NoW UPDATES: TIME IS OUT OF JOINT

 

Time is out of joint the Bard tells us. And it’s hard not to notice there’s one hell of a smash coming our way as we drive full-bore into reality’s brick wall.

 

👉A COUPLE OF WEEKS AGO, a missile landed on a football pitch in the former Syrian territory of the occupied (by Israel) Golan Heights, killing several Druze (a Muslim sect) students. Israel claims it was a deliberate attack by Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia. Hezbollah claims it was an errant Israeli “Iron Dome” missile. Either way, Netanyahu is using this as a pretext to launch his much-anticipated attack into Lebanon to push Hezbollah militia forces north of the Latani River,* thus creating a buffer zone that would allow thousands of Israeli settlers to return to their homes which they were forced from since October 7 when Hezbollah’s missile and drone attacks began raining down on them in support of Gaza’s Hamas.

On July 30, Israel launched a missile attack into the Iranian capital, Tehran, (possibly from inside the country) killing a top Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyeh. [Note: the type of explosive device used in the attack--a missile, a projectile, or a planted bomb is yet to be determined.] Haniyeh was the lead negotiator working on a ceasefire in the Israeli-Gazan war. Apparently, killing the opposition’s chief negotiator is a sign that a deal is near.¹ The day before, Israel targeted a high-ranking Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr, in Beirut, Lebanon. Israel claims the assassinations were in response for the killing of those teens in the Golan Heights. Two high-profile assassinations in as many days. Israel seems bound and determined to open a wider war with Hezbollah and to drag the U.S. into a conflict that neither the Americans nor the Iranians want.

The brazen attacks in Tehran and Beirut necessitate responses from Iran and from Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia. When and where are the key questions, and will the Americans be drawn kicking and screaming into the fray in aid of Israel?

America is sending a carrier group  and a guided missile submarine into the Eastern Mediterranean in part to aid American citizens who are unable to fly out of the impending war zone. The warships are there primarily to provide missile and fighter-jet cover for Israel in the event it engages with Hezbollah and needs support. But there are fears of a wider war involving Iran, Yemen, Iraqi militants and Syria, and even Russia and China to top it all off. We await Iran and Hezbollah's response to Israel's assassinations of the two leaders.  Stay tuned.²

👉Finally, a disturbing story to end my update on the situation in Gaza: There are recent reports about Palestinians detained in Israeli prisons being abused by guards, with rapes, gang rapes, and other examples of sexual abuse and physical violence occurring. These are not new, but it's only because of the intense scrutiny of Israel's ethnic cleansing in Gaza, made available through social media, that such sick, subterranean activities are brought to light. These disgraceful and criminal acts have been ongoing for some time. But what’s new is the report of a particularly egregious violation carried out by Israeli soldiers/guards at the Sde Teiman detention camp, one of several facilities set up by the IDF to detain Palestinian 'terror suspects' following the October 7 attacks last fall. There, a male Palestinian prisoner was sodomized and had objects inserted into his rectum causing injuries so serious he had to be hospitalized and may not walk again. As news of the abuse became public, in part because videos of the rape were made and shared by the guards, several of whom were arrested and held at Beit Lid military base pending trial. Meanwhile the camp's prisoners have been moved to other facilities. It is clear that torture has become normalized within Israeli prisons, particularly those prisons that are run by the IDF. It seems that Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" has found a home in the psyche of the Israeli nation....

BUT the real kicker was when an angry mob broke into the base protesting the arrest of the soldiers charged with rape. They were incensed because IDF personnel were being charged, and demanded their release. That these men may be rapists and in violation of just about every military code of conduct there is didn't seem to bother protestors. After all, the Palestinians were just the Amalek and deserved what they got. If Bibi says so, then it must be true. Three soldiers have been freed and so far none of the others have been formally charged and none may ever be brought to justice. 

And, to add a final shovel of muck atop this steaming pile, there was a shameful debate held last week in the Knesset, Israel’s legislature, on whether it was lawful and proper for IDF soldiers to sexually abuse detainees. Huh? Justifiable rape? Something actually discussed in a legislative committee meeting?! Surely this is another sign of how psychologically sick Israel has become. We may be witnessing the splintering and destruction of the Israeli state, at least as it's currently configured. Such a center surely cannot hold. Leon Uris must be spinning in his grave. Or maybe he's laying about smug and mouldy. Who knows?

 

    FYI: Float pic on top. Da Vinci's "Last Supper" on bottom.

👉ON A LIGHTER NOTE, the opening ceremonies of the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris got off with a major face-plant last month when one of its parade floats—a recreation of The Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci—received a major dose of criticism. Why? It’s a bit religious-y for my taste, I'll grant you, but whatever. Where’s the beef? Well, the brain-trust in charge of float designs thought it would be a good idea if they peopled their ‘homage’ to da Vinci with drag queens and a child, perhaps nine or ten-years old, weaving in between the various ‘diners’ as they preened and threw kisses at the crowds lining the catwalk roadway. It’s artistic expression at its liberated, inclusive best and it tics all the DEI boxes! The float’s designer said the theme they were trying to get across was “community tolerance”. But backlash from IOC funders and advertisers, and the public in general, suggests there’s a limit to what’s tolerated by the community, and the IOC’s float from Hell just crossed a red line. To say it was in poor taste and yet another genuflection before the altar of Woke politics is putting it mildly. What were they thinking?

