Black November sales? All the pond could find was the Ughmann and the dog botherer ...

 

As devotees of genocide, mass displacement and starvation, and collective punishment, the reptiles were in full outrage mode this weekend ...

Democracy in the dock? ICC outrage?

What a pity that the reptiles didn't have a chance to read Jonathan Freedland in The Graudian with Benjamin Netanyahu is a wanted man – and he has only himself to blame.

Freedland makes a number of points, including Benji's ducking of an inquiry because of fears it might point out his many failures ....

..in a break with all Israeli precedent, there is still no inquiry into 7 October or the conduct of the war in Gaza. And that, under the principle of complementarity, opened the door to the ICC.
Of course, Netanyahu’s culpability goes much deeper. The ICC’s statement  makes clear that the heart of its case against Israel’s leaders relates to the supply of humanitarian aid into Gaza. The ICC says there are reasonable grounds to believe that Netanyahu and Gallant “intentionally and knowingly deprived the civilian population in Gaza of objects indispensable to their survival, including food, water, and medicine and medical supplies, as well as fuel and electricity”.
Netanyahu and his defenders say that the ICC’s warrants are outrageous because they overlook the viciousness of Israel’s Hamas enemy and seek to tie the hands of Israel in defending itself. But the way Israel has pounded Hamas is not at the heart of the ICC case. Instead, the focus of the charge sheet is aid.
Now, obviously, the primary reason why Israel should have ensured sufficient supplies of essentials is moral. It is indefensible to use “starvation as a method of warfare”, as the ICC puts it. The second reason is strategic. As I wrote early on in the war, even senior US military figures sympathetic to Israel tried to persuade the country’s leadership that it would be wise to make crystal clear that its war was with Hamas, not the Palestinians of Gaza. It should have provided Gaza’s civilians with all the food and medicine they needed, in order to drive a wedge between Hamas and the people that group has ruled so oppressively and so long. Instead, it made harsh lives even harsher and sowed hatred into the hearts of a new generation. An epic strategic failure.
The legal arguments come last. It should have been obvious to Netanyahu and his allies that while charges relating to the military conduct of a war are legally hard to prove, aid is a clear and measurable commodity. The absence of a domestic Israeli inquiry tasked specifically with examining aid policy, coupled with reckless statements about the imposition of a “total siege” – a threat that was never implemented but which immediately painted the Gaza operation in “illegal and excessive colours”, as the Israeli scholar of international law Prof Yuval Shany put it to me – and Netanyahu and Gallant had all but written their own arrest warrants.

And so on and so forth, and what a pity the outrage machine isn't outraged at the sight of a genocide, but the immortal Rowe drew the reptiles a picture ...

And so to the extreme far right commentary section of the lizard Oz, and on top of the contributors - top of the extreme far right ma - sat the Ughmann.

The Ughmann allegedly became something of a legend in his own lunchtime by doing a documentary for Sky News (Au) showing off his love of coal, though after taking a look around the full to overflowing intertubes, it passed without much notice outside the hive mind. Only Sky News (Au) and a few reptile newspapers - surprisingly few - paid any attention.

Ted "nuke the country" O'Brien loved it, and the Canavan coal caravan inevitably rolled with it, but outside the hive mind only Graham Readfearn - as previously noted by the pond - paid attention in Sky News Australia documentary The Real Cost of Net Zero fails to live up to its hubris, with viewers paying the price.

But that was just Readfearn being loyal - he's featured the Ughmann before, as in The things that you’re liable to read in the IPCC bible ain’t necessarily so, Chris Uhlmann says. It’s a bold claim.

Truth to tell, the Ughmann comes across as an irrelevant luddite, a fossilised relic of ancient monastic thinking, and it comes as no surprise that he should offer up this day Fossil fuels are coal comfort for the energy illiterate, There is more than a casual link between widespread, affordable electricity and the increase in life expectancy.

