CONGRATS TO JEFFREY WRIGHT ON HIS BEST ACTOR OSCAR NOMINATION FOR AMERICAN FICTION

 

 

Science Fact

 

 

The Meaning of Gaza’s Tunnels

Jan. 23, 2024, 7:00 p.m. ET

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By Bret Stephens

Opinion Columnist

Ever since Israel withdrew its soldiers and settlers from Gaza in 2005, critics have accused it of blockading and immiserating the territory — turning it, as Israel’s inveterate critics say, into an “open-air prison.”

The charge was always preposterous. Gaza shares a border with Egypt. Gazans were often treated in Israeli hospitals for cancer and other life-threatening conditions. Israel provided Gaza with much of its electricity and other critical goods even after Hamas came to power in 2007.

Now, as Israeli troops uncover more of Gaza’s vast underground city, the falsity of the accusation has become even more apparent.

According to a report this month in The New York Times, Israeli defense officials now estimate that Hamas’s tunnels measure between 350 and 450 miles in a territory that’s just 25 miles long. (By comparison, the London Underground is only 249 miles long.) Some of Gaza’s tunnels are wide enough for cars; some are more than 150 feet deep; some serve as munitions depots; others are comfortably kitted out as command bunkers.

Israeli officials also estimate that there are 5,700 separate entrances to the tunnels — many of them with access from civilian houses and some directly beneath Gaza City’s main hospital, which U.S. intelligence agencies say was also used as a Hamas command center. Within that maze, scores of Israeli hostages, including a year-old infant, are being held without fresh air, sunlight, adequate medicine or food, or visits from the Red Cross.

All this should radically reconfigure the world’s understanding of what Hamas has done in, and to, Gaza. It has turned the territory into a gigantic military fortress purpose-built to attack Israel, endure Israeli retaliation and interpose civilian lives and infrastructure as part of its means of defense. Imagine any other government doing something similar to its people — say, putting the NORAD command center directly below Times Square — for a sense of the outrage Hamas is perpetrating against its own people.

That’s not the only outrage. How much did it cost to build these tunnels? How much concrete, steel and electricity did it divert from civilian needs? How many millions of hours of labor were given to the effort? What was the cost of building up its stockpile of thousands of rockets, which continue to be fired at Israel? How many ordinary Gazans had to be conscripted into the effort of miserably shoveling dirt deep underground — and how many perished in the effort?

We may never know for sure. But in 2014, around the time Israel first started to get a sense of the scale of Hamas’s tunnel network, The Wall Street Journal, citing Israeli military officials, reported that the cost of building 32 tunnels (a small fraction of what has since been uncovered) came to around $90 million.

“Some tunnel-building materials also came from aid earmarked for development projects by international aid agencies in Gaza or were purchased on the open market when Israel allowed some imports into Gaza starting in 2010,” The Journal added.

In other words, Hamas stole from foreign donors, subtracted what probably amounted to billions of dollars over several years from Gaza’s gross domestic product, and diverted labor from productive to destructive ends, all to feed its war machine. Western progressives are usually against this sort of thing, at least when it comes to the guns-to-butter ratio in their own democracies. Why are they virtually silent about it now?

The tunnels also help explain the level of destruction that Israel has wreaked on Gaza since the war began. If Hamas hides the bulk of its fighters and munitions in the tunnels, Israel somehow has to find, search and destroy those tunnels. If Hamas builds the entrances to those tunnels inside private homes, schools or hospitals, those places all become military targets.

And if there are nearly 6,000 such entrances, the destruction is all but guaranteed to be epochal — just as it was in Mosul when the United States assisted Iraq in destroying ISIS (which was much less deeply entrenched there than Hamas is in Gaza) over nine months in 2016 and 2017. I don’t recall “Cease-Fire Now” demonstrations on college campuses back then.

It’s possible that Israel could fight with more discrimination to spare Palestinian lives while still destroying Hamas’s ability to make war. If so, it behooves Israel’s constant critics to explain precisely how, and to do so in a way that doesn’t let Hamas off the hook. Otherwise, the tragic reality of this war is that it is going to be catastrophic for Gaza — not because Israel wills it, but because Hamas spent years of cynical efforts to make it so.

Hamas could have averted this tragedy if it had turned Gaza into an enclave for peace rather than terror. It could have averted it if it had not started four previous rounds of war against Israel. It could have averted it if it had honored the cease-fire that held on Oct. 6. It could have lessened the blow against Gazans by fighting in the open, not behind civilians. It could have eased it by releasing all of its hostages. It could end it now by surrendering its leaders and sending its fighters into exile.

 

Till then, something I wrote in October holds true now: Hamas bears the blame for every death in this war.

 

NEW INC. MAGAZINE COLUMN FROM HOWARD TULLMAN

Why Older Workers Are Now the Better Choice

There's a lot to be said for youth and inexperience, but many companies today need wiser, more experienced workers to get them through the next business cycle. It's time to go gray. 

 

EXPERT OPINION BY HOWARD TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH INVESTORS@HOWARDTULLMAN1

 

As more and more businesses begin to feel confident about the stickiness of the post-pandemic economy, and their revenues crest or outstrip their pre-Covid levels, company owners and managers are beginning to slowly try to hire back people they have let go in the last three years. That's not necessarily an easy task because a lot of their former team members have moved on, moved out, or aren't interested in returning to their old jobs.

To allow this rebuilding to be done at scale is also going to require a sizeable amount of attitude adjustment on the part of all the parties. Millions of young people think the stock market only goes up and that the world is just waiting to make them rich. Millions of middle-aged people thought they had signed up for lifetime employment and now are learning that they need to be lifelong learners to stay relevant and employed. What keeps growing never grows old. And millions of aspiring entrepreneurs think that tech is going to solve all the world's problems if the old guys will just get out of the way. It's going to take a lot of patience, pain, and perseverance to pull off this process of re-upping and reloading the workforce.

