(According to our calculations, informed projections, and artistic prowess powered by hope, Kamala Harris sweeps ALL the “Swing States,” winning more than 320 Electoral Votes.)

(The New York Sunday Times runs a special “Kids” section once per month. This month’s feature focused on The Presidential Election, including an Electoral College Map inviting readers to complete. Our family decided to complete the map early.)

I am the proud Grandpa of three girls, ages 15, 13 and almost 9.

They are the center of our life.

They cry, we cry; they laugh, we laugh; they feel pain, we feel pain.

When someone does or says something cruel to one of my granddaughters, that person receives the “evil eye” (malocchio) from me for the rest of their days.  The best interests of those girls have become the standard by which I judge others, and the actions of others. 

Eight years ago, when the girls were much younger, I spent the entire month of October in North Carolina doing voter protection—in an open carry (guns) state—for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.  To me, it meant everything to participate in reinforcing the legal voting process against the hateful, racist, anti-woman, criminal candidacy of Donald Trump.  It was even more meaningful to me that our two older granddaughters knew I was away from home because I was trying to get the first woman President elected.

When I returned home after Election Day, 2016, my depression over the outcome was lifted by a delightful letter, festooned with hearts, from my oldest granddaughter, whose great sense of compassion soothed my feelings by writing, “what matters is that you did your very best, and worked for what you believed in.”  I melted.  Every moment in North Carolina, no matter how disappointing, was made worthwhile.

Fast forward to now, when we have a very strong chance of electing the first female President in this country’s 240+ year history.  Our oldest granddaughter is now an incredible young person, an ardent advocate for women’s and human rights, with an extraordinary mind and heart.  When I wore my “White Dudes for Harris,” hat, her only concern was that some “crazy” Trump supporters might hurt her “Grampy.”  I reassured her that they never bother with us old, white guys.

This presidential election, her youngest sister, who will be nine years old next month, has eagerly enlisted in our efforts to repair the world.  A voracious reader, and TV watcher, she alerts me every time she sees anything about Kamala Harris. 

So, it was only natural that when the New York Sunday Times  “Kids” section arrived this week, dedicated to “Election Day,” that I share it with her.  Since she loves coloring with special pens, I knew she would love the “2024 Electoral College Map,” with its blank boxes to equal the number of Electoral Votes for each state.  I figured that the best way to teach her about this historic election would be by coloring in the map together.

Naturally, since we live in California I suggested we start with our State. I asked her to color in all the “Blue States,” which, I informed her, were the ones where Kamala Harris had the best chance of winning.  I told her I’d color the Red (Trump) states, and also a few “Pink” states that I thought could possibly tip toward Harris.

I picked up the blue and purple pens which looked similar in color and asked her to start with the blue one. 

“Grampy, can’t you see the difference?” she said, holding the pens side by side.  And, of course, she was correct.

She started coloring in the blank boxes in California on the New York Times Electoral Map, noticing the symbol “CA=54” under the outline of our State.

The almost 9-year old asked: “Why does California only get 54 votes when we have millions of people?”  Her very first look at an “electoral college map,” and the inherent unfairness of our political system was immediately obvious to her.

It gave me the opening to try to explain the US political system to her, but like most kids her age with quick minds and artistic gifts, she wanted to get back to the fun task of coloring in the “Blue States.”  To give her more to color, I pointed out all of the “swing” States, which I explained, I thought Kamala Harris was going to win. She particularly loved the shapes of Pennsylvania and New York.  

When we got to North Carolina, I noted it was the state in which I worked on Hillary Clinton’s campaign when we tried hard to turn it blue, but now, I said, it looked “very good,” that Kamala Harris was going to succeed.  She colored it blue even more vigorously.  North Carolina was ours.

When she was done coloring BLUE the 27 states, and one Nebraska Congressional District which we projected Harris would win, I asked my granddaughter to now add up ALL  of the “electoral” vote totals she saw underneath all of the Blue States she had just carefully colored.

