Paris, the Russian airliner, Lebanon: ISIS is enlarging the war
The center cannot hold.
View ArticleIran, U.S: Pre-talks posturing ropes in Israel, trash talk, Trump administration
Iran announced in early November that it would start talks on the Iranian nuclear program with the Biden administration and other world leaders this coming week in Vienna. In preparation for the talks,...
View ArticleTOC Ready Room 15 Dec 2021: Contra-indicative speech; Trump’s F-bomb;...
The strangeness of this hour has crossed a line in recent days. It’s a line between some level of fealty to demonstrable reality, and none. Over the last few years, we have repeatedly witnessed the...
View ArticleTOC Ready Room 29 March 2022: Eyes front (not back), on attacks in Israel
This will be a brief Ready Room; basically little more than a string of tweets. But it’s important. The subject is the terror attacks in Israel in recent days, which have now taken the lives of 11...
View ArticleU.S. renders forensic opinion on Abu Akleh shooting
As an Independence Day treat, the U.S. State Department on Monday announced its conclusions on the shooting of journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in Jenin in May 2022. It was reported earlier this weekend...
View ArticleTOC Ready Room 22 July 2022: Biden returns from MidEast, with prejudice; CNN...
We’re on deck with a full-up Ready Room today, after a relatively extended blogging hiatus. Strap in for some serious (if selective) situational awareness. Biden’s Middle East adventure It turns out...
View ArticleTOC Ready Room 22 November 2022: Drive-by edition; Poland missile impact,...
Increasingly, I agree with those who say we need an “audit” of U.S. support to Ukraine. I put “audit” in quotation marks because a mere audit of the tens of billions flowing to Ukraine – and to...
View ArticleIsrael: Rumors of war in a world transformed
On 9 April 2023, Israeli Arabist scholar and former intelligence officer Mordechai Kedar published an article recounting information recently received from an associate he describes as a source he has...
View ArticleA brief meditation on media manipulation: Israel, Republicans, ordinary politics
Haaretz has perpetrated a headline. “Biden Administration Braces for Potential ‘Sh**show’ in Appointing New U.S. Ambassador to Israel – U.S. News” It’s a good mental exercise to recall that whenever...
View ArticleWinds of war: Why is this “Hamas” attack different from all other attacks?
[Note: I am going to post this as-is, although several updates from Tuesday would merit discussion. This just needs to get posted, for the initial point if for nothing else. I’ve added a “Bonus...
View ArticleThe Navy shuffle: Mixed signals with Biden visit to Israel
The signals being sent with President Biden’s visit to Israel on Wednesday may not be that mixed. It remains to be seen. But if they trend less mixed, we should be concerned that their purpose is to...
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