Kisin's case for Israel

It has now been a year since the October 7 massacre of innocents that changed the world. While the world has seen many terrorist attacks, and many, disproportionately many, on Israel, the reaction of many in the Western world has been shocking. Instead of universal condemnation of a terrorist attack—the worst in terms of numbers and barbarity against Israel in its 75-year history—the event triggered a range of responses. These included celebration of the event, support for Palestinians following Israel’s response, repeated demonstrations in support not only of Palestinians but of Hamas, condemnation of Israel and all Jews, and antisemitic attacks on Jews around the world.

It seems this massacre exposed a hidden rift in our society. The event revealed the underlying values of many of our fellow citizens who do not share our values. It also exposed the weakness of politicians, business leaders, media commentators, and academics to speak out against the blatant vilification of Israel and Jews. By their inaction, these leaders have allowed antisemitic feelings, perhaps previously hidden, to become open. This has led to a breakdown of our communities and will take decades to heal.

Of course, there are many—in fact, a majority in most of the Western world—who do share our values, and slowly they are becoming more vocal about the failure of their leaders to speak up in support of fellow citizens and Israel’s right to defend itself.

Many commentators have analyzed the events of the past year. Recently, I came across a compelling analysis by Konstantin Kisin. He is an articulate and compelling debater, having won acclaim in his Oxford Union debate a few years ago. His analysis of Israel’s war provides a structured examination of the arguments for and against Israel. You can see the YouTube video below, and I strongly recommend it.

If you do not have the time here is a summary generated by NoteGPT

Summary

Konstantin Kisin shares his journey from neutrality to a clearer stance on Israel’s conflict, applying first principles thinking to analyze arguments from both sides.

Highlights

• 🗣️ Kisin initially had no opinion on the Israel conflict before the October 7th attacks.
• 📚 He engaged deeply with various perspectives to understand the complexities involved.
• 🔍 First principles thinking helped him dissect the arguments surrounding the conflict.
• ⚖️ Kisin compares October 7th to other historical terrorist attacks, emphasizing its unprecedented severity.
• 🏗️ He argues that the legitimacy of Israel cannot be dismissed based on historical grievances alone.
• 💔 Kisin addresses civilian casualties, stressing that responsibility lies with Hamas for their tactics.
• 📊 He concludes that Israel’s military actions, while tragic, are necessary for its survival against ongoing threats.

Key Insights

• 🔄 Importance of Context: Understanding the historical and emotional contexts is crucial but can often cloud logical arguments. Kisin emphasizes the need to strip away emotional narratives to grasp the core issues. 🌍
• ⚔️ Comparative Analysis: By comparing October 7th to other terrorist attacks like 9/11, Kisin highlights the disproportionate impact and severity of the violence against Israel, which serves to contextualize the response. 📈
• 🏛️ Legitimacy of States: The legitimacy of Israel’s existence is challenged by some, but Kisin argues that many nations were formed through similar histories of conflict, complicating the argument against Israel. 🌐
• 🔄 Nature of Warfare: Kisin points out that civilian casualties are an unfortunate reality of war, but emphasizes who holds responsibility for their safety and the ongoing violence. 📉
• 🎯 Hamas’s Strategy: The tactics employed by Hamas are designed to maximize civilian casualties, which Kisin argues shifts the moral responsibility back to Hamas rather than Israel. 🎭
• 📊 Casualty Ratios: He presents statistics showing that Israel is successful in minimizing civilian casualties compared to historical urban warfare, countering claims of indiscriminate attacks. 📊
• ⚖️ International Perspective: Kisin notes that any nation under similar threat would respond similarly to Israel, highlighting a double standard in international criticism. 🌍

No the earth is not hotter than it has ever been!

Surprise, surprise! Will wonders never cease, the woke Washington Post, WA,PO has recently published an article that contradicts one of the most oft repeated dogma's of Climate Change. 

The article "Scientists have captured Earth’s climate over the last 485 million years. Here’s the surprising place we stand now."

The article refutes the regular claims by the Climate Chane Zealots that the earth has never been warmer than it is today. On the contrary, WAPO says its comprehensive study of the earths' climate over the past 465 million years

" reveals that the world was in a much warmer state for most of the history of complex animal life."

But WAPO seems unaware that it is contradicting one of the shibboleths of the CC dogma, and continued to claim that 

"The revelations about Earth’s scorching past are further reason for concern about modern climate change"

So it seems once again that the CC dogma is unfalsifiable. Previously claims that the earth was now hotter than ever before in its history were taken as proof of anthropogenic CC. Now we have a claim that the earth had much higher temperature in the past and again we have the claim that this too supports the CC dogma. 

As you can see I remain a skeptic. While there seems to be some evidence of warming over the recent past, I believe the contribution of CO2, and man-made CO2 , are highly debatable. Add to that the failure of climate models to predict even the recent past makes it impossible to  trust these models to predict eighty years into the future.

