One of the biggest lacunae on Wikipedia is its lack of an entry on Natasha Hausdorff, a London barrister and expert on international law who happens to work with the UK Lawyers for Israel. She has a sterling background:
She holds law degrees from Oxford and Tel Aviv Universities and was a Fellow in the National Security Law Programme at Columbia Law School. Natasha previously worked for Skadden Arps, in London and Brussels and clerked for the President of the Israeli Supreme Court, Chief Justice Miriam Naor, in Jerusalem. She regularly briefs politicians and international organisations and has spoken at Parliaments across Europe and at the United Nations.
Hausdorff is, along with Douglas Murray, one of the most eloquent and articulate spokespeople for Israel. In this Triggernometry interview, highlighted by a reader today, and which I watched during lunch, Hausdorff debunks several of the Big Lies that propel opposition to Israel: Genocide, Apartheid, and Occupation—all at bottom expressions of antisemitism and, according to Hausdorff, expressions of modern “blood libel.”
I have watched so much Hausdorff that her arguments here aren’t that new to me, but I love to hear her speak. Like Pinker, she speaks in complete sentences and paragraphs. For those of you who don’t know how international law applies to Hamas vs. Israel, you could do worse than watch this one-hour interview of Hausdorff with hosts Konstantin Kisin and Francis Foster . The hosts don’t ask softball questions, but they do allow the interviewee to express her views. Don’t miss the Jew-hating Palestinian propaganda clips interpolated in the interview!
As for me, I’m sick to death today of the endless hatred and bickering about politics, hatred that doesn’t seem to be diminishing despite everybody’s calls for comity after the assassination attempt on Trump. Rather than express my own malaise and grumpiness, I’ll just ask readers to read and follow the posting Roolz if they haven’t. Please pay attention to the rules about civility towards other commenters and the host, as well as the rule about dominating threads.
And now, I give you someone who’s always civil. I’ll be back tomorrow with, I hope, a better disposition, as well as a science post and who knows what else.
James Blilie came through with a photo contribution, but of course we need more. The captions for James’s photos for today (taken yesterday in Oregon) are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them:
These photos are from this morning (15-Jul-2024), taken on an easy hike to Wahclella Falls in the Columbia River Gorge, near our home.
Our son Jamie is home from WSU Pullman for the summer and is mostly working; but we hike at least once a week on his days off.
This is a pretty easy hike to a spectacular 60-foot high waterfall. It’s close to Portland, Oregon, so it gets lots of traffic. If you don’t like crowds, go any time other than Memorial Day through Labor Day! I was able to exclude the large numbers of tourists by careful framing and waiting.
The creek that goes over the falls is Tanner Creek and it is known by local birders as a good spot to see American Dippers (Cinclus mexicanus; a.k.a. water ouzels). Today fully justified that reputation. We found Dippers all along the stream, including a juvenile bird that was (successfully) begging food from its parent. All the photos of the Dippers are taken by our my son, Jamie, the family wildlife photographer. Dippers get their name from their odd behavior of “dipping” up and down on their legs, perhaps signaling to other birds.
First some stage-setting: Photos of the hike that I took. At the lower end of the trail. A basic view of falls.
Next, some basic portraits of the Dippers.
Then photos of Dippers foraging on rocks in the fast moving water of the stream. The insects or insect larvae they were feeding on seemed to be abundant. In one photo, the bird seems to have shining necklace of water and it shakes the water off its feathers. These birds swim very readily and they are fast under water.
Then photos of the juvenile Dipper begging from its parent. One photo showing it calling for food. The other shows the parent at upper left and the juvenile at lower right:
Finally my photo of the bird photographer (Homo sapiens) at work with the falls behind him.
Equipment:
Jamie: Nikon D5600 (crop factor = 1.5), Sigma 150-600mm 5-6.3 DG OS HSM Lens (225mm-900mm equivalent; quite a sharp lens), Nikkor 70-300mm f/4.5-6.3G ED lens, Nikkor AF-S VR Micro-NIKKOR 105mm f/2.8G IF-ED Lens (an amazingly sharp lens that goes 1:1 macro and is a great portrait lens)
Me: Olympus OM-D E-M5 (micro 4/3 camera, crop factor = 2.0), LUMIX G X Vario, 12-35mm, f/2.8 ASPH. (24mm-70mm equivalent), LUMIX 35-100mm f/2.8 G Vario (70-200mm equivalent)