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.

