Here is the YouTube link if the player above is not working: https://youtu.be/5b9LCc79o7c

Hybrid solution

The Bridge Between

Technology & Human Care

Traditional one-to-one support is limited by time and scheduling. Pure AI solutions offer scale but can sacrifice human judgment. MindBridge captures the benefits of both.

Dr. Klempner was a guest on The Yakking Show in  October 2023. He is a pioneer in the use of sound to stimulate the vagus nerve to overcome trauma. Dr. Klempner uses gongs, chimes, and bells in his therapy sessions. He has worked with frontline military service members and prisoners.

Here is the link: https://theyakkingshow.com/portfolio/the-healing-power-of-sound-unlocking-the-vagus-nerve-with-dr-binyamin-klempner-ep-276/

He also contributed updates on the war after the terrorist attacks on Israel on 7 October 2023, which were published on my blog.

Here is the link: https://peterwrightsblog.com/category/the-contrarian-view/updates-from-israel/

Bridge Image by JamesDeMers from Pixabay

The post Overcome Trauma – Mind Bridge With Dr.Binyamin Klempner appeared first on Peter Wright.

Over the last few years, the veins had been getting worse and one section on the inside of my upper leg looked like a coil of half-inch rope. There was also a bulge the size of a golf ball on the inside of my knee and several smaller bulges in my lower leg. Varicose veins are hereditary; my father had surgery on both legs in his early fifties. I am fortunate to have escaped surgery till my 70s.

Did my years of running contribute to the condition? The surgeon – a very capable and competent South African – thought it unlikely. She recommended surgery as varicose veins left untreated can cause circulation problems, ulcers that do not heal easily, and even a thrombosis.

The procedure is done under general anaesthesia. An incision is made in the groin, another lower down the leg where the vein is tied. A plastic rod like a mini-augur is inserted from the top, the bottom end of the cut vein is attached to the end of the rod and the vein is then pulled up and out from the top. The procedure is repeated in stages for all the affected veins down the leg. In total, I had 11 incisions.

From distant memories of my father’s experience 65 years ago and reports from others, I expected the recovery to be somewhat painful and definitely uncomfortable. I was pleasantly surprised. After recovering from the anaesthetic, I was sent home with my leg bandaged from groin to ankle. I was told that for three days, I must keep the leg elevated. No walking or standing except for visits to the toilet and no bathing or showering.

Three days later, it was with great relief that I removed the bandages and all the dressing and had a shower. For the next few days, I kept the leg bandaged and elevated when sitting. I drove both my car when necessary, and my tractor to clear snow.

The recovery was not painful; I did not need to take any painkillers, it was less painful than the incisions to remove two skin cancer lesions from the same leg six weeks earlier.

After ten days, I resumed my morning walks and daily routine of situps, press-ups and other exercises. Now two weeks later, the bruising all down the inside of my thigh has gone. There are still slight swellings and at times, a tight feeling in my thigh. The incisions have all healed well and the surface sutures have dissolved. This week, the surgeon was happy with my recovery but warned me not to overdo things for a little longer.

Next year, I will have the other leg done.

I spoke about it in the most recent episode of our podcast and YouTube channel Health Declassifed.

Snow

We have had an above-average amount of snow this December, with about 10 inches in three days. Despite the surgeon’s warning to take it easy, I had to spend a few hours in the tractor clearing our and a neighbour’s drive.

Wishing you a Merry Christmas and a happy, peaceful, and safe New Year.

The post Varicose Veins, Snow And Merry Christmas appeared first on Peter Wright.

To recap, I had a heart attack in September 2010, just after my 60th birthday. I wrote about it in this post. I did not think it was serious. The doctors and later a cardiologist thought otherwise. They kept me in the hospital for a few days and told me I could not return to farming. Within a week of returning home, I started walking. Starting with 500 metres a day, I gradually increased my daily walks until I was walking 4.2 km every morning. The odd distance was because a mailbox 2.1 km along our quiet country road provided a convenient turning point. I was also back on my rather difficult horse within a couple of weeks.

The cardiologist did not think a stent or bypass surgery was required. I was prescribed the conventional mix of statins, blood thinners, and ACE inhibitors for cholesterol and blood pressure control.

After a few weeks, I was well enough to do short-duration jobs for farmers, some truck driving, crop scouting, operating a crop dryer, and managing a seedling greenhouse. These provided some desperately needed income while trying to get an online business started.

The doctors were happy with my progress and reduced my medication. I kept up my walking, intermittent farm work and many hours cutting and splitting wood. I did notice that I no longer had the stamina for many hours of continuous hard physical work. By 2016, I still felt good, but Sue noticed I was slowing down. At my annual check-up with the cardiologist that year, he was not happy with my performance during the stress ECG on the treadmill. He referred me to a cardiac surgeon who recommended bypass surgery with the warning that without surgery, I would almost certainly have another heart attack within five years and that it would probably be my last one. A good reminder of the possible consequences of a heart attack.

Life After Bypass Surgery

On the 13th of February 2017, I had a double-bypass surgery. It was not the most pleasant experience, but I was walking circuits around the hospital after three days and home after five. I started walking on the road a few days later and, within a few weeks, was back to my regular 4.2 km morning walk. It was not long before I could walk the distance in less time than before, and I added some longer 6 to 10 km walks.

My stamina improved dramatically. I no longer had the feeling that “someone switched the engine off” when I pushed myself beyond a comfortable level of exertion. Once again, I could walk upstairs quickly, spend hours cutting and splitting wood and do more physical work than I had done since the heart attack.

One of my goals was to walk one of the routes of the Camino de Santiago before I turned 70. In September and October 2019, just after my 69th birthday, I walked 250 km (150 miles) from Porto in Portugal to Santiago in Spain. The journey took me 12 days, I carried everything I needed in my backpack which weighed 9kg (20lbs), I stayed in mainly Pilgrim hostels, some with rooms with 6 occupants, others with large dormitories with 30 or more beds.

