any cease fire is better than no cease fire
	I think that the idea behind an update is that it has something new to report. If that's actually the case I'm not sure that this can really be called an update since on the whole it's more of the same. It's presently a bit after 21:30, and in the last twenty minutes we've had two alerts that sent us to our protective hallway. Nadav, who arrived home late this evening until Sunday was with us for the first. Hila had gone about half an hour earlier to an activity of her age group in a shelter about a five minute walk from here. During the first we heard the Iron Dome being launched and numerous booms. The second had only booms, which suggests that the rockets weren't as close to us. Actually, something is significantly different this evening. In "normal" times the Channel 2 news broadcast that we usually watch is from 20:00 to 21:00. Over the past week there's basically been nothing else. Throughout the day we have "special" programming, and then at 19:00 or 19:30 the formal news broadcast begins, and continues ... pretty much throughout the entire evening. For perhaps the last four days we've seen advertisements for the next episode of one of our "Israel has Talent" sort of programs, for either that same evening or the next, but in the end the news simply continues and we get the same advertisement. Today the news actually ended at 21:30 and "regular" programming started. I've been walking a bit, and drove today to pick Nadav up at the road - my first time driving. In general I'm feeling fine, though the antibiotics still tire me out, and I'm not holding the laptop on my lap which makes extended typing a bit difficult. I'd like to do more writing/typing, but I've got some books that I'm plowing through instead. I got a bit of work done for the college this afternoon, but since at present classes aren't being held I don't have much new there that needs being attended to. I also found some time to develop some thoughts that I'll paste here, and perhaps edit and change as I review them before clicking on "Send". Since the late morning we've been getting reports of a Hamas cease fire proposal. Yesterday Hamas rejected the Egyptian brokered cease fire, apparently because the proposed terms made it seem that they had been defeated, and Hamas is willing to end the present conflict if and only if it's recognized as the victor. As far as I'm concerned, they can claim victory for having sent rockets to Tel Aviv and beyond; they can claim victory for keeping us from having a regular summer and instead spending much of our time in our shelters. I'm not sure that having 200 of their own people, including apparently many civilians, killed, and massive destruction to their homes and infrastructure, should be considered a victory, but if they want to claim that as well - they can have it. From what's been reported here, the Hamas proposal offers Israel ten years of quiet, and in exchange Israel and the international community will agree to end the siege on Gaza, and on many counts rebuild the Gazan infrastructure. These terms seem to be the sort of terms that the victor might propose, and at least from the reports we have from within Israel Hamas is far from victorious. But frankly, I see nothing seriously wrong with them. I'd even say that on the whole I'm in favor of them. If we can achieve quiet, and perhaps even rebuild it so that Gazans won't have an interest in provoking Israel to smash it again, why not. Most Israelis, of course, want a clear-cut victory, probably with as much suffering (should that be "punishment"?) to the other side as possible. That would supposedly teach them a lesson and keep them from sending rockets into Israel. I've been in a minority here for the past 42 years, and I see no reason to expect that I won't stay in one, so again, I could live with a cease fire such as that proposed by Hamas. (Though I'm in a minority, today a majority in Israel supports a two-state solution which years ago was almost outside the pale of what most Israelis could conceive of.) The Hamas proposal is still at the rumor stage. Nothing official has been announced. A couple of hours after the first reports in Israel, however, I caught an interview with a Hamas spokesperson (he was identified as the Hamas spokesman, but I trust that there are at least a few of these). In that interview (not to Israeli press) he made it clear that there couldn't be such a proposal since the objective of Hamas was the destruction of Israel such that any agreement of ten years of quiet simply didn't make sense. Perhaps it's in that light that we have to view the international response(s) to what's been happening here. Strangely (and I know that I use that word without really knowing if it's strange or not) groups such as JVP are acutely aware of Israeli crimes in Gaza, while parts of the Arab world seem oblivious, if not outrightly pleased, that Hamas is being pummeled. JVP sees Israel alone as being responsible for what's happening to non-combatants in Gaza, while many others not traditionally identified with Israel think that Hamas has brought this on itself. Perhaps one of the problems is that at its very basis Zionism is supposed to give the Jewish People agency, make them the actors in their own drama. But it turns out that what Israel actually does, or intends to do, is irrelevant. Everybody already has their own dramas, and they're satisfied with fitting the Jews into whatever role they've decided to play - irrespective of whatever really happens or not.
sent: July 16, 2014
	to the next letter to War Writing