Another of My Not-Printed-Letters-to-the-Editor

To the Editor of the Jerusalem Post:

Herb Keinon is correct ("The jarring voices of internal division rise again", Dec 5) that the last thing we need is a continuation of the "camp vs. camp" atmosphere that preceded this period of war. However, I myself was jarred to read that his first example of the divisional antagonism was a Likud Minister, David Amsalem, who was responding - as Keinon admits - to former General Dan Harel who had spoken the previous evening. I would have liked to think that the principle of "first things first" be preserved in "analysis" columns.

More importantly, though, is that Keinon neglected to inform his readers of the true extent of the persistence of the anti-Netanyahu forces. Those who are on social media platforms, notably Facebook, X and Telegram, are aware that they never actually stopped.

There one can see the posts of Mehdal23 with its poster of Netanyahu's face slapped with a bloody hand and the slogan "Guilty of the Slaughter". There are other groups as well. Shikma Bressler and Moshe Radman Abutbol, leaders of "Force Kaplan", along with Ilan Shiloah and Ami Dror, pump out posts multiple times every time in sharp, berating and denigrating fashion. Their messaging, their visuals and their video clips have only increased in negative near hysterical tone. Ronen Tzur who advises many of the anti-Netanyahu groups is now positioned as publicist and strategist for the abductees campaign and is accused by families of those in Gaza of turning that forum into another venue for anti-Netanyahu rhetoric. Jarring indeed.

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"Both Banks" a la Omar Bartov

I left this comment at a talk/interview in which Omer Bartov and Peter Beinart participated in of Democracy Now!:

At 10:10 on to 11:30 or so, on the issue of "from the Rive to the Sea" - a) historically, the Land of Israel as the Jewish national home always comprised of land on both banks on the Jordan River from Biblical times through Talmudic era* and also various foreign conquerors. b) actually, the League of Nations indicated in its 1922 decision that that was so but postponed full application of the Mandate for the reconstituted Jewish home due to Gt. Britain, illegally I would suuggest, bringing in Abdullah the Hashemeite of Saudi Arabia to newly-created Jordan. c) the Israeli Right never intended to slaughter all the Arabs as the Hamas wishes to do and the Fatah wouldn't mind doing.

* "We learned there in a mishna: Eretz Yisrael is divided into three separate lands...Judea, Transjordan, and the Galilee." Pesachim 52B, for example

Thanks to IB for the heads-up.

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