Edit: After the email was sent, a few sentences in "Never! There Cannot Be A Palestinian State!" were reworded. Content and meaning was not modified.
Tags: 6 Min Read; Videos; Large Relief Area
Y’all have been emailing a ton. It’s great. For the input, ideas and questions, thank you. At least two-thirds of what I receive surfaces here in some form. You can email me directly or respond to these emails. It all gets to me.
Back at a gay-friendly Tel Aviv kehilla for the first time in awhile. After the Torah service, after the Bar Mitzvah boy spoke, when prayers are said for the sick, a group of five women took turns saying a prayer and naming all the hostages.
It touched.
One Clip To Smile (3 min, English subs)
One Clip to Think: Dr. Einat Wilf
Dr. Wilf speaking two weeks ago to a U.N. Briefing on UNRWA. 33 Min, English. (More of Dr. Wilf below. Dr. Wilf has appeared before, in #75 and #76.)
Bibi
and the Hague....
In #116 I included a “take” on the potential ICC arrest warrant for Bibi. I confess I missed the reference to laundry.
Observant Israelis, the Washington Post, and reader M.T. know better. From the Washington Post, circa 2020 (PDF here):
Over the years, the Israeli leader has developed a reputation among the staff at the U.S. president’s guesthouse for bringing special cargo on his trips to Washington: bags and suitcases full of dirty laundry, according to U.S. officials familiar with the matter.
The clothes are cleaned for the prime minister free of charge by the U.S. staff, a perk that is available to all foreign leaders but sparingly taken advantage of given the short stays of busy heads of state.
“The Netanyahus are the only ones who bring actual suitcases of dirty laundry for us to clean,” said one U.S. official, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the details of a foreign leader’s visits. “After multiple trips, it became clear this was intentional.”
Flying laundry to D.C. is just the “tip of the hamper.” I had forgotten that Bibi’s laundry expenses are part of one of the corruption cases against him.
In 2016, Netanyahu sued his own office and Israel’s attorney general in an effort to prevent the release of his laundry bills under the country’s freedom of information act. The judge sided with Netanyahu, and the details of his laundry bills remain secret pending an appeal in the Supreme Court.
The Hague smells better and better, no?
and Congress
From Haaretz, 2024-05-24
... a number of foreign leaders – such as President Joe Biden and British Foreign Minister David Cameron – have met with some hostages' relatives more often than Israel's prime minister has....
It turns out, however, that the prime minister did find the time to do something else recently: organize a speech for himself before the U.S. Congress, just months prior to the upcoming U.S. election. The speech is a joint project of Netanyahu's closest confidante, Ron Dermer, and Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson. It will be made possible thanks to the weakness and shallowness of certain Democratic politicians who have no real understanding of Israeli politics and society, and mistakenly think it is "pro-Israel" to cooperate with Netanyahu – a man despised by at least half of his country.
(Raf interpretation: Example "n" of AIPAC as part of the problem. Allowing an Israeli leader to bypass a supportive White House is a hostile, divisive act. This isn't the first time AIPAC has sat on its hands.)
Cultural Topics...
Hamas supporters are taking advantage of the ignorance of many in the Arabic language to exonerate Hamas terrorists from accusations of sexual violence
In the video published [May 22] of the female IDF soldiers being kidnapped from Nahal Oz [I've seen the video, suggest avoiding it], there is a statement at 01:51 of the video by one of the Hamas terrorists who calls the female soldiers "sabaya". In the Arabic language there are words that are difficult for non-native speakers to distinguish.
In Arabic there are:
صبايا (Šabaya)
سبايا (sabaya)
The difference between the words is huge: While the meaning of the first word (Šabaya) is girls, young women (an expression with a neutral connotation), the meaning of the second word (sabaya) is: booty, loot, property taken in war, captive women who are property of their captors who can do whatever they want with them.
The terrorists in the video definitely referred to the second option. Both according to the spelling and considering the situation, which is this context of the second option.
Postmark
Iran
Above: A channel affiliated with the Iranian opposition marked with red circles the security personnel who arrived yesterday to guard the supreme leader of Iran (marked in yellow) during the funeral ceremony.
Paranoid?
Above: Iranian opposition activists mock the clumsy bulletproof vest on Esmail Qaani, commander of the Quds force in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, during the funeral rites in Iran last week.
They wonder: Why does he need so many bodyguards and a bulky vest while walking around in his own country?
Jenin
Palestinian social media channels: Early in the morning of May 23, after almost two days of activity, IDF forces left the Jenin refugee camp.
Gaza
For those keeping track...
Palestinian channels: Dia' a-Din al-Shurafa, the deputy commander of the Hamas national security forces in the Gaza Strip, in the rank equivalent to a general, was killed this morning in an IDF attack in the al-Saraya area of Gaza City.
Four Hamas officers who were near him were injured in the attack.
The Hamas Interior Ministry confirmed the elimination.
Gaza City was "subdued" by the IDF months ago, and the IDF pulled out for some time.
