Okay. I have watched the latest—and saddest—episode of Lost, and I have several questions and thoughts.

Why on earth would anyone—ANYONE—who has spent more than an hour in Ben Linus’ presence ever, ever trust a word he says? I mean, really. The only way this series ends happily for me is if Sayid or Jack or Sawyer or Kate or even Hurley walks up to Ben, say “By the way, I should have done this ages ago,” and shoots him dead. I don’t even want to hear an explanation. Don’t want to know why he did what he did. Because the man couldn’t tell the truth if it walked up to him, gave him a drink and said, “Dude, I’m the truth, and that’s the truth!”

And come to think of it, I think I’d like to see the main writers of Lost. Personally. And hit them on the heads, repeatedly, with, oh, not a baseball bat. Something light, but painful, that won’t leave lasting damage or scars. Like, a yardstick. Or a wooden paddle.

Really. If someone were to ask me to describe Lost in one word, I’d say: Mindfuck. It’s worse than the X-Files, because at least the X-Files had some non-storyline episodes where you could remember that you liked the show regardless of how stupid it got.

I hate that the acting is so good, and the storyline has managed to suck me in so much. Because it makes about as much sense as Alias, which was also J.J. Abrams, and which I watched because it was fun and silly and I never tried to make much sense of it.

I really don’t try to make much sense of Lost, either. Because when I do, my head hurts.

Remember the poison gas from the other season? The one where they did Ben’s history and showed that he was callous enough to let a whole bunch of people die? The fact that there were two rival groups of people on the island? That was never really explained. “Hey, we’re rival groups on this island where weird stuff happens. Let’s kill the other group!” Why? Never explained.

Remember how “The Others” had these, like, superhuman tracking abilities? And superhuman strength? And it turns out that they’re just human after all? Never explained.

The smoke monster? Never explained. The bears? Never explained. The fact that turning off the electromagnetic thingie would destroy the island? Never explained.

Will I watch the rest of the series? Yeah. Because it’s still good, no matter how stupid the things that don’t get explained become. Will I parse every single action and reaction? Nope. It’s J.J. Abrams. It’s stupid. It’s a step above Alias, which was a step above Felicity, but it’s still just plain dumb.

Speaking of Jameel, you simply must read this post about the effect of the loss of eight Torah students in that horrendous terror attack last week.

Every morning I take the 35 bus line to work. It’s a quick ride and usually takes no more than 12 minutes. The third stop after I get on by the shuk is directly in front of Yeshivat Merkaz HaRav. This morning I found myself a bit anxious, unsure of what I was going to see as we passed by. As I looked around, I saw death notices pasted all over the street and flowers that had been brought lined the entrance to the Yeshiva. When the bus pulled up to the stop, the driver shut off the engine and stood. With tears in his eyes he told everyone sitting on the bus that one of the boys killed on Thursday night was his nephew. He asked if everyone on the bus would mind if he spoke for a few minutes in memory of his nephew and the other boys that were killed. After seeing head nods all over the bus he began to speak.

Read it all.

Jameel of the Muqata alerted the JBlogosphere in an email that Palestinians have fired a katyusha rocket from Gaza even farther north than before:

For the first time, an member of Knesset has publicly announced that a Ketyusha has fallen the port city of Ashdod. There were unconfirmed reports of a Ketyusha hit on Ashdod last Shabbat, but there seems to have been a news black-out.

Ashdod is roughly 25 kilometers north of the Gaza Strip. From the Ministry of Foreign Affairs website:

Statistics of Kassam rocket and mortar fire from the Gaza Strip

Total attacks:
Since the first rocket fell on Israel on 16 April 2001: 2,994
Since the Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in August 2005: 2,411
Since the Hamas takeover of Gaza in mid-June 2007: 979
This year:
- From 1 Jan through 29 Feb 2008: 498
- 1-4 March 2008 (tentative): 95

Mortar bomb hits during the same period: more than 3000.

Grad missiles: during the recent escalation (27 February - 3 March 2008), 23 hits of Grad missiles were identified, most in Ashkelon. Some of them were in the northern part of the city, which was hit for the first time (including Kfar Silver, a youth village north of the city). A Grad missile also hit Netivot. The scope and frequency of launchings of these long-range missiles is unprecedented.

