1/ I've been accused of being overly gloomy because I have cancer. I don't think that's true, because having cancer is a full-time job so there's no time for gloom. But I'll concede so I can try and think what may be worth fighting for in the collective heart of darkness. ---> 2/ I am thinking of the world more than of Israel. Israel must be chastened. It must pay for its actions. It must alter itself radically, build itself anew on justice and equality. But what of the world? What world can prevent a new, improved genocide? --->

1/ Time doesn't pass in Gaza anymore. That is another one of Israel's innovations in the field of genocide. Nothing matters in Gaza. There is nothing to keep, nothing for which to strive. Everyone is a casualty. Even survival is no longer a goal. You do, or you don't. ---> 2/ Israel's genocide prides itself on its inefficiency. After all, we say, had we wanted to kill them all we would have just killed them all. But don't even pretend anymore. We don't cite "Hamas acitivists" as the reason for destroying whole families. We have at it. --->

1/ In light of recent scandals in Netanayhu's office (changing time stamps from minutes on October 7th, 2023 to make the PM appear "out of the loop", leaking fake news to the foreign press), Israelis have resumed conversations about the man himself. ---> 2/ The latest debate: Should we ensure his political and personal survival (save his coalition and cut him a plea bargain and even refrain from investigsting the events of 7.10.23) in exchange for him retiring after a determined period of time. --->

1/ I've been struck by hiccups. I was warned about numerous harsh side effects I might expect after the first round of chemotherapy. They have not yet materialized (I'm sure they will), but the hiccups nearly drove me insane for two days. A tad ridiculous, but there I go. ---> 2/ My hiccups reverberate life outside my personal circumstances. A disease can have enormous manifestations (like tumors). It can also have more minute expressions, like hiccups. Both are reflections of the disease. Israel is profoundly sick and it shows both ways. --->

1/ Trump's victory and the machinations of transition renew the vigor of the punditry. We can now speak again of "the great game", "superpower competition" and "grand strategy". It is all about "visions" and "future scenarios". This is part of the illusion. ---> 2/ When we think of genocide we also think in "grand" terms. This can be grandiosity in scope, in planning and in execution. Israel's genocide in Gaza is anything but "grand". It is a neverending bloodletting. Worlds are built on Palestinians dying one by one. --->

1/ Everything Israel says and does at the moment is a lie or a scam. It is that simple. Israel lies about aid entering northern Gaza and about the safety of "humanitarian zones". Israel is hoping to scam Trump into supporting an annexation of the West Bank. ---> 2/ Israel claims to have pulverized Hizballah. But Hizballah keeps pummeling Israel from north to center, easily penetrating Israel's famous air defenses. Our new defense minister says now is the time to lift Iran's "threat of destruction". Another lie/scam. --->

1/ Humbled by all the love and support I've received here. To show you how much I love you all, I'm getting right back in the saddle. A thought about the importance of chaos in the perpetuation of war and genocide. ---> 2/ Israel is in a state of chaos at the moment. It is very clear that there is not even a pretense of "war" in Gaza. There is just genocide and a mini-occupation. Israeli reserve soldiers are airing thoughts of refusing to appear for scheduled tours of duty in Gaza. --->

1/ Events in Amsterdam and their aftermath are important because they present the world with a glimpse at mainstream Israeli discourse, what in the eyes of most Israelis is the bonding agent between various Israeli factions. We are these marauding, beaten fans. ---> 2/ The behavior of Maccabi Tel Aviv's hooligans should not be seen as, well, hooliganism. Following your team on am away game is an exercise in belonging. You build on the tropes most immediately accessible to you in order to present a united front, to project faith. --->

1/ Trump and Palestine: The fact that Trump is a degenerate asshole and that he represents a worldview grounded in degenerate assholery does not make his election "wrong". The people who voted for him were no more deplorable than the people who voted (or did not) for Harris. ---> 2/ It doesn't take "deplorables" to erect a Gilead. It doesn't take "deplorables" to carry out a genocide. This is not the the system gone wrong; it is the system gone right. Life as "survival of the fittest" is a life of crisis and confrontation to the death. --->

1/ Israel annihilates. The annihilation is not a purpose in and of itself. The annihilation is a message, the beginning of a process. When the process matures the victims will forget they ever lived actual, meaningful lives. They will be grateful for simply drawing breath. ---> 2/ This is the new format for establishing Israel's bona fides. The center-left is now entertaining the thought of protesting "war crimes". We can call these "excessive" annihilation. What makes them criminal in the eyes of these good center-leftists? --->

1/ Israelis are beginning to speak in terms that show they see the current "situation" as negative. Those on the "right" feel Israel is too weak and lax, that more force would bring about a tectonic shift. Those on the "left" blame the government and the "extremists". ---> 2/ The general tone is "we don't want THIS", even as "this" can take on many divergent forms. We need to rectify, to shift, to transform ourselves. We need to welcome redemption or be the change we want. THIS isn't working. It's just that there are no alternatives. --->