It was an amazing adventure, and I had no health problems, no lack of energy. Before embarking on the journey, I had thought that I would be one of the older pilgrims. On the road, I met many men and women in their 70s and some in their 80s. It was after the end of school holidays and university vacations, so there may have been more young people on the road in July and August.

I wrote about my experience in these posts.

Thoughts On The Consequences Of A Heart Attack

15 years after my heart attack and 8 years after bypass surgery, I have found out that life is certainly not over. The heart surgeon who operated on me told me that once I had recovered, I could do anything I wanted. Climb mountains, run marathons and ride horses. She thought my knees, probably from the stress of too many marathons, would stop me before my heart.

New Look For Our Podcast

You may know that my co-host, Kathleen, and I changed the focus of our podcast At the end of 2023, we switched to interviewing guests with health and wellness expertise. Earlier this year, in 2025, we rebranded the show to reflect our new focus. We are now Health Declassified, and we have had many fascinating guests sharing the latest developments in topics as diverse as epigenetics, essential supplements, nutrition, women’s health, and longevity.

We are noticing an increasing awareness of the need to take responsibility for our own health. A growing number of people are investigating natural remedies, alternative and holistic health solutions. We aim to bring more experts to our podcast in our bi-weekly guest episodes. Every Thursday, Kathleen does a “deep dive” into a health topic and I give an update on current and future guests. We send out a weekly newsletter with details of the deep dive and future guests. You can get it by subscribing here.

A range of natural remedies we endorse – and we take some of the products ourselves- is Dr. Morse’s Herbal Health Products. The range includes tinctures and capsules for detoxification, products to assist kidney function, for men’s health, and women’s health.

Here are some of the tools we use to produce this podcast.

Kit for sending emails and caring for subscribers

Hostgatorfor website hosting.

Podbean for podcast hosting

Airtable for organizing our guest bookings and automations.

Clicking on some links on this site will let you buy products and services which may result in us receiving a commission, however, it will not affect the price you pay.

The post Long Term Consequences Of A Heart Attack appeared first on Peter Wright.

We have rebranded our “The Yakking Show” podcast and YouTube channel to “Health Declassified” to better reflect our focus on health and wellness topics. We have had some interesting guests in the last few weeks. Especially if like me you are now considered a senior and want to stay healthy and active as long as possible.

Although on a much larger scale than the terrorist war in Rhodesia in the 1970s and 80s, the reports remind me of the parallels between the two conflicts. Both countries were condemned by most of the rest of the world, had few allies, were vilified in the media and both were fighting enemies which had no compunction in killing innocent civilians. We were dealing with AK-47s, landmines and bombs in shops. Israel is facing missiles, drones and rockets. Conscripted civilians and volunteers formed the bulk of the military in Rhodesia, as they now do in Israel. Citizens fighting for their countries. Virtue on the side of those doing their duty.

There are two important differences. Israel has, under the government of President Trump, the support of the USA, including a supply of weapons – we had to make our guns and ammunition. Despite some trade barriers, Israel can openly export most of its sophisticated products and services to international customers. We were faced with sanctions and embargoes.

Many other countries, covertly or overtly, support and assist Israel. Rhodesians were abandoned by our WWII allies, and after the coup in Portugal, Mozambique changed from ally to enemy, leaving us with only South Africa in our corner. Ultimately, international pressure on South Africa ended that support. We won the war on the ground convincingly, we were not able to survive the betrayal by the West. The disaster that is Zimbabwe today is a testament to the virtue of our cause.

Reminiscent of the 1967 Six-Day War, Israel has executed the opening week of this war with careful planning and brilliant execution. We hope and pray that the people of Iran will now rise up against the oppressive regime of the Ayatollahs and bring the conflict to a quick end.

I had not heard from my friend Dr. Binyamin Klempner – a previous guest on The Yakking Show for some time. I was concerned for his safety and contacted him last week. He replied with an update, which I have included below. His previous updates can be found here: Updates from Israel.

June 17th, 2025

Dear Friends,

My wife and I just returned from an anniversary dinner at a restaurant that opened recently in the neighborhood. The food was fresh and delicious. We were the only guests at the restaurant, a restaurant which had been bustling with business a week earlier. It was nice having the place to ourselves. If you’ve ever been the only patron in a restaurant during a blizzard, that was the atmosphere. As we finished ordering an alarm went off on my phone. Then an alarm went off of the chef/owner’s phone. My wife and I, along with the waitress and two co-owners/chefs, went into the nearby bomb shelter. Before we could enter, an explosion in the sky shook the earth. A woman driving down the street with her daughter parked across the street and ran with her four-year-old daughter into the shelter. For ten minutes we schmoozed and then, along with the co-owners/chefs and the waitress, a young woman of about twenty-years with a lovely personality, we went back to the restaurant to enjoy a truly delicious meal. The Iranian Regime didn’t stop us. Didn’t scare us. Didn’t take away our appetite. My daughter meanwhile was on the stairwell outside of our apartment with her two younger brothers, and my thirteen year old son who was out of the house, took shelter in a nearby bomb shelter. When the sirens go off in the middle of the night, we lose sleep. However, it brings me great satisfaction, pride, and pleasure to hear the fighter jets fly overhead on their way to Iran to whoop them the whooping they brought on themselves – knowing that the Iranian Regime, the same regime that was behind the October 7th attacks and the Hezbollah attacks, was two weeks from acquiring a nuclear warhead with plans to exterminate the people of Israel because we’re Jewish. If the price of giving them a whooping is lost hours of sleep, the discomfort of missiles falling nearby, and the inconvenience of sitting in a stairwell with chain smokers at four in the morning, so be it.

Yesterday when President Trump advised the people of Tehran to evacuate, many did. Yesterday when the Ayatollah advised the people of Bnei Brak, where my daughter, son-in-law, and granddaughter live, to evacuate, no one did. The feeling on the streets here in Israel, despite the destruction caused by missiles, is electrifying. The feeling is like the English during the Blitzkrieg. We’re proud. God protects us. We’ll get through this.

