Right, so Israel’s latest Lebanon withdrawal apparently lasted about ten minutes. Ten minutes. You can boil pasta longer than that. You can sit through a Keir Starmer speech longer than that, although frankly nobody should have to, by minute seven consciousness will be touch and go.

But for about ten minutes, Lebanon was told Israel had begun pulling back. President Joseph Aoun was reportedly informed that Israel had started withdrawing from part of the buffer area as a goodwill gesture and jumped the shark a bit in celebrating that news. Cue everyone pretending that Israel, after months of bombing, occupation, security belts and freedom-of-action demands, had suddenly discovered the concept of leaving somewhere it wasn’t supposed to be.

But then everything fell apart, because Israeli sources denied it. Lebanese sources then denied it ...