“It’s a trap. Hamas’s ruthless and spectacular attack on southern Israel last Saturday was many things: an atrocity, a display of militant ingenuity, and a demonstration of the weakness of Israeli intelligence and defenses. Israel and the Palestinians have a long history of brutality against each other, but the Hamas killing spree outdoes anything since Israeli-controlled Christian militias massacred unarmed Palestinian refugees in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps outside of Beirut in 1982. It may even have been the single most brutal act by either side in the 100-year-old conflict. But above all, it was intended as a trap—one that Israel appears about to fall into.” (Hussein Ibish/The Atlantic)
“Putin and Netanyahu have reportedly shared a friendly relationship in the past, but it has deteriorated over the course of Russia’s war in Ukraine. Israel has refused to join the Western sanctions regime, abstained from providing weapons to Kyiv, and largely maintained neutrality on the war, but tensions between Moscow and Tel Aviv have grown due to other factors. For one, the war in Ukraine has brought Russia closer with Iran, who some have been quick to blame for the attacks in Israel over the weekend. Second, as Moscow’s former chief rabbi explained to reporter Pjotr Sauer, many Jewish people are uncomfortable with Putin’s framing of the war as a fight against a ‘neo-Nazi’ government. Sauer elaborates in the Guardian: ‘Last summer, these tensions first spilled over into the public, when Russian officials accused Israel of supporting the ‘neo-Nazi regime’ in Kyiv. The spat was ignited after Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, recycled an antisemitic conspiracy theory claiming that Adolf Hitler ‘had Jewish blood’ – comments that Israel described as ‘unforgivable and outrageous.’ Zelensky, meanwhile, has repeatedly affirmed his country’s support for Israel, comparing Hamas’s attacks over the weekend to Russia’s conduct during the war.” (Blaise Malley/Responsible Statecraft)
“Domestic turmoil in both the United States and Israel likely also whet the appetites of Iranian leaders, who have long been convinced that the West was decaying from within. For this reason, Tehran has been committing more strongly to its relationships with China and Russia. Those links are primarily driven by opportunism and a shared resentment of Washington. But for Iran, there is a domestic political element as well: as more moderate segments of the Iranian elite have been pushed to the sidelines, the regime’s economic and diplomatic orientation has shifted to the East, as its power brokers no longer see the West as a preferable or even a viable source of economic and diplomatic opportunities. Closer bonds among China, Iran, and Russia have encouraged a more aggressive Iranian posture, since a crisis in the Middle East that distracts Washington and European capitals will produce some strategic and economic benefits for Moscow and Beijing.” (Suzanne Maloney/Foreign Affairs)
“The fact that during the years of his rule, especially between 2009 and 2019, Israel experienced economic prosperity and its international status improved, was, in his eyes, proof that he is following the right path. The Abraham Accords signed with Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, and later also Sudan and Morocco, reinforced this belief conclusively. ‘For the past 25 years, we have been told repeatedly that peace with other Arab countries will only come after we resolve the conflict with the Palestinians,’ Netanyahu wrote in an article in Haaretz before the last election. ‘Contrary to the prevailing position,’ he continued, ‘I believe that the road to peace does not go through Ramallah, but bypasses it: instead of the Palestinian tail wagging the Arab world, I argued that peace should begin with Arab countries, which would isolate Palestinian obstinacy.’ A peace agreement with Saudi Arabia was supposed to be the icing on the ‘peace for peace’ cake that Netanyahu has spent years preparing. Netanyahu did not invent the policy of separation between Gaza and the West Bank, nor the use of Hamas as a tool to weaken the Palestine Liberation Organization and its national ambitions to establish a Palestinian state. Then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s 2005 “disengagement” plan from Gaza was built on this logic. ‘This whole package called the Palestinian state has fallen off the agenda for an indefinite period of time,’ said Dov Weissglas, Sharon’s advisor, explaining the political goal of disengagement at the time. ‘The plan provides the amount of formaldehyde required so that there will be no political process with the Palestinians.’” (Meron Rappaport/Responsible Statecraft)
“In addition to the bloodshed in Israel and the growing death toll in Gaza, there are risks that the conflict might spill over to other arenas. The situation in the West Bank has already been volatile, with clashes between Palestinians and Israeli security forces as well as between Israeli settlers and local Palestinians. So far around 20 Palestinians there have been killed and about 80 injured. As the Israeli counterattack unfolds in Gaza, the situation there is likely to get much worse. So far, the situation among Jewish and Arab Israelis inside Israel has not boiled over, but tensions are only likely to rise in the coming days and weeks. The wider risk involves Hezbollah in Lebanon. So far, Hezbollah has chosen to stay out of the fray; it has done so in previous Hamas-Israeli conflicts and generally does not want to repeat the experience of 2006, when a limited operation escalated into a large-scale war that it did not want. Strategically, Hezbollah’s function is to remain as a deterrent for Iran to dissuade Israel or the United States from any direct action against Iran; Iran would not want that deterrent wasted. Israel also does not want to open a second front in the north. However, if the Israeli operations in Gaza turn into a much wider campaign to occupy large swathes of Gaza and attempt to fully uproot Hamas, then Hezbollah, with Iran’s blessing, might choose to open a second front.” (Middle Eastern Institute)
