For Gaza, for Hamas, for Discussion

 

The young man in the photo above is called Abdullah Al-Yazouri. He is the news at the moment because he was the presenter of  the BBC documentary " Gaza: How To Survive A War Zone". I have watched the programme, and have to say that, for a 13-year old boy, he did a good job. The programme focused upon several Gazans and their struggles for survival in the midst of the war. There was a young boy who lived in a hospital, helping with patients. There was a young woman who was bringing up her newborn child in a draughty tent. The programme depicted the plight of Palestinians suffering from Israeli bombing, as well as the pressure on ordinary Gazans to change location when directed by the Israeli army. What I did not know was the fact that Abdullah is the son of a Hamas leader - Dr Ayman al-Yazouri, the deputy minister for agriculture. According to other reports, he is the grandson of a Hamas founder member.

The investigative reporter who discovered this, David Collier, has said;  

'The naivety, stupidity and arrogance of our media has long been apparent. It has allowed Palestinian propagandists to turn our legacy channels into foolish outlets blindly spouting Hamas lies 24/7.'

By "our media", Collier means the BBC, and the backlash against the BBC has been one of increasing fury. Danny Cohen, the ex- BBC director said: 

'The BBC appears to have given an hour of prime-time coverage to the son of a senior member of the Hamas terrorist group. Either they were not aware of the terrorist links because they did not carry out the most basic journalistic checks or the BBC did know and misled audiences about the family's deep involvement with terrorism.'

Lisa Nandy, the Culture Secretary, has expressed her disquiet, saying that she will raise the matter with BBC management:  "particularly around the way in which they sourced the people who were featured in the programme".

 

The former Tory Home Secretary, Priti Patel, has joined the chorus, saying: 

"I’m the Home Secretary that prescribed Hamas, so I don’t need to add much more to that at all," Dame Priti told Nick Ferrari of LBC on Thursday."And I think the BBC has been under a great deal of scrutiny over their reluctance, let’s put it this way. Their reluctance to call Hamas a terrorist organisation - which is exactly what they are."

The BBC has responded, some might think feebly, by saying that they had not been informed of the family connection by the independent producers. The Beeb has apologised for the omission, and has been forced to issue a statement, saying: 

"We followed all of our usual compliance procedures in the making of this film, but we had not been informed of this information by the independent producers when we complied and then broadcast the finished film... a powerful child's eye view of the devastating consequences of the war in Gaza which we believe is an invaluable testament ... and we must meet our commitment to transparency."

Despite calls to ban the film, the BBC has refused to axe the programme, adding a cautionary information message.

Personally speaking, I agree that the Beeb should have done their homework, but I think they are right not to delete the programme. I would have watched it, even had I known of  Abdullah's parentage, though it would have forewarned me that there was a propaganda purpose to the film. Unlike the BBC, I have no hesitation in describing Hamas as a terror organisation, and I hope that previous posts of mine on this topic make that clear. It was obvious that the programme was intended as an emotionally persuading piece of work, with its depiction of casualties, destruction and indiscriminate bombing seen through the eyes of children. But this is standard practice for propagandists, as Britannica says:  

"Propagandists have a specified goal or set of goals. To achieve these, they deliberately select facts, arguments, and displays of symbols and present them in ways they think will have the most effect. To maximize effect, they may omit or distort pertinent facts ..."

And it didn't take much to see that this film fitted the bill admirably. No mention was made of the Hamas incursion of 7/10/23, nor were the atrocities of Hamas or the Israeli hostages. Cleverly, one Gazan was shown who did make a brief criticism of Hamas. It was a nod to impartiality and I hope the person interviewed didn't suffer for it afterwards. Yet, the overall impression was of a beleaguered, united people standing firm in the face of aggression. 

I saw nothing to cause me to revise my view that Hamas are to blame for the present war by their murderous invasion of Israeli territory. I agree that the the Israeli campaign is excessive and indiscriminate, but, I say again. Hamas knew this would happen and wanted it to happen, as I have expounded elsewhere. My concern here is that the BBC has played into the hands of its critics (much as the Israelis have played into the hands of Hamas) and there will be further attacks on its status, which is happening now, over this issue.