She took out a reporters notebook pad and meticulously did her math, as only a bright, enthusiastic Third-Grader can.  Step-by-step, she added her numbers, while I colored in the “Red” states, and took out the “Pink” pen to pick three long-shot states, which I thought the Harris/Walz ticket had an outside chance of winning:  Texas, Florida & Iowa.  However hopeful I was of Harris pulling an upset in those three states, I still added their 78 Electoral Votes to Trump’s total.

Then, I asked my granddaughter to reveal the total number of Blue State votes she tallied up for Harris:  “322,” she announced, and highlighted the number with blue spikes around it, in a box.  I double and triple checked her work and our independent tallies always came out to within 2 or 3 of each other, with me trusting her numbers more than mine.

“Well,” if our calculations are correct, “ I said to my youngest granddaughter, “Kamala Harris is going to be the first woman President of the United States.”

She smiled a big beautiful smile, as proud of the news of what we were predicting, as we both were of her awesome abilities in math, coloring, and now, a new introduction to government and politics.

In our book, Kamala Harris—and all girls like my granddaughters—had already won.

85 years ago, as Hitler was completing the construction of the 6th concentration camp to exterminate his “enemies”, the American Nazis held a hate-filled rally at Madison Square Garden, NYC.

(Rare footage from the 2017 Documentary entitled “A Night at the Garden,” by Marshall Curry, about the 1939 German American Bund Rally at NYC’s Madison Square Garden, supporting Adolf Hitler and the Nazis.)

Donald Trump’s MAGA rally scheduled for Sunday night, October 27, 2024, at Madison Square Garden, NYC, is no coincidence.

Just as the hate-filled, anti-government Trump campaign selected Waco, Texas, as a launchpad for his latest Presidential campaign, MAGA extremists are gathering at The Garden for Trump’s closing campaign statement of 2024 — explicitly to remind hard-core Trump supporters that the last extreme right wing hate group to assemble there was the American Nazi Party, in 1939.

The Nazis met at NYC’s Madison Square Garden at precisely the same time Adolf Hitler finished construction of his sixth concentration camp to exterminate Jews, and Hitler’s other “enemies,” seven months before he started World War II by invading Poland.

The Pro-Hitler rally, was attended by 20,000 hard-core Fascists while 100,000 anti-Nazi protestors demonstrated outside the Garden carrying signs which read: “Drive the Nazis Out of NY.”

Inside, the Garden was decorated with a huge portrait of George Washington, surrounded by Swastika flags on each side. It was billed as a “Pro-American” rally, and supported by the German American Bund Movement, The Christian Front, and the Friends of the New Germany (also known as, “The Hitler Club.”)

Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally comes nine days before the 2024 Presidential election, when two of Trumps own former high ranking generals — Mark Milley and John Kelly — have referred to him as a “Fascist” determined to destroy our democracy and rule like a dictator. Kelly told the New York Times that Trump often expressed admiration for Adolf Hitler.

The American Fuhrer Fritz Kuhn address the Nazi crowd in 1939, and referred to President Franklin D. Roosevelt as “President Rosenfeld,” and then-NYC Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia as “Fiorello ‘Jew Lumpen’ LaGuardia.

His speech called for a “White Gentile-controlled US,” and to kick all “Jews & Marxists” out of American Labor Unions.

Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally is also happening on the sixth anniversary of the Pittsburg Tree of Life Synagogue Massacre, where a virulent anti-immigrant, Jew-hating Trump supporter assassinated 11 Synagogue members who were attending religious services. The mass-murderer targeted the Tree of Life Synagogue because of its support of HIAS — the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society — an historic social services agency founded to help Jews escape pogroms and extermination efforts around the world — which had been singled out for punishment by extremist Right Wing media.

