Short Review: Waxman, The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Waxman, Dov. The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2019.

This book by a US political science professor who specializes in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, is part of the Oxford University Press What Everyone Needs To Know^® series of FAQs on contemporary issues. It is an introduction to the history of the conflict, presented in FAQ, that is, question-and-answer, format. The book is divided into five chapters: “The Basics,” “The Beginning of the Conflict,” “The Arab-Israeli Wars,” “The Peace Process,” “The Occupied Territories.” In addition, there is a section of maps, an introduction, and a concluding section titled “The Long Road to Peace.” The Oxford University Press web page lists a “Suggestions for Further Reading” section in the contents, which seems to have been omitted from my copy.

The book overall is a straightforward backgrounder. Prof. Waxman has made an effort to include both Palestinian and Jewish perspectives. As a non-expert, I can only say that I do not see obvious contradictions between Waxman’s account and what I have read in the news. I would have liked to see more of the Arab, Palestinian, and Islamic thinking on the matter, but given that none of the various Arab states, let alone Palestine, have either a free press or freedom of speech, that is probably not available. For all of Israel’s faults, policy debates there take place in the open. This is not the case in much of the Arab or Islamic world.

I highly recommend the book to everyone who has only learned of the conflict in the US press, or through the propaganda of one side or the other.

2024.06.01: Aid to Gaza

As for According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), aid to Gaza is still not being distributed.

 “We continue to insist that Israeli authorities’ obligation under the law to facilitate delivery of aid does not stop at the border, it does not stop when you drop off just a few metres across the border and then drive away and then leave it to humanitarians to drive through active combat zones - which they cannot do - to pick it up. So to answer your question, no, the aid that is getting in, is not getting to the people.”

The Gaza floating pier is still shut down by unseasonable weather; it has been towed to Ashdod, Israel for repairs, which are expected to take perhaps a week.

Neo-Feudalism, Anti-Capitalism

Speculators may do no harm as bubbles on a steady stream of enterprise. But the position is serious when enterprise becomes the bubble on a whirlpool of speculation. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. The measure of success attained by Wall Street, regarded as an institution of which the proper social purpose is to direct new investment into the most profitable channels in terms of future yield, cannot be claimed as one of the outstanding triumphs of laissez-faire capitalism — which is not surprising, if I am right in thinking that the best brains of Wall Street have been in fact directed towards a different object. – Keynes

CDC Covid Background Review

“Covid is not the same [as other respiratory viruses] due to its cardiovascular and thromboembolic effects leading to stroke, MI’s [heart attack], long Covid.” – Dr. Peter Hotez on X.

This is about the the CDC’s Background for CDC’s Updated Respiratory Virus Guidance as it relates to covid-19. In short, the CDC has decided that they are going to treat SARS-2, the virus which causes covid, as a seasonal respiratory virus, similar to flu and RSV. As Dr. Hotez, says, it is not.

The document is, generally, a fine piece of deceptive writing. It contains no obvious falsehoods, and yet it ends up by making a disease causing 7,000 excess deaths a month since July 2022¹ sound like something minor and under control.

Fearful Symmetry: the Netanyahu government and the leadership of Hamas

Josh Marshall, writing in his paywalled editor's blog on Talking Points Memo, points out that Netanyahu's position is ever more shaky. He isn't even trying to get Hamas' hostages released, and their families are angry with him. (It doesn't help that the families are mostly leftist kibbutzniks and hate him anyway.) Israelis are out in the streets again. The Israeli Supreme Court has decided that Haredi (ultra-orthodox) Jews are no longer exempt from the draft and the Haredi parties make up a quarter of Netanyahu's coalition.

So Netanyahu's coalition is breaking up.

Reviewing the CDC’s Respiratory Virus Guidance with Regard to Covid

The document, Respiratory Virus Guidance is available at https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/guidance/respiratory-virus-guidance.html. Background information on the Guidance, explaining the reasoning that underpins it is at https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/background/index.html.

To my surprise, I found there is a great deal to like in it, though also some considerable problems. I wish it were stronger and compliance is, to put it mildly, poor, but it seems to be the first attempt to provide unified national public health advice on respiratory viruses and there is some good advice here. It is still limited, however, and especially poor on control of covid.

In Defense of Law and the "Rules-based international order"

It is better that the rules-based international order – law – exist than that it not exist. On the other side of that order are Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, Viktor Orbán, and, yes, Donald Trump. Also on the other side are Benjamin Netanyahu and Ismail Haniyeh and Yahya Sinwar.

Like love we don't know where or why,
Like love we can't compel or fly,
Like love we often weep,
Like love we seldom keep.
– WH Auden, “Law Like Love”