The New York Times highlighted the risks:
The article begins:
Heavy fire from rooftops and booby-trapped apartments. Armor-piercing projectiles blowing up troop carriers. Fighters blending in with civilians, launching drone ambushes, or surging from tunnels full of enough ammunition, food and water to sustain a long war.
As the Israeli Army gathers tanks at the Gaza border for a threatened invasion aimed at crushing Hamas, experts are warning that the country’s troops could face some of the fiercest street-to-street combat since World War II in Gaza City and other densely packed areas.
Urban warfare studies and American officials offer dire comparisons to Iraq: Think of Falluja in 2004, the most intense battles that American troops had faced since Vietnam, or the nine-month fight to defeat the Islamic State in Mosul in 2016, which led to 10,000 civilian deaths. Then multiply the destructive toll, possibly exponentially.
Hamas has three to five times as many fighters — perhaps 40,000 in all — as the Islamic State had in Mosul. It can draw reserves from a young, restive population, and has international support from countries like Iran. Even on its own, Hamas’s leadership has had years to prepare for battle across Gaza, including in city streets, where the superiority of tanks and precise munitions can be stymied by guerrilla tactics.
“It’s going to be ugly,” said Lt. Col. Thomas Arnold, a U.S. Army strategist who has published studies on urban operations in the Middle East. “Cities are the devil’s playground — they make everything infinitely more difficult.”
My son, Michael, has a better idea for Gaza:
Netanyahu announces a plan to build Gaza into a comfortable, prosperous, democratic place. Michel calls it his Endless Love Program — an updated Marshall Plan.
Many countries in the middle east — from Saudi Arabia to Qatar, from Israel to Egypt — would contribute money and resources to make the vision happen. At least $100 billion to start.
The world – including America and Europe — would contribute resources and management.
In ten years, Gaza would be the Singapore of the Middle East.
Israel could make it happen. Today, tiny Israel is a critical part of the world’s economy. It’s a country of great technology and great innovation. Examples: Waze, Mobileye, ICQ (first Internet chat), Teva Pharma, Amdocs, SodaStream, etc.
Rebuild for a better life for Gaza. A magnificent Vision from war to peace.
The Gazans might actually welcome the Israelis.
Study. Study. Study.
Picking stocks is hard. I study and I study and I study. Most time I study anything, it pays off. Like with starting new magazines or trade shows. But picking stocks…
Yuch.
Don’t feel for me. I still own the stocks — handsome ones like Apple, Amazon, Google, Meta (Facebook), Microsoft, Nvidia, TSM and Tesla. But my gains this year are gone.
This is what my portfolio at Fidelity looks like:
+ Short-term treasuries 63%
+ Stocks 34%
+ Cash 3%
In addition I have a bunch of real estate syndications (most of which are doing OK) and two homes I float between. So I’m not on the street, homeless. But I am furious that all my efforts to learn and understand the businesses of The Magnificent Seven have come to naught this year.
From CNBC today::
The Nasdaq Composite dropped deeper into correction territory on Thursday as Meta became the latest tech company to offer a forecast that didn’t quite live up to investors’ expectations.
The tech-heavy index lost 1.2%, dropping below its 200-day moving average for the first time since March. The S&P 500 dipped 0.6% while the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 103 points, or 0.3%. With Thursday’s decline, the S&P 500 came close to a correction from its July intraday high.
Following a 2.4% decline on Wednesday, the Nasdaq Composite is now officially in correction territory, down more than 10% from its high close for the year in July.
Wall Street hasn’t been impressed with big-tech earnings so far and the remaining ones, Amazon and Apple will likely struggle given the weakening outlook for the US economy,” said Ed Moya, senior market analyst at Oanda. “Strong demand from today’s seven-year auction shows you investors are still concerned with all the geopolitical risks that remain on the table.”
The BIG lesson from 2023?
Diversification works.
Favorite recent cartoons
If you missed this morning’s blog on World War III in the Middle East, click here.
As I walk Amsterdam, I notice metal paving stones commemorating Dutch Jews who died at the hands of the Nazis:
Tomorrow we’re visiting Anne Frank’s house, now a museum. Killing of Jews has been going on for a long, long time.
Maybe Michael’s idea — if it came from somebody as hawkish as Netanyahu, might work? If you know anyone in Israel, send them Michael Newton’s Brilliant Idea for Gaza.
And pray for no more killings. — Harry Newton, whose father and mother ran away from the Nazis in 1939 to Australia, where I was born in 1942.