Also:
The IDF and ISA eliminated the Commander of Hamas’ Beit Hanoun Battalion in an underground area in Jabaliya
West Bank
While the incident is from the West Bank, the topic also relates to Gaza casualty counts. A material percentage (over %10, to Raf's knowledge) of Palestinian militants are under 18. When they are killed, they are counted as "children."
This is Wassim Jaradat, 15 years old, killed the week of May 20 by IDF fire. He was an operative of the military wing of the Islamic Jihad. There are social media posts of him holding explosives and an assault rifle.
Similarly, a Palestinian woman was arrested in Jenin. When a Palestinian bomb hit the jeep she was being transported in:
Palestinians claim that the prisoner Wafaa Jarrar lost both her legs as a result of a bomb blasting an IDF jeep after she was arrested in Jenin two days ago.
Recognition of Palestine
Excerpt from Dr. Einat Wilf
(The same Dr. Wilf as in the video above.)
A recognition of a state of Palestine is a great way to finally clarify - is the other state in the "two state solution" the Jewish state of Israel? Or, is it, as Palestinians continue to believe, a temporary aberration that will revert to being Arab in due course? It is high time to ensure that any vision of peace by two states means that one of these two state is Jewish. And if not, it would be nice to finally know that your country recognizes Palestine because it believes that "from water to water Palestine will be Arab" - the original Arab version of "From the River to the Sea" - and that there is no room for Jewish sovereignty anywhere. Precisely the vision that animated Hamas October 7th attack and the continued support it enjoys among Palestinians. If this is why your country is recognizing Palestine, it would be a good time for Israel to finally know that.
If not, if you genuinely believe in a two-state solution where one of the two is Jewish, then get off your bum and make it clear - that recognition of Palestine comes with a strong declaration and policy that no-one living in it is or can be or will be recognized by your country as a "refugee from Palestine", that you are therefore defunding UNRWA, that there is no such thing as a "right of return" into another sovereign state in which one has never been a citizen or ever lived. Then we'll know you're serious. Anything else is lazy virtue signaling, worthy of an Anthropology student in the US, not a government of a proper country.
"Never! There Cannot Be A Palestinian State!"
I "love" it (not) when people say this (and they do). I ask, "What is the difference between a state and what you have now?" The next question: "Imagine that such a state will happen--not because you want it, but because it happens. Do you want a seat at the table (e.g. settings conditions, airing issues, up front) or do you want to sulk later that it was done without you?"
Raf sees in the rejection stance denial-of-self: The “never” camp forgets that in 1948 there were people and states, many of them, that said "never" to a Jewish state. It happened anyway! Similarly, no single person, state or entity controls the ultimate creation of a Palestinian state. Movements of people and ideas create (and destroy) all manner of artifacts. Including states.
There is but one question: Do you want a seat at the table?
(The question old soldiers [read: Ariel Sharon, Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres, etc.] ask: How many of your children and grandchildren are you willing to sacrifice for your vision?)
What is written (in the Torah, etc.) is written. Those who wave books in the air or throw bluster in the face take all the oxygen.
So these questions are not heard.
(And really, other than these questions, isn’t the rest commentary?)
SMS in Israel
Everything here is on SMS: Appointments with doctors and post offices. Store receipts. Movie tickets. And unexpected politics:
While our soldiers are fighting, Gallant ordered the army to delay sending draft orders to Yeshiva students.
Gallant, don't be a little politician, don't break the law - send the draft orders!
Relief Area
Alef
Bet
(Parody of the 1948 U.N. vote recognizing Israel's establishment, when Jews around the world listened to the radio as the vote was tallied.)
Gimmel
Dalet: Spain be like…
Hey - 2 Min, in English
Vav -- by Ephraim Kishon
This is the only country where missiles from Iraq, Katyushas from Lebanon, suicide bombers from Gaza and shells from Syria have already exploded, and still a three-room apartment costs more than in Paris.
This is the only country in which the man in the unbuttoned, stained shirt is the Right Honorable Member of the Knesset while the man in the suit and tie is his driver.
It's the only country where there's no problem getting computer software to fly spaceships, but you have to wait a week to fix a washing machine. And only here is a unit of time called "I'll be between nine and six."
This is the only country where 60-year-olds still hate the squad commander from basic training.
This is the only country where the corporal's mother has the phone number of the platoon commander, and he'd better look out.
This is the only country where you can know the security situation according to the songs on the radio.
This is the only country where the rich are on the socialist left, the poor on the capitalist right and the middle class pay for everything.
This is the only country where on the first date they ask the girl where she served in the army and it turns out she was more of a combatant than you.
This is the only country where between the happiest day and the saddest day there are exactly sixty seconds.
This is the only country where most people cannot explain why they live in it, but they have a lot of reasons why you cannot live elsewhere.
This is the only country where the fact that you hate politicians, hate officials, hate the situation, hate taxes, hate quality of service and hate the weather is a sign that you love her.
The Klipa theater is a few blocks from my place. Went for the first time. An amazing one-woman theater performance by Ilana Sarah Claire Bellahsen: Mezonot:
(Ilana’s production reminded me of work I did years ago with Fred Curchack.)
I am off to put my feet in the ocean.
Stay well,
Raf
(Thank you A.K., M.T.)