Last week’s cover story of the Economist, titled “Israel Alone,” is filled with dire predictions about the country being “locked in the bleakest trajectory of its 75-year existence,” about it facing growing “isolation,” and about Israelis being “in denial” about their situation. These predictions were, of course, accompanied by little understanding of Israeli society, the Middle East, or the situation in Gaza. Jeff Jacoby observes that the Jewish state is far from being without allies. Yet for all the article’s flaws, Jacoby suggests there is some truth to its central thesis:

The pioneers of modern Zionism were convinced that only in a country of their own could Jews finally achieve the normality denied them for so long—the normality other peoples take for granted.

But they were wrong. Israel has never been regarded as a “normal” country.

What the Economist proclaims on its cover, the Biblical prophet Balaam, a non-Jew, proclaimed in the book of Numbers. Attempting to execrate the Israelites, he intoned: “Lo, it is a people that dwells alone/ And shall not be reckoned among the nations.” In that singular description—a people that dwells alone—is encapsulated an essential reality of the long, long history of the Jews. Sometimes for better, sometimes for worse, the Jewish people—and the reborn Jewish state—are fundamentally alone, unlike the “normal” peoples and nations with whom they share the planet. Israel can never be just another country, like Belgium or Thailand. The Jewish state is alone; and that is both its blessing and its curse.

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.