1/ The Gaza genocide is not just the moral issue of the age because of the suffering of the Palestinians. It is the strategic issue of the age. Israel is demanding that its sovereignty (and its alone) be defined as absolute and limitless - the state of murderous solipsism. ---> 2/ Israel wants full discretion and permission to kill whomever it desires, wherever and whenever while using whatever means. Israel demands full impunity as it does so. Israel expresses utter disregard for anyone else's notion of sovereignty- from physical to national. --->

1/ "Hope" is a commidified concept. It has been appropriated by the culture of Capitalism, maintained as a resource that can keep underpaid, crisis-ridden "ordinary" people in check. You can manage with an impoverished life as long as you are allowed to hope. ---> 2/ What is "hope" now in Israel? It has two main expressions. One is a frenetic performance of protest. We hate this government! They are ruthless and heartless! We will be in the streets, sign petitions, hold signs, express our outrage at each and every egregious display. --->

1/ The newest piece of wisdom from PM Netanyahu: "All negotiations will be held only under fire". Why? Because Israel has foresaken even its supremacy and victimhood, the Yin and Yang of Israeliness. The only space Israel can consciously occupy now is a perennial purgatory. ---> 2/ We don't want to get anywhere. We have no destination. We don't want to "occupy" Gaza. We want the "freedom" to annihilate Gaza should we so desire, but we don't want to commit to this annihilation. We roll our eyes sardonically when our own fanatics suggest differently. --->

1/ Dozens of soldiers and civilians have been rammed by a truck at a bus station within walking distance of the 8200 HQ, the heart of Israeli intelligence. Nearly 20 soldiers were killed over the weekend, most of them in southern Lebanon. ---> 2/ A Hizballah drone hit what is most likely a drone factory in the Israeli north. As Israel celebrates the "clear message" it sent in its strike on Iran, Israel gas lost control on all fronts, domestic and external. All we can do is respond and kill Gazans by the hundreds. --->

1/ Is there anything smart to say about Israel's attack on Iran last night? I doubt it. There is a debate between those who think Gaza and Lebanon are a prelude to a regional war (itself a prelude to global war) and those who don't. I don't. ---> 2/ Israel is doing its best to draw attention away from Gaza and Lebanon. On both fronts, Israel is flailing. This is also true for the the domestic front. Hizballah has established a routine, just as it has over the past year. Israel seems powerless to stop it.

1/ For months now I have been writing here that Israel's strategy is "no strategy". I believe that is now the foremost Israeli demand. Israel wants "complete freedom of action" everywhere. That is the equivalent of "no strategy". That is the foundation. ---> 2/ In Palestine, this means massacre. Over 76 years (and more) Israel has remained convinced that the very presence of Palestinians in this space was an existential threat. Our "peace" was separation. Our reality was segregation. We did not want to see or hear them. --->

1/ The absolute lack of sympathy or empathy for the lives of others - Palestinians and Lebanese - is making inroads into the way we Israelis think about our own lives. The will to "kill them all" is accompanied by a detachment from the actual life Israelis lead. ---> 2/ I was hospitalized for several days and found myself being wheeled about by various orderlies. The conversation, as it will, turned to current events. At least three of my interlocutors explained to me that "the war" was proceeding in more than satisfactory fashion. --->

1/ Every day brings a deluge of new horrors. Israel is doing everything in its power to raise its own bar again and again. Our fictions crumble, our intentions nefarious, our lies visible to the most naked of eyes. Still, the nature of our evil is misrepresented. ---> 2/ When I was much younger I read a lovely short story by Dan Simmons, entitled "Vanni Fucci is Alive and Well and Living in Hell". It stayed with me because it offered a novel notion of reality: when a great mind provides a new definition for reality, the universe conforms. --->

1/ One of the strangest aspects of Israel's genocidal solipsism is that we appear to be convinced that as this genocidal campaign grows and expands our society is getting more and more complex and that we are on the verge of a civil war. Nothing is farther from the truth. ---> 2/ Israel supports the eradication of northern Gaza, one of the manifestations of the genocide. Israel supports a forever war. Israelis have different opinions about what Israeli public space should look like, but we agree it should include as few Palestinians as possible. --->

1/ It seems out of line to offer a ranking of genocidal events, but what Israel is doing in northern Gaza and particularly in Jaballiya seems to me like the most awful and depraved of all the crimes Israel has committed throughout this year. Proof of depravity? ---> 2/ Jaballiya does not exist in Israeli media, and very little of the horror comes to light in the prominent channels of western media. What is reported is innundated with provisos and disclaimers like "Palestinians allege". Stated reason? Israel has shut off communication. --->