It is urgent to remember the names of the 11 innocent hate-crime victims of the October 27, 2018, Tree of Life Synagogue Massacre on this day and everyday, especially since extreme fascist anti-immigrant, anti-Semitic, anti-democratic elements of American society are rallying once again in Madison Square Garden, the site America’s largest pro-Nazi, pro-fascist rally, 85 years ago:

May their memories be a blessing always:

Joyce Fienberg

Richard Gottfried

Rose Mallinger

Jerry Rabinowitz

Cecil Rosenthal

David Rosenthal

Bernice Simon

Sylvan Simon

Daniel Stein

Melvin Wax

Irving Younger

JD Vance was right: “Donald Trump IS America’s Hitler.” “Poisoning the Blood,” Blood Sacrifices,” and “Blaming the Jews” are no offhand remarks. They are the essence of “Mein Kampf” and of “MAGA.”

(The cover of 14th Sentry Edition of Mein Kampf, published by the Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, Mass; originally in 1943, with copyright renewal in 1971. Translated by Ralph Manheim. All quotes of Hitler’s writings, are taken verbatim from this edition, with pages indicated. Hitler wrote the hateful, anti-Semitic screed 100 years ago, and it was published in 1925—the forerunner to MAGA’s PROJECT 2025.)

Donald Trump is celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the publication of Adolf Hitler’s “ Mein Kampf” by plagiarizing Hitler’s hate-filled, violence-inciting screeds, written by the deranged sociopath and mass murderer, while the Nazi leader served time in Landsberg Am Lech Fortress Prison in Germany, for attempting to overthrow the government of Germany. Trump’s repeated uses of Hitler’s phrases “poisoning the blood” and “vermin,” are directly from the propaganda playbook of the most evil enemy the United States has ever faced, responsible for slaughtering six million Jews, killing hundreds of thousands of US soldiers, and encouraging violent acts against millions more, from 1933-1945, through Europe and around the world.

Within the closing weeks of the 2024 Presidential Campaign, during which Trump has directly expressed his desire to become a dictator, jettison the US Constitution and use the US Military against his “enemies within,” former head of the military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley has called Trump a “Fascist to the core,” and Trump’s former Chief of Staff General John Kelly told the New York Times that Trump “fits the definition of a Fascist.”

Just this past week (October 22, 2024), The Atlantic, in an article entitled “Trump: I Need the Kind of Generals that Hitler Had,” General Kelly is quoted as saying that Trump said:

‘Well, but Hitler did some good things,’” Kelly recalled Trump said. “I said, ‘Well, what?’ And he said, ‘Well, (Hitler) rebuilt the economy.’ But what did he do with that rebuilt economy? He turned it against his own people and against the world.” Kelly admonished Trump: “I said, ‘Sir, you can never say anything good about the guy. Nothing.’”

However, Trump continues to use every canard created by Hitler, “blaming the Jews” who don’t vote for him, if he loses the 2024 Election, and repeatedly vowing to use the American military to hunt down and punish his enemies, just as Hitler did against the Jews and his other perceived “enemies” in Germany.

Later this month, Trump is scheduled to hold a rally at New York’s Madison Square Garden, where, in 1939, the pro-Nazi German American Bund movement held a rally of some 20,000 Swastika-waving fanatics “to proclaim the rights of white gentiles,” whom they declared to be the “true patriots.” According to the Holocaust Encyclopedia, “the crowd consistently booed President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and chanted the Nazi salutation ‘Heil Hitler.”

Here, I’ve juxtoposed Hitler’s direct quotes from Mein Kampf, with Trump’s quotes from speeches, interviews and articles from June, 2015 to the present day:

From Page 327, Mein Kampf, by Adolf Hitler: 

“ In heedlessly ignoring the question of the preservation of the racial foundations of our nation, the old Reich disregarded the sole right which gives life in this world.  People which (sic) bastardize themselves, or let themselves be bastardized, sin against the will of eternal Providence, and when their ruin is encompassed by a stronger enemy, it is not an injustice done to them, but only a restoration of justice.  If a people no longer want to respect the Nature-given qualities of its being which root is in its blood, it has no further right to complain over the loss of its’ earthly existence….A new spiritual rebirth can come, AS LONG AS THE BLOOD IS PRESERVED PURE.”