Now, as I listen to the roar of jets, I think, and I think often, of the Ayatollah’s dead, contorted, silly-putty trunk, his legs and pale, blood-drained corpse head somewhere nearby. I watch the news and I laugh at the site of Iranian Regime Missile launchers, launchers aimed at me and those I love going up in flames. They have no reason to have hated me. I never wronged them and my people never wronged them. Now, I enjoy watching their demise. The site of a frazzled Regime news anchor as a bomb hit her studio during a live broadcast. I watched it with my children again and again and again. I laughed. We laughed at her fear. We laughed at her suffering. To be honest I would have liked to have seen her mangled. 

I need to go now. I need to get my kids and bring them to the stairwell. The siren is sounding.

I’m now with my family on the stairwell. The sound of booms and army helicopters. (Army helicopters are great for shooting down Iranian drones).

We make jokes. Trying to laugh at the situation. I’m reminded of the Monty Python skit in which King Arthur battles the Black Knight. After chopping off the Black Knight’s arm and assuming victory, the Black Knight quips to King Arthur, “Tis’ merely a scratch” and continues on fighting until being reduced to merely an armless, leggless stump, who, still unwilling to accept defeat threatens to bite King Arthur’s legs off. This is the Iranian Regime. Even in war, there is humor.

As the saying goes, “You know Willard, one day this war’s going to end…”

All the best. 

Be well. Stay safe. 

Binyamin Klempner

—————————————————————-

June 19th, 2025

I’m outraged. Iran hit a major hospital with a missile. But even greater is my outrage regarding the silence of the nations. The silence of the lambs. I return too often to an unpleasant memory. I was attending social work school at Barry University School of Social Work in Miami Shores, Florida. My Hasidic garb didn’t go over well with the social work departments idea of how a social worker should be dressed. It was decided that I should receive a hearing before the department board in which I could present my argument for why I should be allowed to continue my studies in their school. In retrospect I should have dropped out of the program there and then. But I didn’t. During the very anti-semetic, and self-hating, self-loathing, (if you include the “Jewish” faculty), hearing, I made a comment, it wasn’t a thought-out comment, it just came out like vomit, I commented, “The world just doesn’t like the Jews.” They protested. Turning the observation on me. Accusing me of being paranoid and obnoxious. Well, if they’re dead, I’m certain those Barry Social Work faculty members are burning in hell, and if they’re living, I’m certain they have hell to look forward to. Seroka Hospital in Beer Sheva was hit. Where is the outrage? The lack of world outrage, this is my greatest outrage.

Be well. Stay safe. Be outraged.

Binyamin Klempner

Thank you Binyamin, I continue to pray for your, your family’s and your nation’s safety and for a quick and decisive victory for Operation Rising Lion

You can support Binyanin’s mission to support Israeli soldiers by buying his book. It’s on Amazon.

The post Update From Israel – Conflict and Virtue appeared first on Peter Wright.

Compensation for Zimbabwean Farmers

Despite the Zimbabwe government’s attempts to convince the world that it is paying compensation for our stolen farms, it is not doing so. I wrote about it in detail in this post.

For more background on farming in Rhodesia as it was, I recommend Peter MacSporran’s blog, “Not Now, Just Now”.

The post President Trump Calls out South Africa’s Ramaphosa for Murder of White Farmers appeared first on Peter Wright.

Those of you who have followed my story will know that I was one of those farmers. I was arrested and put in a police cell for three days and nights for refusing to leave our farm. We have never seen our home again and were forced to move to Canada to survive. Zimbabwe farmers are now scattered all over the world and many are in desperate financial straits.

The image above was taken during 6 weeks of intimidation in late 2002 when part of the mob of 60 surrounding the security fence around our house was blocking our only entrance to prevent us from leaving. In the background is Mildred, our brave maid who insisted on coming to work every day and forced her way through a narrow gap to get through the gate. Several of our workers refused to get involved in the intimidation, often at great risk.

A statement from the Compensation Steering Committee (CSC) setting the record straight is included below. A detailed account of one family’s experience by Ben Freeth is attached at the end of this post.

Please spread the correct story widely so that international pressure continues to be applied to the Zimbabwe government to compensate all those who had their farms stolen and the families of those who, like Martin Olds, Dave Stevens and others, were murdered for refusing to surrender to tyranny.

A link to a report on the murder of Martin Olds by a Zimbabwe Government hit squad is attached below.

Like many others of Zimbabwe’s White farmers, we are working well past retirement age just to survive while our farms have reverted to unproductive bush or are being illegally used by those who have bought favour from the government.

Link to Ben Freeth’s report on farm Invasions

Link to report on Martin Old’s murder.

For more information on the sad state of Zimbabwe, see Zimbabwe Situation.

The post The Truth About Compensation For Zimbabwe’s White Farmers. appeared first on Peter Wright.

This may be a rambling post, but I want to let you know that I am still in the land of the living. Happy that I have no serious issues as a result of the heart attack in what is now the distant past of 2010 or bypass surgery in 2017. I do complain about the abysmal state of the Canadian health system since its decline during the last 8 years, thanks to the Liberal government’s mismanagement of the economy and mass immigration. However, I am grateful that the doctors, surgeons, medical staff and hospitals were outstanding when I needed them. Without them, I may not be writing these words.

It’s ironic that my son in third-world Zimbabwe can get to see a family doctor within an hour, a specialist within 2 days and surgery for non-life-threatening issues within a week, all for an affordable monthly premium for his family, including medical evacuation by helicopter or plane to South Africa for serious problems.

Since the ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas-Hezbollah war, there have been no updates on the situation on the borders from Binyamin Klempner. His last personal email to me indicated that he was helping injured and depressed soldiers with counselling and trying to raise funds to extend these services. His previous updates are all available here. Updates From Israel.