 

Happy Faceless Men : Survival is Success?

 

If I can be forgiven for exercising artistic license, the picture above shows a faceless and anonymous group of men. We do not know their identities, but they must exist. They are three representations of the secretive planners of Hamas military strategy. They must exist, because Hamas would have been unable to launch their attacks on Israel on October 7th, 2023, without meticulous preparation. This preparation was evident in the way that Hamas fighters were able to breach Israeli defences and inflict severe civilian casualties. It was evident in the taking of hostages and the provocative killing of innocent people. And it was especially significant in the construction of an extensive and elaborate network of tunnels in Gaza, where Hamas fighters could take refuge from Israeli retaliation or military action. On all these counts, I think we can agree that the Hamas planning staff achieved a high degree of success.

The principal criteria for success came from the inevitable Israeli retaliation to the Hamas atrocities of 7/10/23. At the risk of quoting myself, in my blog post of 13/10/23, I said that the Hamas crimes were part of the strategy of provocation: 

"...the provocation by said (guerrilla) movements against their stronger and/or occupying enemies... It involves attacks by the terrorists that sting their enemies into using excess force as retaliation, in order to alienate the civilian population. The retaliation, such as it is, will cause deaths to innocent and uninvolved civilians and thus lead to an increase of support for the guerrillas".

Well, I got that right. The Israeli military response, which has lasted over a year, has inflicted far more casualties upon the Palestinian population of Gaza than Israel suffered on October 7th. As Reuters observed on January 15th:

"Palestinian health authorities say Israel's ground and air campaign in Gaza killed more than 46,600 people, with just over half of identified victims being women, children or older people".

Despite this, a Hamas official told the BBC on January 16th that the fact that Hamas had endured, despite the Israeli onslaught constitutes a victory: 

"Israel promised to eliminate Hamas, but now they are sitting in the same building with Hamas leaders and negotiating with them," a senior Hamas official told me (Rushdi Abualouf) in a phone call before the ceasefire was announced".

Predictably, and like other guerrilla groups before, civilian casualties matter little to Hamas, who are, as some say, a death cult. The unnamed Hamas official said:

"In terms of numbers, Gaza has paid an unimaginable price. But in terms of gains and losses, Israel failed to break the will of the Palestinians, the resistance, or to push the people out of the country."

Oh, well, that's all right then, at least for Hamas. This is because the high Palestinian death toll has brought significant benefits for Hamas and all the militant Palestinian groups. The huge number of civilian deaths has brought widespread international condemnation of Israel, galvanising the already extant anti-Zionist movement worldwide who have added to their numbers considerably. According to Asian Eye, a survey conducted last year found: 

"A majority of Britons surveyed (71%) felt it was fair to label the Israel military force's actions in Gaza as ‘genocide’"

And, as we know, there have been huge demonstrations in support of the Palestinians and calls for the UK to ban arms sales to Israel. There has also been an increase in antisemitism   as well as in Islamophobia. This has the benefit for Hamas of an increase in social tension in a major Israeli ally. But the most tangible strategic benefit for Hamas has been the number of future recruits it can garner from the relatives of the thousands of innocent people who have died in the Israeli onslaught on Gaza. They will have many more recruits for their future attacks on Israel and that must afford the Hamas strategists a great deal of satisfaction. The fact that their attack on 7/10/23 started this whole destructive process and claimed so many lives will not trouble them. By and large, and by their own ruthless standards, they have survived and succeeded.

Which leads to my conclusion. Many years ago, I read a book on guerrilla warfare by one Robert Taber: "The War of the Flea". It is largely forgotten now, but was once said to be required reading for US Special Forces officers. Taber was an American Marxist who admired the Cuban Revolution and actually fought with Cuban forces against the CIA-organised Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba, 1961. Taber was wounded in the fighting, but recovered to write his panegyric on revolutionary guerrilla warfare. One sentence from the book is relevant here:

"The guerrilla succeeds because he survives"

That quote is highly appropriate to the present Hamas situation. Despite all the suffering and death resulting from the October 7th attack, and despite a protracted Israeli military offensive, Hamas have survived. They are still intact as a fighting force and have paraded triumphantly during their recent release of Israeli hostages. The faceless strategy planners will have learned from the struggle and will doubtless be planning future actions.

