Mick Hartley

Politics and Culture

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  • The dirty balloon war

    The North Korean rubbish ballons being sent over to the South, packed with anything up to and including human faeces, are getting more and more annoying – as, of course, intended. The South did return to the old loudspeaker broadcasts, halted since 2018, but they don't seem to be having any effect – if anything encouraging the North to send more balloons – and they're understandably reluctant to escalate any further such a ridiculously infantile exchange: “low-grade provocations unimaginable from a normal country". 

    Time for a more robust approach?. Richard Lloyd Parry in the Times:

    South Korea has promised to take “stern military measures” if North Korea continues its relentless barrage of hot-air balloons carrying rubbish across the border between the two enemy states.

    The angry threat comes after Incheon airport, one of the world’s busiest, was forced to close twice early on Monday because of the danger to aircraft presented by the drifting balloons. According to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), 5,500 of them have been released in 22 separate launches, carrying bags containing rubbish such as plastic bottles, used batteries, old shoes and faeces.

    The falling balloons and their cargo have damaged cars. The timers used to release the rubbish bags have even ignited accidentally, causing fires on the ground.

    “While there may be inconveniences and difficulties caused by North Korea’s trash balloons, our fundamental motive in eradicating them is to demonstrate that the enemy will gain nothing,” said Colonel Lee Sung-jun, a spokesman for the JCS.

    “Still, if serious danger is caused to the safety of our citizens or if the North is assessed to have crossed the line, our military will take stern military measures.”

    It's risky, though.

    Pressed for more details about what would trigger a military response and what it would consist of, Lee declined to clarify the “precise standard at the moment”.

    But it would probably involve attempts to shoot down the balloons, probably by helicopter, a risky undertaking in a border zone in which troops from both sides are constantly on alert.

    Committing important military resources to dealing with what are known as “grey zone tactics”, short of deadly force, would also risk encouraging the North to send even more balloons — and loss of face if for the South if it found itself unable to respond.

    Of course some countries – Ukraine, Israel – could only dream of being bombarded with shit rather than deadly high explosives. It could always get worse.

  • Labour stuttering on women’s rights

    Suzanne Moore at the Labour conference is left doubtful that the government can be trusted to protect women's rights:

    This is the first year that the Labour Women’s Declaration (LWD) movement has been allowed into conference and it has a stall and some terrific events. The LWD believe that women and girls are subject to discrimination and oppression on the basis of their sex, have the right to single-sex spaces and are not to be intimidated for discussing this.

    But The LGB Alliance, which was founded in opposition to Stonewall’s policies on transgender issues, is still verboten. When I asked their spokeswoman why, she said they are never given any explanation. Why lesbian, gay and bisexual people cannot organise without including the many diverse groups now under the cover of the trans umbrella, many of whom aren’t same sex-attracted, is simply ridiculous.

    Debate on this issue within Labour is stuttering. Yvette Cooper may want to halve violence against women and girls but the party still can not define a woman. Are those who think that men can grow cervixes and women can have penises to be taken seriously? […]

    Tonia Antoniazzi, MP for Gower, is a bundle of positivity and strategy, and makes it clear how gender is still tearing Labour apart.

    She reckons half the cabinet are on the side of women’s rights, but still don’t want to take the risk of saying so for fear of being called transphobic. At least Wes Streeting is an ally. As is MP Jess Phillips, who I note will appear at a LWD event.

    It’s fine for women with status to stick their necks out – which these days simply means insisting that biological sex exists – but others in the room told us that if they speak up at their local Constituency Labour Party (CLP) meetings they are met with hostility.

    The institutional capture of radical trans ideology may slowly be beginning to crumble top down but it is still deeply embedded in our schools, the NHS and universities. And that’s a challenge.

    Most Labour people will say this is not a priority. There is too much other stuff to sort out. But at some point even the dimmest of them could join the dots between this dismantling of women’s rights and the fact that male violence is rising and that most of those who present with gender dysphoria are teenage girls who reject the burgeoning signs that they are turning into women.

    As I walk back in the rain, I wonder when 51 per cent of the population will ever become a priority. Do I trust Labour not to further dismantle women’s rights? Not really.