You can support him in his good work with this link. https://thechesedfund.com/theunityfarmfoundation/support-our-israeli-soldiers

Farm Expropriations in South Africa & Canada

The ANC dominated government in South Africa has now followed Zimbabwe’s lead and has started listing White owned farms for expropriation without compensation. South Africa has a lower percentage of arable land than Zimbabwe, and more than triple the population. The result of farmers being forced off our farms has decimated the Zimbabwe economy and reduced the country to dependence on food aid. That most of our approximately 500 000 farm workers have died from inadequate nutrition or are living in poverty does not concern the government at all. As long as the select few well-connected to the corrupt leaders can continue enriching themselves, nothing will change.

25 years later, we are still waiting for compensation for our farms. Five years ago, the Zimbabwean government agreed to pay a discounted value for the improvements on our farms but not for the land. It then reneged on this promise and is now selling new “title deeds” to unsuspecting individuals and developers for our farms or parts thereof, of which, according to international law we are still the legal owners.

Farm expropriations are not confined to Africa. There is huge pressure in Canada to persuade – and in some cases force- farmers near cities to sell to developers. Standing crops of maize (corn) where ploughed in and conservation plans have been overridden. Farmers are fighting back with some success. The situation has been aggravated by the government’s irresponsible immigration policy which has allowed hundreds of thousands of immigrants to flood into the country. This has created huge pressure on housing and for job creation. The misguided “green” policy of subsidising huge battery manufacturing plants for electric vehicles – which are not selling – is another problem.

Life In Canada

After one of the coldest winters with the most snow in the 22 years I have lived in Canada, we are being teased with promises of Spring. We have had daytime temperatures as high as 21C and a few days later down to -2C. The snow that had been on the ground since early December has melted, adding welcome moisture to the soil for this year’s crops. Snow from the three light snowfalls in the past week soon melted on the ground.

Thank goodness I have a tractor with a cab for snow clearing. It is only a 2 wheel drive, so the exercise can get quite interesting with getting stuck and having to pull my way out with the front loader bucket a regular occurrence.

Quite often, in temperatures well below zero, the inches of snow on the tractor bonnet (hood) do not melt even after several hours of operation.

Last month, we had provincial elections, with the Conservatives being returned to power with a low voter turnout. The premier called the election at the worst possible time for opposition parties to campaign.

Next month will be the federal election. Our former Prime Minister resigned as leader of the Liberal party and prorogued parliament to prevent a vote of no confidence and stall calls for an election. Now, we have a new party leader as an unelected Prime Minister hoping to win a hastily called election on 28 April. Like his provincial leader’s example, a move to handicap opposition parties’ campaigning efforts.

There is much consternation in the land about the USA President, Donald Trump’s, threats to make Canada the 51st state and his imposition of tariffs as a lever to get Canada to tighten border security and stop the flow of hard drugs and immigrants.

The hypocrisy of a government and media-inspired wave of patriotism to “buy Canadian” and fly the flag when those who flew the flag during the trampling of rights and personal freedom during the protest convoy to Ottawa were vilified is sickening.

My Podcast

This month, co-host Kathleen Beauvais and I have been producing weekly episodes of our podcast for five years. A year ago we changed our focus from business to health and wellness, particularly holistic, alternate and natural health. As a result of that change, we are rebranding and changing the name of the show to Health Declassified. We have had many fascinating guests on the show, with one guest episode every second week and a weekly wrap-up where we explore health topics.

We recommend Dr. Morse’s Herbal Health Club natural products; you can check them out at that link. If you use YakkingShow as a coupon code, you will get a 5% discount. However, as a first-time customer, you may be offered a bigger discount.

p.s. Here are some of the tools we use to produce this podcast.

Kit for sending emails and caring for subscribers

Hostgator for website hosting.

Podbean for podcast hosting

Airtable for organizing our guest bookings and automations.

Clicking on some links on this site will let you buy products and services which may result in us receiving a commission, however, it will not affect the price you pay.

The post Farm Expropriations and Life In Canada appeared first on Peter Wright.

So much has changed in the week since Binyamin wrote this update that I included my message to him today.

It is interesting how much has changed since you wrote that update.

Hezbollah defeated, Assad fled to Russia, the Syrian military weaponry totally destroyed by your airforce and ground forces, Druze villages petitoning to be administered by Israel and today, reports that Egypt is asking Israel for help. A noticeable silence from Iran.

The last two weeks must be among the most momentous in the Middle East’s history and significant in a wider context.

Apart from the usual idiots staging anti-Israel protests at universities and despicably, outside synagogues in the pathetically governed nanny states of Canada and Australia, opposition to Israel’s defending itself seems to have quietened down considerably since Syria started falling and people in the West suddenly woke up to the fact that Israel is the only country with the resolve, resources and capability to stop Syria from becoming a terrorist-governed state with a dangerous arsenal of weapons.

Perhaps the farcical videos of “victims of genocide” actors in Gaza getting off stretchers and walking normally on supposedly broken legs when they thought the cameras were turned off are helping liberal Westerners wake up.

Here is Binyamin’s update from the 4th of December 2024

There were only two checkpoints left right next to the Lebanese border. One of the military police officers manning the checkpoint did a little joyful jig when he saw me. I had made him coffee about six months earlier at a different checkpoint, a checkpoint that no longer exists. Except for this and that one other checkpoint, none of the checkpoints are still there. Man was he happy to see me. We reminisced. About days that used to be. Days that hold meaning for us. I made them coffee. Only coffee I made that day- and drove on. 

Some time later I was standing on the observation deck of Mount Adir with a bunch of paratroopers still in the reserves. They were telling me about their two weeks in Lebanon. The Hezbollah operatives didn’t mind being killed, just so long as they could take some of our guys with them in an ambush. But our soldiers were fast to learn Hezbollah tactics, and to avoid them. The guys were tired. They wanted to go home. They wanted to go back to work. A couple hours later I met up with a couple more paratroopers. One guy was telling me about how depressed he is having just been informed by his university that he’ll need to repeat an entire year of studies.