“Like Donald Trump in the United States and Brexiteers in the U.K., populists have polarized Poland. Since legitimately winning presidential and parliamentary elections in 2015, PiS has subverted the independent judiciary; turned public television, TVP, into a Fox News–style propaganda organ; and passed draconian anti-abortion laws. It has dubbed these policies ‘good change,’ and Kaczyński has called Poles who take part in anti-government protests ‘Poles of the worst sort.’ Similar to recent elections in Hungary and Turkey, PiS is attempting to tilt the scales ahead of the October 15 election, in vying for an unprecedented third term in Parliament. Ahead of the election, the government removed highway tolls, state energy giant Orlen cut its prices at the pump, and the central bank lowered interest rates by 0.75 percent. It is holding a referendum on the same day as the election, asking voters four loaded questions, such as: ‘Do you support the admission of thousands of illegal immigrants from the Middle East and Africa, in accordance with the forced relocation mechanism imposed by the European bureaucracy?’” (Luke Johnson/TNR)
“An archaeology student at the University of Glasgow found a stash of 36 coins that date back to the 17th century under the remains of a stone fireplace at a site associated with Alasdair Ruadh ‘Maclain’ MacDonald, of the MacDonald clan, in Glen Coe, Scotland, according to a report published by the Guardian. It was her first archaeological dig.MacDonald, who led the clan between 1646 and 1692, along 37 other MacDonald Clan members including women and children, was slaughtered by Scottish government soldiers in the Glen Coe Massacre. The killings were spurred by the MacDonalds’ refusal to pledge allegiance to the newly declared Protestant monarchs of England, William II and Mary II, an ascension opposed by many of the clans in the Scottish Highlands. The find includes currency from across France, the Spanish Netherlands, and the Papal states, as well as from the reigns of multiple British monarchs including from Elizabeth I to Charles II. Historians say it’s likely the coins were hidden under the fireplace, which is believed to have been located in a hunting lodge or feasting hall, just before the massacre began. According to the National Trust for Scotland, the attacking soldiers came under the white flag and were given quarter for nearly two weeks before the massacre on February 12, 1692, so it’s likely that some of the villagers were given notice before the attack. Experts speculate that whoever buried the coins did so before the attack, and hoped to one day retrieve them.” (Daniel Cassady/ArtNews)
“In the past 24 hours, two reports out of Israel have pointed to a striking conclusion: that the failure to prevent Hamas’s murderous assault on southern Israel rests in significant part with the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. First, the Washington Post’s Noga Tarnopolsky and Shira Rubin wrote a lengthy dispatch on the many policy failures that allowed Hamas to break through. They find that, in addition to myriad unforgivable intelligence and military mistakes — especially shocking given Israel’s reputation in both fields — there were serious political problems. Distracted by both the fight to seize control over Israel’s judiciary and their effort to deepen Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Netanyahu and his cabinet allowed military readiness to degrade and left outposts on the Gaza border in the south unmanned. ‘There was a need for more soldiers, so where did they take them from? From the Gaza border, where they thought it was calm ... not surprising that Hamas and Islamic Jihad noticed the low staffing at the border,’ Aharon Zeevi Farkash, the former head of the Israel Defense Forces’ military intelligence, said in comments reported by the Post. “ (Zack Beauchamp/Vox)
“With less than two weeks remaining until Argentina’s presidential election, Javier Milei, the unconventional “anarcho-capitalist” candidate, maintains his lead in the polls against four other contenders. His surprising victory in the August primaries can be largely credited to his commitment to dollarize the Argentine economy, a move perceived as the final solution to the nation’s economic turmoil. Argentina’s dollarization would signify a profound transformation, involving the abandonment of the peso and the dissolution of the Argentinian central bank. This potential move, along with Milei’s anti-China rhetoric, raises a significant yet often overlooked issue concerning the continuation of the currency swap line established between the Central Bank of Argentina (BCRA) and the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), which has been recently used to avoid a default on Argentina’s repayments to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In 2014, an iterated version of the Sino-Argentina bilateral swap line (BSL) was formed as part of a comprehensive strategic partnership between the two countries. Over time, it has become a crucial source of financial support for Argentina when it faces cash shortages.” (Xiaofeng Wang and Otaviano Canuto/The Diplomat)