  • A war that benefits only Iran

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    Full text:

    Whatever ones view of Israel and the Palestinians – mine is that whenever two republics can created safely beside each other so that both peoples can live in security and freedom can not be soon enough, long live Israel, long live Palestine – but whatever ones views on this, Hezbollah started firing missiles at civilian areas of Israel on 8 october. The missiles were fired to support the Hamas slaughter raid of 7 October. Hamas expected Hezbollah to open a second front in the north. It avoided that but instead: Hezbollah fired over 8000 missiles into Israel during the last year – including the one that massacred Druze children playing football. 60,000 Israelis were forced to evacuate their homes. This is what would be called an escalation and provocation in any other time or place. Israel replied tit for tat because it was busy fighting Hamas in Gaza. Israel was last present in Lebanon 25 YEARS AGO and has not be present since.
    In 2006, after the last clash between Israel and Hezbollah, UNSC 1701 ordered disarmament of armed groups including Hezbollah, with no armed forces other than UNIFIL and Lebanese military south of the Litani River. Hezbollah's forward position is in direct contravention to this.
    Hezbollah is a terrorist paramilitary and Iranian vassal parastate that has captured the Lebanese republic, terrorizing and assassinating anyone who challenges it. Hence the terrified performance of its president, ministers etc. Hezbollah was a major perpetrator of the biggest mass killing of civilians in the Arab world in modern times – the slaughter of 500,000 Syrians in alliance with the Assad dictatorship, Iran and Russia. So the narrative that Hezbollah has been provoked etc etc is inaccurate. Whatever one's view of the dire Netanyahu govt, Israel has no wish for a northern war; it has no presence in Lebanon and obviously after enduring the trauma and humiliation of the 7 Oct fiasco had no need for any more war.
    No country on earth would tolerate an 8000-missile bombardment that forced it to evacuate an entire region. Israel was unable to respond earlier. Now it is doing so to end an unprovoked bombardment over many months that is sadly overdue.
    It is a tragedy that Israeli civilians have been terrorized all this time; it is tragic too that Lebanon, once a thriving multi ethnic multi faith multi party system, has been sadly hijacked and captured by a ruthless terrorist vassal of Iran and that a few brutal potentates at the top of Hezbollah and the Islamic Republic of Iran are recklessly sacrificing Lebanese security and Lebanese civilians on the altar of anti-American, anti-Western democracy, anti-Israel 'resistance' and Iranian imperialism.
    It is worth repeating that Lebanon has no strategic clash with Israel; Israel occupies no part of Lebanon; Lebanon has no interest in a war with Israel. In fact Lebanon and Israel should not coexists but be close allies in a normal world. Hezbollah's forward positions are in contravention of UN1701 that ordered their withdrawal north of this area.
    And this is entirely a war launched on 8 October by Hezbollah and Iran that benefits only Hezbollah and its masters in Iran and only destroys the innocent civlians of Lebanon and Israel and noone else. Every civilian who suffers or dies in this conflict is one civilian too many! Plse may this end soon.

  • Pallywood fail

    A mourning father – and a child with an itchy foot:

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  • Trying to appease the unappeasable

    The Labour Party has always, historically, been solid in its support of Israel. This started to shift under Ed Miliband – eager to gain the Labour leadership over his brother by courting the left of the party – and then rapidly deteriorated under Jeremy Corbyn. Keir Starmer made it a key feature of his leadership to get rid of all that antisemitic Corbynite baggage, and yet here we are now, with the new Labour government putting in place a ban on arms and adopting what can only be seen as a foreign policy hostile to Israel's legitimate concerns.

    What's going on? Former Labour MP Tom Harris, in Fathom, sees a new factor at play:

    Keir Starmer’s initial political instinct, in the aftermath of the Hamas terror attacks on Israel last October, were sound and based on Labour’s traditions of solidarity with the only democratic, liberal democracy in the Middle East. For a while, his staunch support for the attack by the IDF on Hamas strongholds in Gaza held firm. But it perhaps says much about Starmer’s inexperience in frontline politics that it wasn’t long before he started to cave in to the loudest opposition voices in his party, and started to backtrack on his previous opposition to a ceasefire.

    But when the general election came in July, no backtracking on Israel’s right to hunt down those responsible for the massacre of 1200 Jews and the kidnapping of 250 others was enough to assuage an element of militant Muslim opinion in Britain, whose voices had been amplified by weekly demonstrations at which the most foul anti-Semitism had been on regular display. Now they swapped public demonstrations for the ballot box: four previously ‘safe’ Labour constituencies fell to pro-Gaza candidates, including the Leicester seat of leading shadow cabinet member Jonathan Ashworth.

    Now it wasn’t just public order and Jewish citizens’ sense of safety that was being threatened: this was much worse – now Labour votes were being threatened!

    Perhaps it is too cynical to draw a causal line between Labour’s nervousness about losing ground domestically in a section of the electorate on which it had previously been able to count, and the new Labour government’s undeniable withdrawal of support from Israel via a number of policy announcements. So call me cynical.