The guy who was with him told me that while his marriage is still strong, most other guys who stuck out in their battalion over the past fourteen months have floundering marriages that they can barely go home to. He was talking about himself, but didn’t want to tell me that. So I gave him my number, told him I’m a marriage therapist and I expect to hear from all the guys in the battalion whose marriages are on the rocks. He then mentioned that October 7th their battalion had all one-hundred-twenty members. Half of them dropped out.

Now sixty guys were carrying the weight of the other sixty guys. He said the other sixty guys weren’t willing to sacrifice their marriages and families and educations and careers for their country, so they returned, and those willing to make the sacrifice are now being confronted with the enormity of the sacrifices they made. I told the guy to spread my number around. Then I took out some of the patches donated by my cousin Marc and in ceremonial fashion stuck those patches to their sleeves. 

But for the most part it’s over. 

Just today I saw this editorial in the Time of Israel:

Isolated Hamas faces collapsing negotiating stance after drastic Trump threat

Terror group pinned hopes of salvation on the Iranian axis and world pressure on Israel, but now has just a few weeks until an unpredictable and angry US president returns

By Lazar Berman

Earlier this week, two days after Hamas released a propaganda video showing American-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander pleading with Donald Trump to secure his release, the American president-elect typed out a message that was sure to make the terror group and its backers in Iran take notice.

“Everybody is talking about the hostages who are being held so violently, inhumanely, and against the will of the entire world, in the Middle East – but it’s all talk and no action!” Trump wrote Monday on his Truth Social platform, without mentioning Israel or the Palestinian terror group by name.

“Please let this TRUTH serve to represent that if the hostages are not released prior to January 20, 2025, the date that I proudly assume Office as President of the United States, there will be ALL HELL TO PAY in the Middle East, and for those in charge who perpetrated these atrocities against Humanity,” he continued.

The message was posted by a famously voluble leader, but it should not be underestimated.

It comes at the worst possible time for Hamas, and could be what is needed to finally break the terror group’s unwillingness to recognize the weakness of its position in hostage talks.

Sinwar’s three bets

For much of the duration of war that erupted on October 7, 2023, Hamas — under the guidance of the late Yahya Sinwar — believed its bargaining position was only improving with time. Once its leaders recognized they had withstood the height of Israel’s military offensive in early 2024, Hamas staked its hopes on three developments.

First, Sinwar and his senior aides hoped throughout that the expansion of the conflict with Hezbollah and Iran would force Israel to sue for a ceasefire in Gaza in order to avoid a multifront war that would exact too high a toll on its soldiers and home front.

Second, they also believed that international pressure — from the US and Western allies, the United Nations and bodies like the international courts in The Hague — would force Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept a hostage deal that would leave Hamas standing in Gaza, and in a position to rebuild both its grip on the territory and its military force.

“We have the Israelis right where we want them,” Sinwar told other Hamas leaders, according to a June report in The Wall Street Journal. The higher the civilian death toll in Gaza, the more pressure would be put on Israel, he said.

Government hostage point-man Gal Hirsch argued in a recent speech that there was a “direct and immediate connection between pressure on Israel and Hamas’s appetite for negotiations.”

“Hamas identifies every ‘daylight,’ every sliver of light, and whenever it identifies ideas like ‘we won’t give you ammunition,’ arms embargoes, removing reservations about the ICC [cases], this doesn’t help us to reach hostage deal,” Hirsch said at Reichman University.

As for the third factor, Sinwar, a close observer of Israeli politics, had certainly noticed the growing domestic anger at Netanyahu as the months passed. Protests by hostages’ families and their allies merged with anti-Netanyahu demonstrations, and a growing number of Israelis were calling for an end to the war without Hamas routed — if it meant the hostages would come home.

Shortly before his death in mid-October, Sinwar told Hamas’s leadership that a long war against Israel was beneficial. “The longer it lasts, the closer we get to liberation,” senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan recounted Sinwar saying.

Sinwar is now dead, but those making decisions in his place did not immediately seem willing to make any major concessions, either — at least not until recent developments knocked the pillars out from under Hamas’s position.

Tables turning

When Hezbollah began assaulting Israel to support Hamas in October 2023, it vowed to continue to do so as long as the war in Gaza continued. This past September, Jerusalem reached the limit of its patience and launched a massive offensive against the group. After being hammered by Israel via air, ground, and pager, the wounded terror militia last week threw in the towel without a ceasefire in Gaza, abandoning its previous position and leaving Hamas in the lurch.

And though Iran’s willingness to strike Israel directly with ballistic missiles twice in the past year was sure to raise Hamas’s hopes of salvation, Tehran has so far not made good on its promise to strike a third time. And with the Bashar Assad regime in Syria under new military pressure from rebels, the Islamic Republic appears to have its hands full trying to avoid losing another key member of its axis.

Following Trump’s victory in the US elections, international pressure on Israel is likely to wane, with Netanyahu expecting a more reliable veto in the United Nations Security Council, a quicker flow of key weapons and intense pressure on the International Criminal Court as it goes after the Israeli leadership.

Domestic opposition to Netanyahu isn’t going to push him to a deal either. Firing defense minister Yoav Gallant removed the chief internal advocate of an urgent deal, and bringing in Gideon Sa’ar’s New Hope party stabilized the coalition.

Perhaps, over time, the protest movement’s pressure on Netanyahu, with its carefully chosen slogan of “Bring them home now!” could have gained enough traction in the public.

But Hamas no longer has time on its side.

The pressure is on

In a little over six weeks, Trump’s deadline will arrive. His slogan, which puts the onus squarely on Hamas, seems to be “Release them now!”

It’s not clear what Trump might do to back up his threat, but his disdain for norms makes his ultimatum credible in the region. He could make Iran pay for Hamas’s intransigence through sanctions, strikes on oil and gas sites, or even attacks on Revolutionary Guards forces and Shia militias outside Iran.

Trump is unlikely to order strikes against Hamas itself in Gaza, where Israel is handling the fighting. However, he could see to it that Hamas leaders abroad have no comfortable home in the region, and could provide Israel with the means to target them as they flee Turkey and other countries they’ve called home in recent years.