Even by the miserable standards of the pond's taste for bad puns, that's a cold comfort shocker, but it's only a four minute read, or so the reptiles say, so the pond plunged in ... beginning with the usual snap The wealth of nations is directly linked to their access to coal, oil and gas.

Okay, okay, the pond gets it. Pollution and smog and billowing particles splendid, just like the good old days when you could stick your head out the window and cop an eyeful of steam train soot. Carry on Ughmann ...

Most sitting days a small band of activists gathers outside federal parliament, around an array of hydrocarbon-rich signs, demanding an immediate end to all fossil fuel.
One of their number identifies as a marsupial, kitted out in an ill-fitting polyester suit made from petrochemicals. She/he/it and the other millenarians congregate on a path, made with cement sourced from a coal or gas-fired kiln, as they urge passers-by to repent their carbon addiction or face oblivion.
One ominous black sign warns: Coal Kills Kids. Let’s check how the kids were doing in BC: the era before coal. The Australian Bureau of Statistics records that in 1900 there were 103 deaths in every 1000 live births. A century later that number had dropped to a tick over five per 1000. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare reports that children born in 2022 can expect to live around 30 years longer than those in 1891.
There is more than a casual link between widespread, affordable electricity and the increase in life expectancy. Of course, there are other factors driving it, such as access to plentiful food and better medical care.
In an enduring irony, the world’s ability to feed most of the eight billion people on the planet is due to the work of a German war criminal. Fritz Haber pioneered the use of chlorine gas in World War I and invented the process for making fertiliser from the air.
An unexpected casualty of his research on chemical weapons was his wife, Clara Immerwahr. An equally gifted chemist, she was so horrified by her husband directing the first use of chlorine gas at Ypres that she took his pistol and killed herself.
The same man, working in the same lab, invented a process that produced ammonia from atmospheric nitrogen and hydrogen. This is the foundation of modern synthetic fertilisers, which revolutionised food production. Without it, billions would starve.
So, despite what some activists say, you can, and do, eat fossil fuel. Canadian energy savant Vaclav Smil has calculated the embedded energy in a 125g Spanish tomato bought in a Scandinavian market at five tablespoons of diesel.

Uh huh, and given Spain's recent climate history, what are the chances for tomatoes in the future? 

Never mind, the reptiles paused for the usual cross promotion, featuring the Ughmann, Sky News political contributor Chris Uhlmann claims China has "leveraged" fossil fuels to become the world's "manufacturing superpower". "Now 56 per cent of the world's coal is being produced in China - look at this geostrategically; China has risen to become the world's manufacturing superpower," Mr Uhlmann told Sky News Australia. "It's making EVs, it's making solar panels, it's making wind turbines and selling them to us. "It has risen to the position by leveraging fossil fuel."

Eek, solar panels, as dangerous to the whales of the Hunter Valley as windmills ...

And, as noted here before, a paper in the American Journal of Public Health records that “nearly 99 per cent of pharmaceutical feedstocks and reagents are derived from petrochemicals”.
So, to quote the energy experts at Doomberg, energy is life. Harnessing fossil fuels, particularly oil, drove a warp-speed leap forward in human development in the past century.
The wealth of nations is directly linked to their access to coal, oil and gas. Your standard of living is a product of the amount of energy you get to use. Just because you can’t see the process doesn’t mean you are not using it. Poor nations and poor people are energy poor.
Britain’s economic dominance in the 18th and 19th centuries was fuelled by abundant coal, which powered the industrial revolution. The discovery of oil in Pennsylvania in 1859 fuelled the rise of the US to be the dominant power in the 20th century.

Now let's hear it for oil, The discovery of oil in Pennsylvania in 1859 fuelled the rise of the US to be the dominant power in the 20th century. Picture: AFP

What a heart-warming, reassuring snap, beloved of Hollywood, though the reptiles could have gone the Giant gusher motif ...

The Ughmann kept gushing too ...

