My favorite Lithuanian naturalist just aired an episode on wasps, and it's entirely in agreement with what you've written. So, I'm reading this essay as being purely on wasps, and not looking for allegories.
It totally works on that level.
What I learned from the episode is that wasps have a very limited defense territory AND are predictable. They attack only to defend their hive/colony. They stay away from other wasp nests, and are quite docile when they're out feeding themselves (on nectar). When they're hunting to bring back protein quarry feed their larval young, they're not in attack mode. They attack in defense, but don't attack outside of the immediate vicinity of their hive.
Okay, now looking at as an allegorical view of the Israelis, the Palestinians, Hamas/Iran. I'm going to assume Hamas/Iran are the wasps. We still see it differently. First from my perspective having been a political junkie at the age of 15. My Dad being a well informed man, in spite of lack of formal education (he dropped out of school at the end of 8th grade ti help support his family) [In those days, the 1920's in Canada high school was optional] Ok back to 1948. Most people had Jewish friends or acquaintances. All of us were exposed to pictures taken by news photographers of the horrors of the concentration camps.
I was unaware in the beginning of the really shabby way the UN and England carved out Israel; leaving the Palestinians with the ridiculously small Gaza strip bordering the Mediterranean and another closer to Jordan and Syria. Also we should have been aware that although the Muslims and the Jews are basically the same people - they all originated as Semites, they strongly disliked each other.
Plus the Arabic Countries had been supportive of the Nazis in WW2.
Immediately that Israel was recognized as a sovereign nation, some of the Arabic neighbors swore to exterminate them.
Then the Jews did the worse thing they could possibly have done. They turned a country steeped in poverty, into a wealthy nation through the hard work of the people, great engineering and modern agricultural methods. (Yes they had monetary help from America and probably we supplied a lot of their agricultural equipment) The Muslim neighbors took this as an insult, shaming them. I also remember in the late 1950's the Israelis offered help to the former Palestinians in teaching them and helping them acquire the necessary tools to become agriculturally successful too. The Palestinians took this as another insult, and refused the assistance.
So, started the wars to eliminate Israel. With America, NATO, and most European nation supporting Israel. Also Graham, it wasn't only Israel we, Americans, supported. We also had the Marshall plan to rebuild Europe and we helped rebuild Japan. (Of course we, in good conscience having destroyed both Hiroshima and Nagasaki with atomic bombs - unnecessarily Nagasaki in my opinion).
The Israeli armed forces, combined with great intelligence from Mossad, whipped every Muslim army sent against therm in relatively short time. (Further shaming the Middle East countries in their eyes)
Then in 1978 Iran revolted and dispensed with their Shah (King) Pahlavi. That revolution ended in 1979 when they elected or simply set the Ayatollah in charge of the theocratic authoritarian government. Khomeini for the first ten years followed by Khomenei until now. Iran is the best example of why not to have a theocracy instead of a government.
Rather than risk there own selves by sending Iranian troops, The Ayatollah has given us Hamas, Hezbollah, and the biggest blessing of all - the treacherous pirates - the Houthis
Hamas never intended to help the Gazans from the beginning. Instead they forced many Gazans into concentration camps euphemistically called refugee camps. Living in conditions I wouldn't have kept my pigs in when I had my little farm. The livestock they raised became their willing suicide bombers. How's that for helping Palestinians? Hamas has repeatedly attacked Israel and isolated Israelis. So I have no concern for their. Hamas, fate.
I do sympathize with the Palestinians. They've never had a break. Their Sheiks and other rulers took the lion's share of their labor and products, then the UN squashes them into a narrow strip along the Mediterranean, with their friends an relatives clear across Israel in a slightly better off (at first) West Bank.
