Further thoughts on the hostage rescue: their survival was almost miraculous

The New Neo Posted on by

Here’s a much more detailed description of the Israeli hostage rescue. I’m sure important facts have been left out for security reasons, but enough have been revealed to give a fuller picture than the one we got earlier.

That fuller picture makes it seem almost a miracle that the hostages and their rescuers got out alive. Maybe it actually was a miracle, depending on your belief system.

I suggest you please read the whole thing now, because I’m going to discuss some of my reactions and observations.

(1) When I had just the bare bones of the story, before I had read the article, one thing I wondered was – in the firefight that occurred during the rescue of the three male hostages, when the head of the operation was mortally wounded – how did the Israeli troops somehow manage to protect the hostages and themselves while carrying his body out of the building and bringing him home? The article doesn’t explain exactly how that was done, but it does make clear that he was carried out of there on a stretcher, and that there were medics as part of the original team. So not only did the Israelis prepare for that sort of contingency, but they used precious time and resources to make sure no one was left behind to the tender mercies of the savage Gazan crowd. This was all done under extremely heavy fire.

(2) Prior to reading the article I had already heard of some of the intelligence work prior to the rescue, involving a team of Israelis posing as Arabs and speaking fluent Arabic with a Gazan accent. It had struck me, and not for the first time, that the reason the Israelis could successfully pull that off was that the members of the team probably were Arabs – Israeli Arabs, that is. About 20% of Israeli citizens are Arabs, and I’d wager that most of them have no desire for Hamas to take over Israel and take away the freedoms they enjoy there.

(3) The article makes it crystal clear that the type of combat in which the Israeli team had to engage was enormously difficult and more dramatic than most movies. They were met with an unexpected amount of armed resistance not just on the streets of Gaza as they were trying to get the hostages through the town. but even when they first entered the home where the hostages were being kept.

(4) The hostages had to be very brave, as well, during this operation.

(5) Every single story I’ve read about the hostage rescue operation refers to the site where the hostages were being kept as the “Nuseirat refugee camp,” and that includes the one I’m writing about now. Words matter. The Palestinians and the UN and the NGOs have managed to use these sort of terms to conjure up the image in the readers’ minds of a bunch of makeshift tent cities, full of squalor and lacking basic facilities. But the vast majority of dwellings in the permanent “refugee camps” of Gaza are not like that. They are towns, with shops and homes and all the usual accouterments that towns contain. We should stop calling them “camps” because they are not camps. For that matter, most of the people in them are not “refugees”; they are the children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren of people who for the most part chose to leave Israel when the UN created the original two-state solution that the Arab world rejected in favor of trying to destroy Israel. And lastly, they’re not really “Palestinians,” they appropriated that term back in the 1960s:

Polls show Trump gaining black voters

The New Neo Posted on by

With the usual caveats regarding polls, take a look:

Trump has significantly shrunk his deficit with President Joe Biden among black Americans in the six battleground states, with the current president leading the former president 70% to 18%, a May New York Times/Siena College poll found. Enten, on “CNN News Central,” was stunned by how Trump is performing with black Americans as a Republican candidate, as well as how unpopular Biden is becoming with these voters.

Seventy to eighteen isn’t exactly doing poorly, of course. And it’s not nearly as unpopular as Biden should be. But it’s potentially very important, because any decline in black support for Democrats is potentially devastating.

More:

“I keep looking for this to change, to go back to a historical norm and it, simply put, has not yet.”

Depends, of course, on what “history” you’re going back to in order to find your “norm.” For a long time after the Civil War, black voters were Republicans.

More:

In 2020, Joe Biden was getting 86% of the African American vote. Look at where it is now. It’s 70%, that’s a 16-point drop, John,” Enten told host John Berman. “And more than that, it’s not just that Joe Biden is losing ground. It’s that Donald Trump is gaining ground. You go from 7%, single-digits at this point in 2020, to now 21% and again, John, I keep looking for signs that this is going to go back to normal and I don’t see it yet in the polling of anything right now. We’re careening towards a historic performance for a Republican presidential candidate, the likes of which we have not seen in six decades.”