Stick a pin in 1990 and track the rise of China’s GDP and the country’s use of fossil fuel. Oil, coal and gas consumption and wealth rise in lock-step. China is now the world’s manufacturing superpower, burning 56 per cent of the planet’s coal, 15 per cent of its oil and 8 per cent of its natural gas.
Now look at what happens when you decide to abandon hydrocarbons. As Europe and Britain take the first tiny steps on the long path to weaning themselves off fossil fuel, they are becoming weaker, poorer and dependent on others for the energy they still need.
When Russia attacked Ukraine, the giant Ponzi scheme of Berlin’s much-vaunted Energie­wende (energy transition) was exposed because Germany can’t run an electricity system on wind and solar harvesters without the life support of dispatchable fossil fuel. So it started burning coal to keep the lights on and scrambled around the world to find gas.
Germany’s trillion-dollar transition has purchased its citizens the highest electricity prices in Europe and a ticket to deindustrialisation. Its people grow restless and angry, and somewhere on the road to poverty they will revolt.
It is the exemplar of what not to do.
At this point some anguished voice usually cries: “But climate change is real.” That is not in argument here. This is about highlighting the inconvenient truth that if we are determined to continue on the energy course mapped by the federal and state governments it is a road to ruin. We will not become a green-energy superpower; a rich nation will become a poor one.
It is a terrifying truth that the cavalcade of politicians, billionaire energy hobbyists, scientists and activists demanding an energy transition are profoundly energy illiterate. They cannot even see the energy they consume. The world will not bend in the direction they demand because most of it wants to stay rich or get rich.

At the end of that rant came another clip, Sky News political contributor Chris Uhlmann blasts the Labor government for their “enormous” amount of “energy illiteracy” after withdrawing Australia from a nuclear treaty with the UK and the US at COP29. “On display at the moment we are seeing from the people who are leading this country an enormous amount of energy illiteracy,” Mr Uhlmann told Sky News Australia. “What happened overnight was Australia has decided it will withdraw from a treaty it was already part of, which it joined in 2017.”

Then it was on to the final rant:

Let’s check their record of achievement. Since the Rio Earth Summit in 1992 the world’s carbon emissions have risen every single year except for the financial crisis in 2009 and when Covid shut the planet. Those two events should be a big hint: cutting carbon emissions and destroying economies go hand-in-hand.
Do not listen to what nations say at yearly climate jamborees, watch what they do.
Last year coal, oil and gas consumption hit record highs. The only thing that has changed is where the fuel is burned. No matter what it says, China will continue to greedily burn every molecule of hydrocarbon we don’t want. So will Russia, India, Indonesia and countries in Africa.
And while the Biden administration lectured Australia about carbon emissions, the US grew to become a bigger oil producer than Saudi Arabia and to extract more gas than Qatar. Under Donald Trump America will “drill baby drill” and pull out of the climate accords. Argentina will follow it.
So what on earth are we doing? We have a choice: harness the energy under our feet, stay rich and use our wealth to adapt to a changing climate; or beggar ourselves and adapt to a changing climate.
And for those hellbent on the second path, who rage against the evils of fossil fuel, it’s past time you began living out the true meaning of your creed.
Start small. Spend just one day a week actively avoiding everything derived from hydrocarbons. Call it Fossil-Free Friday. There already is a TV show that will give you a sense of what that looks like. It’s called Naked and Afraid.

Start stupid. Start by ignoring climate science. Start by failing to imagine what the world might look like in the coming decades. Why you might well end up living in a world in which the Ughmann is helping fuck the planet as much as the mango Mussolini ... coal, baby, coal ...

And so to a warning. It seems the reptiles have already shifted into full-on election campaigning mode. 

It's not even Thanksgiving in America, we're still dealing with Midnight November Nightmare Deals alley, and yet Xmas is already in full sales pitch, while still a good month away ... 