And now they’re hitting the port of Ashdod, Israel’s main cargo port, a major industrial zone, and home to a power station and military research facilities.

The removal of the wall on the Egyptian side was an operation long planned by Hamas and their Iranian masters. The influx of longer-range rockets and Iranian Revolutionary Guards to shoot them, and train Palestinians in their use, was part of the plan. It’s becoming increasingly obvious that Iran/Hamas/Hezbullah are about to take the war to the next level.

The Hizbullah organization has completed its military and logistic preparations for a confrontation with Israel, a senior defense official told Ynet on Monday evening, based on recent intelligence assessments.

Hizbullah’s preparations reinforce the intelligence estimate that a conflict in northern Israel is closer than a wide-scale conflict in the Gaza Strip. This may be one of the reasons why the IDF is not rushing into a comprehensive operation in Gaza.

[...] The annual intelligence review, presented to cabinet ministers Sunday by officials from the Shin Bet internal security service, Miltary Intelligence and the Mossad, said that the likelihood for a wide-scale Hamas attack in 2008 was slim.

However, the likelihood that Hizbullah will resume its violent acts against Israel is higher than the likelihood for an escalation on other fronts. An escalation on one front may lead to a similar situation on additional fronts.

Iran’s proxy armies are working overtime to surround Israel with rockets that can reach every square inch of the country. And if they do attack, Israel will also have to keep significant forces on the West Bank to prevent attacks from there as well. I am not hopeful for a peaceful summer this year. In fact, I’m starting to expect that if any forceful action is taken against Iran’s nuclear ambitions, Iran will launch a war against Israel. You may remember that during the first Iraq war, Saddam Hussein threatened to bomb Israel if he was attacked. He kept his promise, and Israel did not retaliate. It set the stage for Iran to threaten to attack Israel if anyone attacks Iran.

Deterrence works. Lack of deterrence, well that works, too—in a way you really don’t want to see.

What did the Spanish diplomat, Eduardo Propper de Callejon have in common with Raoul Wallenberg, Frank Foley and Aristades De Sousa Mendes? Like the others, Propper de Callejon risked his life and career to issue visas to Jews to escape the Nazis.

As German troops marched into France in the summer of 1940, Propper de Callejon, then first secretary in the Spanish Embassy in Paris, stamped and signed passports for four days nearly nonstop to allow refugees to escape to Spain, and from there to the relative safety of Portugal.Propper de Callejon, a Franco loyalist, defied Spanish Foreign Ministry instructions not to issue such visas. In 1941, he was demoted, and never promoted to be an ambassador. He retired in 1965 and died in 1972. The exact number of visas Propper de Callejon issued remains unknown, but Yad Vashem Director Avner Shalev said it was believed to be at least 1,500, both Jewish and non-Jewish. ”He was signing papers with both his hands. He signed so many that his hands hurt so much, my mother had to bandage them at the end of the day,” said Elena Bonham Carter, his daughter. ”It was extraordinary. He said those were the most important days of his life.”

Like De Sousa Mendes he paid for his heroism with his career.

Wallenberg came from one of the wealthiest families in Sweden. (And it’s still quite wealthy.) Propper de Callejon, though, also has a famous relative, his granddaughter.

Israel’s Holocaust memorial on Wednesday posthumously recognized a prominent Spanish diplomat, who was actress Helena Bonham Carter’s grandfather, for his role in saving hundreds of Jews during World War II.

(Yes, her name differs from that of her mother by one letter.)Not entirely related, you might remember that two other Harry Potter cast members have contributed to a Holocaust memorial event.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Solomonia and Israelly Cool write about the Greek singer, Glykeria, who gets a lot of grief back home for her support of Israel.I don’t know if he loves Israel as much, but singer Joe Jackson is excited to have some upcoming concerts in Israel.

It’s taken almost thirty years and nearly two dozen albums and countless tours, but Joe Jackson is finally coming to Israel.The Grammy award-winning jazz musician and composer says he’s always wanted to play here, and has tried to arrange it “at least two or three times I can remember,” he says over the phone from Paris,” for some reason it never worked out logistically.”