Moreover even if these predictions were true, there is a very serious question as to what the world could possibly do about it. Certainly the Paris accord goes nowhere near the magnitude of cuts required.  So I remain skeptical about the science and strongly against the counterproductive policies of many Western governments trying to cut emissions and transform energy usage.

 

Fact Check : What happened to the 2020 Election legal cases

The recent debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump was controversial for many reasons. Not the least is the blatant bias of the ABC moderators. Multiple so-called  'Fact Checks' were targeted at The Donald while none, zero, zilch were addressed at Kamala. Of course that is bad enough, and I am not sure we have heard the end of it yet, given there may be a whistleblower willing to expose some underhand dealings to give differential treatment to Kamala. Let's just watch how that one pans out. 

But even worse than addressing Fact Checks to just one candidate, many of the moderators' so-called 'facts' were, and still are, false! I won't go through them all, as most of the details have been widely covered elsewhere. 

However, one issue that did come up has not been addressed widely. This is the one about the 2020 elections. The moderators asked a 'gothcha' style question baiting Trump about his non-accepting that he lost the 2020 election. In particular, the moderators claimed that Trump's team had lost a large number of court cases proving that the elections were fair. Trump argued that the cases were not 'lost' but had been dismissed on technical issues such as the 'claimant having no standing'.  

It was a long time ago now, but I do recall having looked at these cases closer to the event and remember a number of reasons for dismissing the cases instead of hearing them. The technicalities included standing, latches, being moot ,etc. It appeared that the courts were looking for any way they could to avoid hearing any details of electoral malfeasance.  I think the judiciary did not do their job, but that is a subject for another time,

Just recently I came across a short YouTube video addressing this specific issue;  FACT CHECK: What Actually Happened with All the "Trump" 2020 Election Lawsuits - Viva & Barnes 

It seems Trump was right and the ABC moderators were wrong!

See the video here

Appeasement leads to escalation

For too many months we have seen repeated demonstrations claiming support for innocent Palestinians in Gaza, while screaming anti-Semitic and genocidal slogans. The protests are not 'peaceful' and 'non-violent' as sometimes reported. Too often, masked demonstrators take over the streets and any bystanders are intimidated. Many, especially those who are Jewish are assaulted. If you carry a sign supporting Israel you are in danger. 

The police have generally tried a hands-off approach, hoping that the demonstrators will dissipate their aggression without violence. They have gone out of their way to remove any possible trigger by asking Israel supporters to move on and even resorting to arresting them. 

Look at this video highlighting the experience of an independent reporter attending one of the demonstrations. The video covers the whole saga, showing the attempt by the Police to ignore the assault but having to act once the assault was given sufficient publicity.

However, appeasement has not worked. The demonstrations have become increasingly confrontational and violent. This is exemplified by the most recent violent scenes in Melbourne where some 25,000 protestors clashed with police. 

"Thousands of anti-war protesters clashed with police outside the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, disrupting the Land Forces International Defence Expo. The demonstration, one of Melbourne's largest in decades, saw protesters throw projectiles and manure at police, who responded with pepper spray and batons. Over 25,000 demonstrators rallied against the weapons expo, with tensions escalating as officers on horseback attempted to control the crowd. Traffic chaos ensued, and several protesters were arrested. " The Australian, Sep 11 2024

Appeasement does not work! Ask Neville Chamberlain. Appeasement only leads to escalation.

What should the police do? Simply enforce the law, without fear or favour. That's all!

China announces first commercial Thorium Molten Salt Reactor!

Well it seems to be happening! China is commissioning the world's first commercial Thorium Molten Salt Reactor.

For a few years, I have been posting on Thorium and its potential for virtually unlimited, clean safe, low-waste nuclear energy. 

(See the following few posts ;-

• What the Heck is Thorium?
• Thorium Nuclear update
• Safe nuclear passes first hurdle
• Will Thorium be the magic bullet?)

Commercial Thorium nuclear is potentially a world changer, not only providing abundant energy, but also saving us from the environmental damage of the renewables obsession driving many Western democracies. Wind and Solar while ostensibly a low emission technology come with a lot of baggage. Their low energy density and intermittency necessitate extensive use of land, prime farming or pristine natural, and expensive storage. Added to this the limited lifetimes of both solar panels and wind turbines requires large scale recycling and the construction of panels and turbines uses many scarce resources placing further burdens on the planet. It is saving the environment from carbon emissions by destroying the environment with mining.

Given the successful operation of an experimental molten salt reactor design at Oak Ridge in the late 1960 s, it has taken 60 years to this recent announcement, So it is no overnight success. And of course, we still have another 4 years or so to wait for its completion. But China's announcement comes after a successful trial so we have some confidence that it will happen.

The announcement is covered in the video titled "It's Happening - China Launches World's First Thorium Nuclear Reactor

Hooray!

 

https://youtu.be/t4EJQPWjFj8?si=kEYU0XPu7B8Wnkyt