And, of course, he could give Israel the green light to carry out new, stepped-up raids in Gaza, with less concern for humanitarian aid reaching civilians.

Netanyahu on Tuesday unsurprisingly hailed Trump’s “very strong statement,” noting that the US president-elect had made it clear “that there is one party responsible for this situation — and that is Hamas. Hamas must release the hostages.” Trump, said an appreciative Netanyahu, “put the emphasis in the right place — on Hamas, and not on the Israeli government, as is customary in some places.”

Apparent cracks in Hamas’s resolve have already been showing. Last week, The New York Times reported that the group was expressing increased flexibility in its demands.

Citing two people familiar with the terror group’s thinking, the report said leaders of the terror group have been discussing allowing Israel to maintain a temporary presence in the Philadelphi Corridor, the strategic border area between Egypt and Gaza where Netanyahu has insisted Israel must retain control.

According to the New York Times report, “reality started to sink in” for Hamas after Sinwar’s death in October, as it became clear that Iran was not looking to enter into direct conflict with Israel, and that Hezbollah was being hit hard by the IDF.

But even in Hamas’s new, perilous reality, the fundamental gulf separating Israel’s red lines from Hamas’s core demands remains. The terror group continues to insist that in any hostage-release deal, the IDF will end up fully withdrawing from Gaza, and Hamas leaders and operatives will remain in the Strip, poised to slowly rebuild themselves over time. Israel sees that outcome as a loss, letting the perpetrators of October 7 survive and threaten it once more.

Now, with Trump making his desires crystal clear, Hamas has a decision to make.

It could use the next few weeks to get the best deal it can, allowing Israel to retain a much-reduced troop presence in Gaza, which it hopes will disappear in time under domestic or international pressure, when other countries increasingly see IDF forces in Gaza as part of an occupation that stands in the way of the Strip’s reconstruction.

Or it can continue to hold on to the hostages and the hope that Netanyahu will eventually break, while it faces the unpredictable commander-in-chief of the world’s most powerful military — a man who famously doesn’t like being refused.

It seems to me that either way you look at it, the war is winding down. In the north, at least for now, it’s over. I drove along an empty highway through areas that used to be full of soldiers for whom I would stop and make coffee and talk. I visited places I’ve wanted to visit since the beginning of the war. Keshet Cave. Yifatch National Park. The summit of Mount Adir. But on the highways there were no soldiers, no Humvees. Just civilian traffic.

I look forward. And I also look backward. I look forward and see the soldiers I gave my number to, letting him know my services as a counselor are available to him and to his men. I look backwards and see meaningful days gone by, meaningful days that inform, that give storied instruction, to days ahead.

Thank you for joining me on this journey.

All the best,

Binyamin Klempner

Thank you for your latest update from Israel , Binyamin, and we look forward to your next update after the overthrow of Assad in Syria and the radically changed situation in your neighbouring countries.

The post Update From Israel 4th December 2024 – Already Out Of Date By 12 December. appeared first on Peter Wright.

As you may know, I am the co-host and producer of The Yakking Show Podcast with Kathleen Beauvais. Recently, it was my turn to be on the other side of the microphone and camera when I appeared on Pat Wetzel’s Bump In The Road podcast. Pat has her own amazing story of overcoming adversity and she has an uncanny skill for finding people with their own incredible stories of overcoming their “Bumps In The Road”. I recently listened to her episode with Dr. Mary Neal who talked about her near-death experience after a kayaking mishap left her trapped underwater for 30 minutes.

A Child In A New Country

Shortly before my 6th birthday, my father flew to Rhodesia where he had been posted by his employer. Air travel in Africa in the 1950s was arduous, protracted and expensive. It took my father several days with many refuelling stops to make the journey from London. For convenience and I guess economy, my mother, younger brother and I made the journey by ship to Cape Town and then a two-day train ride to Salisbury.

That was a huge adventure for a young boy and the first of many I was fortunate to experience during my life in Africa.

My parents rented a house on two acres at the outer edge of Borrowdale, a suburb of Salisbury, the capital city. The house was about three miles from the junior school where I was soon enrolled and immediately subjected to teasing for my “Pommy” English accent. My father had a driver’s licence because he had learned to drive in the army during WWII. My mother had never driven a car.

A chauffeur driven car would come to collect my father for work and bring him home. He had the use of a company vehicle for weekends. I would be dropped at school in the morning, sometimes by a passenger van or minibus, occasionally travelling in the official large, stately, 1940’s 1940s-era Austin used for ceremonial functions. That enhanced my status at school and diminished the teasing. With essential transport requirements met my father was not in a great hurry to buy a car.

There was one problem, how to get me home from school which for kindergarten finished at 12 pm and for juniors, 1 pm.

For the first few weeks until my mother could arrange lifts for me with neighbours, she pushed my younger brother in a stroller the three miles to school and we walked home. his was unheard of in Rhodesia. There was limited public transport and no busses in our suburb. White people did not walk anywhere unless visiting places of interest or short distances between shops in city centres.

This added to my label of eccentricity. Going to school in a car, sometimes one that looked like a Rolls Royce, then walking three miles home under a hot African sun was more than most of my classmates could understand.

My First Horse

Fortunately, the walking home phase did not last long. Lifts with neighbours were arranged.

Then, my father started looking for a car. At the same time, he started looking for the horse he had promised me when we first arrived.

One Saturday, we travelled in the office minibus to Bromley about 25 miles or 40k southeast of Salisbury. There my father saw a three-year-old strawberry roan Basuto pony mare. He decided she would be right for me and bought her. Ignoring my mother’s protests that a car was a more urgent need because she couldn’t drive anyway.

Horse trailers were scarce in those days, so Rosebud as she was named was put in a stock carriage and sent by train to a siding in Lochinvar on the far side of Salisbury from Borrowdale. My father rode her home and she took up residence in a hastily built paddock with a huge wooden crate as a shelter.