He’s clearly found a way to please the touring gods this time round as the tour for his most recent CD, “Rain,” will take him to several places he’s never been before, including Israel.

Unfortunately his big thrill with playing Tel Aviv is:

A strong advocate of smokers’ rights, Jackson has heard of Tel Aviv’s healthy appreciation of tobacco. “A friend of mine recently went to Israel for a wedding, and he said that not only could you smoke everywhere, but he went to the gym to work out and there was an ashtray next to the exercise bike. Which I thought was brilliant!”

“Healthy appreciation of tobacco?” Ironic. Still is that why he’s coming? To experience the land of Milk and Tobacco?

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.

Earlier I wrote:

Aside from the silliness of allowing Hamas to re-arm unmolested, Israel is setting itself up for a PR hit. The first time an Israeli soldier fires on a terrorist approaching the border, Israel will be the party that violated the lull ceasefire. (When Israel is blamed, it will take on the more serious term “ceasefire.”)

Well, I got the circumstances wrong, but the effect correct.

Israel kills four after Hamas sets truce termsIsraeli forces killed four Palestinian militants in the occupied West Bank, hours after the Gaza Strip’s Hamas rulers demanded a halt to all Israeli ‘aggression’ as a condition for a ceasefire

So Hamas set the truce terms and Israel violated them by killing four terrorists.

Jihad Watch, btw, wasn’t much in favor of having Hamas set the terms.

The article doesn’t say anything about Israel’s terms, but these would be just a start:1. Release Gilad Shalit.
2. Put an end to incitement in Hamas-controlled media — for example, praising the Jerusalem yeshiva attacker.
3. If Hamas likes to think of itself as “controlling” the Gaza Strip, they need to actually control it, or admit they can’t or won’t. Rocket attacks must end, and “loose cannon” jihadist groups are no excuse.

Those would be minimal requirements. There are many others that could and should be added, including the demand that Hamas renounce the goal of destroying Israel.

Jihad Watch also links to an article from Ynet that claims that one of the terrorists killed today was responsible for the massacre at Merkaz Harav.

Bethlehem sources say IDF forces operating in town kill Muhammad Shahade, Islamic Jihad operative believed to be responsible for attack on Mercaz Harav yeshiva in Jerusalem; three other militants killed in raid.

Maybe he was the mastermind, but Abu Dhaim reported to someone else. If he had been reporting directly to a high ranking member of Islamic Jihad in Bethlehem, I doubt that he would have had a clear record according the Shin Bet. So I’m not convinced that the massacre was the work of only Islamic Jihad.

There are a number of groups trying to take credit for Abu Dhaim.

As I briefly mentioned earlier, the “”Galilee Freedom Batallions” published a picture of the Mercaz HaRav mass murderer in combat fatigues to bolster evidence that they were behind the attack.The Hamas Al-Qassam website published an animation showing that this picture was Photoshopped…

I’m still reasonably certain that the Palestinian police or some other Fatah related group was involved.

Meanwhile Abbas called the killing of the terrorists “barbaric.” No word what he called the launching of more rockets at Israeli civilians.

Discarded Lies notes that

Those racist, baby-killing, genocidal Israelis are at it again

Gaza girls in Israel for heart surgery

Israeli and Palestinian heart surgeons teamed up Wednesday to operate on three young girls from the Gaza Strip under a program to save children’s lives despite hostilities between the Hamas-ruled territory and the Jewish state.Doctors said the lives of the children — aged 7, 4, and 8 months — would have been in jeopardy without the surgeries.

The baby underwent open heart surgery to correct a congenital heart defect, while the older girls were treated to close holes in their hearts. The operations were successful and the girls are doing well, doctors said.

“We ignore all the politics and we are on great terms with the doctors in Gaza, despite violence and wars,” said Dr. Akiva Tamir, head of cardiology at Wolfson Hospital near Tel Aviv, who performed the operations with Dr. Rula Awwad, a Palestinian surgeon from the West Bank.

Such barbarity.

Crossposted on Soccer Dad.