I was wondering what, exactly, had happened this week such that a) Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman backed away from a Palestinian state; b) President Joe Biden backed away from a Palestinian state; c) Biden dropped criticism of Israel's judicial reforms, at least in public.
The answer dropped late on Wednesday.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the U.S. (with Israeli assent) will assist Saudi Arabia in enriching uranium on Saudi soil. This is another anonymously sourced report, but I believe it because the Biden administration's promises to adhere to "non-proliferation" while doing the opposite sound authentically lame to me, and there is little else that could explain the sudden change in Saudi tone.
So the peace deal would mean that the Saudis get nukes (quietly), Israel gets peace with Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Sunni world, and the Palestinians get concessions that fall short of statehood.
As to the problem of a nuclear Saudi regime: we'll worry later?
It might, after all, be worth the risk, for a variety of reasons.
The story of Noah is familiar; the details, less so.
Noah is often seen as an ambivalent figure. He was righteous -- but only for his generation. What was his deficiency?
One answer suggests itself: knowing that the world was about to be flooded, he built an Ark for the animals and for his own family -- but did not try to save anyone else or to convince them to repent and change their ways (the prophet Jonah, later, would share that reluctance).
Abraham, later, would set himself apart by arguing with God -- with the Lord Himself! -- against the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, saying that they should be saved if there were enough righteous people to be found (there were not).
Still, Noah was good enough -- and sometimes, that really is sufficient to save the world. We don't need heroes every time -- just ordinary decency.
Hi all -- as I noted last month, I'm going to be closing down my Locals page, at least for tips and subscriptions -- I may keep the page up and the posts as well, but I'm no longer going to be accepting any kind of payment.
Look for cancelation in the very near future. Thank you for your support!
An interesting weekend -- one of the last of Daylight Savings Time -- in which there is much to celebrate, much to contemplate, and a bit to worry about.
The Gaza peace deal is shaky, but holding, after the living hostages returned; the shutdown is still going on, with no end in sight; the China trade war is heating up; and the confrontation with Venezuela continues to escalate.
The "No Kings" protest was a dud, despite the media's attempt to inflate it. What I find fascinating is that the Democrats have basically stolen the rhetoric and the imagery of the Tea Party protests, circa 2009. They claim they are defending the Constitution -- just like the Tea Party did.
On the one hand, this is good. How wonderful to have a political system in which both sides, bitterly opposed though they are, articulate differences through the Constitution -- and not, as in so many other countries, outside it.
On the other, this is sheer hypocrisy for the Democrats. Not only did they malign the Tea Party as ...
