As the war in Gaza appears to be coming to close, writes Michael Milshtein, Israelis are left with “a sense of failure and bitterness” despite the IDF’s “military successes and strategic achievements.” Meanwhile, he writes, Gazans are likely to see the war as a “historic achievement,” and thus once more fall into the cycle of ecstasy and amnesia that Shany Mor identified as the key pattern in Palestinian understanding of the conflict.

Milshtein too acknowledges how much the present results resemble what preceded them, reminding us that Arabs and Israelis felt similarly after

the 1956 Sinai Campaign when, like in the current war, Israel was pressured by the United States to withdraw from conquered territories and bring the conflict to an end. The same applies to the Yom Kippur War, the second intifada, the Second Lebanon War, and the 2014 Operation Protective Edge [against Hamas]. Arab collective memory regards these events as achievements resulting from sacrifice and the ability to absorb severe blows, exhibit steadfastness (sumud), and make it impossible for Israel to declare decisive victory.

This phenomenon shouldn’t lead Israel to conclude it has been defeated but must be understood so as to formulate sober goals and courses of action in dealing with enemies in the region.

For now, there are no signs of soul-searching [among Palestinians] concerning the price of the war. Responsibility for the carnage and destruction, described as a nakba greater than that of 1948, is laid at Israel’s doorstep. This reflects a long-standing fundamental Palestinian flaw: a “bipolarity” with, on the one hand, fighting spirit and praise for the ability to harm Israel and, on the other, victimhood from the results of the war the Palestinians themselves started.

To Mathias Döpfner, a German and the publisher of the online magazine Politico, the war between Israel and Iran

is a central front in a global contest in which the forces of tyranny and violence in recent years have been gaining ground against the forces of freedom, which too often are demoralized and divided. In a world full of bad actors, Iran is the most aggressive and dangerous totalitarian force of our time.

But Israel is only the first target. Once Israel falls, Europe and America will be the focus. . . . It is therefore surprising that Israel is not being celebrated worldwide for its historic, extremely precise, and necessary strike against Iranian nuclear-weapons facilities and for the targeted killing of leading terrorists, but that the public response is dominated by anti-Israel propaganda. The intelligence and precision of Israel’s actions are not admired but are instead used here and there to perpetuate blatantly anti-Semitic stereotypes.

If Israel does not achieve its goals—destruction of the nuclear facilities, maximum weakening of the terrorist regime, and, ideally, the removal of the mullahs—the world will quickly look very different. China will seize this historic opportunity to annex Taiwan sooner than expected. Largely without resistance. . . . That is why America and Europe, in their own interests alone, must stand united with Israel and do everything in their power to ensure that this historic liberation is achieved.