The next day was my first riding lesson. I was lifted onto a very basic soft felt saddle on Rosebud’s back and my father led her out of the drive and along a road. At just three years old, she was not well trained and it soon became obvious that she had not been ridden much. Young horses and inexperienced riders are a dangerous combination

A few days later on my second or third ride, we came across an old rusty oil drum lying in the long grass on the side of the road. Rosebud was convinced it was a lion about to attack her and refused to move. My father kicked the drum to show her it was safe. She reared and dumped me on the ground. The first of many falls off that horse, it left me unhurt but shaken and with no sympathy from my father, I was told to stop whining and get back in the saddle. That was the style of parenting and I am glad I was exposed to it.

Relaxed Parenting and Building Resilience

Within a couple of months, my parents felt that I was competent enough to ride away from home on my own.

That was the start of a series of adventures and a lifelong love of horses and equine sports.

A few hundred yards down a quiet road were hundreds of acres of farmland which was designated for residential development in the years ahead. With its future uncertain for agriculture, it had reverted to grassland and bush. It linked up with a vast expanse of farmland and had become an informal game sanctuary inhabited by wild pigs, small antelope, civets and serval cats, an abundance of birdlife. Jackals and leopards were rumoured to pass through although I never saw any evidence.

This became my childhood extended backyard. After school, I would saddle Rosebud and ride along the footpaths that meandered across the expanse of unspoilt bush. At times in hollows or patches of bush, I could not see a single house or any sign of human interference. In my mind I was riding across the veld as a Boer fighter defending my country from the brutal English. Or a pioneer on the months-long trek from the Transvaal to the Rhodesian Highveld.

There were no mobile phones back then. Once I could ride reasonably well, my parents did not worry about me. Unless I had chores to do, collecting eggs, killing and plucking chickens, I was free to ride all afternoon as long as I was home by dusk and in time to feed and groom Rosebud.

I was not even 10 years old.

I have more to write about parenting and the gift my parents gave me by allowing me to take risks. I will continue in the next post.

If you are interested in other ideas on raising resilient kids, you might enjoy a recent Yakking Show episode with guest Jeff Nelligan who wrote a book with that name. You can get it here.

p.s Here are some of the tools we use to produce this blog and the podcast.

Kit for sending emails and caring for subscribers

Hostgator for website hosting.

Podbean for podcast hosting

Airtable for organizing our guest bookings and automations.

Spikers Studio for video editingClicking on some links on this site will let you buy products and services which may result in us receiving a commission, however, it will not affect the price you pay.

The post Parenting for Resilience & Enjoying a Bump in The Road appeared first on Peter Wright.

Watch out for my next post which will explore the way our lives in Africa helped prepare my and my sons’ generations for life.

Dear Friends, 

Summer vacation is a time for experiential education. A time to give our children the value-based education they rarely receive in brick-and-mortar schools. With that in mind, I took my twelve-year-old to conflict zones to make coffee for soldiers. My cousin, Marc Frost, gave me a thousand bucks to have patches embroidered for soldiers. Patches have messages on them. Messages that instruct. Messages that inspire. The message, the patch, paired with the coffee and the barista, make for a story that sticks. Sticks with them through the tough times of being under fire. The guys couldn’t have been happier with the coffee and the patches and father-and-son team that inspired them. Really proving Napoleon’s words that, “The moral is to the physical as three to one.” “Hey guys, you know…we’re only half of the team, the other half is stationed with some tank guys up the road a bit. You think you’d mind going up there and making them coffee and giving them patches? It would mean a lot to them.” “I don’t know man. It’s real sketchy up there…and I got my twelve-year-old with me.” “It’s safe man. I get it if you don’t want to go up there. But it’s safe now. Okay, it’s only safe because they can’t see us. But they can’t see us.” “Alright man. We’ll go. But call them first. I don’t want to just show up. I want them to be expecting us.” “No problem. Of course I’ll call them. They’ll be expecting you.” 

Twenty-minutes later…”A child?!?! Can’t believe this! You guys are making us ice-coffee??? God bless you!!! It’s hot today! By the way, how did you get here?” “I drove my car. How do you think I got here?” “Obviously, but, I mean, nobody comes this way.” “Well, I guess we do.” “I guess so.” “Didn’t your friends down the road tell you we’re coming?” “No. But that’s okay. We’re glad you showed up. But you know, you guys can’t be here unless you eat with us.” “That b-b-q gives me indigestion just looking at it, but it’s okay, my son can eat for the two of us while I make you guys coffee.” I hand a guy a coffee. “Hold on. Give me back that coffee.” I take the coffee out of the guy’s hand and give it to the officer. The officer grins quietly. He’s a petite blond haired fellow in his mid-twenties with piercing blue eyes and an ever-so-calm demeanor. “Now. I’m going to embarrass the commander. But that’s alright. Because I want you guys to know. Had I not given him the coffee, you guys would have let him go last. He’s the first to go into battle and the last to let himself get served around the dining table. And that’s a true commander. But you guys. You guys need to make sure he gets the honor due to him.” “He’s shy. You’re embarrassing him.” “I see. I’ll stop embarrassing him.” We all laugh. We had a good time. Tanks. Machine guns. Buckets full of bullets. Night vision goggles. Making this war into a family’s summer outing. The enemy tries making us miserable.

We take it as an opportunity to have fun. Nothing infuriates an enemy more than seeing their enemy unafraid and having fun. Eating good meat off the grill. A father-son visit to the front makes a mockery out of Hezbollah, a jerk out of Nasrallah. During the early days of this war I met a guy who couldn’t eat meat because it reminded him of the smell of burnt human flesh. Well, those days are behind us. All hardened soldiers. All warriors. The guys loved the coffee as much as my son enjoyed the grilled sausage and burgers. The patches I gave them had the words of Sun Tzu embroidered on them, (in Hebrew of course), “As swift as the wind. As gentle as the forest. As Fierce as fire. As unshakable as the mountain.” Before taking our leave a soldier asked me to give some advice on soldiering. I told him a story I’d heard, during the Seven Year War there was a prince who was severely rebuking a Major for his failure. After some time the Major spoke up for himself blaming his failure on the fact that he was following orders from a Colonel to which the prince rebuked him, “The reason his majesty the prince made you a Major is because he thought you would know when to disobey an order from a Colonel!” The soldier nodded and laughed. He asked, “Before you leave here. You have to tell me. Why do you come to conflict zones? What do you enjoy about being here?” I told him, “You’re not wearing a mask. And I’m not wearing a mask. Everywhere else, we pretend. Here. There’s no pretending. Just being. Being here is a breath of fresh air.” And then, with a lighter tone, “And the view. You just can’t beat the view.” We laughed. My son and I left. An hour later. We were home. On the way I asked him, “So, you had fun?” He answered: “I had a great time!” 

