Polls show that a large percentage of Israeli citizens have lost faith in the future of their nation

Major General (Reserve) in the Israeli Army, and former ombudsman for the occupation forces, Yitzhak Brick, has sounded an alarm over the growing inefficacy of the country’s army to win a possible war.

Warning that the Israeli occupation forces have turned into an “air force army,” Brick criticized the leadership in Tel Aviv for their “sensitivity” towards human losses on the ground.

“Whoever wants to completely avoid losing on the battlefield, completely loses the deterrence of the army and the ability to win the war. This way of thinking and managing the security echelons will eventually lead to much heavier losses in the war,” the former official said in a column published on 10 May by Channel 12.

Brick went on to add that Israel’s land army and reserve system have been continuously ignored: “We lost the inter-arm combat capability and became a one-dimensional Air Force army that alone could not win a war.”

He goes on to highlight that the occupation forces in general, and the land army in particular, “are not ready for war.”

The warning comes on the heels of a number of polls showing that a large portion of Israeli citizens have lost faith in the future of their nation.

A poll published by the Pnima Movement at the start of the month showed that 40 percent of Israelis were not optimistic about the country’s future. It also showed that 33 percent of Israeli youth are seriously considering emigrating out of the occupied territory.

Meanwhile, at least 75 percent of Israeli Arabs believe Jews have no right to sovereignty in occupied Palestine, according to a survey by Habithonistim–Protectors of Israel published on 9 May.

In an article published in Yedioth Ahronoth on 7 May, former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak expressed fears of the imminent demise of Israel before the 80th anniversary of its founding.

“Throughout Jewish history, the Jews did not rule for more than eighty years, except in the two kingdoms of David and the Hasmonean dynasty, and in both periods, their disintegration began in the eighth decade,” Barak said.

Earlier this year, former Air Force chief Amikam Norkin said Israel no longer enjoys superiority and freedom over the skies of Lebanon, highlighting that this reality was apparent to the Israeli military establishment after Hezbollah began manufacturing its own drones.

In the weeks after this statement by the Israeli official, Iran notified Tel Aviv that the army of the Islamic Republic has missiles pointed at all of their nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons sites.

Source: The Cradle

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Toronto, Frankfurt (2/11 – 42)

World media are jumping all over the conflagration in Gaza following the 7 October attack, killing 1400 Israelis and kidnapping several hundred others – followed by an all-too-predictable retaliatory response from Israel, with indiscriminate bombardment and gunfire into Gaza. The number dead and injured in the Palestinian zone will likely never be known but it is currently estimated at over 5,000 – many of whom are women and children caught in the crossfire.

Is Hamas sorry about those who voted for them and support their cause being machine-gunned or trapped by crumbling concrete in a bombed building? Not at all – for them it’s just the cost of doing business.

What do the neighbors across the region say? As a matter of fact, the timing of the bloody 7 October attack was quite apt.

It was just three weeks ago that the “Abraham Accords”, an agreement  that would have “normalized” relations between Israel and several states of the Arabian Peninsula, complete with exchanges of ambassadors and new relations, were about to be signed. This landmark deal would have been followed by North African Islamic nations joining up. Precisely before the October 7 Hamas terror attack, normalization talks between Saudi Arabia and Israel were set to go. That hopeful move is gone with the wind.

That declaration of co-existence must have deeply displeased Hamas, Hezbollah, ISIS and the other murderous bandit gangs. They would clearly have been cut out of the deal. (Kindergarten Lesson One: “Follow the Money”)

Meanwhile, back in Tel Aviv, the fearsome Netanyahu was set to appear in court and face criminal charges that could have seen him in the cooler for quite a while. That trial has also been set aside. A survey shows that 80% of the Israeli public puts the blame for the surprise attack on him, particularly as his government pointedly ignored multiple urgent warnings from Egypt that an attack was being prepared. Convenient, no?

