The Global, Moral Case for Israel’s War

One year on, I’m ready to share the uncomfortable but important revelation I had on October 7th, 2023. As painful as it is to acknowledge, I believe we have to stop denying and actually explicitly accept that to remove the biggest threats to humanity, many innocent people have to die. To rationalize the why and the how requires guiding principles that are not driven by tribalism, but rather by morality informed by humanism.

Below is an explanation of the new worldview I formed on October 7th, which I believe every Westerner who cherishes their values and freedoms and humanity in general, should find a compelling (if not 100% convincing) case for Israel’s war against the terror regimes that seek to destroy it and all of humanity. Those who don't need convincing can skip ahead to "The Trolley Problem Reimagined" section, as I believe the framing is still valuable to understand & defend the moral necessity of Israel's war.

While this was all thought of and then written to specifically address Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, the principles apply precisely the same to the expanded view of the genocidal Islamic Republic and the numerous terrorist death cult proxies they prop up, who must be eliminated by Israel, with support from the West, to save the West.

A Shock, Then A Shocking Revelation

I'm a left-of-center Israeli-American who always believed in and advocated for peace, and regularly criticized the Israeli government for its actions that I believed were moving us away from that possibility, while also acknowledging that the Palestinians never offered a shred of evidence that they were capable of meeting us in the proverbial, peaceful middle.

On 10/7, in an instant, my life and my mindset changed in a profound way. Seeing civilians in Gaza (or other Muslim nations) in the past celebrating terrorism was always unsettling, but seeing it in this moment of unprecedented (in my adult lifetime) atrocities, I realized something I had long refused to consider: we Israelis, and our neighbors who have sworn to destroy us, cannot all stay alive and have peace. Whatever stalemate with minimal loss of life that we appeared to have, that we believed could be the basis for a lasting, peaceful resolution, on which so much of the world’s stability rested on, was one giant illusion.

While Hamas may not appear like a strategic threat, and they certainly aren't one in a direct or immediate sense, there is now a unique and arguably existential risk to Israel that has arisen, for 2 main reasons that stem from an internal and external sense if Israel was perceived to be unable to protect their citizens:?

1. Internal - Israeli society will fracture into 2 groups, hawks and doves, like never seen before. In the era of deep polarization we’ve seen around the world, and within Israel, this will lead to a severe weakening of the state and the military. Ultimately though, with most Israelis sensing a do or die choice, the hawks will dominate even more than today, which will aggrieve the world and our allies even further.
2. External - It is not just a turn of phrase, or a way to express machismo: in the Middle East, one cannot afford to appear weak. If Israel does not show that they are both able to protect their citizens, and willing to effectively dispense of threats, it will embolden Israel’s many other regional enemies (mostly fueled by Iran) to escalate their threats and attacks.?

These two interrelated threats would exacerbate each other in a vicious cycle that would end very badly not just for Israel, but cause instability throughout the Middle East that would spread throughout the world. Thus, Israel, and the Western world, have no choice but to eliminate Hamas.

So, with this realization, I concluded on 10/7: either many of them (Palestinians) will have to die, or all of us (Israelis) will have to die. While I had absolute clarity & certainty on this thought, it also made me deeply uncomfortable. I hate innocent people dying, and while I believe some peoples’ beliefs and actions are loathsome, I don’t want them to die. In the case of Gazans, many of them are brainwashed, many of them have no choice but to support Hamas. As long as they don’t have blood on their hands, they don’t deserve to die. Yet I now knew that if they didn’t, then many others, many innocent people including my own, would. But why do I get to choose that my people live and others die? If I am to follow my humanist values, how do I ensure that my bias in protecting my people and my nation is not leading me to rationalize an immoral and unjust treatment of “others”?

A Classic Thought Experiment

To resolve this cognitive and moral dissonance, to ensure I was being principled and not succumbing to tribal instincts I believe are responsible for most of society’s biggest tragedies & challenges, I came up with a framing, using the thought experiment known as the “trolley problem”.

In the classic version, a person is given a scenario where a train (trolley) is rolling down a track that has 4 people on it who will be run over and killed, but a bystander has a lever they can pull to divert the train to another track where only 1 person is on the track. What should the subject of the experiment, as the bystander, do in this situation? Let 4 people get killed, or pull a lever to save them and instead kill 1 person who without their action would’ve remained alive? It is an ethical, philosophical, and psychological dilemma with no right or wrong answer. In my example though, I modified the scenario thusly:

The Trolley Problem Reimagined

A trolley is going down a track which has two people laying on it. Both of them will be run over, but I have a lever that I can pull which will divert the train to save one of them OR the other. Now come the scenarios, and how I would decide which way to pull the lever, which person to save:

1. Two random people I know nothing about

- I pull the lever at random to save one person.

2. One man and one woman

- I pull the lever to save the woman (not exactly sure why, seems to be the default in society).

3. One adult and one child

- I pull the lever to save the child (same reason as #2 above).

4. One person who loves & celebrates life and the rule of law. They mourn when any innocent person dies for any reason. The other person has never killed or hurt anybody, but they celebrate when innocent people are killed and want more to be killed.

- In this situation, I pull the lever to save the first person, who celebrates life and denounces murder.

- N.B. In this situation, if the first person is a Gazan who hates Hamas and just wants peace, and the second person is a West Bank settler who regularly says “all Arabs should die” and celebrates when innocent ones do, I make the same exact decision to save the first person. My morals trump my tribe.

5. [This is the hardest one] One newborn who is going to be raised in a humanistic society, and another newborn who is going to be raised in a society where they are taught from birth to hate others, to celebrate the deaths of innocent people. Both are completely innocent beings, equal in every single way other than the environment they will grow up in, which informs the probabilities of whether they’ll be raised to love or hate, to enhance or erode humanity.

- In this situation, if I had to choose one, I save the first newborn.

These last two examples, especially the last one, are incredibly difficult to fathom, but I am able to confidently assert that those are the just, moral choices. Perhaps non-Western cultures would look at this differently, but it’s hard for me to imagine many Westerners that would disagree.

A Regretful, But Necessary, Reality

My heart breaks for what is happening in Gaza. Every innocent person there, I don’t care if they voted for Hamas, I don’t care if they cheered in the streets on 10/7, as long as they never broke a law to commit or actively support terrorism, they do not deserve to die, to lose their families, to lose their homes, to lose everything they have. But the reality, as I see it, is that Hamas has to be eliminated for Israelis to be able to live safely, for stability in the Middle East and beyond. And unfortunately, tragically, the only way to eliminate Hamas and the threat they pose, is through the Gazan streets and population that they have intentionally and strategically used to shield themselves. Israel can and must do, and I believe by and large generally has done, everything they can to minimize the death and destruction inflicted on Gazan civilians. The world can and should condemn Israel when they violate their own moral codes and standards, whether that is via intentional & inexcusable actions, or via standard acts of war that do not meet the duty of care expected to minimize innocent loss of life. But innocent loss of life is unavoidable in this situation, and Israel cannot be expected to stop the war until they are able to confidently claim success for their objectives - dismantling the terrorist threats that perpetrated the atrocities of 10/7 and promised to repeat them (including Hamas and Hezbollah and all others propped up by the Islamic Republic), returning the hostages, and securing their citizens in their homes.? This is the only way, not just for Israel to survive, but for the morally righteous, humanity-loving forces of the world to prevail over the death cults that choose death over life, and live only to see the West fall.

We can and we must be enraged and saddened by the many innocent people being killed, but we must understand that Islamic terrorists are responsible for their deaths, and it is a moral imperative to accept these in order to save humanity.