September 27, 2023, Donald Trump in a video interview posted on the conservative website National Pulse:

“Nobody has any idea where these people are coming from, and we know they come from prisons. We know they come from mental institutions and insane asylums. We know they’re terrorists. Nobody has ever seen anything like we’re witnessing right now. It is a very sad thing for our country. It’s poisoning the blood of our country. It’s so bad, and people are coming in with disease. People are coming in with every possible thing that you could have .”

From page 289, Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler, on “Blood Poisoning:”

  “All great cultures from the past perished only because the originally creative race died out from blood poisoning.” 

December 16, 2023, Whittemore Center Arena, Durham, New Hampshire, Donald Trump on “Blood Poisoning.”

“They let — I think the real number is 15, 16 million people into our country. When they do that, we got a lot of work to do. They’re poisoning the blood of our country,” That’s what they’ve done. They poison mental institutions and prisons all over the world, not just in South America, not just to three or four countries that we think about, but all over the world. They’re coming into our country from Africa, from Asia, all over the world.”

From page 286, Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler, on mixed-race “defilement of the blood.”

“Historical experience offers countless proofs of this.  It shows with terrifying clarity that in every mingling of Aryan blood with that of lower peoples the result was the end of the cultured people.  North America, whose population consists in by far the largest part of Germanic elements who mixed but little with the lower colored peoples, shows a different humanity and culture from Central and South America, where the predominantly Latin immigrants often mixed with the aborigines of a large scale.  By this one example, we can clearly and distinctly recognize the effect of racial mixture.  The Germanic inhabitant of the American continent, who has remained racially pure and unmixed, rose to be master of the continent; he will remain the master as long as he does not fall a victim to the defilement of the blood.”

November 12, 2023, Veterans Day Speech, Claremont, NH, Donald Trump on “vermin:”

“We pledge to you that we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country that lie and steal and cheat on elections.”

Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, on dehumanizing Jews:

•    “ All who are not of good race in this world are chaff.” (pg. 296);
•      “If the Jews were alone in this world, they would stifle in filth and offal.” (pg. 302)
•      “He (the Jew) is and remains the typical parasite, a sponge who like a noxious bacillus, keeps spreading as soon as a favorable medium invites him.” (pg. 305)
•      “ He (The Jew) is the “scourge of God.  In the course of a few centuries they have come to know him , and now they feel that the mere fact of his (the Jew’s ) existence is as bad as the plague.”  They are “eternal blood suckers.” (pg. 310)
• “The Jew poisons the blood of others, but preserves his own.” (pg. 316)

June 16, 2015, Announcement of Candidacy Speech for President, Donald Trump, after descending his Golden Escalator at Trump Tower in NYC:

“When Mexico sends its’ people, they’re not sending their best; they’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing their problems with us. They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they’re rapists…And, its coming from more than Mexico. It’s coming from all over South and Latin America, and from the Middle East…”

From page 562, “Mein Kampf,” Adolf Hitler on “Jews as Black parasites:”

“Bear in mind the devastations which Jewish bastardization visits on our nation each day, and consider that this BLOOD POISONING can be removed from our national body only after centuries, if at all.  Consider further how racial disintegration drags down and often destroys the last Aryan values of our German people…THIS CONTAMINATION OF OUR BLOOD, BLINDLY IGNORED BY THOUSANDS OF OUR PEOPLE IS CARRIED OUT SYSTEMATICALLY BY THE JEW TODAY.  SYSTEMATICALLY, THESE BLACK PARASITES OF THE NATION DEFILE OUR INEXPERIENCED YOUNG BLOND GIRLS AND THEREBY DESTROY SOMETHING WHICH CAN NO LONGER BE REPLACED IN THIS WORLD.”

January 11, 2018, Donald Trump in Oval Office Meeting discussing immigrants from Haiti, El Salvador and African countries: (as reported in Washington Post, by Josh Dawsey):

“Why are we having all these people from shithole countries come here? Why do we need more Haitians? Take them out.”

Six years, later, during the only Presidential debate with Democratic Presidential nominee Kamala Harris, Trump spread pernicious lies about Haitians living in Springfield, Ohio, that they were : “eating the cats, eating the dogs, eating the pets.”