Then the worst catastrophe yet - Netanyahu - the Jewish version of Trump, only smarter, wilier, with full control of the armed forces and a similar bunch of half witted thugs. In his first go around he allowed these thugs to claim land on the West Bank to which they had neither legal nor moral right. I admit it is easier in a Parliamentary form of government for an unsuitable and unfit 'ruler' like Netanyahu to take control than here in America. But this creep has been indicted, I think on 80 charges of fraud and corruption during his first 20 odd years. He ran again this last time and had to try to form 5 times a government to keep his worthless carcass out of jail and cough up some of the funds he's stuffed in Switzerland. He is the worst leader Israel has had in its 76 year existence. As I said about not shedding a tear over killing every wasp in their nests, I won't shed a tear over the demise of Netanyahu. I just hope he is killed before I die - fat chance. I'm already 91, but I'll ask my grandkids to do a happy dance for me. (:-)
You have way more respect for wasps than I do, Graham. Those nasty little buggers, not only sting with impunity, the bite and take chunks of flesh with their pincers. Honey bees are kind little things, that only attack when threatened. Wasps sting and fly away to sting again another day; bees lose a section of their abdomen with their stinger and die. So I like bees and despise wasps. I know I should be more kind, biology was my second major in college. But when my husband and I built a house in the foothills of the Sierra Nevadas, every time I found a wasps nest burrowed i the ground I poured a gallon or two of kerosene and killed all the adult wasps and their eggs and babies too. And I didn't shed a tear. I have never been attacked by a honey bee - or a bumble bee either - but I had a wasp take a quarter inch bite out of my calf - and I wasn't anywhere near food. The only time I've ever been stung by a bee, I accidentally stepped on one while barefoot, I felt more sorry for the bee than me.
Ok, it's about live and let live, but I wish you'd choose a different subject than wasps. I'm not fond of rattle snakes either, but if they stayed in their pile of rocks or don he mountain side I didn't have them killed only when they invaded my garage or enclosed patios I called the boys who lived nearby to come and shoot them, which they were quite willing to do, I had cats and very small dogs (papillions) which would not survive a rattler bite, I didn't let my cats or dogs wander down the hill so I figured I was being fair - if I didn't attack the rattlers in their homes, they shouldn't crawl into mine.
My favorite Lithuanian naturalist just aired an episode on wasps, and it's entirely in agreement with what you've written. So, I'm reading this essay as being purely on wasps, and not looking for allegories.
It totally works on that level.
What I learned from the episode is that wasps have a very limited defense territory AND are predictable. They attack only to defend their hive/colony. They stay away from other wasp nests, and are quite docile when they're out feeding themselves (on nectar). When they're hunting to bring back protein quarry feed their larval young, they're not in attack mode. They attack in defense, but don't attack outside of the immediate vicinity of their hive.
I think you just unwittingly found an allegory, Aidas. Nice to hear from you.
Here's more on the non-allegorical subject: https://endlesschain.substack.com/p/wasps-and-dumps.
Okay, now looking at as an allegorical view of the Israelis, the Palestinians, Hamas/Iran. I'm going to assume Hamas/Iran are the wasps. We still see it differently. First from my perspective having been a political junkie at the age of 15. My Dad being a well informed man, in spite of lack of formal education (he dropped out of school at the end of 8th grade ti help support his family) [In those days, the 1920's in Canada high school was optional] Ok back to 1948. Most people had Jewish friends or acquaintances. All of us were exposed to pictures taken by news photographers of the horrors of the concentration camps.
I was unaware in the beginning of the really shabby way the UN and England carved out Israel; leaving the Palestinians with the ridiculously small Gaza strip bordering the Mediterranean and another closer to Jordan and Syria. Also we should have been aware that although the Muslims and the Jews are basically the same people - they all originated as Semites, they strongly disliked each other.
Plus the Arabic Countries had been supportive of the Nazis in WW2.
Immediately that Israel was recognized as a sovereign nation, some of the Arabic neighbors swore to exterminate them.
Then the Jews did the worse thing they could possibly have done. They turned a country steeped in poverty, into a wealthy nation through the hard work of the people, great engineering and modern agricultural methods. (Yes they had monetary help from America and probably we supplied a lot of their agricultural equipment) The Muslim neighbors took this as an insult, shaming them. I also remember in the late 1950's the Israelis offered help to the former Palestinians in teaching them and helping them acquire the necessary tools to become agriculturally successful too. The Palestinians took this as another insult, and refused the assistance.
