Examining the change in attitude toward morality in the West over the past century, Jonathan Sacks sees the collapse of the principles on which liberal societies are built:

Morality achieves something almost miraculous, and fundamental to human achievement and liberty. It creates trust. It means that, to the extent that we belong to the same moral community, we can work together without constantly being on guard against violence, betrayal, exploitation, or deception. The stronger the bonds of community, the more powerful the force of trust, and the more we can achieve together.

Morality is essential to freedom. That is what John Locke meant when he contrasted liberty, the freedom to do what we ought, to license, the freedom to do what we want. It is what Adam Smith signaled when, before he wrote The Wealth of Nations, he wrote The Theory of Moral Sentiments. It is what George Washington meant when he said, “Human rights can only be assured among a virtuous people.” And Benjamin Franklin, when he said, “Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom.” Or Thomas Jefferson, when he said, “A nation as a society forms a moral person, and every member of it is personally responsible for his society.” Lose morality, and eventually you will lose liberty.

When I went as an undergraduate to Cambridge University in the late 1960s, the philosophy course was called Moral Sciences, meaning that, just like the natural sciences, morality was objective, real, part of the external world. I soon discovered, though, that almost no one believed this anymore. Morality was held to be no more than the expression of emotion, or subjective feeling, or private intuition, or autonomous choice. It is whatever I choose it to be. To me, this seemed less like civilization than the breakdown of a civilization.

As for the consequences of our choices, these have been outsourced to the state. Bad choices lead to bad outcomes: failed relationships, neglected children, depressive illness, wasted lives. But the government would deal with it. Marriage was no longer needed as a sacred bond between husband and wife. . . . Welfare was outsourced to government agencies, so there was less need for community volunteering. As for conscience, which once played so large a part in the moral life, that could be outsourced to regulatory bodies.

Israel will likely respond directly against Iran after yesterday’s attack, and has made known that it will calibrate its retaliation based not on the extent of the damage, but on the scale of the attack. The specifics are anyone’s guess, but Edward Luttwak has a suggestion, put forth in an article published just hours before the missile barrage: cut off Tehran’s ability to send money and arms to Shiite Arab militias.

In practice, most of this cash comes from a single source: oil. . . . In other words, the flow of dollars that sustains Israel’s enemies, and which has caused so much trouble to Western interests from the Syrian desert to the Red Sea, emanates almost entirely from the oil loaded onto tankers at the export terminal on Khark Island, a speck of land about 25 kilometers off Iran’s southern coast. Benjamin Netanyahu warned in his recent speech to the UN General Assembly that Israel’s “long arm” can reach them too. Indeed, Khark’s location in the Persian Gulf is relatively close. At 1,516 kilometers from Israel’s main airbase, it’s far closer than the Houthis’ main oil import terminal at Hodeida in Yemen—a place that was destroyed by Israeli jets in July, and attacked again [on Sunday].