All right, Alexander, let's do an update on what is happening in the Middle East.

And there was an interesting article from the New York Times.

I'd like your thoughts on it.

It said that with pressure from the Pentagon and the U.S. administration, Israel has scaled down the goals of their ground operation.

I'm summarizing what the New York Times said, but that's pretty much it.

The U.S. was alarmed that the ground operation was was too broad, was trying to accomplish too much,

and they wanted a new plan for the, for the war. And it looks like the ground operation,

instead of expanding, is now more, more narrowly focused,

which is what the U.S. was pushing the Israeli defense forces to do.

What are your thoughts on that?

It's very interesting how the Pentagon is approaching this ground operation with how they

approached the counteroffensive in Ukraine, where it was probably the exact opposite.

The Pentagon was telling Ukraine to accomplish this huge goal, this huge task of splitting the Russian forces and getting to

the Sea of Azov and doing all of this in a matter of days. While in Israel, it seems like the

Pentagon is telling the Israeli military to not do too much and to remain very, very focused on

very specific goals. What are your thoughts on this

New York Times article? I think this New York Times article is extremely interesting and it may be

extremely important as well, because to be absolutely clear, that was not, what, what it is discussing, what the New York Times is talking about now, is not Plan A.

Now, we've had enough information coming from the Middle East and indeed from comments made by US officials,

including, by the way, Biden himself, to get a sense of what plan A was.

Plan A was to open the crossing points between Gaza and Egypt, get people to leave Gaza, go into

Egypt, set up ten cities in Sinai, get tents to, you know, house them. Then the Israelis would go into Gaza.

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