So, Israel should “not exist” now?

For all of my life it’s been “Of course Israel has the right to exist…BUT…”.

And then the bits after the “but”: it must give Palestinians land and justice. Or, it must stop oppressing Palestinians. Or, it has to stop being an apartheid state. Or, it has to stop illegal land occupations. And so on.

Now, it’s no longer a given than Israel has a right to exist. 

That’s clear from the demonstrations around the world. “Palestine shall be free, from the river to the sea” means expelling Israel. 

Which gets me thinking. 

Israel was established by the United Nations in 1947, by Resolution 181. All the Israel haters of today are very keen to quote the United Nations when it comes to resolutions that have criticised Israel (which number an absurdly high number, indicating a priori an anti-Semitic bias, or at least Israelophobia), but ignore the resolution that establishes a separate and independent country. As was the case for many others in the wake of WW2 and post colonialism.

There are 57 countries, members of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation. Fifty-seven Islam majority countries. Yet somehow it’s too much to have ONE country as the Jewish state.

Arab Muslim states in the Middle East are 99.6% of the land. Israel is 0.4% of the land.  It somehow that’s too much for Muslims and the world.

Other religions have countries that recognise them as the majority religion: Christians 21 countries, Buddhist seven countries, Muslims 57 countries. But the Jews? None apart from Israel. If Israel were to be liquidated, as Hamas aims, there would be zero places for Jews, one of the three “great Abrahamic religions”, and the very first. How can that be right? 

The “new history” movement of the likes of Ilan Pape say that at the very beginning, in 1937/8 with the Peel commission  or 1947/48 with the UN resolution on two states, the “Palestinians” never agreed to the land split. But they weren’t “Palestinians” then. They were Arabs, mostly but not all, Muslim and they had no country. They inhabited the land, as did Jews, in somewhat smaller number. I don’t buy the proportion that they had some kind of veto power over the splits of land in a post colonial middle east. Similar splits happened around the region and while often bloody (think Pakistan), they resolved and are now accepted in the international community. Why is it only Israel that has a long running problem, with refugees that are now five times the number of what they started of as (some “genocide”!).

What does it matter what I think, sitting here in Hong Kong. With no dog in the fight. Save to say that there is a moral, practical and international legal (the United Nations) reasons for Israel to exist. 

And that to call for “Palestine free from the river to the sea” is simply the call to wipe out a nation recognised by 168 countries in the world. Just not by genocidal, jew-hating, misogynist, homophobic Hamas, to which the western left has chosen to ally itself with. 

All unconscionable, IMO. 

I stand against Hamas. 

I stand for the rights of Israel’s IDF to pursue the war against Hamas. 

Down with Hamas! Long live Israel!

Coleman Hughes on Race, Racism and Reparations

Click above for video 

I’ve long followed Coleman Hughes. Big fan. Talks here of big issues for the United States, with insight and nuance.

“Celebrate colonial past for Chinese people’s vim and ingenuity” | Christopher Ip

Agree, Christopher!

We should celebrate the fact that not a statue has come down, not a street has been renamed, cars still drive in the left. That’s good. For Hong Kong was a refuge for millions from the depredations of communism, post-1949. 
It was the British legal system allowed the creativity of the Chinese people to flourish.

In the Not The Good News category: “Law to target foreign meddling in all guises” | SCMP

In favour: Article 23 is required under the Basic Law.
Against: vague definitions might catch us — “human rights and arts”? “Incite hatred against … government”? Could my own blog, this blog be caught up crossing some ill-defined “red line”? Given I’m often critical.

By the way, we were part of the half million marching back in 2003 against the draft Article 23. In retrospect had it been passed then, perhaps the rioting, the throwing of petrol bombs, may not have happened. As Chris Tamg says. 

Elon Musk talks to Joe Rogan about the extinctionists via the Lotus Eaters pod

I’ve hated on haters of homo Sapiens, the likes of David Attenborough. 

In the discussion with Joe Rogan, which the lads on the Lotus Eaters pod like and excerpt, Elon Musk gives big shade to what he calls the “extinctionists”, those who want to get rid of humans on earth, because they’re harming the earth. And he ties it all into the woke mind virus. To the extinctionists he says “you go first”. They may want it, he says, but “to hell with them. I like humans”. Ditto for me, 1,000 times over. 

In the process he calls the “old Twitter”, now X, an “arm of Pravda”. Damning stuff. Run by the government, for the government, via the  FBI and the CIA. He has the receipts. Because he owns it now. 

Garden

“How Hamas Won Hearts and Minds on the American Left” | The Wall Street Journal.