Six decades ago it was 1964, the year of the passage of the Civil Rights Act.

Most of the current movement of black voters towards Trump seems to come from men and in particular younger men (I read that earlier but can’t find the exact source in a quick search at the moment). But again, I would be cautious about believing overmuch in polls.

One thing that occurs to me, though, is that once a previously politically monolithic ethnic group starts turning in the other direction even a little, it could have a cascade effect in which it becomes less shocking for a person in that group to consider affiliating with a previously-despised party and its candidates.

Update on Gerard’s book: the proof is on its way

The New Neo Posted on by

I finally turned in the PDF of Gerard’s book to the printing company. I had long been formatting and fixing things and proof-reading and fiddling with this and that. There are a nearly infinite number of decisions to make when printing a book, and I have zero experience with any of them.

It’s interesting, though. Change the font and the margins – I finally made both bigger, the better for elderly eyes to take in – and BAM! You’ve added quite a few pages, and therefore quite a bit of expense, to the book. I reduced that by changing the distance between lines and making that a bit smaller. Voila! Back to fewer pages again. And on and on with that sort of thing.

But by far the biggest time-consumer, the largest generator of tooth-gnashing hair-pulling, is copy editing. That means paying attention to typos, commas, grammar, the form to use for quotes, and a host of other nit-picky details and errors that the eye and mind can easily miss. Our human brains like to fill in the blanks of a mistake, but that’s a no-no for copy editing. I found that, no matter how many times I’d gone through the book already, I could always find an error I’d missed.

So I finally had to just – as one might say – close the book on it and send the PDF out to be made into a physical book in the real world. They say I should be receiving the print proof copy on Monday. I’m somewhat nervous to see what it will look like. But whatever I see, I’m inclined to accept it unless there’s some egregious flaw. I’ve had it with copy editing that thing.

Once I do approve it, the books are printed, and after I tweak the website a bit I’ll announce that they’re for sale. That’s the plan, anyway.

Our very own Jew-haters, left and right

The New Neo Posted on by

I find this sort of news intensely depressing:

And there’s plenty more where that came from, including a “Long live October 7” banner:

On Tuesday, a mob took over a New York City subway car and chanted, in a call and repeat fashion, “Raise your hands if you’re a Zionist. This is your chance to get out.”

Two nights ago, the homes of Brooklyn Museum’s director Anne Pasternak and several of the museum’s Jewish board members, were defaced with fake blood and a sign that accused Pasternak of being a “White-Supremacist Zionist.”

I’ve been writing in these pages about the growing antisemitism in New York for years.

But this is the worst it has ever been. It’s no longer random attacks, that could be blamed on the mentally unwell.

There is now a coordinated threat to Jewish presence in this city.

“Hate doesn’t have a home in our city,” former mayor Bill de Blasio said in 2019 after eight attacks on Jews within one week happened in New York.

De Blasio had famously blamed Trump-supporters for these increased attacks saying “I want to be very, very clear, the violent threat, the threat that is ideological, is very much from the right.”

He never explained how the shadowy MAGA fans existed in such large numbers in his deep blue New York and were able to disguise themselves so well.

To his credit, Mayor Adams visited the Nova exhibit after the hateful protest outside.

But he said similar words to his hapless predecessor, “Hate has no place in our city,” when it is clear “hate” has developed quite a foothold in New York where Jews are concerned.

“Hate” – that is, hatred of Jews – has found a very cozy place indeed in New York City, a place with a large Jewish population. New York City is presently 16% Jewish, but that’s ethnically Jewish; religious Jews are probably 8% or less, and Orthodox Jews less than that. The Jewish population of New York has been declining since the 1950s, when it constituted approximately one-quarter of the city.

Then again – in the year 1900, Jews constituted 25% of the population of Baghdad. You can read some of the history at the link, but here are a few details:

In the 1930s, the situation of the Jews in Iraq deteriorated. Previously, the growing Iraqi Arab nationalist sentiment included Iraqi Jews as fellow Arabs, but these views changed with the ongoing conflict in the Palestinian Mandate and the introduction of Nazi propaganda. Despite protestations of their loyalty to Iraq, Iraqi Jews were increasingly subject to discrimination and anti-Jewish actions.