Netanyahu: “This is our 9/11 moment.” Truer words were never spoken. And just like the exceedingly suspicious collapse of two huge (and hugely unpopular) office buildings in downtown Manhattan, purportedly after being slammed into by jetliners, the 7 October attack is looking more and more like a false flag – something to give Israel the excuse the finish the job in Gaza.

Cut to the airport in Riyadh. A group is hurrying along.

A British reporter waylays a Saudi government minister. (You have to feel sorry for these guys – bodyguards blithely bump them out of the way … an expensive woman companion might give them a cat-scratch or snatch the microphone out of their hands … their target might just ignore them completely, or glower and growl “No comment, creep”)

Luckily for this journalist, the Saudi – young-looking for a Minister, and quite fluent in English – is eloquent and to the point.

Roving Reporter: “Can I just ask you… What is the first thing that has to happen, to achieve peace, in your view?”

Saudi Minister: “Right now we need a ceasefire.”

Roving Reporter: “Beyond that – “

Saudi Minister: “We have to restart the peace process.”

Roving Reporter: “Is that possible?”

Saudi Minister: “It has to be possible. If we are not willing to overcome all the difficulties, all the challenges, all the history that is involved in this issue, then we will never have a real peace and security in the region, so we must restart the peace process. The Arabs have shown that they are serious, they are willing to engage. We hope that we can do it soon.”

Dear Reader – studying this historical tragedy, do you not get the sensation that the “Arab world”, such as it is, really finds the Palestinians a monumental annoyance, deranged relatives anxious to drag all of them into a no-win military confrontation? (Everybody has an eye on those 200 Israeli nuclear weapons tucked away in a Negev Desert “research facility”.)

Of course it is necessary to offer deep and sincere vocal support to Palestine, which was deeply wronged some 70 years ago. Who wronged them? Hmm, how about the same perfidious colonialists whose meddling wreaked tragedy in Nigeria, Malaysia, Kenya, India and on and on… Yes, John Bull did it. The Brits “set aside” a land for the persecuted Jews, land that happened to have been occupied for hundreds of years by farmers and herdsmen known as Palestinians. Just like Malaysia or Iraq or Pakistan: they bottled up enemy peoples in the same artificially-demarcated country, grab the resources and piss off. Thanks Olde Blighty.

Israel is a reality. Most countries in the world accept that as a fact. It may have been built on stolen land but so was the United States of America, Canada, Japan (ask the Ainu), People’s Republic of China (poor Tibetans), Australia (aborigines nod sorrowfully) and many others, if you reach far enough back into history. Israel, the reality, is not going away. Hamas, the troublemaking terror gang, may have picked up some neat tricks from the Israelis (BOOM goes the King David Hotel, brought down by future Israeli statesmen).

But times change. Nobody else wants this war. The Arabs are by and large interested in getting by in life, minding their own business and avoiding trouble. Even Iran, fingered as a troublemaker by Uncle Sam, doesn’t want war – especially nuclear war. Nobody wins then.

Hamas? Nuclear war? Bring it on. They are maniacs, as all the neighbors are fully aware. But this seems to be a festive age around the planet for such manias, even among the throngs of “useful idiots” parading through Europe, Australia and North America waving Palestinian flags. Ask those entitled kids whether they support the annihilation of Israel. Then they get coy and the weasel-words flow freely.

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The Palestinians’ longstanding and legitimate grievances have been irrevocably subverted by Hamas’ brazen attack against Israel on Oct 7. Unlike previous rounds of conflicts and clashes between Israel and the Palestinians on the one hand and neighbouring Arab states on the other, Thailand has become a direct casualty like never before, as 30 Thai workers have been killed to date, with at least 16 injured and 17 taken hostage. As a militant political movement motivated by Islamic fundamentalism using methods of terrorism to achieve its objectives, Hamas has made a bad name for the Palestinian cause, eliciting condemnation and opposition all the way over here in Thailand.

