Nous? Puissance régionale dominante?

Arab states fear Israel as a disruptive regional power, even a dominant one; the UAE still wants to do deals with it. (From The Economist)

They are starting to take us seriously. Good.

Tachos

 

The late Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza loved shiny decorations (a popular hobby among generals - see pic from North Korea). The people nicknamed him "Tacho Somoza" (In Nicaragua, "tacho" meant metallic waste, like the Coca-Cola bottle cap). His son was called Tachito.                                             

 

The World of Yesterday

 Finished reading Stefan Zweig's memoir (he and his wife killed themselves after the completion of the book). Five hundred pages, but only one is dedicated to the greatest tragedy of Europe - the elimination of the Jews. Zweig tried all his life to become a "generic" European, an Austrian, and never something particular like a Jew. I found that many of the expressions and ideas of my family and their circle of friends originated from Zweig, or maybe he captured precisely the spirit of the times. My uncle called his business "Europlast" to emphasize its Europeanness (vs. those lazy criollos). Zweig, like his generation, believed that his ethnic origin was an unimportant detail, but it was exactly what condemned him to desperate exile. I dislike cosmopolitan Jews; I am a Zionist. 

Israeli Photonics Startups

 
Within weeks in April 2026:

• DustPhotonics → Credo Technology — $1.3 billion
• Teramount → Molex — $430 million

Two Israeli photonics startups acquired for a combined $1.73 billion — both solving different but complementary problems in the same AI data center photonics stack. Israel's silicon photonics ecosystem has just been significantly absorbed into the global supply chain.

The remaining independent Israeli photonics player of note is NewPhotonics — worth watching as the next potential acquisition target.

Interesting. And April 2026 is not yet over!

Roof collapsed - engineer (91) jailed

 

A decade after the Iron parking garage collapse disaster in Tel Aviv, the court sentenced engineer Hanoch Tzahar (91 years old) to imprisonment and a fine, after he was convicted of causing the deaths of 6 workers through negligence and the injury of 23 additional workers.

Engineering is a high-risk profession, especially after 90. 

Sanchez: El Lado Bueno de la Historia

 

The President of Spain, Sanchez, assumes the leadership of the world progressive movement (he is head of the International Socialism organization). He calls it a fight for democracy, exactly like the fishwrap HaAretz. The Brazilian Lula has conceded the position. Bibi and Donald Trump are Sanchez's enemies. Per contra, Hamas, Hizballah, the Ayatollahs, and so on are on the correct side of history and "democrats".  "Vomitabile", to apply Giorgia Meloni's expression.  

Babies are not showing up

Social Security needs 2.1 births per woman to stay solvent. US is at 1.6. $39T in debt needs the next generation to service it. That generation isn't showing up at the numbers required.

That is a funny way of talking about the central problem of our generation. I am an only child, have no siblings, and no relatives. That is typical of the Hungarian Jewish post-WWII generation. That's why I doubt the common estimate of 60,000 Jews in Hungary. They may be only a small fraction of it. No more than 10,000.