Looking at my picture above has suddenly given me a sinister, creepy feeling. I can almost imagine those happy, faceless men quietly laughing to themselves...

The Southport Murders: Some Thoughts

 

It's difficult to think of something new to say about the Southport murders and the sentencing of the killer - Axel Rudakubana (AR), seen above in an appropriate location. All I can do is to provide a personal perspective. When I first heard the news back in July of how the three small children -  Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, Bebe King, six, and Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine - had been slain, like everyone else, I was consumed with shock. Although I don't live in Southport now, it is still my home town and I could not believe that such a thing could happen there. It's the sort of thing that happens here in London, so I thought, remembering the London Bridge and Westminster Bridge attacks. "Why", so I wondered at first, "would a terrorist want to strike in Southport?". Now, as we know, AR was apparently not a terrorist, still less a Muslim. Not that this awkward fact stopped the Fash from using the attacks as an excuse to launch racist rioting, but that's not relevant here.

What I found of interest was the way that AR conducted himself at his trial, and the weeks leading up to it. As we know, he has never expressed any remorse for his crimes. As The Guardian says: 

"The Southport killer, Axel Rudakubana, said “I’m so glad those kids are dead” after he was arrested for the “sadistic” murder of three young girls and attempted murder of 10 others".

In the courtroom, His sentencing was halted as he shouted that he felt ill before the judge ordered him to be removed from the dock. Now, this drew shouts of "coward!" from the public gallery, but it gives me pause for thought, as did the revelation (at least to me) that he had planned the attack for some time. Even his purchase of two knives from Amazon had been planned with care. It seems that he had used special software to get round Amazon's security checks. This causes me to wonder why he unexpectedly pleaded guilty and if there was another reason for his court outbursts, other than cowardice. Perhaps he simply wanted to appear to be in charge of proceedings and/or to deny the children's relatives the satisfaction of seeing him sentenced.

AR was clearly a troubled youth, as the BBC describe in some detail. It seems that the first serious signs Rudakubana was capable of serious violence towards others date back to when he was in year nine at Range High School in Formby, near Southport. From then on, as the Beeb say: 

"...over his adolescence, Rudakubana began to exhibit anger issues and a propensity for violence. When he was sentenced in January 2025, his barrister would tell the court that "something changed" in Rudakubana at the age of 13". Fellow pupils remember him being obsessed with figures such as Adolf Hitler and Genghis Khan."

And the violence exhibited itself later, leading to his expulsion and returns to his old school to commit acts of violence as well as his diagnosis for Autism Spectrum Disorder. He was convicted several times for carrying a knife and, as the BBC say:

" He had involvement with local mental health services but "stopped engaging" in February 2023.
At the time of the attack, social care professionals were assessing whether the then-17-year-old needed to be offered additional care to manage his transition to adulthood".

I have been very critical of the mental health powers that be over the release of murderous mental health patients back into the community but, to be fair, I cannot see what grounds they would have had for permanent incarceration of AR. Neither did the police have any such powers. I am the first to declare that he should have been in an institution, but without grounds for putting him there, it would have been difficult to enforce.

Having said this, I expected that AR's defence team would have entered a plea of manslaughter with diminished responsibility and assumed that he would be sent to Broadmoor or somewhere similar. To my astonishment, that has not happened. Instead, his guilty plea has been accepted and he could well be sent to a "normal" prison. And that opens up another topic.

For if AR goes to an ordinary jail, he will be a prime target for attack by other prisoners. As we know, he has been sentenced to 52 years but, if other prisoners are successful, he might not reach the age of 70 (not that he would be released anyway - I hope). There are precedents for this. As Joe Duggan says on MSN News:

 

"In 2019, paedophile Richard Huckle, was killed by another prisoner after being attacked at Full Sutton, where he was serving 22 life sentences after admitting the sexual abuse of up to 200 Malaysian children aged between six months and 12 years. In 2010, Soham child murderer Ian Huntley had his throat slashed in HMP Durham’s Frankland Jail while Roy Whiting, who murdered eight-year-old Sarah Payne, was stabbed at HMP Wakefield last year".