    First, we had the decision to drop Britain’s objections to the issuing of an arrest warrant for ‘war crimes’ against Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, a move that created a serious disagreement between Britain and our strongest and most important ally, the United States.

    Then there was foreign secretary David Lammy’s announcement that the government would reinstate funding to the UN Palestinian refugee organisation UNRWA, despite allegations that UNRWA personnel took an active part in the 7 October pogrom.

    And then we had the announcement that some arms-based exports to Israel by British firms would be halted.

    In none of these cases can we see any similarity with what previous Labour governments would have done. But the case for concluding that these policies have been pursued specifically in order to assuage Muslim opinion in the UK is convincing, if not overwhelming. Labour has form on this, after all. During the Batley and Spen by-election in 2021, the party avoided at all costs even mentioning the local grammar school teacher who was forced into hiding for his own safety after threats by Muslim protesters in response to his showing cartoons of Mohammed to his pupils. The issue strikes at the very heart of what role religion should play in an open, tolerant, liberal society, but it is one that no Labour MP, including the local one who actually represents the teacher, is willing to discuss.

    Assuming, perhaps unfairly, that the government’s approach to Israel has at least been influenced by domestic Muslim opinion (which in itself would be disgraceful and unacceptable) what do ministers hope to gain from such acquiescence?

    In campaigners’ experience, will there ever be a point, short of declaring that Israel should abolish itself in favour of a Greater Palestine, that more extreme Muslim opinion is satisfied? How far must the government go along the path it has chosen before it starts to win back that lost support in northern and midlands seats?

    The answer, of course, is that extremists tend to demand extreme things. Those who march each week for Palestine and who voted for pro-Gaza candidates at the general election will never, ever be satisfied with a government that does anything other than express complete opposition to Israel.

    Time for Labour in general, and Starmer in particular, to show some backbone. Unfortunately, though the PM's principles may be sound, backbone is not something we've seen much of to date.

    Labour must rediscover its principles and – just as important – its international allies. Wasting time trying to appease the unappeasable can only lead to surrender of our own values and the betrayal of our true friends.

  • The cuckoo in the nest

    Oh dear. The "deadly Israeli bombardment" on Lebanon continues to make the headlines. BBC live reporting, meanwhile:

    Lebanon's Prime Minister, Najib Mikati, says he is heading to New York later "in light of current developments" to make further contacts.

    The UN General Assembly is currently meeting in New York and Mikati had been due to attend the meeting.

    But on Saturday he cancelled the trip because of intensifying strikes in his country, including strikes hitting the Lebanese capital Beirut on Friday as Israel said it targeted and killed a senior Hezbollah commander.

    Mikati's New York trip means he is also cancelling the government cabinet meeting scheduled for today, a statement adds.

    Has there ever been a war with a more obvious solution? Can Mikati grasp it? His country has been co-opted  – taken over – by an Iranian proxy that has been waging war on Israel for years and, since the Hamas pogrom of October 7th last year, has been firing rockets indiscriminately into northern Israel. Just get rid of Hezbollah – that's all. That's how straightforward it is. Israel doesn't want to take over any part of Lebanon: it just wants the bombing inside Israel to stop. Simple.

    Will the UN be able to offer any moral clarity to the situation? Will it tell Mikati that all he has to do is get rid of Hezbollah, the cuckoo in the nest, and all his Israel problems will be resolved?

    Um….I'm guessing perhaps not.

  • The way to Amarillo

    Jack Delano, March 1943. "A westbound Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe passenger train passing by a siding near the town of Hoover, Texas, enroute to Amarillo."

    SHORPY-8d15319u
    [Photo: Shorpy/Jack Delano for the Office of War Information]

    Surely one of the great pop music rhymes:

    Is this the way to Amarillo?Every night I've been hugging my pillow…

  • A celebration of mediocrity

    Non-binary races are on-trend, it seems – notably with the New York Road Runners and their exciting Non-Binary Equity and Inclusion [NBEI] initiative:

    The NBEI framework was designed to make NYRR events more gender-expansive to better meet the needs of our gender-diverse running community. NYRR participants now have the option to choose either “Man,” Woman,” or “Non-binary” on their NYRR profile. Additionally, a Non-binary category has been implemented in the majority of NYRR programs and community events extending from the youth level all the way up to the elite field.

    Amazingly, the non-binary category is always won by men.

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    "it just gives poor male athletes, who can’t win the men’s category, an opportunity to get prize money or accolades. It’s unnecessary & a celebration of mediocrity".

    Well said.