Support for Hamas on college campuses and in city streets has shocked Americans. But we shouldn't be surprised. It's the fruit of an influence campaign dating back at least 30 years.

How Hamas Won Hearts and Minds on the American Left

Explains a lot of why universities in America break solidly pro Hamas and anti Israel, up to and including vicious Jew hatred (a Hamas specialty).

“Disaster Polls for Biden” | Megyn Kelly

Interesting talk Megyn Kelly with Ted Cruz in the latest poll numbers Biden v Trump 2024.

Cruz is calling Michelle Obama being parachuted in next summer to take the Democratic nomination. 

He says it’s “nakedly obvious” that the Dems are using the Justice system to try to take out a political rival they fear they won’t beat in an election. IOW they fear democracy in the presidential election.

Yeah, but ESG is a boondoggle

“ESG is a scam”, say prominent business people. A scam to direct money into advisers’ pockets. Like those snuffling at the trough right here in Hong Kong and shamefully promoted by our government, I’m guessing more because our civil servants are easily duped into supporting the Next Big Thing, than out of malice. 
The whole ESG bandwagon is an unwanted burden on industry. Which it appears we are going to add to listing requirements. But as one said in the last para: “there are 1,000 places to hide”, meaning, I guess, many places that are not as silly as we are, to list your company, ESG-free.

The real reason they hate Israel

It’s because it’s the Jewish state. They hate Jews. They are not simply antisemitic. They are Jew haters. I see it even among old friends. Who rationalise their hatred it every way, to try to minimise it, to explain it,  but don’t see that ot is a hate and it’s hate, very specifically, for Jews. Who they would not mind if they were slaughtered. Holocausted. 

It is truly revolting to see the Jew hatred in the west. Not just among our new and growing Muslim communities — where it is as natural as motherhood — but among the young, the Left, as well.

The tyranny of the minority

Click above for video 

My comment at YouTube:

@21:01 No need for Konstantin Kisin to “feel terrible” about the infamous Sam Harris clip. As Harris himself said in a later show with KK and Eric Weinstein, “in my world” (aka “in my bubble”) he had no grief no bad static. Because it want mentioned at all.

Which just shows how much of a bubble he was and IS in. No self-awareness that his side did not report on his extraordinary revelations that the Dems would “do literally anything”, legal or not, to stop the Orange Man Bad.

Chris Williamson and Konstantin don’t talk about that, because they’re still dear “Sam” fanboys. They only talk of him with reverence.

Democrats PANIC Over SHOCKING Liberal Media Polls Showing TRUMP DESTROYI...

https://youtu.be/RIVanNkUDIw?si=3SEq0rOKPRNvVr3O

German vice-Chancellor on Gaza war

	Bundesministerium für Wirtschaft und Klimaschutz ⁦‪@BMWK‬⁩ It's almost four weeks since the horrific terrorist attack on #Israel. A lot has happened, the public debate has become heated and confused. Find thoughts from Vice-Chancellor Robert #Habeck in the video, putting the events in context. 📣With English, Hebrew and Arabic subtitles. pic.twitter.com/5jdXAZr7ey   3/11/2023, 1:28 am

Reflections on the Australian Voice referendum | Tony Thomas

	Ocarina Jones ⁦‪@OcarinaJones‬⁩ Quadrant The Voice Our Woke Boffins' Orgy of Self-Loathing The Australia-wide "No" triumph in the Referendum was mud in the eye for the woke corporations (QANTAS, banks etc), the ABC, the education and the charity sectors and the poobahs of sports management. But one… pic.twitter.com/AAOGlx3kIq   5/11/2023, 10:46 am

Reflecting on Covid lockdowns

Reading Jennifer Sey's "Levi's Unbuttoned". Subtitle: "The Woke Mob Took My Job But Gave Me My Voice".

Sey was next in line as CEO of the storied brand: a job worth tens of millions. Until she started talking of the clear unfairness of closing public schools in California while private schools stayed open (this was early 2020). All her Levi's colleagues were sending their kids to private schools. Which stayed open, so they were just fine, thank you. While the oleaginous California Governor Gavin Newsome shut the public schools for two years….

Jennifer called out the hypocrisy. For that she was eventually eased out of her senior job. By a company proud of its "social justice values". She describes all this and more, so well in the book. How there was a narrative. And you had to follow it slavishly. Or be cast out, heretic!

In the page above she talks more broadly about a trend that we here in Hong Kong and on this blog also noticed early on: how the "salaried class" as called them then — academics, the media, civil servants — nowadays more often called "the laptop class", were just fine working from home, thank you. While the working class was either expected to actually go in to work (eg as delivery drivers and checkout girls) or were stopped from working and making a wage.