The article goes on to describe just how bad it got for the Jews of Iraq. And the Nazis had a huge influence on the Arabs of the Middle East, continuing to this day, although it’s certainly not the only influence. You can see that influence in our own Jew-hating crowds, which openly praise Hitler.

Remember the brownshirts?:

Its primary purposes were providing protection for Nazi rallies and assemblies, disrupting the meetings of opposing parties, fighting against the paramilitary units of the opposing parties … and intimidating Romani, trade unionists, and especially Jews.

We also have this sort of thing, as well as this lesser but still troubling phenomenon.

NOTE: The greatest danger to Jews in America these days comes from the left – in particular the university-educated homegrown left – as well as students and residents of Arab origin. I don’t think there’s much doubt about that; they speak openly of wanting Jews dead. However, there are some people on the right who hate the Jews’ guts as well, although their hatred takes a different form, and as far as I know they’re not demonstrating in the streets, nor do they like Hamas or what happened on October 7. At the moment, their Jew-hatred seems of a less lethal variety than that displayed by the left plus jihadi-supporting Muslims.

Here are just a few examples of the sort of thing I mean, however, from the right. I often see this sort of thing in blog comments on the right; these particular ones were posted at Instapundit in response to an article on the subject of the Jew-hatred in New York City:

When the Jews who vote D reflexively start loving their children more than they hate white rural Christian people (and stop considering white rural Christians to be subhumans) this mess will get sorted out right quick.

Another:

They still vote D, so they hate you more than they fear the Muzzies.

Still another:

Boo hoo.

You flooded this country with third worlders. Enjoy what you created.

The “you” meant by the commenter there is Jews in general.

The accusations are not just that Jews vote for Democrats (although of course all Jews don’t vote for Democrats, so far 2/3 tend to do so, although the great majority of religious Jews vote for Republicans). The claims are that Jews hate Christians and consider them subhuman, hate white people (Jew are racially protean, white when the left needs them to be and brown when the right needs them to be), and that Jews are extremely powerful and responsible for our open border policies.

Roundup

The New Neo Posted on by

(1) Has Joe Biden ever had a good idea? Of course, it’s hard to say these days which of his policies actually are Joe’s ideas. But the Gaza pier had his telltale fingerprints on it, the mark of sheer stupidity. Here’s the latest on the fiasco that is the pier, aka Joe’s Folly.

(2) Oakland is removing its traffic lights because thieves keep stealing components of them.

(3) The rules for the presidential debate have been set. I wonder whether RFK Jr. will somehow make it. I doubt that either Trump or Biden wants him there.

(4) I keep reading polls that say Trump is doing well. It’s somewhat encouraging, but I haven’t linked to them and don’t pay them much mind because I think the wild card is “rigging” and fraud.

(5) A NY Post editorial says: “it looks downright cruel to keep trotting Biden around under the pretense that he can possibly serve four more years in the world’s most grueling job.” I find the statement a bit cryptic: cruel to whom? Not to Trump, whose chances of winning are increased by Biden’s obvious decrepitude. Not to Jill, who clearly relishes the thought of four more years with all that power and all those perks. I think Joe himself is very happy about it, too, as is the rest of his family. I suppose it might be most cruel to the casual onlooker, who might feel sorry for Biden, but in particular to those Democrats who plan to vote for him but look on his decline with dismay.

Robert Spencer on the transformation of Britain by Islam

The New Neo Posted on by

What’s been going on has become rather obvious, although some are in denial:

A world-historical societal transformation is taking place before our very eyes, and yet few have taken notice. Britain, the erstwhile leader of the Western world and the foundation and source of English-speaking civilization, is in its last days as a free society, and will soon become an Islamic state.

