Reflections on My Trip to Israel - Realizations upon My Return Home
December 28, 2023 - Issue #38
I left Israel on Thursday, December 21 at 1:00 PM. Thirty minutes later a barrage of rockets fired from Gaza winged their way towards Tel Aviv where I had just been. Others headed in the direction of Ben Gurion Airport from which I had just left. Meanwhile, in the north, Hezbollah fired missiles into the regions I had explored only days before. In opposite, I was now headed for a land at relative peace.
But, I had just left a war.
I mention this because since I’ve been home, I have been wondering whether I was in a bubble in Israel or have returned to a bubble here in America—or both. I’ll return to that topic in a moment, but first what I learned there—and then here.
Israel
Israelis are united in their desire to see Hamas destroyed as a governmental force and a military power. While there are some outliers, this is the view of all Israelis that I encountered, whether from liberal or conservative camps. That is also the view of the IDF’s soldiers, whose morale is sky high.
Uniting Israel is Hamas’ depravity which knows no bounds. But those atrocities weigh heavily on Israelis too. So much so that few are willing to view the compiled IDF video of Hamas’ savagery that I saw. Few too journey to view Kfar Aza or the other locations where Hamas’ cruelty has left scars on the soul of the nation. Those documentations of October 7 are more for visitors than citizens of Israel because it is just too painful for them after having lived through the horror of the unfolding tragedy on October 7 and the days after. This is especially true for the many for which there is only one degree of separation from those that bore the brunt of Hamas’ infamy.
And so, Israel is a nation at war whose economy has ground down and whose vibrancy has been extinguished. Soldiers flood the border regions in the north and along Gaza but the lack of civilian activity there leaves those regions feeling barren despite the many military personnel. And while that is not the case in Tel Aviv, there is still a palpable sadness and change in life on the city’s streets and beaches punctuated by the occasional missile to remind everyone that the war is still raging.
And that war is far from over.
In the south, the IDF presses forward house-by-house, (sometimes taking 4-8 hours to clear one home on a city block) determined to rid the region of Hamas’ leaders and military power. There, the IDF is clearly winning but it is moving methodically and slowly to save both civilian and IDF soldiers’ lives.
However, in the north, Hezbollah has won the first round. Since the war started, residents in northern Israel have endured 1,000 missiles and other projectiles fired at them by Hezbollah. Recently, the average had been ten a day. A week ago, on one of the days I was there, there were more than twenty (many coming uncomfortably close to me). Yesterday there were 34 missile strikes and UAV incursions. Today, as I write this, my missile alert alarm has been shrieking constantly and sirens in Israel have gone off as far south as Haifa. The count will likely be more than yesterday.
It’s plainly getting worse in the north.
As a result of those missiles and fear of invasion by Hezbollah’s Radwan force, twenty-eight communities within three miles of the northern border, consisting of 80,000 people, received mandatory evacuation orders. The citizens of Kiryat Shmona, once a city of 23,000, now live in 200 shelters and hotels around the country. The same is true for over 50,000 Israelis who once lived near Gaza and now are scattered around the country. More living slightly father away from the border evacuated too. Those evacuees, totaling 200,000, are in agreement about one thing—they will not return to their homes under the status quo that existed the day before October 7. This means no Hamas in Gaza and in the north, no Hezbollah forces close enough to endanger the people living nearby in Israel with a sudden invasion. The memories and imagery of October 7 are too vivid for them to do otherwise. And the overwhelming majority of Israelis are supportive of the government doing anything necessary to make those lands safe—including a bitter fight in Gaza to eviscerate Hamas and a dangerous and deadly confrontation with Hezbollah to push its forces back.
The America I Returned to:
I was only away ten days, but I still was surprised by the media coverage upon my return. Probably I shouldn’t have been, but ten days away from seeing the one-sided, passionate reporting of the civilian death toll in Gaza laid at the feet of Israel rather than the true perpetrator of this nightmare—Hamas—jarred me after what I had seen and experienced in Israel. One friend asked me about what I had learned in Israel but then referred to a TV opinion piece by a well-known commentator with an hour-long show. I patiently refuted the argument made by the TV personality, but then another friend mentioned how disturbed he was by the same piece—not convinced but instead angered by its misrepresentations. Therefore, I decided to view the presentation on YouTube.
It was a slickly produced hatchet job effectively constructed to evoke an emotional reaction leading to a conclusion that Israel either intended to cause Gazan civilian casualties or was indifferent to their suffering. The diatribe included at least one blatant false statement about international law and human shields, and several snippets designed to reinforce the argument—among them words uttered by an Israeli news commentator that I discovered, after a brief google search, engages in rather flamboyant, extreme discourse—hardly a government leader; and a news report heading inaccurately summarizing statements by Israel’s President Herzog; and of course very sad and tragic images of human suffering in Gaza.