We remember. But these hypocrites, who were also wrong, but admitted no wrong. Or, if admitting any wrong say "we were doing our best with what we knew at the time". But we did know better at the time. As did Jay Bhattarachaya. But whose "Great Barrington Declaration" was brutally shut down. Jay was labelled "a fringe epidemiologist" by Anthony Fauci. "We have to shut this down" he emailed his colleagues. But of whom no bad can be said, even today.

Sent from my iPad

“The Problem of Islam in a Multicultural Society” | Brian Wimborne

	Ocarina Jones ⁦‪@OcarinaJones‬⁩ Islam The Problem of Islam in a Multicultural Society 2nd November 2023 The word Islamophobia, meaning fear or hatred of the religion of Islam, appeared first in English in 1923, having been taken from the French word Islamophobie. However, it was not commonly used until… pic.twitter.com/6yv3khtMl4   3/11/2023, 3:44 pm

We've come a full circle. I started this blog 14 years ago to cover things Islamic. Then got sidetracked by lots of other stuff. Now back to Islam.

Not surprising I guess, since it's been an issue for the west for fourteen centuries. It's going to keep bubbling up. As it does now in the wake of Gaza.

The above essay covers so much that I've written about over the years. The problems of Islam in a modern society. That is, the two — Islam and modernity — don't mix. A radical, aggressive, sectarian, political-ideology (Islam) is not compatible with a tolerant, secular, liberal-democratic society. Sadly, the one that gives, the one that surrenders, so far, is the latter. 

We have to get over the fear of being called racist for wanting to resist tyrannical theocracy in our own home country. 

“A little history for those wanting to 'restore Palestine'.” | Imtiaz Mahmood

	Imtiaz Mahmood ⁦‪@ImtiazMadmood‬⁩ A little history for those wanting to 'restore Palestine'. 1. Before Israel, there was a British mandate, not a Palestinian state. 2. Before the British Mandate, there was the Ottoman Empire, not a Palestinian state. 3. Before the Ottoman Empire, there was the Islamic state of…   4/11/2023, 2:46 am

Funny!

 

And we’ve wondered in this household, what it is that drives George Soros. A man that both of us used to admire, way back when, and now don’t. Because of what he’s done to American cities, by his policies of funding super-woke DAs who are soft on crime and lead to the “zombie apocalypse” of places like San Francisco. Really, it is. 

Soros. As opposed to Elon Musk. Devil vs ... angel? not quite. superhero of some sort, anyway

"The Unconsidered Risks of Renewable Energies” | The Alliance for Responsible Citizenship

Click above for the video

Robert Bryce chairs the meeting.

Revealed above the hypocrisy of activist movements in the developed world, compared to the needs of the developing world, like Africa, as said by Magatte Wade.

Very interesting discussion, with an Aussie, Gerard Holland, who speaks common sense. And the incredible idiocy of German energy policy, as described by Björn Peters.

And, of course: the danger of relying on China for all the Rare Earths needed for the renewable industry. You don’t need to be in a hot war with China for their control of critical minerals to be a problem. Look what they did to Australia, embargoing Australian wine, beef, iron ore, all because of asking a question on the origin of Covid. 

Pathetic, Cynical, and Divisive: Jacinta Price slams "yes" campaign and Voice referendum response

 

Jacinta Nampijimpa Price had a clear message: We won’t be divided by race. Which 60% of Australians were convinced by. Including me. 

This above is a pretty good summary of her recent op-ed. In which she explains her stance: that indigenous Australians need to have their own agency -- "agency" as in capacity to act, not "agency" as a body of government.... And not to be condescended to. Including by the aboriginal grievance industry. 

"THE LABYRINTH WAR” | Seymour Hersh

The Israeli leadership is continuing its all-out war against Hamas—a war being played out in the air above Gaza City; at street level, where tanks have entered the zone; and underground in a labyrinth of tunnels under Gaza—as the death toll from its constant bombing and shelling mounts. More than 8,000 residents of the Gaza Strip have been killed so far, forty percent of them children, according to the international aid group Defense for Children, in retaliation for Hamas’s terrorist attack on an all-night Israeli dance party, kibbutzim, and small farming villages in the south of Israel on October 7. Hamas still holds more than 230 Israeli hostages it seized on that murderous Saturday, when scarcely any Israeli forces appeared on the scene for as long as ten hours.

