Isn’t language wondrous? President Donald Trump announced on Monday that Israel and Iran had reached a “ceasefire” deal, at least temporarily ending what he called “the 12-day war.” Fantastic! Here’s how the New York Times described how this went down:
“The sides traded fire until the last moments before it went into effect, and Israel said Iranian missiles had killed four people.” Literal next sentence: “Soon after the truce began, sirens again blared in northern Israel. Israel said Iran had launched missiles during the cease-fire, a claim Iran’s military denied. ‘We will respond with force,’ the chief of staff for Israel’s military said.”
So, to recap: the two sides were trying to blow each other up directly up to the moment of the — ahem — ceasefire, and then proceeded to continue to try and blow each other up immediately after it took effect. But wow, that precise moment when fire ceased and cooler heads prevailed. Inspiring.
For his part, Trump seems to be getting a tad exasperated that his public proclamations don’t carry the weight of god’s word behind them. Criticizing both sides for their part in turning a ceasefire into a beginfire, or perhaps a keepfiring, he told reporters that “they don’t know what the fuck they’re doing.” Which of course raises some questions about why he decided to join this apparently misguided bombing campaign — though whether Donald Trump ever actually knows what the fuck he is doing is somehow never the primary question for most media.
On Tuesday morning the president told reporters on Air Force One that he had spoken with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and told him to recall planes “on the verge of attacking Iran,” per the NYT again. He also took to social media, obviously, to say the same thing publicly, shouting “BRING YOUR PILOTS HOME, NOW!” into the void. Trump also told reporters that a nuclear weapon was the “last thing” on Iran’s mind at the moment, which, again, poses some issues about Trump’s participation in Netanyahu’s rogue-state warmongering.
A bit later in the morning, Netanyahu’s office announced that their post-ceasefire strikes had destroyed a radar system near Tehran, but that they would hold off — “cease” one might say, “firing” — after that. What the rest of the day brings in this — let’s see, “shaky,” “fragile,” “teeter[ing],” “broke[n],” and so on — ceasefire is anyone’s guess.
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