...and yet the dog botherer is shrieking Vote for the small-target candidate and watch your country shrink, Not since Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard lost control of our maritime borders have we seen our country deteriorate before our eyes like this. But this time, the damage is more widespread.

It's too much, especially as the reptiles call it a six minute read. 

The pond approached it in a state of high glum-ness knowing that the precious snowflake would be full of grievances and a loud caterwauling, of the "we'll all be rooned, we're already rooned, there's more rooning to come" kind ...Anthony Albanese snuck into power with a historically low primary vote, but that has not stopped the government having a vastly detrimental impact on the country.

What a classic montage, clouds over the country, while it takes a special reptile skill to dig up that sort of glowering portrait of an evil man with Wicked intent (and not just a way too long movie that's only half the story). 

The editor of Der Stürmer would have been proud, and the dog botherer seized the low ground.

Beware the small-target electoral strategy – it may work for the politicians but not for us. Under Anthony Albanese, Labor shrunk into the 2022 election campaign and snuck into power with a historically low primary vote, but that has not stopped the government having a vastly detrimental impact on the country.
In his valedictory speech to parliament this week, Bill Shorten made a veiled swipe at the timid approach that followed his policy-rich election loss in 2019. “Through my time as Labor leader I was proud to lead not just a strong opposition but a genuine positive alternative,” Shorten said.
The former Labor leader said “right now around the globe democracy is under greater challenge than at any time since the second world war” and “we have to jealously guard and nourish our democracy and safeguard our pluralist society”.
Few would disagree, but fewer still could argue the Prime Minister is meeting that challenge.
Theoretically a government with little ambition might be a good thing – first, do no harm. But the lack of a platform and a limited mandate tend not to constrain ideologues once they take the Treasury benches.
From record government spending to unprecedented immigration, Albanese Labor has turned its small target into a range of massive problems. Not since Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard lost control of our maritime borders have we seen our country deteriorate before our eyes like this.

When on this sort of rant, it behoves the reptiles and the dog botherer to drag out ancient hits and memories, Not since Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard lost control of our maritime borders have we seen our country deteriorate before our eyes like this.

Is now the right time to revive thoughts of the parrot and chaff bags? Just asking for a friend ...

This time the damage is more widespread. Starting with the same issue, Labor has cut aerial and maritime surveillance and at least eight people-smuggling vessels have delivered asylum-seekers to our shores, something that had not happened for a decade.
The abolition of temporary protection visas and ongoing mishandling of court cases and monitoring of criminal non-citizens released from immigration detention might have put more sugar on the table. As ever, Labor’s activist bent and lack of resolve is leading to border-security strife.
This comes at a time of record immigration, with net migration topping a half-million people two years in a row, so that in the space of a single term Labor will have added the population of Adelaide to the country. Admitting the dilemma, the government has drastically lowered its quota yet cannot seem to curb the arrivals.
With high prices and interest rates making it difficult for young people to buy their first home, and scarcity driving rents upwards, the immigration wave exacerbates the housing crisis.
Labor’s only responses involve more government spending on “social housing” and interventions including a scheme for government to take a share in private house purchases, turning the great Australian dream into something akin to socialist share farming.
Despite its small-target campaign, Labor made some sweeping promises; it was going to reduce the cost of living, cut mortgage rates and boost real wages. Inflation remains a problem, mortgage rates have not been cut and the cost-of-living crunch has not abated, even though real wages have edged up by 0.7 per cent across the past year.
Labor’s specific promise to reduce household electricity bills by $275 a year has become its albatross – power bills have skyrocketed instead, often by about double that amount. Pensioners are choosing between heating or cooling and food, and small businesses are pushed to the wall.

With revenue booms gifting two budget surpluses, Labor continues a big-government trajectory with record spending levels and more than 26,000 additional federal public servants. It is inflationary, unsustainable, and will be a mess for someone else to tackle.
Jim Chalmers is looking to steer Future Fund investments into Labor’s preferred political projects, a grand socialist intervention that can only end in tears.

