Articles which have caught my interest. Mostly Israel stuff and other nubbins from the ongoing holy war.

 
And So it Begins

So who'd have expected the bombing to begin as quickly as it did. I woke up this morning and turned on the morning talk shows only to find a collection of talking heads which normally appear only at night: the evening news anchors, Ehud Yaari (the Middle Eastern affairs expert), and a smattering of retired generals all holding forth on What Does it all Mean.

And so, after many months of waiting, the game is finally afoot. Already we're swimming in questions: Have the ground forces started moving? What were the results of this morning's bombing? Is Saddam still alive? Was that speech he gave this morning live or taped, and was it even Saddam?

So far, I haven't heard any real concrete info coming from Ari Fleischer or Rummy. Perhaps later on this evening or tomorrow.

Israel has entered into standby mode, which is driving at least part of the population a little cuckoo. Part of the problem comes from mixed messages. Homefront Command made a very dramatic announcement last night instructing people to open up their gas mask kits, install the filter on the mask, and begin carrying around the kit everywhere. At the same time, the government -- especially the Education Minister -- is emphasizing business as usual: go to school, go to work, most likely nothing will happen.

The school system went all higgledy piggledy as a result of stressed-out kids and their equally stressed-out parents. Officially, only 60% of students attended school today. My wife, an English teacher, reports that at her school at least, attendance was closer to 30%.

Since the news media all switched over to all-war reporting, they suddenly had a lot of air to fill. A big part of the programing in the middle of the day was taken up with people's fears of an attack. Channel Two had popular radio psychologist Varda Raziel Jacont on hand to field calls from anxious citizens uncertain about what to do with themselves and their children. (Varda, who is a big proponent of medicine-based treatment for personal problems, suggested going to the shrink and getting something to calm you down. But that's neither here nor there).

The radio call-in shows featured the usual kooks, along with one guy of Iraqi origin who claimed that his grandmother had helped raise the young Saddam Hussein back in Tikkrit. He admitted having a soft spot for the great mustachioed one and hoped that the war would be quick.

Most of the listeners calling in, however, were either those who are anxious or thsoe who are copping the typical Israeli attitude of yehiyeh beseder ("everything will be alright"). One caller -- who had expressed a blase attitude towards the whole thing -- sheepishly admitted that he was carrying his gas mask around because his mother had asked him to. The host of the show laughed cynically and said that everyone he talked to this morning was carrying around their kits to calm their mothers.

A highly non-scientific survey (conducted while I drove around central Tel Aviv today) shows that only about 10 percent of the population is in fact schlepping their gas masks with them.

At the very least the flood of people fleeing the Tel Aviv area for Jerusalem and Eilat hasn't materialized. Sure, people are hightailing it to safe ground (among them, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom's incredibly annoying wife, Judy) but not in the droves that we saw back in '91.

My safe room is as set up as it's going to get. The gas masks are operative, and now we wait.
posted at 9:55 PM

 
The Masks are Out

Homefront Command just issued its orders for everyone to open up their gas mask kits and start carrying them around.

As far as Israel is concerned, it's go time.
posted at 10:37 PM

 
Tony Gots Sack

Of all the figures involved in the current conflict, Tony Blair has impressed me the most. GWB has shown leadership and a clear worldview, but Blair has been the one who really put his political career on the line backing the war.

Last night Parliament voted overwhelmingly to back the war against Saddam. The opposition came mainly from Blair's own Labour party. During the leadup to the vote, three of Blair's cabinet members resigned in protest. The Labour mutineers were hoping to get at least 150 votes. They failed to do so.

During the last few months Blair could have easily started waffling in order to appease his sniffy back-benchers. The fact that he did not do so really elevates him to the rank of a leader.

Or, as The Guardian put it today in an appreciative editorial:

Mr Blair has not shrunk from debate. He has taken the argument to all quarters of his restive party. He has allowed the Commons its say. And despite all the doubts about this war, Mr Blair has shown himself in the past few days to be at once the most formidable politician in the country and the right national leader for these deeply uncertain times.

posted at 9:15 PM

 
"Don't Panic"

The countdown continues.

At this point, the IDF Homefront Command has issued orders to seal up the safe rooms and has opened an information channel on TV which discusses gas masks and things. They haven't issued orders yet for us to open up the gas mask kits, but once the ultimatum on Saddam runs out they probably will.

The next step is to issue an order that we start carrying around the kits with us at all times.

Still, the official word is that chances are very low ("very, very, very low" in the words of the IDF Chief of Staff, "no more than one percent" according to Sharon. In other words, like the morning show host said this morning (in English, for some reason), "don't penick."

The big question right now is what Israel does if Saddam does send missiles our way. During the first Gulf War Israel sat quiet as Saddam launched 39 missiles at Tel Aviv and Haifa. The government sat quiet at the behest of the US, who didn't want to see the Arab coalition fall apart if Israel entered the fray.

Over the years a number of politicians and security experts have argued that the Arab world read Israel's inaction as a lack of will. By not retaliating against Saddam, the argument goes, Israel lost a lot of its prestige and deterrent capability in the face of the Arabs.

One of the key proponents of this theory is former Defense Minister Moshe Arens who spelled it out again in yesterday's Ha'aretz.

The argument is far from academic as long as there is any chance that Israel will get hit again once the shooting war starts. Various political and military figures have made noise that Israel won't sit quiet this time and will retaliate in direct proportion to the level of attack from Iraq. If Saddam launches a conventional warhead which lands in the sea, the reaction will probably be minor. On the other hand if, God forbid, a chemical-tipped missile hits the center of Tel Aviv, God help us all.
posted at 4:59 PM

 
The Big Countdown

T minus about 30 hours or so now.

