In the past few weeks, Islamic State-inspired attacks—including multiple shootings last night—have left over a dozen dead in the Jewish state, and several others seriously injured. Yet after meeting with Prime Minister Naftali Bennett in the wake of two deadly attacks, Antony Blinken, the American secretary of state, declared that the way to “foster” peace is to “prevent actions on all sides that could raise tensions, including settlement expansion, settler violence, incitement to violence, demolitions, payments to individuals convicted of terrorism, evictions of families from homes they’ve lived in for decades.” Lahav Harkov comments:

Note that amidst a wave of terror by Palestinians against Israelis, Blinken’s list of the actions to foster peace includes four that fall to Israel and just one that is clearly the responsibility of the Palestinians, with a sixth item—“incitement to violence”—vague enough to belong to either or both.

Someone seeking to interpret Blinken’s remarks charitably might have presumed that he sought to bring up Israel’s faults in Jerusalem and would later stress the Palestinians’ problems in Ramallah, to encourage each side to change. But such a person would have been proven wrong when Blinken presented the exact same litany, almost verbatim, hours later that [same] day after a meeting with the Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas.

Moreover, none of the recent deadly attacks in Israel took place in settlements; they all took place in cities that have been part of Israel from its establishment. They were clearly not about “settlement expansion;” they were motivated by a belief that the state of Israel should not exist.

Meanwhile, there is incitement to violence across Palestinian state-controlled media and on the Facebook pages of Abbas’s Fatah party. Most tragically, Palestinian textbooks are used to promote a violent and delusional agenda. . . . But perhaps the biggest incitement to violence of all is the fact that the Palestinian Authority literally incentivizes it. In 2021, the Palestinian Authority paid over $270 million in salaries to convicted terrorists in Israeli prisons and the families of those killed while committing acts of terror.

Taking stock of the events of the last year, including the recent battering Israel has dealt Hizballah, Ben-Dror Yemini believes it is time for the Jewish state to take an even more significant step:

The Iranian axis of evil has attacked Israel from Gaza, Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq, Iran, and Syria—and a significant part of the world has aligned with the dark and murderous forces. A year in which even the leaders of countries expected to lead the free world, who should oppose the axis of evil, are imposing arms embargoes on Israel.

With or without the U.S., Israel must destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities. . . . Because if this regime is not eliminated, if it gains the capability, if it [obtains] nuclear weapons, it will destroy Israel. It will commit genocide on millions. Oil prices will rise? Let them rise. Our lives are more important.

The Middle East needs peace and rehabilitation. They will not come so long as the ayatollahs rule Iran. Tens of millions of Iranians, Lebanese, Iraqis, Yemenis, and Palestinians are the primary victims of the Iranian regime, which brings destruction, hunger, devastation, and bloodshed. It’s not clear if the U.S. can afford to abandon them. It is clear that Israel cannot abandon itself. It is possible that an action by Israel, alone, will exact a high price. But any price today will be lower than the price Israel will pay in the future.