I often wonder if part of this insane disconnect we're dealing with when it comes to the US, the UK and our supposed European and other "allies" is that they simply don't understand what war is. They've had some terror attacks, they've had "police actions" on the other side of the world, but within living memory they simply don't have any experience. Even in most of Europe there we're talking only people over 80 who have any memory of what an existential threat and war on the home front is.

To them it's all theories and dogma. War by remote control, something you can just "walk away from" if it doesn't go the way you plan.

An utter failure to understand the meaning of an existential threat on your doorstep, what it means to run from rocket sirens, what it means to look over that border a few hundred metres or maybe a kilometre or two from your home and see people there with their Hamas or Hizballah flags and guns ready to kill you.

The same way they don't get that urban warfare with a terror group firmly embedded in a civilian population will not be neat and tidy, no matter how many precautions you take, no matter if you follow the dictates of the laws of war to the letter, there is no way to just neatly pick out Hamas without causing any other casualties or damage.

I've tried to explain this over and over again to highly educated intellectual friends and family in various Western countries. I get responses like "well, Israel should only have defensive weapons", with absolutely no comprehension what that even means. When I ask them what a purely defensive weapon is they say "Iron Dome!" So I ask them how that could save us from a repeat of the October 7th invasion and they have no answer except to insist that Israel is "overreacting" and needs to be "reigned in". Then I ask who is going to reign in Hamas and Hizballah, if they expect Iran, China, North Korea and friends to stop supplying them with weapons. And of course they have no answer except to say that "Israel needs to calm down and stop the war". Total, utter disconnect with the reality. Totally failure to understand the daily threat to Israel's survival.