Not surprisingly, the great mustachioed one rejected GWB's ultimatum to leave the country. (Saddam's lunatic son Uday in fact turned the ultimatum around and demanded that Bush resign). And so, if nothing else changes between now and early Thursday morning it looks like showtime is finally here.

I watched the highlights of W's speech on the morning show today. For some reason my initial thought was that it reminded me of an SNL sketch during the first Gulf War where Bush Sr. addresses the Iraqi leadership in a language they can understand. ("Bar said to me last night 'Jackals will slake their thirst on the blood of Iraqi soldiers...'" etc.)

The national mood seems to have shifted slightly from complete indifference to a state of semi-bored resignation. Last night the IDF Homefront Command issued orders to start sealing rooms in the event of a gas attack. However, the public hasn't mobbed the stores looking for masking tape and life goes on as usual.

As expected the news outlets have found curious bits of news -- such as the starry-eyed dude from Brooklyn who chose today of all days to make aliyah -- along with the discussions of what Israel's reaction should be if we do get attacked.
posted at 5:42 PM

 
Here it Comes

And the storm clouds continue to mount. The Bushies say "enough is enough" to all the UN jawjacking and the inspectors mount planes out of Baghdad.

Yes, it looks like it's finally coming down, quite possibly this week.

You don't really get any sense of it over here, even though wer're nominally in the line of fire. The weather has been fairly nice in the last couple of days, and the kiddies are on Purim vacation.

You see them in the streets and malls, decked out in their Purim costumes. (The holiday is kind of like the Jewish version of Halloween). You see a lot of kids dressed up as Ilan Ramon along with the expected Harry Potters and Brittney Spearses. Also, the missus (an elementary school teacher) reports that for some reason a lot of the kids came to school yesterday dressed as the Devil. Go figure.

The government may issue an announcement for people to stock up on supplies for sealing off rooms in case of a gas or biological attack. If they do that, the atmosphere here may get a little more stressy.

In the meantime, we wait.

(BTW, you can see the scud sculpture on display at Rabin Square in this photo.)
posted at 6:57 PM

 
Picture of the Day

There are times I wish I had a camera on me. Driving home this evening, we passed Rabin Square. A dozen pencil-shaped conical sculptures covered with artistic graffiti have been in the middle of the square for the past couple of days. They represent scud missiles, the kind that rained on this area during the last Gulf War.

The Tel Aviv municipality set up a big sign in lights reading "Happy Purim" above the sculpture. The combined effect says it all: Purim is almost upon us and we're still waiting for the war.
posted at 11:06 PM

 
Abu Mazen

The Palestinian Legislative Council is expected to define the powers of the new Palestinian Prime Minister tomorrow. At the moment it appears that the new Palestinian PM will be authorized to resume negotiations with Israel on all the major issues. Abu Mazen is widely expected to hold this new post.

The establishment of the new PM is one of the reforms for the corrupt, decaying Palestinian Authority and the terrorist who heads it. Abu Mazen has the advantage of being one of the few higer-ups in the Palestinian Authority whose hands aren't stained with blood. As such he is acceptable as far as the Americans, Europeans, and Israel are concerned. His appointment may be the first step to calming the situation in the region.

But I wouldn't put any money on it.

For one thing, Abu Mazen has no power base among the Palestinian people. This means he'll have a hard time bringing Hamas and the PLO's own Al Aqsa brigades to heel. Secondly, Arafat -- who dislikes the guy personally -- will do everything in his evil powers to undercut Abu Mazen at every turn and make his life hell.

And then there's Ariel Sharon and the new government over here. I'm still willing to give Sharon the benefit of the doubt and believe that if there is a reasonable peace offer on the table that he'll go for it (or, in the worst case, call for new elections to turn the decision over to the public, who will accept). However, the road to a reasonable offer is long and twisted. Sharon's coalition partners in the National Religious Party and the National Union oppose any negotiations with the Palestinians.

As long as it appears that Arafat is still the one stirring the pot with the Palestinians, the negotiations will once again get bogged down in the same quid pro quo mire as before: Israel says "We'll start pulling out of the territories once the Palestinians stop the terrorism"; the Palestinians say "We won't stop the terrorism until Israel pulls out of the territories."

The problems go on and on, even once the negotiations do start. The only real hope here is that a successful Gulf War will change the equation: Ousting Saddam will help undercut Arafat and possibly drive home a message to the Palestinians that they will have to be responsible for their own salvation; at the same time, a triumphant GWB will be able to force some kind of understanding between Sharon and Abu Mazen.

Pie in the sky? Possibly, but at the moment I'll take that over the shit pie that we eat daily.


The "Road Map"

As part of the possible change of things in this region, GWB announced the resumption of the road map idea in order to get Israel and the Palestinians talking again.

The road map is nothing new. It's been around since last summer and basically spells out the steps that both sides need to take towards an interim agreement. For the Palestinians this means stopping their terrorism. For Israel, it means pulling forces back from Palestinian towns and stepping down settlement activity.

What's interesting is less the plan -- which is vague on a lot of the specifics and which will doubtlessly get mired in tit-for-tat finger pointing -- but rather the way it's being presented now. By announcing it like he did, GWB basically took posession of the plan and turned it into a specifically American initiative.

By doing this, he cuts out the Europeans (even if he doesn't admit this explicitly). This, along with the fact that he has already disqualified Arafat as a partner in the negotiations, will help Israelis swallow the plan.

As the Times article points out "Israelis say pointedly that they do not want the same people who think Iraq is cooperating with arms inspections to determine whether Palestinians are easing up on attacks on Israelis."

Like with Abu Mazen, wait and see.

posted at 11:05 PM