Here's an interesting question, which was posed by Naomi Klein in a recent article published in 'The Nation' and titled “Laboratory for a Fortressed World”:

"Gaza in the hands of Hamas, with masked militants sitting in the president’s chair; the West Bank on the edge; Israeli army camps hastily assembled in the Golan Heights; a spy satellite over Iran and Syria; war with Hezbollah a hair trigger away; a scandal-plagued political class facing a total loss of public faith.

At a glance, things aren’t going well for Israel. But here’s a puzzle: why, in the midst of such chaos and carnage, is the Israeli economy booming like it’s 1999, with a roaring stock market and growth rates nearing China’s?"

And her answer is a little counterintuitive, but it's basically that the Israeli economy is growing BECAUSE of the mess, not despite of it. Her article outlines the development of the 'home-security' sector (hmm, an interesting cluster that I should suggest to Michael Porter! People taking his MoC class next year, here’s your suggestion :)) with all the surveillance, interrogation, high-tech fences, armed drones...

“”Within three years, large parts of Israel’s tech economy had been radically repurposed. Put in Friedmanesque terms: Israel went from inventing the networking tools of the “flat world” to selling fences to an apartheid planet. Many of the country’s most successful entrepreneurs are using Israel’s status as a fortressed state, surrounded by furious enemies, as a kind of twenty-four-hour-a-day showroom-a living example of how to enjoy relative safety amid constant war. And the reason Israel is now enjoying supergrowth is that those companies are busily exporting that model to the world.""

I give you that it might fully explain all the development of the country - I wouldn’t know. The number she gives are quite impressive, though. But in any event, I wonder whether those industries not only benefit from the current climate but might seek to perpetuate it... What’s the military-industrial complex in Israel like? Anyone?

Breaking News: BBC Confirms Mahmoud Abbas' Manhood

I don't know if it's a glitch -- or if it's someone at BBC News with a wicked sense of humour, BUT:
Clicking on today's headline "Israel to let in stranded Gazans" gives this page:

Ok, fine. Apart from the fact that they omit how blunt a human rights violation it is to block sick people from reaching hospitals, or to starve an entire (country?) that they are supposed to have 'disengaged' from and block food (food!!) from reaching it.. it's just a regular piece of news.

Only look at the second line of the fifth paragraph. There's a funny symbol next to Mahmoud Abbas' name. And since Firefox allows you to enlarge the font as much as you want (hit [Ctrl] and [+], baby), this is what you get:


Brilliant. British humour at its best.
Because, let's face it: the recently emboldened Abbas, coming with the promise of international aid (read: american and european aid), has effectively grown himself a new-found manhood. How else would he find the balls to stand up to Hamas, as the failure he is?

Anyways. That was fun.

(Also: they managed to mess up the name of Egypt on the map below... tsk, tsk, BBC News is going downhill!!)

War Criminals at Harvard

It's a bit of an old piece of news but still worth mentioning, because it very well might happen again -- the Harvard-based Alliance for Justice from the Middle East (AJME) is running a website about war criminals who attend Harvard University: http://harvardwarcriminals.blogspot.com/

The latest of those being, of course, Dan Halutz, who led the Israeli military during the summer war on Lebanon last year...

AJME effectively started a manhunt for Halutz on the HBS campus, where he was attending an exec programme, distributed 'Wanted' posters on him... quite some great work!

On targeted Army advertisement

It’s normal to target advertisement to the wanted demographic: you don’t want the ads for diapers to be playing in the middle of a football game, or a chainsaw advertisement to play during the Saturday morning cartoons (my favourite). I’m fine with that.

Sometimes I think advertisers get it quite wrong when they make assumptions about their demographic: for instance ads about ‘Technical institutes’ or whatever online diplomas that promise to advance your career are very frequent after 11pm. As if only unemployed, hopeless bums were watching ‘The Daily Show’.

But I feel uncomfortable when the US army starts to play their ads (we help you pay for college!) during the Dave Chappelle show (he’s a Black stand-up comedian) on Comedy Central , or on the late-night shows on BET. Hmmm, so this is your targeted demographic? Young black males? Nice. God bless equal opportunity. We are all given the chance to die for a wrong cause.

And now, I’ve just seen a US army ad on Facebook (see below).

Seriously. Apart from the principle of an ad invasion in Facebook (should I also say: of the larger public?), I find mediocre that the army does that. Facebook is primarily a website for college kids, which was recently opened to other people and the general pervs who populate myspace and the like.

And the army is now seeking fresh flesh to send to their death oversees. Puuuah.

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