I was speaking with one soldier recently who said it well, “There’s nothing left to do except cry and pray for the Messiah.” This statement came after I had told him about a border guard up the highway from where we were. A missile fell about three hundred meters from us. He said that it was their everyday life. Rockets falling. He said that after the war he’s going to have awful PTSD. Having not been in combat he was embarrassed to have such a reaction and excused himself for it. I told him that he doesn’t need to excuse himself. I told him, “Look man, rockets are exploding around you. And there’s nothing you can do about it. You can’t fight back. You’re normal to have PTSD.” He appreciated the validation. Anyway, the soldier I told this to, before saying that there’s nothing to do but cry and wait for the Messiah said, “You know…I’d rather be in Gaza than here.” “Why’s that?” I asked. He answered, “Because in Gaza you can react. Here…there’s no reaction. Just being attacked and swallowing it. Trying to stay safe. Trying to stay out of the way. Here you’re a sitting duck. And there’s something else you should know…Everyday I see the people who live up this road pass by this checkpoint. I’ve gotten to know them, at least by face.They don’t live in their homes, but many of them run businesses out of their homes. They can’t just walk away from their homes. And their faces…their faces don’t look right. There’s something about their faces that doesn’t look right anymore. Their faces don’t look like regular human faces. Something sad replaced their faces. Something distant. Not the face of a human.” The only thing to do is cry. I went on to the next checkpoint. Made coffee for the female soldiers working it. One of the soldiers said to me reflectively, “You know…when this war is over, as a nation, we’ll need to turn inward and work on the bigger problem. Our division.”

Just got off the phone with a fundraiser from one of these international IDF “friends of” organizations. The guy I was speaking with, a fundraiser who makes around eighty grand a year, began telling me all the many and wonderful things his organization does to help soldiers suffering from PTSD after they’re discharged from their service. I called his bluff. He gasped and hung up on me. I guess he didn’t dig what I had to say.

This from Israel National News:

Mental health officer who attacked religious Zionists discharged

Uzi Baruch Aug 27, 2024, 8:27 PM (GMT+3)

Commander of the 91st Division Brigadier General Shai Klapper decided on Tuesday to dismiss the mental health officer of the Alexandroni Brigade, Adi Angert, after she accused the brigade commander of wishing for genocide and spoke out against the religious Zionist sector on social media.

Angert wrote that the brigade commander, Colonel Moshe Pasal, wrote in a letter to his troops: “May the villages of Lebanon be desolate and may its roads have no outlet,” and commented: “The brigade got a new commander. The first thing he does is to wish that the soldiers commit genocide. Amazing.”

In addition, she referred to the religious Zionist community as a “cult of death eaters.”

The IDF stated that a non-commissioned officer in reserves “expressed herself severely and inappropriately on social media while still in active reserve duty.”

She was summoned on Tuesday to a hearing by the brigade commander, Colonel Moshe Pasal. During the hearing, the commander made clear that such severe remarks have no place in the IDF. At the end of the hearing, the commander of the 91st Division decided to discharge her from her position and from serving in the division.

The IDF praised the brigade’s soldiers: The soldiers of the Alexandroni Brigade and its commander fought from October 7th until today and brought important achievements both in the north and in the south.” Brigade commander Pasal himself rushed to fight terrorists on October 7th, was wounded in battle, and returned to the battlefield.

In a heated debate on X, Angert mentioned an opinion column in Ha’aretz which lashed out against Laly Dery, whose son Saadia fell in battle while serving in the Alexandroni Brigade, and stated that Dery “exhibits satisfaction with her son’s death.”

Haim Goldich, a reservist in the brigade and Kan 11 journalist, protested the column by Rogel Alpher and wrote: “It’s not enough that people sacrifice their lives so we can live here, this brat dares to write such disgusting things about a bereaved mother. Ungrateful, repulsive, and shocking.”

Angert did not understand “what’s wrong with what he wrote.” In another post, she wrote: “She’s proud of death. That’s terrible, and that’s religious Zionism. A cult of death eaters.”

NCO Angert, and those like her, with their faux sophistication and moral judgment, cause defeat both on and off the battlefield. Officers such as NCO Angert are the reason armies lose wars. They are more dangerous to the moral courage of our soldiers than anyone on the other side of the battlefield. 

Stay supportive. Stay strong. 

Sincerely, 

Binyamin Klempner

P.S. An unfortunate P.S. Going up to visit soldiers isn’t cheap. Between gas, coffee, ice, cups, patched tires (of which there are many) each visit costs me about $150-$200. At this point, it’s mainly out of my own pocket. But it’s got to stop. I can’t afford to keep going on a regular basis, never could but did it anyway. For now, I’ll go whenever I have a sponsor. No sponsor, no visit. https://thechesedfund.com/theunityfarmfoundation/support-our-israeli-soldiers 

You can also support Binyamin’s visits to soldiers by buying a copy of his book. It’s good, I have read it.

Here are some of the tools we use to produce this podcast.

Hostgator for website hosting.

Podbean for podcast hosting

Airtable for organizing our guest bookings and automations.

Spikers Studio for video editing

Clicking on some links on this site will let you buy products and services which may result in us receiving a commission, however, it will not affect the price you pay.

The post Real-Life Education – Israel Update August 16th – 31st appeared first on Peter Wright.