How weird does it get, all this FUD, these saucy doubts and fears? Why the dog botherer has dusted off Lord Downer, Former foreign minister Alexander Downer accused Labor of turning the Future Fund into a political slush fund.

The gloom and the lamentations continued apace, with the only disappointment the failure of Lord Downer to feature at the start of that clip ...

The National Disability Insurance Scheme is being rorted extensively and has become so unwieldy and unaffordable that it is distorting the labour market and hurting the productive economy.
Politicians who run a small-target strategy hide their true agenda or perhaps are tempted into grand designs once in office. In Albanese’s case it is probably a combination of both.
Labor’s commitment to an Indigenous voice to parliament was hardly front and centre in the campaign, then on election night it was suddenly elevated to a prime and defining undertaking, and infused with partisan triumphalism. This doomed it to ignominious defeat, setting back reconciliation for a generation.
Now, unchastened by the lessons of the Hindmarsh Island secret women’s business of the 1990s, Labor is again weaponising questionable Indigenous cultural heritage claims against developments. The economic and cultural harm will extend far beyond one goldmine.
Energy mismanagement is our worst case of national self-harm since Christmas Day 1859, when Thomas Austin released 13 rabbits into the wild near Geelong. Despite the so-called transition to renewables costing upwards of $600bn, driving up prices, alienating vast tracts of land, undercutting reliability and showing no prospect of ever being achievable, Labor refuses to countenance the proven, dense, reliable and emissions-free option of nuclear. It is partisan pigheadedness against the national interest. And it is engineering and economic delusion.
In a world committed to net zero there is nothing surer than the inevitability of Australia, like all modern economies, embracing nuclear generation. When Billy McMahon abandoned our domestic nuclear energy program in 1971 he had the excuse of plentiful coal and gas in a pre-climate change world.

Nothing surer? That's simply not true. Why just above the Ughmann assured the pond that the future of the planet was coal, gas, and oil, and who could doubt the Ughmann?

Then came another bit of cross-promotional activity, which if the pond took seriously, could have extended the pond's time with the dog botherer at least until the twelfth of never, Sky News host Chris Kenny has slammed Labor's attempt to “undermine” the Coalition's nuclear push. Mr Kenny said Labor’s anti-nuclear rhetoric is “not really working out that way for them”. WePlanet Australia Tyrone D’Lisle joined Mr Kenny to discuss Labor’s failed attempt to condemn nuclear energy.

Could it be a dog botherer piece without talk of zealots? It's projection of course, a zealot loves to accuse others of zealotry, and that's the dog botherer, zealoting away ...

History will judge Albanese and his renewables zealot sidekick, Chris Bowen, very badly.
Labor has sold out our cheap, reliable energy advantage for UN climate goals that are not reducing global emissions – crippling our economy for no environmental gain. Labor is so fearful of the Greens that it runs an energy policy that could be designed by them – expect blackouts.
Yet this is not even the worst of this government’s transgressions. Its anaemic response to the October 7 atrocities in Israel and the Jew hatred triggered here has seriously undermined national cohesion.
This week we saw “F..k Israel” graffiti sprayed in Sydney’s Woollahra and a car torched. From October 8 last year, when Sheik Ibrahim Dadoun led celebrations of the terrorist slaughter on a Lakemba street, the Albanese government has been impotent: no arrests, no action and no clear condemnation of the views, threats and intimidation. The following night crowds chanted “Death to Jews” or “Where’s the Jews” on the steps of the Opera House, and again they did it with impunity.

It seems that everything is attributable to those deviant overlords, and so the sky falling, and the current failure of the NSW plods to collar the crims is a federal matter, Dozens of cars have been vandalised and one set alight in an overnight attack in Sydney’s east. Emergency crews were called to extinguish a car fire around 1am in Woollahra. Police also found anti-Israel graffiti painted onto multiple cars parked along several streets in the suburb.