From page 325, Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler on Blacks and Jews defiling Germany:

“With Satanic joy in his face, the black-haired Jewish youth lurks in the wait for the unsuspecting girl whom he defiles with his blood, thus stealing her from her people.  With every means he tries to destroy the racial foundations of the people he has set out to subjugate.  Just as he himself systematically ruins women and girls, he does not shrink back from pulling down the blood barrier for others, even on a large scale.  It was and is Jews who bring the Negroes to the Rhineland, always with the same secret thought and clear aim of RUINING THE HATED WHITE RACE by the necessarily resulting bastardization, throwing it down from its’ cultural and political height, and himself rising to be its’ master…And so, he tries systematically to lower the racial level by a continuous poisoning of individuals.”

Similarly, in his Veterans Day speech delivered in New Hampshire last year—supposedly honoring thousands of American Veterans who sacrificed their lives fighting Hitler, and Fascism—Trump targeted many groups long tagged by tyrants like Hitler, Mussolini and Joseph McCarthy as “fellow travelers” of Jews:  “radical leftists,” “sinister, dangerous forces from within,” “communists,” “Marxists” and, “thugs.” In every major speech over the past year, Trump has repeated his mantra calling his enemies “communists, socialists, leftists and Marxists.”

In Mein Kampf, Hitler’s deranged diatribe against the Jews and “liberal” society,  the Fascist mass-murderer explodes with the same kind of vitriol that Trump and his MAGA-Nazis use against many of their imagined contemporary enemies.  Sounding much like Trump, Hitler rants:

“…all at once the Jew also becomes liberal and begins to rave about the progress of mankind…Slowly, he makes himself the spokesman for a new era…To strengthen his political position he tries to tear down the racial and civil barriers…To this end, he fights with all the tenacity innate to the Jew, for religious tolerance; …another weapon in service to the Jews is the Press; the Jew talks of ‘enlightenment,’ ‘progress’, ‘freedom,’ ‘humanity’…and of the equality of all men without regard to race  and color.  He (The Jew) poisons the blood of others, but preserves his own.” (From, section of Mein Kampf entitled “Development of Jewry”)

Michael Tomasky, writing in The New Republic on November 12, 2023, is right to point out the difference in Trump’s Veterans Day version of “Mein Kampf,” :

“Trump, let us clarify, does not mention the Jews.  He means SOME Jews—the ones who aren’t for him, which, come to think of it, is most (American) Jews.”

And at an event dedicated to combatting Anti-Semitism held in Washington just one month ago (September, 2024) Trump whined that he was “not treated right by Jewish voters,” stating:

“I’m not going to call this a prediction, but in my opinion, the Jewish People would have a lot to do with a loss if I’m at 40%.”

Adolf Hitler couldn’t have articulated it any more clearly than his Apprentice did.

An entire public career of denying the existence of Climate Change, finally catches up with former Florida Governor and present US Senator Rick Scott, in the unforgiving form of Hurricane Milton.

(Voldemort, a Rick Scott look-a-like; Florida residents protesting Senator Scott’s long record of Climate Denial (photo from the Florida Phoenix, Sept. 30, 2024)

Think of the vilest villains

Who have disfigured the faces

Of nightmarish graphic novels, movie screens,

Or other such rot.  Than, think of Rick Scott.

If Lex Luthor & Voldemort

Mixed their twisted sperm into a test-tube,

And steamed it in a fetid Florida swamp for

Many months or years, or what,

The end result would be…Rick Scott.

His glowing orb, fresh from the Dark Lagoon,

Sucked life from ailing humans far too soon,

Hissing his seductive tune of health care savings each day,

Killing them harshly, through Columbia HCA.

A mere warm-up for the spawn of Voldemort & Lex,

His deprivation of care, sheer insanity.

How easily Scott shilled his heinous hex,

Manipulating it, Mengele-like, against humanity.

Crazed Eyes, ablaze with dollar signs,

Gleefully pulling the plug on yours and mine.

Then, foraging for more to defraud, or scare,

Scott’s ghoulish-gaze grabbed Medicare.

