Tolerating the Intolerable: The Unbelievable Mercy of the Jewish Nation

Imagine if you will growing up in an active warzone. Picture the Blitz of London; or, for a more contemporary example, life for the past years in Ukraine. Now imagine a lower intensity but constant bombing and terrorism campaign against your home stretching out over decades, and one that occasionally escalates into unimaginable horror and tragedy.

This is life in Israel. Since (and even before) Yasser Arafat of the Palestinian Authority rejected again the ‘two state solution’ offered to him at the Camp David Summit and launched the ‘Second Intifada’, Israel has been subject to unrelenting Palestinian terrorism for decades. Hundreds of suicide attacks and rocket barrages over four and a half years alone. Buses, train stations, restaurants, discotheques blown up. Thousands dead on both sides. When students chant for ‘Intifada’ on our college campuses, make no mistake about what they’re calling for. And the Palestinian Authority pays the families of terrorists who die or get locked up for killing or trying to kill Israelis. ‘Pay for slay’ is official policy of the PA — to compensate the ‘martyrs’ who fight ‘Zionism’ — and your tax dollars likely go towards it.

And the terror does not just come from the Palestinian territories; who at this point hasn’t heard of Hezbollah in Lebanon and their hundred-thousand-plus rockets aimed directly at the Jewish nation? Or the Houthis of Yemen that have terrorized and paralyzed international shipping around the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden for months? Or their financial terrorist backers in the Islamic Republic of Iran that a couple months ago tried and failed to devastate Israel with a missile and drone barrage that was partly shot down by allied forces and partly intercepted over the skies of Jerusalem?

Many in the international community may not realize that Israel requires by law that new residential buildings be built with bomb shelters (called mamads) — safe rooms to protect from terrorism. I have seen many videos now of Hamas terrorists assaulting mamads, shooting guns and throwing grenades inside, burning and smoking out the inhabitants. How many apartment buildings do you know of in your first world liberal democracies that have newly-built bomb shelters? Would you think such a requirement necessary where you live? Would you think it strange?

It is a necessity in Israel. There are several ‘Red Alert’ apps like Tzofar that track incoming rocket attacks and warn residents near the predicted site of impact to take shelter in mamads. How many years of ‘Red Alerts’ would you tolerate at your home? How many of your neighbors would you tolerate being blown to bits before going on the warpath?

Here’s a question you already know the answer to: how many countries have defensive technology like Iron Dome, Arrow, and David’s Sling? I’m not just talking about SAM turrets and MANPADS. I mean how many nations have full, intelligent missile protection across their entire territory? The reason you have never heard of any other nation having an Iron Dome is because they don’t have one. Do you know the cost of a single Iron Dome defensive intercept missile? They’re in the tens of thousands. While Hamas fires crude scrap metal rockets running on sugar and fertilizer. They don’t have to care about aiming them; the goal is to terrorize civilians.

Israeli defense technology has become decades ahead of the game of every other nation on Earth precisely because they have to defend against this threat, and instead of doing what America would undoubtedly do and level every single city block where rockets were fired at us, Israel chose and chooses instead to preserve the lives of its enemies as best it can. The entire tenure of Netanyahu (and Ariel Sharon before him) can be summed up in the idea that Israelis simply have to outlive their enemies, and eventually they will stop attacking. Israel also drops countless leaflets, telephones every civilian it can, drops ‘knock-bombs’ (an entirely new category of weaponry previously unheard of on this Earth) and otherwise does everything it can possibly do to remove as many civilians as possible from the area of combat, even when such actions also warn enemy combatants of operations ahead of time.

For a pretty long while, I’ve had an obsessive fascination with military history. Whereas normal people watch cooking videos or whatever, I watch battle formations, maps, and troop developments. I’ve studied everything from Alexander the Great to Julius Caesar to George Washington and through to the present day. I would never claim to have exhaustive knowledge of warfare (as such knowledge is by definition unobtainable; war is ever-evolving), but I can say with high confidence that I know more than the ‘average Joe’ about military history. And I am telling you that no other nation or people with an army in the history of the world would tolerate what Israel has tolerated for decades. That is not to say that war is not tragic and terrible; after all, ‘war never changes’. But to consistently strive to protect life even at great strategic expense is the Israeli way.

The Israel Defense Forces, like the Republic of Korea Armed Forces, is a conscripted fighting force. There are some exceptions; Arab Israelis and Haredi Jews are not required to serve, but many still do. This means that the Israeli army is a cross-section of the entire society of Israel. Defaming the IDF is tantamount to defaming the Israeli people. I cannot tolerate lies about the good men and women of the IDF; lies like that they are committing “genocide”, lies implying that they have lost their innate humanity. The IDF is the most moral army in the world. The Jewish nation is the most merciful in existence. These are simply the facts.

We who live in the dull comfort of our modern lives cannot even imagine what growing up in an area where you are surrounded on all sides by people who want to kill you is like. And despite the overwhelming hate and hostility of their neighbors, Israel still practices compassion that no other would. My deepest respect to the heroes of the IDF and the Jewish nation. You inspire the good in us all.

Am Yisrael Chai 🇮🇱