The Israeli death count for the Hamas attack of October 7 now stands at 1,400 and includes 317 members of the Israeli military—some of those victims may be military contractors—and 58 policemen. At least thirty Americans, according to the State Department, many of them working for NGOs, were also killed, and thirteen Americans are still unaccounted for. Dozens of those captured by Hamas—among them the very young and the very old—never made it to its tunnel system because they fell or, more likely, were flung off the bicycles or motorcycles that were carrying them and were immediately executed. Continue Reading...

Stereotypes are fun !

	Hillel Fuld ⁦‪@HilzFuld‬⁩ *WHEN A FLY FALLS INTO A CUP OF COFFEE . . .* *The Italian –* throws the cup, breaks it, and walks away in a fit of rage. *The German –* carefully washes the cup, sterilizes it and makes a new cup of coffee. *The Frenchman –* takes out the fly, and drinks the coffee. *The… pic.twitter.com/XrXIZswMOq   1/11/2023, 8:14 pm

Where are your Jews?

	Rabbi Shmuel Reichman ⁦‪@ReichmanShmuel‬⁩ The most important video on the internet! This is a breathtaking moment that occurred in the UN. Now more than ever, we need to remember the ethnic cleansing of the historic Jewish communities of the Middle East and North Africa.  Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Lebanon, Iraq, Syria,… pic.twitter.com/AobUFkQOLI   31/10/2023, 6:11 am

Some I know. 

Egypt has 100 (elderly) Jews. In a population of 100 million.

Lebanon has zero Jews

Saudi Arabia has zero Jews

Algeria has 120 (elderly) Jews.

And so it goes.

Whenever a population is counted down to an exactness like 120, you know they're in real trouble. 

But, you know, Palestinians are the ones in trouble. The ones whose refugees have quintupled in 75 years. They're the ones in trouble. They're the ones suffer apartheid. 

Right …

"If you condemn Hamas, you should also condemn the Israeli government” | Letter, SCMP

Did we ever say “if you condemn the Nazis you should also condemn the British government”?

Yesterday’s dopey letter, from S. Chor, in the South China Morning Post:

I do not support Hamas, which some countries have labelled a terrorist group. But Palestinians have been oppressed and killed over the past 75 years and few have spoken up for them. Both Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have said what Israel has done to Palestinians during this time is apartheid.

Even former US president Barack Obama says in his book A Promised Land that most countries considered Israel’s continued occupation of the Palestinian territories to be a violation of international law and that Palestinians “lacked self-determination and many of the basic rights that even citizens of non-democratic countries enjoyed”.

He also points out that US politicians receive significant donations from the Jewish bipartisan lobbying organisation American Israel Public Affairs Committee. This explains why the US continues to support Israel.

I am not disputing that the Hamas attack was cruel. However, the world only tends to pay attention when Israelis are killed but not to the fact that Palestinians have been killed over the past decades, not to mention their continued oppression. Human rights groups have long described Gaza as an open-air prison. Its people have no powerful defender. In an excellent graphic, The New York Times showed the sharp contrast between the Israeli and Palestinian death tolls in past conflicts.

Supporting a free Palestine does not mean supporting Hamas. The same goes for supporting the Jewish community while condemning the Israeli government.

Some Israeli newspapers have been critical of their government. An op-ed in The Times of Israel argued that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had been propping up Hamas so that an independent Palestine cannot be formed.

If you condemn Hamas, you also have to condemn the Israeli government for what it has been doing over decades and what it is doing now, which include violations of international law.

Recent attacks on the Gaza Strip in the name of fighting Hamas have led to the destruction of entire neighbourhoods, a huge shortage of food, water, fuel, first aid supplies and medication; the displacement of over a million Palestinians, and horrific injuries and deaths of civilians, including children, journalists and UN workers, none of which can be justified by the attack on Israel on October 7.

We must support a ceasefire now.

S. Chor, Pok Fu Lam

My quick comment, in the “moderation queue”:

Support Palestine DOES mean support HAMAS. They are the government and they're popular, by all polls.

"... shortages of food, water, fuel, first aid...". BUT HAMAS, by its own admission has tunnels full of these supplies. They're they government. It's up to them to supply to their Gazan citizens. But they keep for themselves, to they can kill yet more Israeli women and children. Meantime, their leadership live in 5-star hotel luxury in Qatar.

No, these are not the people we (at least I) wish to support and there's not equivalence here. No need to "criticise Israel" as balance of criticising HAMAS.

A ceasfire only allows HAMAS to regroup and prepare for its next atrocity.

What does it mean to say "you have the right to defend yourself" and in the next breath say "you must lay down your arms".

