Temporal News, and (Mostly) Slain Dragons
How reading news out of order robs us of the context we need for understanding, and how Israel now stands close to victory in a field of mostly defanged foes.
Despite all attempts to make time disappear and capture us in endless scrolling, an activity without beginning or end, timeless as God Himself, we are still time bound as long as we inhabit this mortal coil. Experiencing events in the order they happen is one of the keys for deriving context and meaning, and it enables us to critically evaluate and think deeply about them. An endless stream of outrages on the other hand, as presented in an endless social media feed, or even a non-chronological newspaper digital ‘front page’ (organized by degree of importance or order published, not the order of events), leaves us only our pre-existing opinions and prejudices to judge by.
Yesterday I watched in real time, following updates minute to minute about the ceasefire, yes-no-maybe-wash-rinse-repeat on the various Telegram news channels which verify and publish every bit of information they get as it comes in. Admittedly some verify better than others, but one learns who to trust just as with any other news source. Then I signed onto Facebook and saw news stories picking bits and pieces of the flow of information which had not even struck me as particularly important. For example Trump’s little outburst in an impromptu interview as he is walking to a helicopter, about how Iran and Israel, “have been fighting so long and so hard they don’t know what the f**k they’re doing.” In newspapers, and on social media, this was portrayed as an important event. It SAID SOMETHING. It MEANT SOMETHING. But let me lay out the events as I experienced them.
Ceasefire is announced
At exactly the last moment of the ceasefire at 7am, perhaps a few minutes after, Iran fires a last barrage at Israel. This was expected. Despite this barrage hitting a building and killing four, Israel is clearly ready for the fight with Iran to settle down and does not respond.
At about 10:30 Iran launches a couple of missiles at Israel. They cause no damage. It is unclear if this was intentional on the part of the Iranians or if they are having trouble getting the ceasefire message through to everybody.
Israel says this is a clear violation of the ceasefire and, since we cannot allow the Iranians to think they can shoot at us without response (thus having NOT achieved the deterrence which is one of the main goals of the war though less publicly stated because people don’t understand such concepts very well) we were launching a massive, disproportionate response.
Trump is caught on his way to the helicopter, in the middle of trying to convince Israel not to launch this counter-strike, is momentarily frustrated with both sides, and lashes out.
Trump and Netanyahu have a brief phone call in which they agree to pull back most of the Israeli response and instead only have a ‘symbolic’ target hit.
Israel strikes an Iranian radar, and everybody is happy enough to go back to the ceasefire.
To my mind, number 5, the most heavily reported event in this list, was by far the least important. In fact, it was of no importance whatsoever except as a public acknowledgment of frustration, a bit of information about Trump’s character, which is not at all news and shouldn’t be a surprise to anybody in the world. We’ve known who Trump is for many years, and nobody ever accused him of being puritanical in his use of the English language. When seen in the context of events, this is a non-story, or a sideline ‘human interest’ story.
With that said, what about the ceasefire and the war with Iran? What about the 400kg of missing uranium? The answer is that we simply don’t know yet. If deterrence has been restored, the Iranians will use the 400kg of uranium as a chip to bargain with in upcoming negotiations with the US. They will give it up one way or another. If not, and the Iranians are playing games again as in the past, Israel has now shown that attacking a not-yet-nuclear Iran is no longer a doomsday scenario, and either the US or if necessary Israel will go back in and do what needs to be done. Either way, the IAF says that short of moving for regime change, a gambit which may or may not work out to our benefit, they were running low on targets for the time being. That means lengthening the war would only be making it into a war of attrition, which we do not want, and neither does the regime in Tehran. For now, the ceasefire is good. But we won’t know for weeks or possibly years whether the Israel-Iran war ended well for us. It doesn’t pay to jump either to doom and gloom, or to Pollyannish optimism.
What waits to be seen is whether this will allow us to make an acceptable deal with Hamas, not just symbolically but functionally ending their rule in Gaza. That means disarming Hamas in Gaza and the exile of the remaining leadership, with no participation from Hamas in any future political arrangement in Gaza. If we can achieve that, and get back every last hostage, it’s a good deal. If any of those requirements are not met, in my opinion, it’s preferable to keep fighting. We slew or permanently hobbled much bigger dragons in the last year and a half: Hizbullah, Assad, Iran. With all the might we once held in waiting for possible war with those foes now turned entirely on Hamas, and building political pressure to bring the war to a close one way or another, the ‘fire and fury’ they are about to experience if they fail to make a deal is something I wish only upon my worst enemy, which they happen to be…
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