There will be precious little sympathy for AR, should he face a similar or worse fate. As Duggan says, he will probably lead an isolated life in a segregation unit. He will not be completely safe there, as Mark Fairhurst,  national chairman of the Prison Officers’ Association (POA) trade union says: 

“Everyone will know who he is, and no matter where he is in the prison, they’ll know where he is, and they will target him. His life will be an absolute misery...You’ve got to unlock him for a phone call for exercise, so he can have a shower. And there’ll always be prisoners around when that happens. They always find a way to get to these people.”

I can find no room in my heart for Axel Rudakubana, should that happen. My sympathies lie with his victims and their families. 

By way of a footnote, it has been reported that the father of Sara Sharif, who was convicted together with his wife last month of his 10-year old daughter's murder, has already been attacked in prison. The BBC reports: 

"Urfan Sharif is said to have been attacked at Belmarsh Prison on New Year's Day by two other inmates in a cell, the Sun newspaper reported. Sharif reportedly suffered cuts to his face, and it is understood he received medical treatment inside the prison. The weapon alleged to have been used in the assault was part of a tuna can".

For Axel Rudakubana, the clock is ticking.

Sara Sharif, R.I.P.

Elon Musk: an Alien Influence?

 I have to admit that I didn't know much about Elon Musk. I knew, of course, that he was the new owner of Twitter/X. Like the rest of the world, I knew he was fabulously wealthy and - who could miss it? - he was in political cahoots with Donald Trump and is now part of the US government. However, his recent "interventions" into British politics, and his tiff with Nigel Farage, have spurred me into learning more about him. If his wealth is to become influential in our political affairs, we need to understand what we are dealing with.

Well, he is a a South African by birth, born in Pretoria about 53 years ago. According to the BBC: 

"Mr Musk showed his talents for entrepreneurship early, going door-to-door with his brother selling homemade chocolate Easter eggs and developing his first computer game at the age of 12".

Coming from a domestically fractured background, and despite suffering from Asperger's Syndrome, he left home at 17 for college. He moved to Canada, becoming a Canadian, before moving to the USA where he gained a degree in economics and physics at the University of Pennsylvania, and became a US citizen, before starting out on his business career.

Now, there are several factors of interest here. First, we should note that Musk has a family background that was far Right politically. Joe Hill, in Searchlight magazine, writes:

"Our attention has been drawn to a fascinating recent interview in which Errol Musk, father of Elon, apparently begins to say that Elon’s maternal grandparents were signed-up Nazis, but then checks himself: "They used to support Hitler and all that stuff… they were in the Nazi P... [stops himself]… they were in the German Party in Canada, so they sympathised with the Germans."

Not that this makes Musk a Nazi, but early political influences can affect children. There is also Musk's diagnosis of Asperger's Syndrome. The National Autistic Society (NAS) says: 

"Historically, Asperger syndrome was used as a diagnostic term for some autistic people who did not also have a diagnosis of a learning disability. Broadly, it is now agreed that what was referred to as Asperger syndrome is part of the autism spectrum and there is no need for a separate term."

Hans Asperger, who invented the term, has been exposed as a Nazi supporter who helped the Nazis with their genocide programme, which has led to the term falling into disuse, as the NAS say. In spite of this, the accepted dictionary definition is relevant to our study of Elon Musk. It says:

 

(Asperger's is...) "...a condition forming part of the autistic spectrum, characterized chiefly by repetitive patterns of behaviour, preoccupation with restricted interests, and difficulties with social interaction, without intellectual impairment or significant problems with verbal communication".

 Compare this to the verdict of Musk's first wife, Justine Wilson, who became his wife in 2000, when he wasn't yet a rich man. In a 2010 essay for Marie Claire, she wrote that even before making his millions  Musk was "not a man who takes no for an answer. The will to compete and dominate, that made him so successful in business, did not magically shut off when he came home,". While dancing at their wedding, Elon the Charmer told his new wife: "I am the alpha in this relationship."

Now, is it going too far to say that this indicates a definite autistic trait and an authoritarian background influence? I am not qualified to say, but it does remind me of an old saying: "as the twig is bent, so is the tree inclined". But let's move on.