“By many accounts, Fisk was a notable rogue of the Gilded Age, villainized by high society for his scandalous affairs, brazen manipulation of the stock market, and the garish way he displayed his wealth. But, ultimately, save for being immortalized in the 1937 film The Toast of New York (which played fast and loose with the facts), he didn’t achieve the legacy that his fellow robber barons — like John Jacob Astor, J.P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, and Vanderbilt — did. Perhaps if he had lived longer (Fisk was only 36 when he died), he would have had ample time to build a more lasting legacy. Or, at least, add a few more high-profile crimes to his CV.” (Avenue)
“Houseman opens her biography with the twenty-one-year-old Edith Hamilton writing to her cousin Jessie about a performance of Sophocles’ ‘Electra’ in 1889. Thirty-seven years later, in 1926, tragedy was the subject of her first published essay in Theatre Arts Monthly. It attracted the attention of an editor at W. W. Norton, which published a collection of her essays under the title ‘The Greek Way’ (1930). The book was such a success for Norton, a young firm at the time, that it was soon followed by ‘The Roman Way’ (1932). Hamilton’s writing, unencumbered by scholarly apparatus, seems to rise spontaneously from deep knowledge and love of her subject. Her translations of ‘Prometheus Bound,’ ‘Agamemnon,’ and ‘The Trojan Women’ were published by Norton under the title ‘Three Greek Plays’ (1937). Hamilton’s ‘Mythology’ (1942), conceived by an editor at Little, Brown to replace the venerable ‘Bulfinch’s Mythology’ as a reference book for the general reader, has yet to be supplanted. Her writing is lucid and her tone is warm; in her telling, certain myths, such as the one about Demeter and Persephone, are powerfully moving. Houseman writes that she came to be regarded as ‘an accomplished classicist gifted with a unique ability to clearly communicate her interpretation of the ancient world to others.’” (Mary Norris/TNY)
“The three major American nightly news broadcasts don’t command the same influence they once did, but they remain some of the biggest sources of news in this country. Last week, ABC’s World News Tonight was the most-watched non-sports program on all of television, broadcast or cable; NBC Nightly News was the fifth-most-watched. It still matters what stories these broadcasts cover, and how they cover them. This week, unsurprisingly, there has really only been one story on the agenda: the ever-spiraling violence in Gaza and Israel. Actually, that’s not quite accurate. The story on these programs is almost entirely about Israel, and Israel alone.” (Jack Mirkinson/The Nation)
“(Nobel laureate Claudia) Goldin appreciates the importance of social norms but emphasises how they can be supported or eroded by economic forces. In the 1930s American companies formalised policies of either firing or refusing to hire married women. ‘Men are too selfish and should have to support their wives,’ explained one contemporary advocate. But such views were sustained by high unemployment. With the advent of tight labour markets in the 1950s, these discriminatory policies were virtually abandoned. As well as the impact on women’s fortunes of changing supply and demand for their skills, Goldin explores the effects of technological progress. It wasn’t always good. The gender pay gap widened as America’s women moved away from piecework and towards office jobs where productivity was harder to monitor. The availability of the contraceptive pill in the 1970s was more positive. Along with Lawrence Katz of Harvard University, she showed how the lower risk of unplanned pregnancies allowed women to invest more in education and delay marriage. (As so many women did this at once, they could put off tying the knot without worrying that the most eligible bachelors would be snapped up.) Expectations were crucial too, as women invested in their own education in the late 20th century in anticipation of higher returns. But Goldin argues that some cohorts made mistakes by basing their expectations on what they saw their mothers doing.” (Soumaya Keynes/FT)
“MBS’s rehabilitation over the past five years has been remarkable. In the aftermath of the 2018 Khashoggi assassination in Istanbul by Saudi operatives inside the Saudi consulate, world leaders recoiled from MBS, whom they now viewed as a bloodthirsty prince opposed to values of free speech and human rights. The years of goodwill he’d built up as a young Saudi changemaker went up in flames overnight, and many commentators seemed to think his own family would remove him from power to protect the Saudi royals from further blowback. Instead, MBS slowly rebuilt his stature deal by deal and decision by decision. Freshly elected, Joe Biden told reporters he wouldn’t meet with MBS because he wasn’t the head of state. Four years later, outside the gilded Jeddah palace, photographers captured Biden fist-bumping MBS on a trip to ask favors—namely to increase oil production after Biden pledged not to import oil from Russia following its invasion of Ukraine. Once he had secured this invaluable photo opportunity, MBS politely informed the White House that its request was denied. It was the kind of snub no recent predecessor of MBS would even contemplate. The message resonated: Saudi Arabia is no longer a dutiful puppet of the US in the Middle East.” (Bradley Hope/Vanity Fair)