So, started the wars to eliminate Israel. With America, NATO, and most European nation supporting Israel. Also Graham, it wasn't only Israel we, Americans, supported. We also had the Marshall plan to rebuild Europe and we helped rebuild Japan. (Of course we, in good conscience having destroyed both Hiroshima and Nagasaki with atomic bombs - unnecessarily Nagasaki in my opinion).
The Israeli armed forces, combined with great intelligence from Mossad, whipped every Muslim army sent against therm in relatively short time. (Further shaming the Middle East countries in their eyes)
Then in 1978 Iran revolted and dispensed with their Shah (King) Pahlavi. That revolution ended in 1979 when they elected or simply set the Ayatollah in charge of the theocratic authoritarian government. Khomeini for the first ten years followed by Khomenei until now. Iran is the best example of why not to have a theocracy instead of a government.
Rather than risk there own selves by sending Iranian troops, The Ayatollah has given us Hamas, Hezbollah, and the biggest blessing of all - the treacherous pirates - the Houthis
Hamas never intended to help the Gazans from the beginning. Instead they forced many Gazans into concentration camps euphemistically called refugee camps. Living in conditions I wouldn't have kept my pigs in when I had my little farm. The livestock they raised became their willing suicide bombers. How's that for helping Palestinians? Hamas has repeatedly attacked Israel and isolated Israelis. So I have no concern for their. Hamas, fate.
I do sympathize with the Palestinians. They've never had a break. Their Sheiks and other rulers took the lion's share of their labor and products, then the UN squashes them into a narrow strip along the Mediterranean, with their friends an relatives clear across Israel in a slightly better off (at first) West Bank.
Then the worst catastrophe yet - Netanyahu - the Jewish version of Trump, only smarter, wilier, with full control of the armed forces and a similar bunch of half witted thugs. In his first go around he allowed these thugs to claim land on the West Bank to which they had neither legal nor moral right. I admit it is easier in a Parliamentary form of government for an unsuitable and unfit 'ruler' like Netanyahu to take control than here in America. But this creep has been indicted, I think on 80 charges of fraud and corruption during his first 20 odd years. He ran again this last time and had to try to form 5 times a government to keep his worthless carcass out of jail and cough up some of the funds he's stuffed in Switzerland. He is the worst leader Israel has had in its 76 year existence. As I said about not shedding a tear over killing every wasp in their nests, I won't shed a tear over the demise of Netanyahu. I just hope he is killed before I die - fat chance. I'm already 91, but I'll ask my grandkids to do a happy dance for me. (:-)
You have way more respect for wasps than I do, Graham. Those nasty little buggers, not only sting with impunity, the bite and take chunks of flesh with their pincers. Honey bees are kind little things, that only attack when threatened. Wasps sting and fly away to sting again another day; bees lose a section of their abdomen with their stinger and die. So I like bees and despise wasps. I know I should be more kind, biology was my second major in college. But when my husband and I built a house in the foothills of the Sierra Nevadas, every time I found a wasps nest burrowed i the ground I poured a gallon or two of kerosene and killed all the adult wasps and their eggs and babies too. And I didn't shed a tear. I have never been attacked by a honey bee - or a bumble bee either - but I had a wasp take a quarter inch bite out of my calf - and I wasn't anywhere near food. The only time I've ever been stung by a bee, I accidentally stepped on one while barefoot, I felt more sorry for the bee than me.
As usual, the article has nothing whatsoever to do with wasps, Fay.
Ok, it's about live and let live, but I wish you'd choose a different subject than wasps. I'm not fond of rattle snakes either, but if they stayed in their pile of rocks or don he mountain side I didn't have them killed only when they invaded my garage or enclosed patios I called the boys who lived nearby to come and shoot them, which they were quite willing to do, I had cats and very small dogs (papillions) which would not survive a rattler bite, I didn't let my cats or dogs wander down the hill so I figured I was being fair - if I didn't attack the rattlers in their homes, they shouldn't crawl into mine.
It's about the Gaza Strip.
I totally missed that, sorry, I'd better read it again