10 September—Monday’s disquisition about Richard I elicited this observation from a percipient and pessimistic reader from across the pond: “Following Richard’s long-term popularity precedent, are we to assume that one day Mr. Trump will reach hero status?”

Perish the thought. But, sad to say, that day was in fact reached right around 6 January 2021 and confirmed on 5 November 2024 by a minuscule majority of American voters.

On the subject of Mr. Trump, Israel’s increasingly unpopular and offensively self-defensive Mr. Netanyahu really screwed up when he bombed Qatar with a view to eradicating the upper management of Hamas who have been living the high life in Doha while the people of Gaza suffer because of them. The typically chutzpadik (daring) Israeli raid was only partially successful, it must be noted, terminating only five Hamas Gauleiters, while killing one Qatari as collateral damage. Militarily the strategy made perfect sense, to be sure.

But Bibi evidently failed to take into account that Qatar—which is not itself a belligerent—had a few months ago cunningly bought Trump’s favor with a blingy 747 that its royal family hadn’t been able to sell. Of course, it’s common knowledge that Trump’s favor, in addition to being conditional and ephemeral, is a commodity that’s for sale on the open market.

It must be noted here that Trump’s favor is not to be confused with Trump’s loyalty. If that even exists.

Trump has let it be known that he “feels very bad” about the Israeli raid on Qatar, as the White House put it yesterday. So it behooves Netanyahu to proffer a bribe—sorry, make that a gift—that surpasses Qatar’s 747 in all respects, including but not limited to enriching Donald Trump personally. While we shouldn’t want to speculate about such a peace offering, Gaza would probably mollify him. At least for a little while. And it would have to be unoccupied and ready for development into the world’s greatest, most beautiful resort.

While still on the subject of Trump, then, harking back to his alleged birthday letter to Jeffrey Epstein, it occurs to us that whoever may have drawn the nude figure with only four lines had some talent and may have been influenced by Henri Matisse’s spare but brilliant use of line in his sketches: