My thoughts exactly.
(Checking outside for flying pigs)
Rare burst of common sense from the NYT’s resident pseudo conservative.
Anyone anywhere will prosper and succeed by doing the exact diametric opposite of anything the Biden admin says.
<< Brooks said, “I’m no big fan of Bibi Netanyahu, but…” >>
The obligatory leftist virtue signal for the PBS hosts and audience.
He really has little choice but to cut out all of the cancer. They will hate him no matter what he does anyway.
Biden and Harris warned BiBi not to go in Rafah.
BiBi rightfully ignored them and guess what.
The head of the snake in Gaza…Sinwar got big holes in his head.
Bibi is basically on the right path but too slow, he defers too much too often to the foreign interference
(which is not unexpected given his strong emphasis on Israel’s alliances with the West especially USA, but those alliances, especially USA, have proven a lot less trustworthy for Jerusalem than Bibi still wishes or dreams they are... he’s showing “wishful thinking” and it is costing IDF lives, alas)
They live in the neighborhood. They have the best intelligence and obviously in Lebanon they have a large number of human intelligence assets. Most importantly, they have to live with the consequences of their decisions. Other countries don’t really pay the price for Israeli action, or inaction. At least not in the same way.
What Netanyahu seems to have realized on Oct 7th, and Oct 8th when Hezbullah decided to pile on, was the opportunity to chop off Iran’s forward tentacles. That day was coming anyway. They could not live with Hezbullah threat of 150,000 rockets pointed at them. I doubt this attack on Hezbullah was impulsive I am pretty sure it has been well planned even before Oct 7th. When they would do it was the question and US Aid last year helped. Israel knew they had to strike fast and relentlessly to take out as many rockets and missile launchers as quickly as possible. The pager attack obviously had to take years to plan and lots of game theory to execute. It sent Hezbollah scrambling and that was the moment to strike their weapons. This pushed Iran’s plans back decades. It had to be done. It also opens a door to the downfall of the Iranian regime.
Israel’s mistake in Gaza was made 19 years ago, and Israel let it fester too long. They thought Gaza was contained. They know what Hamas is and they knew they were building tunnels and smuggling weapons and other materials. I suppose they never thought Hamas would be so audacious and egregious in a single day. Israel could deal with some crude sporadic rocket fire. But after Oct 7th it was a bridge too far. Now Israel has to destroy or disable as much of Hamas infrastructure and personnel as possible. They have to reoccupy the Philadelphi corridor border to prevent smuggling, even over Egyptian objections. They seem to have plans to divide Gaza into 3 or maybe eventually 5 sections. We’ll see if they go through with that (international pressure will be immense to stop that) but I just don’t see them ever relinquishing the Egyptian border. At least not for a generation or two. They are already paving the border to allow troops and tanks free and easy movement and are supposedly paving another corridor about 1 KM wide down the middle of the Gaza Strip.
Bibi has not been going against this American’s opinion.
Slow down there, Brooks. Has he really ? ? ?
Don't mistake Biden/Harris opinions for "American opinion".
It’s about time Brooks got a clue.
Just like Trump said on Oct 17.