Opher,

Apologies for the terse message. Well said response.

Read enough history, in my own country as well, when propaganda trumps common sense.

Seen it far too many times south of the border too...Iraq and Afghanistan most recently. When everyone with a lick of common sense knew neither country had anything to do with 9-11.

I am more interested in why most Israelis buy the whole 'we were caught unawares' by Oct. 7th.

I worked and lived in Israel as a young and idealistic young man. Visited Yad Vashem, not that it gives me any extra credo, ALL people should, and read everything I could get my hands on when it comes to WW I and II, the Mossad, the IDF and Sun Tzu and Machiavelli and Von Clauzwitz.

I studied Ben Gurian's life and the Zionist Congress, the Balfour Doctrine, the Sykes-Picot agreement and the chaos that followed.

All war is deception says Sun Tzu.

So, Netanyahu appoints a far right racist, Itamar Ben-Gvir as Minister of National Security. Convicted in an Israeli court no less, of inciting anti-Arab racism,

Israel's Minister of Defense since 2022 is Yoav Gallant. He is a former commander of the Southern Command in the IDF. He knows the turf.

A 40 page document, translated from the Arabic, outlines Hamas' plan of attack. It is code named Jericho Hill. And Israeli intelligence had it for more than a year?

CNN for Christ's sake, showed open air footage of Hamas planning the attack with kibbutz mock-ups, with powered hang gliders, for at least two years before the attack.

And how could a whole government ignore the warnings from Egypt that something big was going to happen on the Gaza border?

So while the 21st Century has been rife with conspiracy theory, and in many cases rightfully relegated to the lunatic fringe, I'd say we're both barking up the wrong trees and lamentably at each other. I apologize again.

My point?

Netanyahu needs the war. The far right racists need the war, the 700,000 illegal vigilante settlers need the war and the Palestinians?

They are living on borrowed time in what used to be their land, and knew that the Arab world had lost interest in their cause, legitimate or not.

So yes, they too needed the barbarous attack and war and Israel's unconscionable retribution.

Hitler dressed up his troops in Polish uniforms as justification to invade Poland, Machiavelli encourages it in The Prince and to think that the Mossad and all other Israeli intelligence services did not know of the Oct. 7th attack defies credulity.

I took me 5-6 hours to ride by bus, with stops at Beersheba, from Kiryat Shmona to Elat. And it took more than 7-9 hours for the IDF to fully respond to the Oct. 7th attack?

So I'd say that this kind of obfuscating propaganda is used by most countries that want to win a war, galvanize and enrage the citizenry into looking the other way, and delve into zealous and murderous acts of revenge.

Both.