Developing countries like Thailand generally tend to support underdogs in the rough-and-tumble canvas of international politics. When Israel was established as a nation-state in 1948, it enjoyed broad global support, backed by a United Nations resolution to split the land of Palestine between local Arabs and Jews. Many of the latter gravitated to Palestine after World War II when their race and religion faced persecution and genocidal extermination. Israel’s wars for survival in the face of Arab states’ invasions in 1967 and 1973 also found global sympathy and support.

After this point — perhaps Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982 to eradicate the Palestinian Liberation Organisation — the tables turned. Israel became an occupying force and was seen more as the aggressor rather than the victim. Although a “two-state” deal was worked out and codified in UN resolutions, the Palestinians never got a state and the self-determination they were promised until the Oslo Accords, brokered by the United States, allotted the West Bank and Gaza Strip to the PLO to administer under the Palestinian Authority.

This was more like a one-and-a-half state solution. The Palestinian Authority became a limited self-autonomous government in both territories. The West Bank remained workable as a self-governing entity, but Gaza became problematic. Hamas, an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, eventually won an election in Gaza in 2006 over the PLO’s Fatah party. Hamas has since carried out unrelenting attacks against Israel and faced continual reprisals from the Jewish state.

Hamas’ latest violence is attributable to several motives. First, the Arab world is moving beyond the Palestinian plight. While the West Bank remains self-governing and viable despite tensions and issues with Israel, particularly Jewish settlements, Gaza under Hamas’ autocratic control was being lost on the Middle East’s geostrategic chessboard.

Over the past three years, the US-sponsored Abraham Accords have profoundly realigned regional relations in the Middle East and normalised Israeli ties with key Arab states. The peace agreements and attendant recognition of the Jewish state started with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain in 2020, building on Israel’s earlier peace treaties with Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994.

Soon after, Morocco and Sudan entered into similar normalisation agreements with Israel. Other regional players, from Saudi Arabia and Qatar to Turkey and Iran, then shuffled their strategic postures, realigning and considering normalisation deals, including with Israel.

The diplomatic remaking of interstate relations in the Middle East is favourable to Israel as much as it threatens the existence of violent non-state terrorist entities, such as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. If their sponsoring states, such as Iran, normalise relations with hitherto adversaries, these extremist movements’ days would be numbered.

Apart from sabotaging, if not altogether derailing, the peace deals among Arab states and between them and Iran and Israel, Hamas may want to regionalise or even internationalise a broad pro-Palestinian uprising in the region and beyond. The Palestinians’ death toll and sufferings in Gaza have already prompted the Malaysian government to take a supportive stance for Hamas, Indonesia, the largest Muslim country in the world, is casting a glaring eye on Israeli retaliation in Gaza, which may involve a ground incursion. Palestinians in the Arab world, not to mention the Arabs themselves, will likely become more critical of Israel as the conflict escalates.

In addition, it is reasonable to assume that Hamas knew exactly what it was doing when it attacked and wantonly killed hundreds of innocent civilians inside Israel. With Israel’s well-known doctrine of disproportionate response, Hamas was likely geared to provoke the Israeli Defence Forces into a violent overreaction. As more Palestinian lives are lost, Israel may end up being the villain perpetrating violence against a helpless population rather than the victim of Hamas’ aggression.

Global public opinion will thus be fiercely contested. It is not hard to see that the longer the war goes on, the more disadvantaged the Israelis will be. The more measured and Hamas-focused they are within a limited duration, the better the Israelis will likely come out of it. In Hamas’ calculation, Israel’s overwhelming superiority in the force of arms and military prowess may well be its chief weakness in this situation.

For the Thai people, Hamas’ killing spree on Thai workers is unfathomable. Thailand has never done anything to harm Hamas nor caused any trouble for the inhabitants of the Palestinian territories. Survivor accounts from Thai workers who have returned safely indicate that they were specifically targeted by Hamas militants. Perhaps Palestinians in Gaza were resentful of Thai workers in Israel’s agricultural farms for holding jobs that could and should have gone to them. Because of Thailand’s 30-year estrangement with Saudi Arabia until normalisation last year, Israel became an attractive employment destination. Thailand is not alone, as the Philippines has similarly enjoyed employment opportunities in Israel.