  • The mullah and the actress

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  • Propaganda disguised as journalism

    Eitan Fischberger at Tablet on The New Rules of Western Journalism, as straight-up Hamas propaganda gets an Emmy nomination from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS):

    In late July, NATAS nominated a Gazan journalist and apparent member of a terror group, Bisan Owda, for a news and documentary Emmy Award for her AJ+-produced It’s Bisan from Gaza and I’m Still Alive. The docu-short, which has already clinched Peabody and Edward R. Murrow awards, is up in the “outstanding hard news feature story: short form” category. The documentary presents the harsh realities experienced by the people of Gaza in the early days of the Israel-Hamas War, which was initiated when Hamas massacred 1,200 people 11 months ago in southern Israel and took 250 others hostage.

    Remarkably, Bisan’s eight-minute documentary makes no mention of the medieval horrors inflicted upon innocent Israelis that terrible Oct. 7 day that started the war. Instead, Bisan presents her unsuspecting Western audience with a sanitized version of history in which Hamas and Gaza’s other terror groups are nonexistent, even inside the Hamas stronghold of Shifa Hospital, and in which she is somehow an objective journalist caught up in horrors being inflicted on innocents by Israeli “occupiers,” rather than an apparent adherent of a terror organization that deliberately murders innocent people, and helped bring about the events she depicts.

    Even more troubling than the bizarre absence of Hamas in Bisan’s documentary and the subsequent episodes released by AJ+ from the standpoint of basic journalistic ethics and practice, is what she does choose to show. Interspersed throughout the footage of the immense and genuine human suffering in Gaza is propaganda straight from the Hamas media office. By deliberately mixing truth with lies, such as the assertion that “women, children, and the elderly make up 73% of the dead in Gaza,” numbers that several experts have referred to as “statistically impossible,” Bisan’s content is purposefully designed to sway the hearts and minds of millions of viewers who don’t know better toward the terrorists.

    Bisan takes an even less nuanced approach, however, when uploading short videos to her Instagram account for her 4.7 million followers. There, she veers into outlandish antisemitic territory, such as the grotesque allegation that Israel is stealing the organs of dead Palestinian children of Gaza—which comes straight out the pages of age-old antisemitic blood libels. In a video from Oct. 18, the day after an explosion infamously rocked Gaza’s Al Ahli Hospital, Bisan filmed herself in tears over the “800 people killed” by Israel (300 more than Hamas’ number). In a now-infamous twist, the explosion turned out to be caused by an errant rocket fired by the Islamic Jihad terror group. European intelligence later placed the likely death toll at 50—or 93.75% less than the total Bisan claimed.

    The terror group Fischberger is referring to is the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). There are videos of Bisan at PFLP rallies in full PFLP regalia. 

    Despite Bisan’s open affiliation with a terrorist organization, and reporting that violates every norm of ethical journalism, NATAS has defended the nomination. Bizarrely, NATAS President & CEO Adam Sharp stated that “NATAS has been unable to corroborate these reports, nor has it been able, to date, to surface any evidence of more contemporary or active involvement by Owda with the PFLP” and that the “content submitted for award consideration was consistent with competition rules and NATAS policies.” Sharp’s response completely ignores the ample evidence of Bisan’s terror ties (including her own confirmation that she participated in the PFLP rallies) and her propensity for spreading antisemitism and openly lying in the service of terrorist propaganda campaigns. In reality, multiple Gazan journalists working for Al Jazeera (which owns AJ+) have been linked to terror groups, while the PFLP and Hamas have been openly training journalists in the Strip for over a decade—some of whom participated in the Oct. 7 terror attack as combatants and even held Israeli hostages in their homes.

    Sharp, NATAS, and the other journalistic institutions who honored Bisan are virtue-signaling, yes, But they are also displaying complete ignorance as to the nature of journalism in the Gaza Strip and a callous indifference to the lives of Jews and Americans who have been murdered by Hamas and by the PFLP. Moreover, Bisan’s manipulation of journalistic standards, and journalistic cover, mirrors the practices of her broadcaster AJ+, a U.S.-based subsidiary of Al Jazeera, which is funded by the government of Qatar, a longtime Hamas funder that provides safe haven for its leaders. In 2019, the media platform released a video questioning the Holocaust, and more recently, has repeatedly justified the Oct. 7 massacre.

    No matter. Normal journalistic standards don't apply when it comes to Israel. As long as duplicitous Jews are the target, all concerns about objectivity fly out the window.

    What NATAS, the sponsors of the Peabody and Edward R. Murrow awards….have apparently agreed on is that there should be two sets of journalistic standards: one for them, and one for Jews. It’s hard to think of a more shameful development in the annals of modern journalism.