Aging Capriciously

I know that I am getting older and that my memory is not what it used to be.  I suppose, I am also losing some of my former mental acuity.  However, this story in the “Times of Israel” regarding efforts to arrange a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah just leaves me bewildered.  I have heard of “Doublethink”, but this would put anything Orwell talked about in his famous book “1984” to shame.  Orwell defined Doublethink as follows:

“Doublethink is a tool used by the Party to maintain control and perpetuate a state of war.  The Party’s manipulation of language and truth contributes to the absence of justice and peace in society.”

Read the following article and see if you can tell what the US and Israel really mean by saying that they are pursuing a ceasefire.  By the way, I think that the same Doublethink is being used by the US State Department in its so-called ongoing efforts with Netanyahu to arrange a ceasefire in Gaza.  Secretary of State Blinken and his right arm Jake Sullivan think that all Americans are idiots.

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US: We appreciate that PM clarified he’s engaging in our Lebanon truce efforts in “The Times of Israel”

By Jacob Magid

4:40 pm, 09/26/2024

NEW YORK — A senior Biden administration official says Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s initial comments yesterday rejecting the US-led initiative for a 21-day ceasefire in Lebanon did not reflect the discussions he had with Washington, which led the US to announce this plan.  However, the administration appreciates the English-language clarification Netanyahu’s office issued late last night in which he said Israel would continue engaging in the effort to secure a diplomatic agreement between Israel and Hezbollah

State Department Counselor Tom Sullivan tells The Times of Israel during a briefing that the US believes Israel shares the administration’s stance that the only way to prevent a full-scale war in Lebanon is through a diplomatic solution and that Washington looks forward to working with Jerusalem to achieve such a deal.

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Please allow me to try to clarify the above Doublethink if possible.  I confess my interpretation may be a long shot.

1. Israel will keep bombing Gaza and Lebanon as long as it wants to.
2. Netanyahu does not give one red cent what Biden and European leaders want or think.
3. Biden is too senile, old or owned by the Israeli US lobby to do anything to impose a ceasefire.
4. The Israeli lobby owns most of the Republicans and Democrats in Congress.
5. The real strategy by the US State Department is to Stall and Delay giving the Israeli military more time to wipe out the Arabs in Lebanon and Gaza.
6. Israel is pursuing the same strategy that the US military did with the American Indians. The US wiped out hundreds of thousands of Indigenous people as we pursued our policy of Manifest Destiny.  General Sheridan infamously said, “The only good Indian is a dead Indian.”  Netanyahu and his right-wing cohorts might as well say that “The only good Arab is a dead Arab.”  Come to think of it, many prominent Israelis have already shared that opinion.

Here in the USA, we are facing a real dilemma.  If we stop paying tribute to Israel, the Israeli lobby will fire on the Democrats.  Many Democrats including Harris may lose the election and we get an even worse option, namely Trump.  Harris and the leaders of the Democratic Party know this fact all too well.

On the other hand, if the Democrats do nothing to stop Israeli aggression in the Mideast, they may lose a substantial majority of the Arab-American vote as well as the votes of many progressives.  Jill Stein is making real noise about the Democrats doing nothing to stop the war and the Republicans are trying to help her to take votes from Harris.  The sly Republicans realize that Stein will only pull votes from Harris.  Stein has already been accused of being a factor in Hillary’s loss to Trump back in 2016.  She is now running for the third time.

Conclusions:

As someone once said, “There is many a slip between the cup and the lips.”  The Democrats may say that they want a ceasefire in the Mideast, but their actions suggest the opposite.  They are not willing to take the steps to enforce a ceasefire.  Billions of dollars in weapons are still being sent to Israel while foreign aid is blocked by Israeli forces from reaching those in need.  Thousands of dead Arabs are being viewed as the price to pay for stopping Trump.  It is a bargain with the Devil and such bargains never turn out well.