Frontlines

I have never seen a war in which the “day after” is discussed as much as the war being waged against Hamas in Gaza. Israel appears to be on the road to victory, but there are still months of fighting up ahead. Because it is a guerrilla war, there has to be flexibility in understanding that it is a complex process. The fact that Hamas terrorists dress and blend in as civilians makes it even harder.

If Mazi Melesa Pilip gets elected on Tuesday, February 13, in a special election to fill the George Santos vacancy, she will achieve many firsts. She will be the first Black Jew ever to be elected to Congress. She will be the first American-Israeli woman ever to be elected to Congress. She will be the first Black of Ethiopian extraction to be elected to Congress. If elected, she will be the only Black Republican woman in Congress. There are presently five Black Republican men in both houses: Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, Reps. Byron Donalds of Florida, Burgess Owens of Utah, Wesley Hunt of Texas, and John James of Michigan.

World War II officially began on September 1, 1939, when Germany invaded Poland. Some might contend that it actually began in March of 1938, when Germany annexed Austria. Others would say it began with the Munich Agreement, which was an appeasement pact orchestrated by British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain allowing Germany to annex the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia in September of 1938. Chamberlain has gone down in history as the “Great Appeaser.” America did not enter the war until the bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Many lives could have been saved had the United States entered the war earlier.

Sometimes a country has to hit rock bottom before it wakes up. I believe that is the case with America. There is hope America can be fixed. The recent resignations of President Liz Magill of the University of Pennsylvania on December 9 and President Claudine Gay of Harvard on January 2 is a strong indication that America is in a state of transformation.

MIT has changed a lot since the days when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attended and received degrees in architecture and business and nearly a third in political science. He would have gotten that last degree had it not been for the fact that his brother Yoni was killed in the Entebbe raid in 1976. Prime Minister Netanyahu was called into action by Prime Minister Begin. He was so brilliant that only a handful of individuals accomplished what he did at MIT in the four years he spent there - and none had to take a hiatus for 40 days to fight in the Yom Kippur War in 1973 the way he did.

Israel is leading the fight against barbarism, terrorism, and evil. Israel is in its own existential battle, but it is exposing the fault lines and fissures that face society today.