If by “soon” Spencer means within a year or two, and if by “Islamic state” he means an outright mullahtocracy such as Iran, I’d say his timeline is too quick. But the basic trend is there. Britain doesn’t need to become a theocracy (although I don’t doubt that’s the goal of some of its Muslim inhabitants) for Islamic ideas to take hold both in government and in public life, and of course vicious Jew-hatred is only one of those bad ideas. What’s more, the transformation relies on the sympathies and support of the left, which is a large segment of the population that isn’t Muslim.

More:

The English actor-turned-political-activist Lawrence Fox recently noted what was happening: “The Mayor of London is a Muslim. The mayor of Birmingham is a Muslim. The Mayor of Leeds is Muslim. Mayor of Blackburn – Muslim. The mayor of Sheffield is a Muslim. The mayor of Oxford is a Muslim. The mayor of Luton is a Muslim. The mayor of Oldham is Muslim. The mayor of Rochdale is Muslim. All this was achieved by only 4 million Muslims out of 66 million people in England.”

You might say it’s impressive in terms of the achievement of political power by a fairly small group.

More:

This kind of thing has happened before, but few remember. …

The invading Normans were few in number compared to the English, but once they had defeated the defenders, they set about systematically to ensure that England would remain theirs in perpetuity. They removed the native English from positions of political and ecclesiastical power. Norman French mingled with the Old English language, ultimately creating the English language as we know it today. Historian Richard Southern observed that “no country in Europe, between the rise of the barbarian kingdoms and the 20th century, has undergone so radical a change in so short a time as England experienced after 1066.”

Until now. Lawrence Fox continued: “Today there are over 3,000 mosques in England. There are over 130 sharia courts. There are more than 50 Sharia Councils. 78 percent of Muslim women do not work, receive state support + free accommodation. 63 percent of Muslims do not work, receive state support + free housing. State-supported Muslim families with an average of 6 to 8 children receive free accommodation. Now every school in the UK is required to teach lessons about Islam. Has anyone ever been given an opportunity to vote for this?”

All this has already transformed Britain, and much more is to come. JNS recently reported that “honor-based abuse cases in England rose by more than 60% in two years, with 2,594 cases in 2022 vs. 1,599 in 2020.” …

The native authorities, meanwhile, are cowed and submissive, afraid of offending their new masters.

The Rotherham sex abuse cases, ignored by authorities for a long time for fear of seeming racist and offending the Muslim population, were the portents of things to come. Or actually they were the sign that those things were already present.

The fear of being called “racist” and the existence of an extensive welfare state have combined to help contribute to this crisis, and have been almost as influential as Britain’s immigration policy itself. Add a refusal of the Brits to insist on assimilation, and the stage was set. At this point it seems to have reached a point of no return, as far as I can see.

Hamas spokesman says no one knows how many hostages are alive

The New Neo Posted on by

And what’s more, Israel must agree to a permanent ceasefire anyway.

It’s so hard to keep track of those elusive hostages:

In an interview with CNN released on Friday, Hamas spokesperson and political bureau member Osama Hamdan said that he did not know about how many of 120 hostages in Gaza are still alive. “No one has any idea about that,” he stated, adding that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) operation to free four hostages on Saturday resulted in deaths of three others, including an American citizen.

So neither he nor anyone else has any idea whether hostages are living or dead, but one thing they do know is that three were killed in the raid that freed the four hostages last week.

How do you know that a Hamas operative is lying? When his lips are moving.

That’s meant to be a joke in an unfunny situation. But it actually might be the truth that there is no person with an overview of what happened to every single hostage. It’s even possible that no person knows where they all are located, even just the living ones. As I’ve said many times, there were a lot of what I call “freelancers” from Gaza operating on October 7th, wild with the jubilation of satisfied sadism and the promise of money from Hamas for their captive prizes.

It’s even possible that three hostages died during or shortly after the Israeli raid, almost certainly either directly at the hands of Hamas (murdered in revenge by Hamas, that is) or “caught in the crossfire” when Hamas unsuccessfully used massive firepower in an effort to stop the hostage rescue, prompting massive firepower from Israel (I’m planning a post tomorrow dealing with some of the details of the rescue itself).

