The cannon fodder: The reality that seeps through the alarms

Uri Misgav I want to write my opinion on the war. Without filters. It is important to me to do this before, God forbid, a missile hits our rented apartment in Jaffa, or the protected space of the nearby nursing home to which we evacuate with the endless alarms. To this end, I am taking advantage of the free platform given to me at Haaretz, which has been under frontal attack by the government in recent years. And also my right to voice a civil voice in a democratic country (still, apparently). I think this is a psychotic war. That Israel and the US entered into under the leadership of two psychos. Megalomaniacs, narcissists, disconnected. Up to their necks in political and legal troubles. Who are at the head of the two most fundamentalist and anti-democratic governments in the history of their countries. And they have the audacity to preach democracy in other places. This is a war that America entered with its Defense Department headed by Pete Hesseth, who prefers to be called "the Secretary of War," an evangelist who comes to work smelling of alcohol, tattooed with crusader crosses associated with the far right, suspected of sexual harassment and who came to his position as a commentator on the Fox News morning show. Israel entered it with the Defense Ministry in charge of a Likud operative, Yisrael Katz, without a security background or public weight beyond the Likud districts. The orders are carried out by technocratic and obedient general staffs, addicted to the exercise of unlimited power and without a strategic horizon.

Right now, it's a deluxe war, based on bombing from high above in an open air corridor, almost devoid of anti-aircraft threats and enemy aircraft. Or with American cruise missiles, which sometimes hit desalination plants or a school for girls. The cannon fodder is the citizens of Israel and the Gulf states. Also the Iranian people, whom Trump and Netanyahu are encouraging to go out and replace the ayatollahs' rule while being savagely bombed and hit with black rain following the shelling of oil depots. And a million Lebanese who were ordered to evacuate their homes again, or were simply unfortunate enough to live in Beirut. All of this is supposed to give rise to "changing the face of the Middle East for generations."

This is a war for which no clear goals or plans have been defined, and if they have been defined, they change daily, due to the nonsense and follies of President Trump. At the very least, he talks to the media every day.

Netanyahu has not appeared before the public and answered questions from (real) journalists since the start of the war, and is content with recorded videos and briefings of himself and his eunuchs in the name of a "political", "security" or "knowledgeable" official. From them, and from the reality that seeps through the alarms, we learn that from regime change we have moved to "creating conditions" and "forming cracks." From removing the nuclear weapons, we have moved to "nuclear withdrawal." From destroying ballistic missiles to "damaging launch capabilities." And there was also talk of eliminating Hezbollah and severing its ties with Iran. They stand roughly where the complete victory over Hamas and the overthrow of its rule stands.