With Frankensteinian flare,

He raped and pillaged taxpayers bare.

His scandalous fraud hit the multi-billion $$ scale,

So Scott “5th” away the truth 75 times, cheating jail.

Fueled by money from Big Oil & Gas,

And his own crooked, thieving past,

Scott sucked up Fossil Fuel funds,

While the Gulf overheated, very fast.

The soul-less son of Slytherin,

Slimed the idea of “Climate Change;”

Wiping it out of State Regs, and

Erasing it from students’ brains.

Slithering into his Naples Mansion,

Giving Floridians a middle-fingered jilten’,

Scott gets spit-out, dervish-like, from the boiling Gulf,

Stripped bare by the wrath of his creation, Hurricane Milton.

From Tampa Bay to Key West,

Scott’s Climate Change denials roared on shore,

His pathological scientific whitewash,

Was now a killer storm–Category 5 or 4.

Scott force-fed the State a pipeline—

One of 3 from which he sucked out cash;

Addicting Florida, fentanyl-like, to Fossil fuels,

Setting it up for a crippling, tidal surge crash.

“I’m not a scientist,” Scott once bragged,

 Such willful blindness leaving Floridians sandbagged.

 Now, he tells CNN  “something’s clearly changing,”

As the waters his actions heated, wipes out people, raging…

Slithering Scott, flailing hard for votes;

Trying to rewrite his record of malfeasance,

Which wiped out lives, houses and boats.

Stripped naked before you,

Scott washes ashore;

His craven career of excuses drowned out,

By Milton’s deafening, deadly roar.

Israel’s Netanyahu is waging a Regional War in the Middle East to keep his grasp on power, and, potentially, stay out of prison.

(Photo from the New York Times)

Every since I converted to Judaism 44 years ago, I’ve always loved Rosh Hashanah.

I am always humbled by the Jewish New Year’s 10-day focus on introspection and contemplation, rather than the brainless and ritual inebriation of the other New Year’s celebration.

Sure, it’s a time to raise a glass of wine or two and be grateful for surviving another year of life, but Rosh Hashanah was always more of a gentle invitation to a quiet retreat from that life.  To me, the High Holy Days always been a special, sacred time to reflect on where our lives, our humanity and our souls have been over the past year, and where we would like them to be.

This year, the sounding of the Shofar, a modern day trumpet, which Maimonides and other Jewish scholars have interpreted as a “wake-up-call” for personal introspection and self-improvement, or as “a means of asking God to remember man” (Pentateuch), appears on the brink of being thrust back centuries to an ancient role of heralding war, the way it was used when Joshua waged war against Jericho.

In Hayyim Schauss’ book, The Jewish Festivals: History & Observance, (1938; 12^th Printing 1978, Union of American Hebrew Congregations, Schocken Books, NY), the author writes that:

“In the old days, the shofar was used as a musical instrument by Jews at various religious ceremonies, but its’ most important use was to intimidate the enemy, to declare war, and in general, to make proclamations of the people.”   

Apparently, the Netanyahu government is choosing to use the shofar this Rosh Hashanah to sound a clarion call for widespread war, in the increasingly questionable claim of Israel’s self-defense.

Netanyahu and his extremist Ultra Nationalist government has chosen to respond to the October 7, 2023, massacre by Hamas of more than 1200 Israeli citizens and the forced kidnapping of hundreds of hostages, by grinding Gaza into the dust, and killing more than 40,000 Palestinian non-combatants, most of whom are women and children. 

Gone is any semblance of the Israeli Defense Force’s (IDF), Code of Ethics for the IDF, which previously—before Netanyahu came to power– commanded the IDF to adhere to specific rules of combat.

That Code of Ethics, required as part of basic training for IDF soldiers, consists of four essential principles:

·      NECESSITY:  “to apply force only for the sake of the mission;”

·      DISTINCTION:  “aim your fire at those who pose a threat, NOT at combatants indiscriminately;

·      RESPONSIBILITY:  “since you know there will be collateral harm of civilians, you have to do whatever you can to MINIMIZE the expected collateral harm.”