 

👉IN UKRAINE, Russian forces continue to make slow, methodical progress in the eastern oblasts of the Donbass and in the north around Kharkiv, a traditionally Russian city. Putin probably does not want his troops to move much further west lest they enter indigenous Ukrainian territory, with all the difficulties of governing a hostile, subject population that would follow. But if Kiev fails to surrender, or to adopt neutrality as its official state policy, or if NATO pig-headedly continues to say it will make Ukraine a member at some future time, then Moscow is left with little choice other than continuing to the Polish border, taking more territory than it wants in order to create a buffer zone between it and its unfriendly NATO neighbours.

CONQUERING the port city of Odessa is still a question mark. If Russia does take Odessa, Ukraine will become a landlocked, dysfunctional rump state.

NOTE: In the last few days, Ukraine’s AFU (Armed Forces of Ukraine) has made an incursion into Russian territory in the Sudzha and Korenevo districts. While it’s an embarrassment for Russia, it is hardly a game changer as far as the war is concerned, and seems more like a desperate move from a failing military.

SOME commentators argue that Ukraine won’t last out the summer, let alone the year. I think it will probably go on for a bit, but the longer the Zelensky regime refuses to read the writing on the wall and continues its hopeless fight, the more territory Russia will ultimately seize. 

There are reports that Russia has hundreds of thousands of fresh troops ready to enter the fray in Ukraine. There may be big moves in the coming weeks. So, we’ll see; wars tend to surprise us. Often.

 

    Hiroshima Peace Memorial. Remains of City Hall in Background.

👉AND A SMALL palate cleanser to prepare us for upcoming (and they are coming!) clusterfucks in various and sundry parts of this increasingly frazzled and at loose ends world of ours: 

August 6 and 9, just past, were the 79th  anniversary of the atomic bombings of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Dignitaries, foreign ministers, politicians from around the world come to pay homage for those killed in the world's only (so far) wartime detonations of nuclear weapons. On August 6, many delegates assembled at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. Among those attending was a representative from Israel.  (Palestine was not represented.) Activists protested Israel's inclusion in this year's event because of their actions in Gaza.

 

“Among the roughly 100 participants of the event, 73-year-old Mitsuko Yamaguchi, a Hiroshima native, said, ‘Inviting Israel to Hiroshima was disgraceful. It's as if we're accepting what's happening in Gaza.’"

 

Days later at Nagasaki's memorial service, it was Israel's turn not to be invited. Instead there was a representative from Palestine. Naturally, the Japanese PM had egg all over his face, but said the invitations protocol was the municipal government's responsibility. Nice buck-pass, Fumio!

Naturally, the high mucky-mucks of the G-7 refused to attend if war-criminal Israel was not on the guest list. Boo-hoo. And Canada, simping as always, followed in lock-step the American lead, no doubt disappointing cuck extraordinaire and Biden rent-boy, our very own PM Trudeau who, no doubt, was looking forward to another world stage where upon he could preen and display his feathers.😄 

 

Cheers, Jake.______________________________________

 

* And your guess is as good as mine as to what will happen to the Lebanese city of Tyre (pop. 200,000), one of the world’s oldest cities, that lay between the Israeli/Lebanon border and the Litani River.

 

1. Meaning, of course, that Israel has no intention of stopping their ethnic cleansing of Gaza (along with the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Golan Heights), and doesn’t want a ceasefire or treaty with Hamas. The death toll in the nine-month genocide Israel is carrying out in Gaza may be much higher than the official Hamas Health Ministry figures of around 40,000, with many more dead Palestinians buried under the rubble, and many more dying or dead from disease, starvation, dehydration and infection. (Hardly surprising with only a handful of Gazan hospitals and clinics still operating, the rest reduced to rubble in Israel's horrific bombing campaign. 

SIDE NOTE: Polio may become endemic once more in the Palestinian homeland. It had been eradicated in the enclave, as it has in most parts of the world. But with little or no clean water and sanitation infrastructure all but destroyed, infectious diseases are on the rise there.) Some suggest over 186,000 Palestinians may be dead when the tally is finally counted, even more by other estimates.

 

2. For those who like their wars hot, you may get your wish if Israel decides to uncork the nuclear genie from its bottle. Some commentators have said that if Israel has its back against the wall it may resort to using nuclear weapons. It has a store estimated at between 2-300 warheads. And it may even open its war with Hezbollah by nuking parts of southern Lebanon to weaken or destroy Hezbollah emplacements. The reckless and criminal way Israel has been conducting its genocidal war in Gaza suggests a level of nihilism in its leadership, its military, and in the general population that does not preclude this horrible possibility. Perhaps it's fitting for WWIII to start in Israel, after all the biblical city of Armageddon, today's Tel Megiddo, is located there.

 

"Genocide Joe" by Lowkey. [Great tune by a gifted song-smith. Ed.] Did I mention the U.S. could stop all this shit with a fucking phone call? Biden, or whoever is pulling the strings of that meat-puppet in the White House could stop it cold. All they have to say is: "STOP! NO MORE! No more money. No more weapons. No more political cover. 

Come on, Joe! How about one for the Gipper? [Oh, yeah, don't forget that other hot mess in Ukraine could go nuclear as well if things continue the way they're going. Buckle up!