomes favorably, or have a completely different set of concerns that lead you to support him. We can differ on those things.

But we must agree that a candidate who cannot accept the possibility of losing should not even be running for office. Some candidates lose. It could happen to your candidate. It happened to Trump. That’s the reality of elections.