Walking through the streets of London recently, Howard Jacobson unexpectedly heard a shout of “Free Palestine!” and realized that it had come from a “middle-aged, somewhat theatrical looking Jewish woman wearing . . . a PLO scarf,” and was directed at him. Jacobson—who soon thereafter learned that the woman was the founder of an anti-Israel Facebook page—reflects on the experience:

I was alerted to a social-media posting from a certain E.G.—I’m going to confine her to her initials—in which she described seeing me outside the Soho Theater and, having recognized me as someone “who often speaks out against justice for Palestinians”—“Justice for everyone except Palestinians!” I am frequently heard to cry as I walk through Soho—decided there and then to mount, in her own words, a “small act of resistance.” . . .

Ask her why . . . she feels confident in asserting that I often speak out against justice for Palestinians—when I never have—and we quickly run into the rigid dualism of the activist, where whatever isn’t wholly good in their eyes must be wholly evil. . . . This assumption of heartlessness whenever Israel is defended or Zionism embraced bedevils relations between the factions contesting the rights and wrongs of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. To speak up even lukewarmly for Israel outside a Jew-friendly environment is to invite obloquy. To declare oneself a Zionist of any kind is to present an incontestable thumbprint of exceptionalism and cruelty. . . .

Thus, the Jew remains forever trapped in being a Jew. Simply to invoke anti-Semitism is to prove his own bad faith. The more he struggles in the birdlime, the faster stuck he becomes. . . .

If the truth be told, all of the handwringing and demonizing by generations of pro-Palestinian activists has ameliorated the plight of Palestinians not one bit. By promising nothing short of total victory provided “the Palestinians” stay obdurate and concede nothing to the racist Zionist entity, they have consigned those they claim to care about to a perpetuity of sullen and fruitless resistance. We can say the same of [this] tiny act of defiance.

Robert Clark explains why the resumption of hostilities is both just and necessary:

These latest Israeli strikes come after weeks of consistent Palestinian provocation; they have repeatedly broken the terms of the cease-fire which they claimed they were so desperate for. There have been numerous [unsuccessful] bus bombings near Tel Aviv and Palestinian-instigated clashes in the West Bank. Fifty-nine Israeli hostages are still held in captivity.

In fact, Hamas and their Palestinian supporters . . . have always known that they can sit back, parade dead Israeli hostages live on social media, and receive hundreds of their own convicted terrorists and murderers back in return. They believed they could get away with the October 7 pogrom.

One hopes Hamas’s leaders will get the message. Meanwhile, many inside and outside Israel seem to believe that, by resuming the fighting, Jerusalem has given up on rescuing the remaining hostages. But, writes Ron Ben-Yishai, this assertion misunderstands the goals of the present campaign. “Experience within the IDF and Israeli intelligence,” Ben-Yishai writes, “has shown that such pressure is the most effective way to push Hamas toward flexibility.” He outlines two other aims:

The second objective was to signal to Hamas that Israel is not only targeting its military wing—the terror army that was the focus of previous phases of the war up until the last cease-fire—but also its governance structure. This was demonstrated by the targeted elimination of five senior officials from Hamas’s political and civilian administration. . . . The strikes also served as a message to mediators, particularly Egypt, that Israel opposes Hamas remaining in any governing or military capacity in post-war Gaza.

The third objective was to create intense military pressure, coordinated with the U.S., on all remaining elements of the Shiite “axis of resistance,” including Yemen’s Houthis, Hamas, and Iran.