8 | DECEMBER 28 • 2023 J N guest column Dear World, Israel Doesn’t Need Your Lectures A s every Jew knows, the rules are different when it comes to them and Israel. When Israel was brutally attacked on Oct. 7, people across much of the world blamed Israel for causing the war. Within days, millions more unleashed their inner Jew hatred, which was apparently lurking just beneath the surface. From the moment Israel struck back, it has been under a microscope like no other country at war. Since then, on practically a daily basis, it has had to endure incessant lectures on how it should and should not defend itself. World leaders, the U.N., the media, celebrities, college kids and just about everyone else freely give Israel — not Hamas, shockingly — stern instructions on how it must conduct this war. Even Israel’s staunchest allies like the U.S., Great Britain, Canada and others quickly joined in the popular chorus that “Israel has a right to defend itself, but it must take every measure to avoid civilian casual- ties’” or some similar words. President Biden, Vice President Harris and Secretary of State Anthony Blinken use a variation of these words every time they publicly address the issue, as do most members of Congress. When they meet with Israeli leaders, they proudly tell us, they always make a point to deliver the message that Israel must care about civilians. At every turn, from seemingly everywhere, it is Israel — the country that was attacked — that finds itself subjected to lec- tures, reprimands and scoldings. One can only imagine what Israeli leaders must think each time they have to endure these lectures. How hard and offen- sive it must be for them to bite their tongues and not explode when chastised about their lack of humanity. Or the insinuation that they are capable of the same kind of savagery and bar- barism as Hamas. Or that they relish the deaths of civilians or wantonly target them, no differ- ent than the terrorist group that seized babies, beheaded others, raped their mothers and kid- napped hundreds of civilians, from babies to the elderly. Hamas, one would assume, must be delighted by all the lat- est scrutiny and criticism lodged at Israel. It has been handed a gift, a new talking point, one that neutralizes their heinous war crimes and paints both Israel and them with the same brush — a huge win for them. They now have new words to sprinkle in alongside the oldies like “genocide, ” “apartheid, ” “from the river to the sea” and so on. Israel may understandably feel constrained to fully lash out to the criticism because of dip- lomatic pressures. They are at war, and they have to be mind- ful of public relations. But those of us who are unapologetically pro-Israel are not so tongue- tied. We can be blunt. We can tell the world what needs to be said: Stop the lectures. Go give them to Hamas. Spare us your moral superiority. We appreciate your concern for humanity, but Israel doesn’t need your remind- ers. It gets it. It always has. The irony is that most of the loudest choruses come from groups that have never support- ed Israel’s right to exist. Their hypocrisy is transparent to anyone who knows about these groups or the money behind them. They portray themselves as moral crusaders for justice, but, in reality, they’re just plain old-fashioned Jew haters. Many of them are the worst kind, actually, because they support the destruction of Israel and the genocide of the Jewish people. Perhaps it’s a good time to remind Hamas apologists that for years Hamas has been launching rockets into Israel — during a time of a so-called “ceasefire” — trying to kill as many Jewish civilians as possi- ble. For years, I have had an app on my phone, “Red Alert, ” that signals when Hamas rockets are launched into Israel. The alerts are nonstop and have been for years. Maybe 1% of the time, if that, I see something about it in the media. In southern Israel, in particular, grabbing your chil- dren and sprinting to a bomb shelter as the rockets are coming is a regular part of life. Yet the world has been silent. Who can recall a single time Hamas was lectured by the world commu- nity for these constant attacks? Israel is facing a conundrum with only horrible options. As of this writing, Hamas is holding 137 hostages. It is hiding out beneath or besides densely populated areas, which Hamas uses as human shields. At this point in the war, Israel has discovered more than 800 tunnel shafts in Gaza, all designed to kill Israelis. Many of these tunnels, we now know, contain vast caches of arms, sleeping barracks and air- conditioned meeting rooms that are underneath schools, hospitals, mosques, homes, even one in a U.N. office. As long as these terror tunnels exist, the existential threat to Israel continues. The reality is that since the day of its inception 75 years ago, Israel’s enemies have never accepted its right to exist, leaving Israel in a perpetual state of war. The first war it loses will be its last. The current cast of armchair quarterbacks are quick to give their advice from safe spaces thousands of miles away. Most have never been to Israel nor studied it enough to understand what it’s like to live under constant attack. Or, more probably, they simply don’t care since they’ d just as soon see Israel destroyed. Yet, they incessantly lecture Israel as if they are morally superior or possess military brilliance that Israel never considered. Both are laughable. Their lectures are unnecessary, ignorant and hypocritical. Give it a rest. Israel has its hands full at the moment and will conduct this war as effectively and mercifully as it sees fit in order to continue to survive. Mark Jacobs PURELY COMMENTARY Correction In “Fall Fix-Up,” homeowner Rae Nachbar’s name was misspelled.