If repetitive behaviour applies to human relationships, Musk certainly exhibits it in his family life (lives?). As all the tabloids know, he has had three wives and has 12 children by three different women. Anyone who finds this of interest can read about this on People.com or by conducting a Google search. Musk has requested privacy for his partners and their offspring, but one comment by one of his children is of interest.

Vivian Jenna Wilson is a transgender woman in her early 20s. She is also the child of Elon Musk and his first wife, Justine. Her recollection of Musk as a father is relevant here. According to NBC News:

"Wilson said that, for as long as she could remember, Musk hasn’t been a supportive father. She said he was rarely present in her life, leaving her and her siblings to be cared for by their mother or by nannies even though Musk had joint custody, and she said Musk berated her when he was present. “He was cold,” she said. “He’s very quick to anger. He is uncaring and narcissistic.”

Once again, I am left wondering about the autism link. Not all uncaring and narcissistic people are autistic, but there does seem to be a connection. In 2022, Vivian applied to change her family name from Musk to Wilson. In doing so, she practically disowned Musk, saying: “I no longer live with or wish to be related to my biological father in any way, shape or form,”.

Musk's reaction to this is, I think, of particular significance. The first, obvious point is that Musk used this domestic affair as an excuse to move towards the political Right. Expressing no anguish over the alienation of his child, he said on X: “I vowed to destroy the woke mind virus after that, and we’re making some progress”.

Perhaps less obvious is the obsessive way in which Musk has launched a sustained attack on Transgender people on X and - highly relevant - Musk has shown no regret or remorse over his treatment of his child. Narcissists never express remorse.

And his move to the Right has continued. Once a Democrat voter, he now is critical of the Democrat party's stance on a number of issues, including the economy, immigration and gun control - decrying many of its policies as "woke" - shades of his statement on X, mentioned above. It looks to me that Musk is venting his wounded pride in having a transgender child into a deepening liaison with the far Right - which leads us to his political status, both here and in the USA.

Musk's interference in politics here is well enough known. After last summer's riots, Musk said that we are drifting towards civil war. Lately, he has launched a number of attacks on the Labour government, accusing the PM of being "complicit in the rape of Britain", and described Jess Phillips MP as "a rape genocide apologist" - whatever that means. He is even said to be interested in buying Liverpool FC.

  According to the Mail:

"...his (Musk's) father revealed that his family have generational ties to the Merseyside city. 'His grandmother was born in Liverpool, and we had relatives in Liverpool, and we were fortunate to know quite a lot of the Beatles because they grew up with some of my family. So, we are attached to Liverpool, you know,' he told Times Radio".

Happily, FSG, the club's owners, say that the club is not for sale. And, as the Liverpool Echo comments: "Musk’s right-wing views likely would not chime with the socialism of Liverpool".

Liverpool fans, to their credit, have spoken out vociferously against this proposed purchase by Musk and , by doing so, have set us an example of how we should react to the intrusions of this foreign billionaire.

In conclusion, I can declare that the more I have learned of Elon Musk, the less I like him. As Wordsworth said: "The child is father of the man". My readings of the early lives of Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump and Boris Johnson bear this out and it's true of Elon Musk. They are all egotistical, narcissistic opportunists with an overweening sense of privilege and/or "entitlement". Musk's first wife's comment that he wouldn't take no for an answer is true of all four. The problem with Musk is that he has a  lot of money to throw around. His unstable character, shown by the way he abruptly turned on Nigel Farage (NF) because NF wants to keep his distance from Tommy Robinson (for now) indicates that he is capable of sudden changes of preference. Reform UK might not receive funding, but more extreme groups, including whatever faction Tommy Robinson now sides with, might well benefit from Musk's largesse. 

But we must not forget the menace he poses to many people in the USA. As we know, he has a reputation as a hard-nosed businessman. When he took over ownership of Twitter/X, he made a lot of Twitter employees redundant. Federal workers across the USA must be sweating with anxiety for their future employment. If he is capable of treating his own child badly, then he won't shrink from creating mass federal redundancies. And that is just the beginning. Dissenters, and past opponents of him and his friend, Donald Trump, might well find themselves targets of Elon's baleful attention.

I wonder - is it too late for Musk to find treatment for his autism?