It's party hat time, and never mind the current genocide ...

Labor has only fuelled the grievances of the anti-Israel and anti-Jewish mobs by increasing its own criticism of Israel and voting in favour of contentious anti-Israel motions at the UN, motions that encourage the fantasy of a Palestinian state. This week we learn it has denied a visa to former Israeli minister Ayelet Shaked.
Albanese and his Foreign Minister, Penny Wong, constantly call on Israel to implement a ceasefire, yet seldom demand that Hamas should lay down its weapons and stop firing on Israelis – if Hamas terrorists surrender and hand back the hostages, the war is over. Labor claims to support Israel’s right to defend itself yet criticises Israel for striking back at enemies that continue to attack it.
Weakness abroad has combined with timidity at home to produce a volatile mix undermining the pluralistic tolerance that is the linchpin of our nation. A more fundamental failure of leadership is harder to imagine – Jewish Australians feel abandoned and all Australians should be deeply worried.

Cut to another cross-promotional exercise, Sky News host Chris Kenny urges the “weak” Albanese government to take “stronger action” against antisemitism in Australia. “At every step along the way, the Anthony Albanese Labor government has been too weak,” Mr Kenny said. “I think our state governments and state police forces should’ve done more. “If this stuff is escalating, we need stronger statements, stronger action from politicians and police authorities.”

At some point, the dog botherer usually resorts to "Orwellian", and sure enough, in his final extended rant, so it comes to pass ...

This feeble performance has been mirrored in Labor’s sycophancy towards China, with Albanese willing even to ignore sonar attacks against our navy personnel while he has ingratiated himself with Beijing. The Prime Minister shamefully averted his eyes from the physical monstering of freed Chinese prisoner Cheng Lei by Chinese government staff at a Canberra media conference.
Now Albanese has suffered the ignominy of being held up by the China Daily as an example to the world of how to please Beijing. Albanese and Labor have shown “strategic autonomy” rather than falling under Washington’s “anti-China spell”, the Chinese Communist Party mouthpiece said. Beijing has Albanese where it wants him. Yet in Washington we wait to see whether his risky choice as US ambassador, Kevin Rudd, will gain access to the incoming Trump 2.0 administration.
Lauded in China and on tenterhooks in the US – this is not the foreign posture Australia needs.
Donald Trump will expect Australia to do more heavy lifting in defence preparedness to ensure both parties carry a fair share of the alliance burden. And the president-elect and his new defence secretary will be flabbergasted by our defence force’s net-zero strategy.
Labor is now trying to pass so-called misinformation and disinformation laws that would severely curtail freedom of speech, handing censorship powers to a semi-government authority. After coming to office Albanese continued the secret censorship of Covid-19 information on social media, a travesty that began under the Morrison Coalition government.
Factual posts and reasonable debates about the effectiveness of vaccines, lockdowns, masks and vaccine mandates were secretly censored. Yet Labor’s proposed laws will exercise similar power over a broader range of topics and will lead, at the very least, to stifling self-censorship by digital giants to escape censure.
This Orwellian move to constrain speech within government guard rails comes from the same government that tells us daily that renewable energy is the cheapest form of electricity and struggles to define a woman.
More than ever, truth will become a political plaything.
Even by the shambolic standards that have bedevilled this country since 2007, Albanese Labor has a dismal record and holds miserable prospects. Vote for the small-target candidate and watch your country shrink.

The pond felt a deep sense of fatigue. Already in election mode, why the reptiles were trying to turn the country into the United States, which seems to have one long, never ending election cycle. 

And when the pond is forced to read lines such as More than ever, truth will become a political plaything, from an inveterate distorter of the truth and a veteran feeder of misinformation, the inclination was to run shrieking from the room.