·      PROPORTIONALITY:  “Is the expected collateral harm proportionate to the military achievement?” 

All of that moral and ethical guidance for Israel’s soldiers was tossed out when Netatanyu and his megalomaniacal cabinet seized power, declaring war on anyone not sufficiently Jewish, according to their own extremely narrow perspective.  Unarmed Palestinian women and children—either in Gaza or the West Bank—were considered sub-human by the Ultra Nationalists controlling the Israeli government and its’ armed forces.

Instead of abiding by the IDF’s historic ethical code, Bibi and his unbridled band of extremists have justified dropping 2,000 pound bombs—provided by the United States—on civilian populations by claiming, often suspiciously, that Hamas or Hezbollah combatants had hidden themselves underneath non-combatant populations and structures, like hospitals, schools, day-care centers, or apartment buildings.  By its’ own actions, the Netanyahu government has single-handedly undermined the credibility of any statements or videos coming from the IDF.

Under that spurious “self-defense” definition, any civilian population in any country in which anti-Israel terrorists may be hiding is fair game for any indiscriminate—and non-proportional— IDF attack.  National borders, international law, or individual state sovereignty do not matter under this new formulation of “self-defense” by the Netanyahu government.

Netanyahu and the Ultra Nationalists ruling Israel, using the “self-defense” trap to ensnare the US and other allies in its military actions, have now expanded it’s unending crusade for revenge for the murders of October 7, 2023, well-beyond retribution against Hamas, or the boundaries of Gaza and the West Bank.

Bibi has launched a Regional “Ring of Fire” War not just against the terrorist groups Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, but has dangerously expanded the war, just this week, across the national borders of Lebanon, Yemen & Syria, and is poised to attack any number of sites in Iran, to retaliate for Iranian missiles being launched into Israel.   Iran’s missile attack was done in response to Israel’s attack on Hezbollah  strong holds in Southern Lebanon, the killing of Hezbollah and Iranian leaders, and the maiming of thousands of Hezbollah operatives and Lebanese citizens with exploding personal communications devices—an act on Israel’s part, considered by some, to constitute terrorism against the nation of Lebanon and its people.

On the eve of Rosh Hashanah, 5785 (2024), the Jewish publication The Forward  outlined several military options Israel may take against Iran, which would shatter any hopes for a ceasefire, any chance of peace in the MidEast, and destabilize democratic nations and economies around the world:

·      “A tactical strike on Iran: A more substantial response could involve direct military action against Iranian assets, such as oil facilities or military installations. This would aim to inflict real damage on Iran’s infrastructure, forcing it to reconsider further provocations. 

An attack on an oil installation, for instance, could disrupt Iran’s economic lifelines and send the clear message that Israel will not tolerate continued missile strikes. The goal here would be to create enough pain for Iran to deter future actions, without pushing the region into a full-scale war.”

·      “A strategic overhaul of the region’s balance of power: This option is far more ambitious, and fraught with risk, but could reshape the Middle East. It would involve Israel somehow pushing the West to lay down the law with Iran, demanding not just an end to its missile strikes, but a full dismantling of its nuclear program and an end to its sponsorship of proxy forces across the region”. 

The Forward goes on to point out that the most extreme option poses a serious, not hypothetical, risk of starting World War III:

“If Iran responds forcefully, the U.S. would almost certainly be drawn into the conflict to protect Israel. This could trigger a chain reaction, with Russia and China, both of whom have strategic relationships with Iran, seeing an opportunity to exploit the chaos. China could use the distraction to finally make a long-threatened move on Taiwan, while Russian President Vladimir Putin might take the opportunity to expand his war in Ukraine, or press into neighboring countries. 

The global balance of power would be thrown into disarray, with potentially catastrophic consequences.”