But, effective as the segment was at making its point, its central premise was false, and I think intentionally so. It, like so many others, suffers from its failure to critically examine what is happening, and much more so, to ask why. Nor did it address two fundamental questions that all these hit pieces fail to address:
Why would Israel choose not to minimize Gazan casualties because it is a simple fact, the more Gazans that die the more international pressure Israel will experience to stop fighting?
How would the critic do things differently to accomplish Israel’s goal of eliminating Hama’s military capability and ability to govern? Or does that commentator not think that doing so is the solemn responsibility of any nation that suffered an inhumane attack that killed on one day 1,200 people and lost into captivity more than 200 others—of which the dead included more than 800 civilians who were hunted, butchered, and in many cases raped and sexually desecrated. Especially so when the perpetrator declares its intention of doing it again and again.
After watching the hit piece critically, a second and third time, I started thinking about how Information War works. The Russians are masters at it, so are the Iranians, Hezbollah, and Hamas. The basic formula is as follows:
Deliver a simple message (suffering in Gaza) in an emotional manner.
Repeat the message over and over in multiple forums.
Don’t let anything else cloud the basic message (like what happened on October 7 and the need to respond or the dense urban and tunnel environment in Gaza that presents challenges no military has ever encountered before).
Then rinse by repeating the message over, and over in numerous social media outlets until it bleeds into more traditional news media. This is how opinions are established. Opinions that are almost impossible to change even when presented with fact rather than fiction and context and purpose and real life complications rather than just emotional images. Unfortunately, this is how the human mind works.
Thus, Hamas does its best to deliver images of suffering and carefully curated body counts. This is its plan for survival and is no surprise. But what disturbs me greatly is why western media allows itself to be used. I’m not saying that the death of civilians, often in tragic circumstances and sometimes due to error, is not news. But so is Hamas’ callous refusal to surrender, its commandeering of humanitarian supplies and its interference with the movement of innocent populations away from the fighting, not to mention what it did on October 7 and its announced intention to do it again. And so is Hamas’ use of schools, mosques, UNWRA facilities, children’s stuffed animals, fake recordings of babies crying, boobytraps, etc. to kill IDF soldiers and put at risk the noncombatant Gazan population.
So why is much western media so slanted against Israel? I don’t think the answer is always antisemitism—although that plays a role in some cases. I think the answer is much simpler—blood and horror bring eyeballs. And that means money. Viewers much prefer images and simplistic bombastic statements over nuanced explanation. For the news cycle, October 7 is old news. Dead Gazans is new news. Never mind why.
How then can we combat this slide towards sensationalism that so clouds the truth. Honestly, there is no good answer. But, as best you can, I suggest whenever you suspect you might be viewing an inflammatory report ask yourself what has been left out and what is the motive of the reporter. Many times, that is as simple as asking yourself why, and what was the intent behind, what has been sensationalized happened. Also ask yourself who is the population that news outlet is serving. And make sure that you have not been trapped by a truth wrapped in a web of lies to make a much larger false claim than the truth depicts.
I give you this example to illustrate the point I am trying to make. Israel has been assailed in certain media outlets for the use of so called “dumb bombs” up to 50% of the time. The assumption being that they are less accurate. Use of them is true. But then ask yourself why are they being used. And how inaccurate are they? Brig. Gen. Omer Tischler, Chief of Staff of the Israeli Air Force, said recently:
The term “dumb bombs” describes munitions that are not guided-based. These are standard munitions that are regularly used by militaries worldwide. The claim that such munitions are indiscriminate or cause uncontrollable damage is misleading. Even though these munitions are not GPS-guided, they are still used accurately. It is released in a specific release point calculated by the aircraft’s system to allow the pilot to strike a target accurately.
Still, you might ask, why use the “dumb bombs”? Well, the answer is simple. If Israel had enough precision guided bombs of the correct size they would probably be used instead. And, complicating matters greatly, Israel has another problem. Hezbollah has many times the military power of Hamas, and also hides its missiles and other assets within the civilian population. Therefore, should a large scale war break-out in the north (which looks more and more likely everyday) precision guided bombs will be required on that battlefront to a much greater degree than in Gaza because of the quantities of weaponry Hezbollah possess. Therefore, Israel must husband a significant amount of its weapons inventory for use in the north and in other regions, like Syria, where Iran is attempting to get a foothold along its border with Israel and to transport more weapons to Hezbollah. Furthermore, how many noncombatants have died because of the use of “dumb bombs” when other alternatives exist (keep in mind stockpiles of armaments, size of explosion required, etc.)? Perhaps those numbers are listed somewhere, but I have not seen numbers or cogent analysis to that effect. And while I am sure there are instances of civilian casualties caused by mistaken releases, I am equally sure that in the vast majority of uses that is not the case. Far too many “dumb bombs” have been dropped for that to be true. Thus, I don’t think we should assume what we do not know.