Instead the pond thought it might be a useful corrective to run this piece by Dahlia Scheindlin, published in Haaretz a few days ago, Israel's 'Day After' Plan for Gaza Is No Secret if You Know Where to Look, The question of what Israel is planning to be can be laid to rest; the only question is what can be done to stop it.

The mystery of what Israel's government is planning for "the day after" the war in Gaza is essentially over. In fact, it was never really hidden.
This week the Israeli cabinet has been discussing new options for the distribution of humanitarian aid in Gaza. These range from a logistics hub run by international organizations or turning over aid distribution to a private American firm. The plans raise more questions than they answer. Who would pay for these private firms, and more importantly, who will secure their operations? If the Israel Defense Forces takes over security, what does that mean in practice?
The clearest answer was provided on Wednesday by the recently-dismissed defense minister, Yoav Gallant. In a long post on X, he wrote: "The discussions to address 'food distribution for residents of Gaza through private firms with the IDF providing security' is whitewashing the start of a military government. Soldiers and the State of Israel will pay the price in blood due to misguided priorities that neglect more important security missions. Everything hinges on preparing an eventual alternative to replace the IDF in the field – without that we're on the way to a military government," an outcome he concluded would be "dangerous and irresponsible."
Yet the government intends to do just that; the evidence stretches back all year. In late January, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a religious fundamentalist, began advocating for the IDF to take over humanitarian aid distribution itself. He said it at the time: "mark my words," (a rough translation) "there will be a military government."
Gallant took a different position back then too, reflecting the inherent clash between ecstatic religious aspirations and security interests. In early January, he was already concerned about the lack of a clear day-after plan. He proposed the outlines of one himself, envisioning that some Palestinian body would govern Gaza, possibly the Palestinian Authority; he supported total Israeli military freedom of movement in Gaza but opposed civilian control. Even this approach involves de facto Israeli control – there is no true separation between security and civilian control – but Smotrich was having none of it. Gallant saw where things were going, warning again in May that Israel was stumbling into military and civilian control of Gaza, for lack of any other planning.
Smotrich never let up on his core demands, from "voluntary departure of Palestinians" to the IDF's takeover of humanitarian aid distribution. If audiences missed it, that's because he provides more salacious headlines. In an August conference celebrating the heritage of Israel's Gush Qatif settlements in Gaza, Smotrich was widely quoted saying that it would have been justified to starve the residents of Gaza. In fact, this was a throwaway line in his speech, which was devoted mainly to the urgency of the IDF assuming responsibility over humanitarian aid.
In early October, the prime minister began considering the suggestion. On October 9, Smotrich posted that the opposition of the senior IDF command to his idea was a "colossal debacle," and that finally the cabinet had approved it. "The IDF has been instructed to prepare to take over aid in northern Gaza," he wrote triumphantly. Asked at that time if such preparations were underway, a spokesperson for the Civil Administration for Gaza said he could not offer a comment, explaining that the issue is being handled exclusively by the prime minister's office.
Do Smotrich and his allies actually determine government policy? To answer that, it's easy enough to look at the decisions Benjamin Netanyahu has made so far: continuing the war for 13 months, avoiding a second hostage release deal, and escalating the regional war. The fundamentalist religious parties have gotten everything they ordered.
Yair Golan, former deputy Chief of Staff and leader of the left-wing "Democrats" party (a merger of Labor and Meretz), told IDF radio that Israel is on the road to re-establishing settlements and remaining in Gaza for a very long time. Doron Avital, former commander of the special forces unit Sayeret Matkal before serving as a lawmaker on the foreign affairs and defense committee, said in an interview that Israel risks "getting dragged into" establishing a military government – which he believed would be a "catastrophe." Gaza was always a security liability for Israel, he noted, and this means "turning the wheels of history backwards."
The question of what Israel is planning to be can be laid to rest; the only question is what can be done to stop it.

Well yes, speaking as the reptiles were of outrages and democracy in the dock.

And now to close, here's one for the Ughmann ...