At the end of our High Holy Days, our Days of Awe, we Jews say a profound prayer during Yom Kippur:

“On Rosh Hashanah it is written,

On Yom Kippur it is sealed:

How many shall pass on, how many shall come to be;

Who shall live and who shall die;

Who shall see ripe age, and who shall not;

Who shall perish by fire, and who by water;

Who by sword and who by beast;

Who by hunger and who by thirst;

Who by earthquake and who by plague;

Who by strangling and who by stoning;

Who shall be secure and who shall be driven;

Who shall be tranquil and who shall be troubled;

Who shall be poor and who shall be rich;

Who shall be humbled and who exalted;

But REPENTANCE, PRAYER, and CHARITY

Temper judgement’s severe decree.”

It’s in the spirit of that prayer, of this somber and reflective period, and of this immensely important moment in each of our lives that I question the tragic circle of firing squads that Netanyahu and the Ultra-nationalist Israeli government have built encircling Israel and threatening to plunge the world into full-scale war.

During this time of questioning, we need answers to a few critical questions.

1.     What about the 100+ hostages in Gaza?  Has BiBi given up on them?

2.     Did the Netanyahu government turn its attention to Hezbollah because it was losing the public opinion and political war in Gaza, and saw no hope of getting the hostages out alive?

3.     Does the IDF already know the hostages are dead, and is using a wider war as a distraction from that horror?

4.     Did Bibi carefully calculate that with only a month out from the US Presidential Election few, if any, American politicians would oppose any military action taken by Israel, as long as it was shrouded in the words, “self-defense?”

5.     Was the booby trapping of personal electronic devices—and interdicting the supply chain to do it—an act of international terrorism? Does it open up a new and dangerous vein of “permissible” terrorist activities, now that Israel has done it? Has it raised the possibility of terrorists interdicting and arming I-Phones headed for the consumer market in the US or Western Europe?

6.     Were those hand-held explosives an act of war vs. Hezbollah, or against Lebanon?  Iran?

7.     Can Israel do anything in the region—or in pursuing terrorists around the world—as long as it declares it:  an act of Israel’s self-defense?

8.     Has Bibi and Israel’s Nationalist government intentionally ratcheted up his “Circle of Fire” strategy and shooting war across several sovereign state borders to justify bombing Iran’s oil and Nuclear production facilities?

9.     Is this Netanyahu’s “October Surprise” for Donald Trump in the 2024 US Presidential Election to continue the US’ unquestioning support for any Bibism?

10. Was this Netanyahu’s long-term plan since sabotaging Barack Obama’s Nuclear agreement with Iran in 2014?  Did he always want to take out Iran’s capacity to make nuclear weapons himself, militarily, and not allow it to happen under a global peace agreement?

The stakes here, at this very instant in human history, are extraordinary, and not just for the future existence of Israel, but for all of us. 

Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak told Katy Tur of NBC news that, while he wanted to “guarantee security for Israel,” he believed that Netanyahu was “creating the danger because he doesn’t want a two-State solution.”

Jordan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, an US educated member of the Jordanian Druse community—Israel’s long-time allies—urgently pleaded that “The Arab states around Israel can guarantee its’ security.”

Israeli Prime Minister Yitzak Rabin, in his final speech delivered at the Peace Rally where he was assassinated by an Ultra Nationalist Jewish extremist on November 4, 1995, stated clearly one of the fundamental principles upon which the State of Israel was built:

“The path of peace is preferable to the path of war.  I say this as a military man…and see the pain of the families of the IDF soldiers.  For them, for our children, in my case for our grandchildren, I want this Government to exhaust every opening, every possibility to promote and achieve a comprehensive peace.”

Just as Bibi campaigned against every peace initiative put forth by Rabin going back 30 years–especially regarding a Two-State solution—he has repeatedly scuttled American cease-fire efforts in Gaza over the past several months to free any remaining hostages, or entertain any exit plan from Gaza and the West Bank that involves Palestinian self-determination, or contradicts the fever dreams of the Ultra Nationalist coalition keeping Netanyahu in power, and out of prison.

That terrible and troubling track record compounds an already towering tragedy, and this Rosh Hashanah, it appears the Netanyahu wants to use the Shofar as an instrument of war and revenge, and acquire for himself the awful power  to determine “who shall live, and who shall die.”