the definite article 34
the hostage deal, war songs, spy craft, archaeology, and other good stuff from around the web
Shalom to all – we’ll start out this week with two pieces about the hostage deal. One is an article by Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the US during the Obama years. In a sense, he captures quite well the split in Israeli society about the deal. Both sides are easy to understand: the government has a blood oath to do everything to free the hostages. Our national and religious tradition demand we place life above all, and if that means freeing murderous terrorists by the hundreds and completely withdrawing from Gaza – that’s part of the deal. Others point to disastrous Mephistophelian agreements Israel has made in the past to rescue captives by freeing terrorists that resulted in more terror and increased motivation to capture more Israelis – and wonder if the blood shed by our soldiers is betrayed by ending the war before completing the mission of destroying Hamas.
In a sense, one could say the war was lost on October 7 with the capture of 250 hostages. One could further say that the war was lost when so many in the Western world celebrated the barbarity of the invasion. It wasn’t just Israel that lost the war, it was the world. It was humanity.
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Dan Senor brings his old standby, Nadav Ayal, to analyze the hostage deal. Nadav Ayal is not my favorite commentator, but sometimes you have listen to folks you don’t like in order to understand a point of view with which you don’t much agree. So it is worth the listen.
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I’ve never heard of Pirate Wires. I do admit that some of what people say about Soros is exaggerated to the point of antisemitism, but IMHO if you want to point at the dude who was one of the most influential is getting Trump elected, that would be Soros, not Musk. Citizens United was the single most destructive move for American politics, and turned elections – not just for president but local elections – into gog and magog warfare, going to the highest bidder. Worse than social media.
I have written more than once that control of sites like Wikipedia by antisemitic and antizionist elements is the most dangerous challenge we are facing. AI will get information from there – other places too, but certainly from there. I again call upon young Jewish scholars and high tech professionals to get involved in de-Nazifying Wikipedia!!!
https://www.piratewires.com/p/george-soros-wikipedia
RCP is my go-to place for news. By the time it gets there, it’s not always news, but they make heterodox decisions on what they post, and their staff writers seem to be good journalists.
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Jewish Review of Books has migrated to Substack! It is one of the periodicals that’s really worth you attention and $$$. This article is about the spy who became James Bond! Jewish, of course.
https://jewishreviewofbooks.com/jewish-history/13110/a-perfect-spy/
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It’s a law of culture that wars give birth to songs. The article reviews some of the songs coming out of Israel that responded, each in its own way, to the national trauma.
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/community/articles/war-songs-israel-pop-music
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The thing about archaeology is “what you see is what you got.” What they see here is a cultic site dated to the period of the First Temple. Was it a Jewish site, or a pagan site for foreigners in Jerusalem? In any case, it is a very very cool find. Whatever it is.
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A Torah study intro to Sefer Shmot by really one of the more interesting guys I have bumped in to. And even though he is so intelligent that I count myself lucky to understand a word or two, this is a very accessible and insightful read.
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/belief/articles/third-time-charm
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Did you know that young folk don’t read these days?
When I first started teach high school, we required students to read chapters from The Source, and my students read both Night and Dawn by Elie Wiesel. And those are short short books! In recent years, I would assign those books and the students would look at me like a fish looks at fruit soup.
Kudos to TE who still reads.
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Greenland?!?! Are you serious? Canada as the 51st state? What is on the guy’s mind? This article does a good job in creative perspective.
https://unherd.com/2025/01/trumps-return-to-the-monroe-doctrine/
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Natan Sharansky is certainly one of the great heroes of our generation. He is one of the few who can talk from the moral high ground. A good piece from the Free Press.