Hamas’ brutal killings of Thai workers are totally unjustified. Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin was spot-on to condemn Hamas’ action. When Thais are killed indiscriminately, the Thai government cannot conscionably stand on neutral ground. We need to condemn Hamas’ murderous acts in no uncertain terms and call for the immediate release of Thai and all other hostages. Doing so is not making enemies out of Hamas but sticking up for the innocent Thais who have been killed, injured and abducted.

Source

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Paris, Frankfurt (13/10 –  42)

Twenty-First Century technology has a way of speeding everything up – often overdriving events beyond human control. Exhibit “A”: the internet. Hamas and its supporters were undoubtedly aware of the multiplication impact of social media when they mounted their recent murderous attack on a “peace party” along the Israeli border (twist the irony dial); Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, intent on a blanket reprisal on the Palestinians, apparently does not care what the internet thinks, says or reports.

It is perplexing to the simple-minded when there are no “good guys” in a fight. Note how the vociferous left, long championing what they condemn as “disinformation” or “misinformation”, is now caught in their own web, as barrages of anti-Israel – not to mention pro-Hamas terrorist attack – flood the Web.

Go back a bit. Betar “pioneers” infiltrating British-controlled Palestine in the 1930s harassed the inhabitants by “occupying” ancient water sources and springs – thus preventing the Bedouins and farmers from accessing them. No water = no life.

This is related in detail in the memoir of Moshe Arens.

A video clip of an Arab man and his elderly father confronting an Israeli settler, explaining patiently that the newcomer had stolen and now occupied the old man’s land. The Arab showed the Israeli the deed. The settler responded by stating that God had given him the land.

A situation without a resolution.

An ugly history leads up to the present impossible conundrum. The Haavara Agreement, signed in 1933 by an unlikely collaboration between Zionists and German Nazis, facilitated the emigration of German Jews to Palestine, taking assets pointedly used to purchase German goods for export to that sad land. Most of the Jewish population of Germany, comfortable and prosperous, declined to move to the desert (which the British controlled, in any case, and did not welcome settlers). They had no idea of what lay in store for them, as the Jewish Agency for Palestine, the main Zionist organization there at that time, played a key role in organizing illegal immigration of Jews from Europe.

Technology exacerbates the hostility, by stoking rumors, conjectures, info and disinfo. Was Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu aware of the impending attack – considering little Israel has the most advanced military intelligence capability on the planet? Did the Egyptians not pass urgent warnings to Israel of a likely Hamas military move? Was the attack a “false flag” event laid by Netanyahu to shore up his political position? We’ll likely never know. What we do know is the furious backlash of the authorities to the media blitz.

As BLM supporters gloried in the terrorist attack, and supporters of Israel battled back in the media, the European Commission piled in, warning billionaire-joker Elon Musk that “X”, née “Twitter”, that allowing what the EC ceremoniously deemed “hate speech” was unacceptable.  According to guidelines set up by the “Digital Services Act”, rules were being breached, by jaw-snapping, foaming-at-the-mouth rabid commentors on all sides of the current matter. This dictum from “Europäischer Kommissar” Thierry Breton, wielding a whip over the reckless social media site.

“Let me remind you that the Digital Services Act sets very precise obligations regarding content moderation.”

Musk comes back and challenges the saucy Info-Eurocrat with “What are you talking about? Give me examples” but the Kommissar won’t step into that trap, instead primly hand-waving with “Vu, merci. You are well aware of your users’ — and authorities’— reports on fake content and glorification of violence.

“Up to you to demonstrate that you walk the talk.” [The gent means “…walk the walk…” and not just “…talk the talk…”] Idioms, Thierry, idioms!

He signs off with an unctuous “My team remains at your disposal to ensure DSA compliance, which the EU will continue to enforce rigorously.”