This is an extential and life-defniing issue. I'm on the side of those who Don't target children, who don’t bake babied, who don't rape and kill women, who don't capture hostages and torture them, who don't use human beings as shields, who don’t act as barbarous savages. I’m in favour of THEM. The ones who DON’T do all that. And don’t get all “moral relativist” about it. It’s not that hard.

“Subsidies could be used to encourage electric bus switch” | SCMP

Everywhere you have EVs you have EV subsidies. 

In Hong Kong the subsidy is $HK 286,500 per new car EV bought instead of an ICE car. That's a massive $US 36,800 ! That's one very nice new ICE car, like a BMW, or even two or three average ones. That's Crrraaazzzy!

AND… the government has been providing road-side electricity charging for free!

My point here is that we're constantly told that the "energy transition" to electricity will give us lower prices. When all the evidence is the exact opposite. (Ditto on Green Jobs, btw, but that's a whole 'nother story).

EVs need massive subsidies to compete. Solar and wind are only cheaper at source when not taking into account (a) intermittency (b) need for storage and (c) need for whole new transmission lines systems.

I'm not at all against renewables. We have a roof-top full of solar panels! 

But the proponents of Net Zero, etc, need to come clean on the true cost of renewables, and the great "energy transition". 

For the planet, in terms of reducing carbon emissions, the best that people can do is hold in to their current vehicle for longer, and if buying, buy a new-old second hand ICE car with a history of reliability. Like a Toyota. An oldish Mercedes or BMW. Or, even… shudder… a Volvo. 

EVs, especially EV buses, produce so much CO2 during their construction that it takes up to a decade to reach CO2 neutrality with an equivalent ICE vehicle. In some cases, depending on how the local electricity is generated, they may never reach neutrality with their ICE equivalent. 

ADDED: 

"From the beginning, these [offshore wind] projects were all about lining the pockets of foreign-owned offshore wind companies. Orsted repeatedly asked for additional taxpayer funds and tax breaks while expecting ratepayers to absorb a massive increase in utility costs.”  -- New Jersey Congressman Jason Van Drew, Orsted abandons whale killing wind energy project. 

How To Think About the Death of Innocents in War | Onkar Ghate and Elan Journo

Yeah, ok, so it’s the Ayn Rand Institute. 

But they do get to the nub of the issue. Onkar Ghate and Elan Journo discuss how to think about civilian casualties in war.

A thought: In WW2, the UK had 70,000 civilian deaths. Germany had 500,000 civilian deaths. Was UK a “war criminal” because of disproportion? 

Another thought: Israel is the only country that people attack, ceaselessly, for “war crimes”. Despite the IDF, by all measures, taking the most care that it can. In keeping with all “international law” on the prosecution of War. And they’re at war. Yet constantly attacked. 

And: we’re learning that the Hamas tunnels are fully kitted out. Food, Fuel, Water, Ammo, it’s all there. Just not with the people they’re supposed to be representing, the average Gazan.

And: a ceasefire will only help Hamas. Imagine: you attack your hated enemy and as soon as they counter attack, the world calls for a ceasefire. And if Israel does that, Hamas gets away scot free and gets to rearm for the next atrocity. The idea of War is to WIN. 

And: why are the demonstrators around the world not calling for Hamas to surrender? Or at least to give back the hostages? Itself a war crime for which they’re not challenged. Hypocrisy. 

“We are in the fight of our lives" | Konstantin Kisin

	TRIGGERnometry ⁦‪@triggerpod‬⁩ "We are in the fight of our lives" - the speech the world NEEDS to hear right now. Check out ⁦‪@KonstantinKisin‬⁩'s speech at ⁦‪@jordanbpeterson‬⁩'s ⁦‪@arc_forum‬⁩ 2023 👇 pic.twitter.com/27R9kTHBSE   31/10/2023, 10:04 pm

Great speech from Konstantin Kisin. 

Food Fanatics: "Incredible Cooking Skills That Are on Another Level"

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Seriously good and amazing stuff!

Kowloon, Hong Kong | June 2015

“Proxy Americans” | Damien Green

Click above to enlarge. Online here

How Australians are "viewed" by Asia is irrelevant to our relations with them. Our defence ties, investments, trade, are all carried out with national interests in mind, not what some observers agonise over. People like Damien Green, above, obsess over how Australia is viewed, but no one else cares. 

Note the article makes no mention of the recent decision to continue the Darwin port contract, run by a China PLA affiliate, and which the US — and much of Australian opinion — had wanted cancelled. How does that fit into the "Proxy Americans" narrative?