Hiring the right number, desired skillsets and demographic mix of new employees is clearly more challenging than before because rapid advances in various AI technologies, new, increasingly intelligent robotics, and the expanded automation of many traditional processes have changed the game. A significant number of the old positions have been eliminated (or compressed) and many others require new and different skills.01:23

As a result, the job descriptions and search parameters for qualified candidates who are already trained and can smoothly step into the open slots have also been altered and updated. Experience and expertise are going to be highly valued, along with the ability to hit the ground running. The last thing that many of these companies desire is to spend a lot of scarce dollars for on-the-job training.  

Another large group of theoretical prospects are the pools of recent college graduates -- a great number of whom have never had a full-time job. Unfortunately, far too many of them have unrealistic compensation goals, work-life expectations, and other employment requirements, which make them less attractive and riskier hires. They don't seem to have gotten the memo about what "work" actually means in the real world. They've also never lived through a real economic downturn or suffered through a recession and seen friends and families lose their jobs, savings, and sometimes far more than that.

So, they're softer, less resilient, and aggressively impatient -- but not in a good way. Since things have largely always gone their way, they haven't really learned much about adversity or the bitter compromises everyone eventually makes in life. You don't really learn from good experiences and success -- you just keep doing things the same way that you always have done.

Energy, enthusiasm, and eagerness used to be critical considerations in hiring new employees. These are still important attributes, but we're facing another year or two of market uncertainty, slow and careful growth rather than explosive leaps, and an overall interest in patience, prudence and hunkering down to weather the next storm. Security, stability, and liquidity are going to be top of mind for senior management, stockholders, and stakeholders and no one wants to be seen hanging way out over their skis.

As a result, in the smartest and most competitive companies, we're going to see another dramatic shift in their hiring perspectives: more focus on gray hair, prior, relevant work experience and, maybe most importantly, men and women of a certain age who are now far more readily available in significant numbers. They're grounded, serious and realistic and they're much more about taking orders than taking risks, and that's a good thing. These are the mid-careerists who've seen the hard times and remember the troughs and valleys that always offset the peaks and moonshots that have been all the media rage for the last two decades.

The pampered and hyper-parented Gen Zers have heard incessantly, their whole lives, about home runs, trees that grow to the sky, and the glory days. By contrast the older folks have seen the bumps in the road as well. People who've maybe lost a serious job or two; who have serious financial, family, and other obligations; and, frankly, who are likely to be excited and grateful to be rejoining the working world at this point in their careers. What they may lack in speed and reaction time is far less critical in the tortoise times to come when only the craziest rabbits are running amok. The fact that they appreciate the opportunity and what they can make out of it instead of regarding a job as something they're willing to settle for in the moment tells a smart employer everything you need to know.

Resilience is a powerful muscle that grows stronger over time and through repeated exercise and testing. Our teams need it now more than ever.

COULD THESE MAGAts BE ANY DUMBER??

 

CLARENCE IS STILL THE BIGGEST CROOK ON THE SUPREME COURT

 

Eileen Burke

 

Huge congratulations to the team at Bunker Labs

 

Joseph KopserJoseph Kopser • 1st • 1stKeynote Speaker | Innovation Consultant & Strategist on the Future of Work | Serial Entrepreneur | Military Veteran |Keynote Speaker | Innovation Consultant & Strategist on the Future of Work | Serial Entrepreneur | Military Veteran |15m •    15m •

Huge congratulations to the team at Bunker Labs for being acquired by the Institute for Veterans and Military Families - IVMF. Reflecting on the last decade of my professional journey, it's clear how integral Bunker Labs has been, not just to me, but to countless others.

From its inception in Chicago to its expansion to Austin and then nationwide, Bunker Labs has been a beacon of growth and support for veteran entrepreneurship. I remember vividly the excitement of August 14th, 2014, when Bunker Labs launched in Chicago at 1871, thanks to Howard Tullman's support. After exiting from Cohort 1 due to our acquisition by Mercedes, the following year we proudly opened its first chapter in our RideScout offices in Austin, Texas with the generous support of many including Bob Metcalfe and Mayor Steve Adler.

Witnessing its remarkable growth over these nine years has been nothing short of inspiring. The impact Bunker Labs has made on veteran entrepreneurship and the greater good is monumental. This journey wouldn't have been possible without visionary founders like Todd Connor and Brandon Bodor, who laid the foundation, and the unwavering support of individuals like Blake Hogan, Jonathan and Sabrina Wojtewicz in launching the Austin chapter-- all who were instrumental in propelling us forward.

Seeing Kelly Perdew and Craig Cummings rise to the National Board of Directors, followed by Blake Hogan becoming the CEO, has been heartwarming at every turn. The events held at the Capital Factory in Austin, supported by Joshua Baer and the CF Dream Team, and the backing from The University of Texas at Austin, have been pivotal to their success.

As I eagerly anticipate hosting IVMF in Austin this February, I can't help but express my immense excitement for the entire team. The role models like Shaydi DeJesus, Marcus J. Carey, Anthony G., Bret Boyd, Miles Murray, Samantha Snabes and countless other Bunker company founders have been inspirational for Veterans across the country to live out their dreams.

Here's to the next chapter of innovation and impact.

hashtag#BunkerLabs hashtag#VeteranEntrepreneurship hashtag#IVMF hashtag#Innovation hashtag#Leadership hashtag#GrowthJourney"