As The War Rages

Sorry for no posts considering all that's happening, been a bit under the weather here.

My in-laws, sister-in-law, brother-in-law, and nephew are heading to Israel for another nephew's Bar Mitzvah this week. (Mazel Tov to the OurBS, Eh?/Eema2Four family!) Even if they weren't, and even if almost all my living relatives and way too many friends and family friends didn't, it would still be important to know what's going on in Israel this week, as the war with Hamas in Gaza rages on, SO:

• Jameel and Dave are (as usual) live-blogging as much as possible. They're the best sources of straight up "what's happening" that you'll find, certainly here in the States.
• Jack has a pair of roundups of some of the better posts about what's happening, so check those out. He's putting together a third one now.
  
• If you only have time for a couple people, Treppenwitz has had a few great posts this week that really get to the heart of it all; he also notes what anyone can do to help.
• ADDeRabbi has probably the shortest, sweetest post that nails the media coverage perfectly. (Eliezer StrongBad also liked this one and pointed it out as well.) On the flip side, Daled Amos notes that this time around is a little better, with Al-Aqsa even showing a Palestinian girl blaming Hamas for all wars. We'll see.
• I thought this DryBones comic was telling. Read his post, too, but here's the comic: Note that this was not written today, but 33 years ago. Some things just have not changed...
  
• Finally, one thing the IDF and Israel seem to have realized is that PR is extremely important. To that end, the Israel Defense Force seems to have created a YouTube account - IDFNADESK - and they have been putting up videos of operations being carried out. The videos are very telling, showing just how Hamas situates itself among civilian populations - from ammunition depots to carrying missiles to trucks for transport in the middle of the cities - before showing them being blown off the face of the earth. It's actually mind-boggling that Israel has managed to be as precise as they have been in avoiding civilian casualties. (Trep has a good post on this, actually.) Here's one of the videos:

Please have everyone in Israel and serving in the military in your prayers.