כבר 15 חודשים שאני מלווה את ניר עוז. היו הרבה רגעים קורעי לב, אבל לא כמו הנאום של ימית אביטל הערב בעצרת. היא סיפרה על חטיפתו והירצחו של אריאל ביבס דרך העיניים של בנה, יואב, בן ה-5.
"לפני שנה, במלון באילת, ראה יואב תמונה של אריאל ואמר: "הוא כבר לא חבר שלי, הוא מת" ואז נרדם>
*ידעתם שהדרישה הגוברת לחשמל גורמת לאנרגיה גרעינית לחזור לקדמת הבמה?*
במאמר הקצר הזה סקרתי את המחקר של מקינזי על 18 הזירות הטכנולוגיות שיעצבו את הכלכלה העולמית בשנים הקרובות והוספתי קצת מחשבות לגבי איך ישראל יכולה להמשיך את ההובלה בתחום הסייבר ולהוביל בבינה מלאכותית.
דעתכם?
It’s over: Assad has fled Damascus, according to senior officers in the Syrian regime (Reuters). Syrian state television also reports that he is no longer present. Rebel forces are making their way to the communication buildings to announce the establishment of a new interim Syrian government. 54 years of the Assad dynasty and over 60 years of Ba'ath rule have come to an end. The regime has fallen.
3 true things that are hard to keep in your head, but not THAT HARD.
1. Voters hate inflation, and there's been a global incumbency backlash to prove it, which played a huge role in Trump's big victory
2. The U.S. economy out-performed the developed world in growth, productivity, real wages, and beyond
3. Part (2) remains a strangely uncovered story, in part bc popular partisan media roots for teams rather than outcomes. Here's today's WSJ oped page cheering the end of a cursed era when our poor beleaguered s&p 500 only rose ... [checks stocks] 54 PERCENT IN FOUR YEARS
I've covered U.S. elections since 2008, produced documentaries that predicted Trump’s rise before November 2016, and written a book on the failures of the liberal order and the global revolt against it. Trump's ascent underscores where Democrats went wrong—not now, but already after 2020. We’re in a Trumpian era, only briefly interrupted by four years of harsh realities and the deep failures of his first term during COVID. Trump speaks to a sentiment that the system is broken ("the American Dream is dead") and personifies that dysfunction. Meanwhile, Democrats have clung to two main narratives.
First, they argue that the liberal order has a perception problem. If people could just see things are better than they seem, they’d avoid voting for what some see as the end of the civilized world. This message—that Trump supporters, or even those considering him, are misinformed, biased, or even bigoted—has been a recurring theme from 2016 through 2024. This stance is rooted in a rich ideology, celebrating progress and the Enlightenment's achievements.
The second narrative claims that relatively modest reforms will restore the system, solving the bigger problems. These reforms are not strucutal changes to current power structures, but a software update.
The truth is, many power structures are dysfunctional, corrupt, or hollow. 20th-century mechanisms are crumbling under societal and technological shifts, and Trump is harnessing that frustration.
Globalization has brought a sense of unmooring to identity. I remember a coal miner’s wife in Pennsylvania, speaking to me in frustration, saying, “It’s never about here; it’s always about other countries.” In a sense, she meant that there is no “here” anymore. She voted for Trump, and she’s remained with him through three election cycles now.
Many will resist this. Are we to consider letting go of human rights? Of liberal democracy? The answer is a definite no. But beyond core principles, everything else within the system should be reconsidered. Our police forces were not built for an era in which much of life happens online. Our welfare networks don’t fit today’s job market. Our ideas about financial security are relics from the early 20th century. We have no idea how to run a democracy with fake news so prevalent and not agreeing on basic facts.
The message from the Democratic and classic conservative right—that the populist "barbarians" are at the gate and the city (the liberal order) must be defended—has failed. The reality is that it’s the city itself that needs rebuilding, and this uprising's energy should drive a reimagining of the liberal model.
If the call for change is left only to nationalists (as Trump calls himself), they will continue to win. Only by acknowledging that these grievances demand a transformation of the model can those who believe in classical liberalism find a real breakthrough.
