In case you missed it, because the three major network evening news over-the-air broadcasts were all pre-empted by football:
Hamas launched a major assault on Israel this morning. Thousands of rockets fired into Israel. Ground incursions by Hamas troops into Israeli towns. Hundreds of Israelis killed I finally found a use for the free streaming service my new Samsung TV offers: watching CNN headline news.
Interesting tidbit in this PBS report. Today is one day after the 50th anniversary of the 1973 war that kicked off the oil embargo, that added fuel to the embers of inflation in the US.
I hate to be that guy, but Israel and the Palestinians going at it isn’t a black swan. It has been standard operating procedure for nearly 100 years now.
I really, really hate to be that guy, but in reality this has been going on since the dawn of time and people were living in caves. But this could be a black swan for any Israeli companies in your portfolio.
For all you self-hating guys… at the day job several years ago, I had a pod mate with extreme confidence in his own being right all the time, demanding that everything go according to him, and a very short tempter. It was like sitting next to a grenade on which the pin had been pulled. Not a matter of if it would explode, only a matter of when.
The timing for this could hardly be worse. It does divert attention from the Israeli judicial “reform” that was pushed through a few months ago, that drew massive protests from Israeli citizens. But the US House is in limbo. The stock market sputtering. The POTUS with very low poll numbers.
Will the market bid the price of oil up, way up?
Didn’t the previous POTUS broker a deal between the Israelis and Saudis a few years ago? A deal that the Pals were not a party to? US might not be viewed as an “honest broker” by the Pals.
But wait! There’s more. Remember Bin Laden’s issue with the US was the US troops stationed in Saudi. The US troops were moved out, to Qatar, about 10,000 of them. Qatar has always been tight with Hamas, and was making favorable comments about Hamas today. If the US does anything to Hamas, will we be tossed out of Qatar?
I really really really hate to be that guy that points out they are each others’ bogeyman, providing the needed threat that unites their respective cult members.
That’s not a Black Swan though. You know with a high degree of confidence there will be a conflict in this region, so you can plan for that. The Black Swan is the event you didn’t think about.
Some people said COVID was a Black Swan. But in the 2007 book “The Black Swan” Taleb specifically said that a “strange virus” coming out of China was something we should plan for. COVID was a big disruptive event, but not even close to a Black Swan.
Ok well if not a black swan how about a gray swan. Because it still has to be a big disruption to business in Israel. But if a Black Swan is something that nobody has ever thought of, I do not think there can be a black Swan event then. If there is could you please name it.
“Black Swan” is both misunderstood and used for shock treatment, a.k.a. click bait. The Arab-Israeli conflict is better called a semi-active volcano. It rumbles, it erupts, it kills and maims, and solves little.
The media is consistently reporting Israeli intelligence was taken completely by surprise. They apparently had no ideal Hamas was going to pull an op of this size and complexity.
…can’t believe we are disputing the hue of a swan, rather than the implications of the biggest attack on Israel in decades.
So, when a former leader with multiple criminal charges against them retakes power and focuses all his energy on creating new rules to corrupt the political process and protect his own self interest, can we really be surprised by this type of result?
When this type of event happens is a surprise. That this happened is not. That it caught the Israelis so unaware is also a surprise. Malcom Nance looked at that in his Substack article today.
only sort of maybe bigger than expected but still works for Netyhu just fine or
Israeli intelligence screwed up big time and that is Big News
As to Israeli securities, well, all of them I have ever owned had almost all their assets and production outside of the country with the exception of the pure brainiacs working via internet scattered all over hill and gone from bunkered hamlets to (mostly) TelAviv.
Decades ago I started telling my Israeli and Palestinian friends they should leave their beloved homeland because, well, what others on this thread have pointed out – war, sadness, betrayals, stupidity, and cruelties of all sorts are guaranteed for some time to come.
There has been discussion that Israeli intelligence focused on comms and data intercepts, which Hamas may have evaded by taking a low tech approach.
Recall a war game in the Persian Gulf, 20 years ago. The USMC General, who played the Islamic boogyman, confounded the western powers by taking a low tech approach: like using motorcycle messengers, rather than electronic communications, because messengers were more secure. This is all reminiscent of the air war over North Vietnam. US doctrine was that all air/air engagements would be fought with missiles. When our guys got into combat, they found the missiles didn’t work worth a hoot, and they desperately needed an old fashioned gun, and dog fighting skills that date from WWI.
Red, commanded by retired Marine Corps Lieutenant General Paul K. Van Riper adopted an asymmetric strategy, in particular, simulating using old methods to evade Blue’s sophisticated electronic surveillance network. Van Riper simulated using motorcycle messengers to transmit orders to front-line troops and World-War-II-style light signals to launch airplanes without radio communications in the model.
…and it is always useful and pertinent (alas!!) to remember that both the Israeli and Hamas governments are heavily dependent on conquest oriented religious wackos with high reproduction rates that are themselves largely exempt from fighting and heavily subsidized by both their controlled states and arch wackos and powerful cynics living overseas.
I do not see any way this does not become quasi genocidal, with the ruling Saudis and Iranians and many polarized USAians will be both frothing at the mouth and dancing with glee.
My remaining Israeli and Palestinian friends are all alive but hunkered down in various bunkers.
The Israeli PM today: Sounds like he is channeling General Sherman.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned people living in Gaza to leave as he vowed to turn parts of the territory “into rubble” in revenge for a “black day”.
at the day job several years ago, I had a pod mate with extreme confidence in his own being right all the time, demanding that everything go according to him, and a very short tempter. It was like sitting next to a grenade on which the pin had been pulled. Not a matter of if it would explode, only a matter of when.
