loyal readers, it’s hard to believe that we’ve been putting out weekly issues for four months now! we want to hear from you (#notdesperate) in our first reader poll!  it’s quick, cute, and will really help us out. please tell us how we’re doing in three rapid-fire questions today.

big idea: arabs and israelis...compromising?

1. it looks like Benjamin Netanyahu is out as israeli PM, assuming he doesn’t pull any last minute shenanigans this week. as we discussed in issue 14, the recent gaza war was caused in large part by him trying to keep power.
2. what’s fascinating is how Netanyahu will be forced out. eight parties ranging from ultranationalist/racist to socialist/hippie are forming a coalition with no goal other than to kick Netanyahu out. this will be the first time in israeli history that the palestinian arab party will be included in the governing coalition. 
3. let’s just make this clear - the arabs are joining forces with a party which wants to annex the west bank and refuses to recognize a palestinian state. to put that in ‘murican terms, it would be as if Bernie and Mitch got together to force He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named out, only to replace him with...Ted Cruz. 
4. is that worth the compromise? would our politicians even have the courage to compromise? readers can decide for themselves, but we’d like to applaud the palestinians for using what little power they have in israel to give the boot to a guy who has systematically destroyed any chance of a two-state solution while creating an apartheid state within israel.

story to watch: killer robots are here

1. a UN report of violence in libya last year appears to document the first use of killer robots, as if 2020 could’ve gotten any worse. the UN thinks a fully autonomous turkish drone destroyed a russian tank in libya, possibly also killing a rebel. please give us a second while we go make sure our bunker is stocked with enough toilet paper to last WWIII.
2. while human-operated drones have been around for decades, some countries have been putting AI into them to remove the human element altogether. militaries release the drones into the wild, assuming its programming will find the appropriate targets. some are equipped with multiple missiles while others are just kamikaze, blowing up on impact.
3. turkey, china, the US, and israel are leaders in the field, exporting billions of dollars worth of drones (both the human-operated and killer robot variety) in recent years. turkey and china got into the game when we...