⚠️ Trigger Warning ⚠️
Watch if you dare.
The full story of October 7th, as was filmed by Hamas-ISIS terrorists along with the Palestinian mob that helped them.
A lot of attempts to deny and distort history are taking place, we will not let it happen.
The truth will win.
Please share.
@BrightmindC
Huge demonstrations in Israel:
Many friends abroad have been asking why Israelis are taking to the streets today in the largest demonstrations since October 7.
Given that Hamas executed the hostages, why are they demonstrating against the government?
The reason is clear: there is a consensus within the Israeli security apparatus, including the defense minister, the chief of staff, and the head of the Mossad, that the government, led by Netanyahu, is making demands that could sabotage a real chance for a deal to return the hostages. These demands, which lack real security value, are seen as politically motivated.
It's important to note that no one in Israel is under the illusion that Hamas is necessarily interested in a deal. Israelis understand that Hamas, with its acts of mass murder, abduction, rape, and looting, is responsible for the situation we are in. However, Israelis—and especially the hostage families, and the families of those who have already been returned, alive or dead—expect the Israeli government to do everything in its power to bring them home. This includes being willing to agree to a deal.
Israel has already seen significant success in the negotiations, including a tacit agreement from moderating countries and Hamas that this deal would not mark the end of the war. The IDF would be understood to continue pursuing Hamas after an interim deal that was supposed to release between 18 and 30 live hostages, some of whom were executed in cold blood by Hamas between Thursday night and Friday.
The majority of Israelis do not trust this government. It has not won a single reputable poll since March 2023, long before October 7, and it certainly hasn't won any since then. Most polls indicate that most Israelis believe the Prime Minister prioritizes his political survival—specifically, retaining the far right in his coalition—over the return of the hostages. This fear of a disastrous election defeat, and the potential end of his political career, seems to take precedence.
This is the context behind why hundreds of thousands of Israelis, many of them reserve soldiers, are now protesting during a time of war.
They are making a single demand: that the government do everything in its power to bring the hostages back home. They do so with the full understanding that it's not only up to the government, and that the enemy is both cruel and calculated.
This demand is far more than political pressure on the government to agree. It’s about the essence of Israel as a society that enshrines the value of solidarity, encapsulated in the Mishnah’s teaching that saving one soul is akin to saving the entire world.
The idea that Israel will do everything—not only through military force, which no one doubts, but also through political moderation and compromise—to return Israelis who were kidnapped, sometimes from their beds, by a cruel enemy, is central to the Israeli identity. And it is this part of the Israeli identity that the government has completely managed to unmoor by its actions. It is this part of the Israeli identity that people are demonstrating for.
The Tour: A Reality Show 📺
52 seasons in the making, a look at the lives and loves of 'professional' tennis players as they serve nothing but drama, attitude and aces… 🎾
#TheTour#GameServeDrama
.@SecBlinken: "This could be over tomorrow if Hamas got out of the way of civilians - instead of hiding behind them - if it put down its weapons, if it surrendered. And what there ought to be...is a call on behalf of the entire world for Hamas to do just that."
As a professor who favors free speech on campus, I can sympathize with the "nuanced" answers given by U. presidents yesterday, about whether calls to attack or wipe out Israel violate campus speech policies.
What offends me is that since 2015, universities have been so quick to punish "microaggressions," including statements intended to be kind, if even one person from a favored group took offense. The presidents are now saying: "Jews are not a favored group, so offending or threatening Jews is not so bad. For Jews, it all depends on context." We might call this double standard "institutional anti-semitism."
University presidents: If you're not going to punish students for calling for the elimination of Israel and Israelis, it's OK with me, but ONLY if you also immediately dismantle the speech policing apparatus and norms you created in 2015-2016. Please read The Coddling of the American Mind. @glukianoff and I laid out exactly where the oppressor/victim frame came from (ch. 3), how it spread out of a few departments to gain power over administrators and campus culture (chapters 4 and 5), and how it drove the creation of the bureaucratic structures and processes that now have us all teaching and learning on eggshells (ch. 10). In chapter 13 we offer advice to leaders on how to to return universities to their academic mission and regain public trust.