> I live in Canada

Oh nice, I have lots of family and friends there, and I've been many times, what a wonderful country.

> Having said that, I don't live under an "iron dome" and my life is not at risk; so, I can sympathize but will not be commenting on that as I have no lived experience of that level of stress and anxiety. No one deserves to live like that.

Thank you. No one really deserves to live in any kind of war zone. For sure the people in Gaza have it far worse than we do here.

I will say, one thing that I think keeps getting "lost" by outsiders to conflict is just how different it is to live under threat of annhilation. That's something I think outsiders don't really understand, because they mostly think Israel is "all-powerful" in this conflict. And for sure Israel is more powerful. But people here vividly remember that we are surrounded by enemies that have attacked us many times, and that absolutely might be able to overwhelm us. It's happened before, and this current situation makes us all feel incredibly scared that a wider war will break out. Many Israelis I know have fled the country for fear of a wider conflict.

I'm not saying this excuses all behavior, but for sure, when talking with Westerners, it often feels like they just don't have a concept of a real war that could destroy their country. And that makes sense - most Canadians/USians are hundreds of years removed from that kind of worry.

> But, I completely reject the notion that this violence is happening in a vaccuum and that Israel didn't play a role in causing this.

I agree, of course it didn't happen in a vacuum. I'm not trying to say Israel is faultless, or that the Palestinians don't have very legitimate grievances.

> Again, not alone here, as there are at least 15 U.N resolutions condemning Israel in 2022 alone and of course, vetoed by the U.S.

I just want to give you an Israeli's perspective on this. We absolutely hate the UN, and assume it is incredibly biased against Israel. Which makes sense, since it's not a democratic institution, it's far closer to a popularity contest, and there are more than 20 Arab countries, representing 200 million Arabs, as opposed to only one Israel representing 7 million Jews (or 15 million worldwide Jews).

As proof of this bias, per Wikipedia:

> Since the UNHRC's creation in 2006, it has resolved almost as many resolutions condemning Israel alone than on issues for the rest of the world combined.

Now, say whatever you want about Israel, I don't think there's any legitimate way to make the claim that it deserves more condemnation than the rest of the world combined. Not even close.

> I will spare you repeating the talks of dehumanization, eradication from your democratically elected government officials as you've already expressed more empathy than any of them towards civilian lives.

Just for the record, I am against that kind of talk. I understand where it comes from, and I think in some cases people are blurring between things said against Hamas vs. against all Palestinians, sometimes intentionally (on both sides). But I think it's wrong.

> Gaza is under a blockade, their movement is restricted, their trade and goods are restricted, electricity, food etc. and it has been like that for years. It's why it's compared to a prison and Israel is its warden, literally.

Israel withdrew from Gaza, after which they elected Hamas, with the avowed intent to destroy Israel. Israel then implemented a blockade to prevent them getting weapons.

Let's say Israel lifted that blockade and allowed free movement - do you think that Hamas wouldn't just arm themselves even more and commit even more violence? Even under the current situation, where aid and things are going through the blockade, you have videos that Hamas themsleves put up of them digging up water pipes meant for the populace, and turning them into rockets.

> Again, I see little to no good will from Israel. There are no humanitarian corridors open. People cannot escape. People can go south but even the Rafah (Egypt's border) area was bombed and they also bomb the south of the city in general.

If we're talking in general, I think you can see goodwill by the fact that Israel has agreed to several peace deals that the Palestinians walked away from, the fact that Israel completely left Gaza, the fact that after every time Hamas started shooting rockets at Israel, it has agreed to a ceasefire despite being objectively much stronger than Hamas. As terrible as the rockets alway were, it's not like Israel couldn't have any of the dozen times this has happened decided to go in and do far more damage.

Also, I do ask that you judge Israel not by some ideal moral standard, but by the standard of how other countries have acted or would act in similar situations.

As for goodwill in the current situation, all I can say is, two weeks ago everyone was up in arms at Israel saying that it was giving Gazans 24 hours to evacuate, turning off the water and blocking food, etc. I said then, that Israel would not let Gazans starve, and would not create a mass casualty event. Israel still hasn't, and I continue to stick by this statement - while many Gazans will regrettably lose this lives (and I really do regret this), Israel is not going to indiscriminately kill Gazans, there will be no mass casualty event neither by bombing nor by mass starvation etc. While Israel has bombed a bit in the south, it is mostly not bombing there and mostly allowing Gazans to escape to the south.

I don't have proof of any of this, but all I can say is that I've been right so far and all past actions have shown that Israel is not trying to mass kill Gazans, despite always having had the ability to do so, and there's just no real way to think otherwise when looking at the actual numbers.

(And I will reiterate again - every civilian death is a tragedy. I even think it's a tragedy that any terrorists/militants have to be killed, because despite the civilian/combatant distinction, most of them are scared/angry teenagers too! I definitely think Israel has sometimes killed innocent it didn't have to, just like any other army in the world, but I don't think any of Israel's actions are consistent with it trying to create a genocide, period, and I've seen no reason to think otherwise except people saying "this time is different and Israel will cause a genocide".)

> The lie is: Gaza has been left alone and the people/government have failed to make something of themselves. Meanwhile, I read/watch the lives of people in Gaza (very little footage as many journalists are not allowed to enter Gaza by Israel and are accused of being propagandists) and I can't even imagine how I would live my life under those circumstances without resorting to violence, radicalization or desperation.

I don't mean to sound callous, truly, but people live in bad conditions all over the world. Gazans are certainly not living in good circumstances, but there's many people around the world who live in far worse conditions. And it's worth reiterating - if they would agree to ceasing violence and compromising with Israel, we would have peace. They don't have to resort to violence any more than anyone else does - it's only because they refuse to accept Israel existing as it currently does, only because they refused and refuse to compromise, that they continue to be in this current situation.

(And once agian, I mostly blame their leaders for this, not the "average citizen", and also put a lot of blame on Israeli leaders, who have for years done nothing to encourage peace and done plenty to discourage peace.)

> Here are two videos that influenced me:

I don't have time to watch these right now (they're long), but will try to watch them soon. I'll try to think of good resources.

I wish for peace too. Unfortunately, it's a two sided thing, and one side really hasn't tried to achieve peace all these years. (And the Israeli side is somewhere between "giving up" and "actively try to discouarge peace", so it's not like our side is perfect.)