Bottom line, war is a terrible business. Noncombatants will die. But there is no basis for suggesting that Israel is not attempting to reduce those numbers, and likely succeeding to a far greater degree than any army would that is facing the same fighting conditions.
Back to the Bubble Discussion
While in Israel, I thought I was in a bubble. But coming back to America, with regards to Israel, I have come to realize the bubble is here not there. On the website englishdocs.eu, I found this definition:
”Living in a bubble means to live in one's own world, completely isolated from what is happening all around. A person living in a bubble can't see or perceive events around him as he is too engrossed in the little world he has created for himself.”
Unfortunately, that definition comes close, but not all the way towards what I am going to try to convey.
Israel is facing a real life existential crisis. It is surrounded by fundamental hatred orchestrated by Iran that is not beholden to western beliefs nor guided by our morality. For them, death is a tool used to further their religious and political goals. Timeliness for their plans is measured in decades not days or weeks. For Israel to defend itself against its implacable foes, there are no good paths. Instead, it must choose the least bad one. But all roads carry risks. All roads have real life consequences that include death and destruction. However, some roads increase the likelihood that the state of Israel will be destroyed either by outside forces attacking, inside citizenry despairing and leaving, or the combination of the two. That is not a bubble it is the epicenter that outside evil is targeting.
To the contrary, American opinion of what Israel should do is more based on our personal perceptions and experiences. While totally understandable, it is often incomprehensible because it is based on flawed views of what Israel faces. Case in point is the often cited point that “Hamas is an ideology so therefore it cannot be defeated.” While true that it represents an ideology, that does not make it indestructible. Nor does that fact mean that Israel should permit Hamas to continue operating on its border. Doing so, would be a disaster both externally and internally for Israel (I will delve further into this topic with regard to Hamas and Hezbollah in a future newsletter). And so, talking heads pontificate what Israel should do without any personal understanding about being in a 24/7 bullseye nor, in many cases, any military experience or past contact with Israel’s foes. While not quite meeting the definition of a bubble, it is an intellectual bubble because it is devoid of personal or national experience.
Same too, perhaps, could be said of the lessening of support for Israel among younger Americans. Some argue it is because of issues between Israel and Palestinians and the philosophy of the progressive movement. All true. However, also true is that the experiences of older Americans, and especially Jews, are closer to the Holocaust, closer to World War Two, closer even to the Cold War when we practiced tucking our heads in our arms in school hallways in the event of a nuclear exchange. Younger Americans have never experienced those real life concerns. Nor have they felt what it was like to get a draft number. For them, that is historical not experiential. Thus, perhaps some of them live in a form of an bubble that is more idealistic than realistic. That then can shape their opinions based on what they believe should be rather than what is. I would like to be wrong in this, and acknowledge I have much to learn from their generations, but in the case of Israel and the enemies it now faces, mistakes are existential and foes implacable. There is no margin for error. Lacking a better alternative, what Israel is doing and trying to achieve today is its best chance for its survival. And survival is very much on the table.
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Alma Weekly update: Israel at War – December 28th, 2023, 8:00 PM Israel time
The Growing Air Defense Capabilities of Hezbollah and Iranian Proxies – An Emerging Threat to Israel and the West—Written by Yair Ramati and Yaakov Lappin for the Alma Research and Education Center—December 21, 2023
Even Amidst the War in Gaza, Iran’s Nuclear Project Must Remain Uppermost on Israel’s Strategic Agenda—Written by Colonel (res.) Dr. Eran Lerman for The Jerusalem Institute for Strategic Affairs—December 12, 2023.
IDF Uncovers Secret Underground Hamas Tunnels in Gaza's Palestine Square—Written by Tovah Lazaroff for the Jerusalem Post—December 20, 2023
Displaced Israelis call on Biden to allow move to return them to their homes—Written by Yair Kraus for Ynet News—December 27, 2023—This is an article about a letter written to President Biden and other officials by Lobby 1701, a group representing evacuees from the Lebanese border region. I had a hand in editing their letter.
What if Israel Loses the War—Written by Michael Oren, former Israeli Ambassador to the United States.
U.S. Forces Shoot Down Dozens of Houthi Missiles and Drones—December 26, 2023 Flash Brief for the The Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
Israel’s Struggle with Hezbollah—A War Without End is now available in eBook and hardback format on Amazon and IngramSpark. This compelling narrative explores Hezbollah’s origins and cancerous growth, traces Israel’s response, and reveals Israel’s present readiness to meet Hezbollah’s challenge.
Cliff Sobin
Important Link—Alma Research and Education Center: Understanding the Security Challenges on Israel’s Northern Border