A challenge to which Mr. Musk promptly replied, X’ing it out:

“We take our actions in the open.

“No back room deals.

“Please post your concerns explicitly on this platform.”

 – Elon Musk

Now do you see why he shelled out the billions to buy this nonsense social media site? What fun, to tease and tickle the hypocritical Eurocrats.

What is actually accurate or fake in this kangaroo court of social media? Are we to only accept the government stamp-of-approval-issued content? Think Pravda, think Izvestia (wink, wink). Ditto for the corporate media, obedient and in league with the Official Party Line.

Deep State undoubtedly has its feelings hurt that there are no longer direct lines, offices, perks and money for FBI, CIA and other “truth agents” in the TwitteRealm.

For that matter, why are millions of previously-trusting consumers now justifiably wary of their governments cajoling, threatening and mandating the so-called “vaccine”, untested mRNA “single-stranded RNA … in a growing protein chain” into their bloodstreams? Tens of thousands crippled, thousands dead maybe? You won’t see a single case of vaccine injury on CNBC, and no hospital will ever admit to such a possibility. It’s all over the internet.

Did the Israeli authorities, and military, just stand by and allow their citizens to be kidnapped and murdered? Were they simply incompetent, unaware, distracted? Is there a “back-story”?

Will we ever know? The media barrage is intense. Advertisers are perplexed. The world is being dragged into an unending domestic disturbance in the Middle East, one with no solution, across an ancient land poisoned by hatred and greed.

The Israelis declare “This is our 9/11.” Considering the enormous doubts raised about that spectacle, their statement may be truer than they imagine.

The post “The King’s New Clothes – Hamas, Israel, Censorship” appeared first on Tashkent Citizen.

Israeli private detective, Aviram Azari has pleaded guilty for involvement in surveillance and cyber intelligence hack scheme in April 2022. Azari, who has been detained and under investigation in the United States since 2019, used New Delhi-based hacking company BellTroX Info Tech Services to conduct surveillance operations on Russian oligarchs.

The Azari case surfaced the name of a Russian businessman and aluminium magnate, Oleg Deripaska as one of the Israeli private detective’s clients. Deripaska allegedly employed Azari in connection with a business dispute in Austria. Both BellTroX and Deripaska’s press secretary had denied being involved in the hacking and claimed that the accusation was false.

New York prosecutors alleged that Azari had orchestrated a series of hacking attacks on behalf of unnamed third parties against US companies that are based in New York, using fake websites and phishing messages to steal passwords from email accounts. Azari’s attorney Barry Zone said the allegation against the defendant stemmed from the work that Azari did for German payment company Wirecard, which filed for insolvency in June 2020, owing creditors almost $4 billion, after disclosing a 1.9 billion hole in its accounts that EY said as the result of a sophisticated global fraud.

New investigation reports by an international consortium of journalists at The Guardian revealed a team of Israeli contractors who claim to have manipulated more than 30 elections around the world using hacking, sabotage and automated disinformation on social media. The team appears to have been working under the radar in elections in various countries for more than two decades.

The team was led by Tal Hanan, a 50-year-old former Israeli special forces operative who works privately using the pseudonym “Jorge”. Team Jorge ran a private service offering to covertly meddle in elections without a trace. The team also have corporate clients.

One of Team Jorge’s key services was a sophisticated software package, Advanced Impact Media Solutions also known as Aims. It controlled a vast army of thousands of fake social media profiles on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Telegram, Gmail, Instagram and YouTube.

Hanan told the undercover reporters that his services, which others described as “black ops”, were available to intelligence agencies, political campaigns and private companies that wanted to secretly manipulate public opinion. He said they had been used across Africa, South and Central America, the US and Europe. The methods and techniques described by Team Jorge raise new challenges for big tech platforms, which have for years struggled to prevent nefarious actors spreading falsehoods or breaching the security on their platforms. Evidence of a global private market in disinformation aimed at elections will also ring alarm bells for democracies around the world.

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