Or, as I said, every word out of the Hamas operative’s mouth might be a lie. The fact that CNN is interviewing this guy is both a bad thing and a good thing: bad because it gives him a platform to further spread his lies; good because it exposes (to those with eyes to see) his evil and unreasonableness.

Here are his demands of Israel, despite making no promises that hostages are even alive at this point:

Hamdan told CNN that any deal to release the hostages must include guarantees of a permanent ceasefire and the complete withdrawal of Israeli troops from the Gaza Strip.

In other words, end the war and maybe, just maybe, we’ll give you back some dead bodies.

He said that the latest proposal on the table backed by the United States did not meet Hamas’ requirements as the group seeks “a clear position from Israel to accept the ceasefire, a complete withdrawal from Gaza, and let the Palestinians to determine their future by themselves, the reconstruction, the [lifting] of the siege, and we are ready to talk about a fair deal about the prisoners exchange.”

Despite Hamas’ losses, he seems to think they’re negotiating from a position of great strength; he is basically asking that Israel unconditionally surrender. What gives him and other Hamas operatives that feeling of enormous power? They see the world – including the Biden administration – as being on their side.

Europe’s fight on the right

The New Neo Posted on by

One of the things that’s become even more clear after the recent EU elections is that in many countries in Europe, as what reporters like to call the “far right” is growing, the right itself is experiencing discord between the old line conventional right and this so-called “far right.” It somewhat mirrors a similar split that happened in this country in 2016 with the rise of Trump, and was likewise reflected in the move in the House against Speaker McCarthy.

At the moment in the US the Republicans, facing the prospect of Trump or another four dire years of Biden and/or his minions, are somewhat united. That unity is fragile, but it was exemplified by the recent meeting between Trump and the GOP in Congress:

Donald Trump made a triumphant return to Capitol Hill on Thursday, his first with lawmakers since the Jan.6, 2021 attacks, embraced by energized House and Senate Republicans who find themselves reinvigorated by his bid to retake the White House. …

… He has successfully purged the GOP of critics, silenced most skeptics and enticed once-critical lawmakers aboard his MAGA-fueled campaign.

A packed room of House Republicans sang “Happy Birthday” to Trump in a private breakfast meeting at GOP campaign headquarters across the street from the Capitol. The lawmakers gave him a baseball and bat from the annual congressional game, and senators later presented an American flag cake with “45” candles — and then “47″ — referring to the next presidency.

In contrast, the right in France, England, and several other countries of western Europe is experiencing a major rift between the old and new (Ace discusses the issues at some length in this post). If the right in the countries of western Europe tears itself apart, the result is that left wins in those countries where it has happened. Some people find that result acceptable, for a while at least:

With the right’s vote [in Britain] now evenly split between Reform and the Tories, neither party can win more than a couple of handfuls of parliamentary seats. Labour will win seats with just 20-30% of the vote.

But, as the right in the UK has realized: We have to beat our first enemy first, and our first enemy is the fake Conservative Party that we vote for only to see it implement the left’s agenda with gusto.

I know that plenty of people on the right in this country feel similarly. There’s one big problem with it, though: the left and the Democrats – at least in the US – are determined to make it impossible for the right to ever win. When I was growing up, the party out of power could bide its time and regroup till its turn came around again with the swing of the political pendulum. Today’s Democrats have become hard left, and the danger is that if they come to power they will fix it so that there will be no return pendulum swing. For example, they have made it clear that they intend to pass a law such as HR1 that will gut the voting security of the red states to match that of the blue states and enable vote fraud and/or “rigging” on a nationwide scale. They also plan to create a couple of new states that will be overwhelmingly blue, changing the balance in the Senate and the Electoral College. Court-packing is on their agenda, too, in order to destroy the conservative majority on SCOTUS. That’s not a complete list of their legislative agenda, but just those three changes would do the trick.

What are called “left” and “right” in Europe are somewhat different. But I wonder whether the nations of Europe could survive a victory by the left at this point without being irrevocably changed for the worse. I’m hoping that the old right and the new right in Europe manage to get their act together in time to prevent that.