The World Is Watching Israel While the Fire Spreads

Yesterday it was September 11.

A date that should make the civilized world remember what happens when terrorism, fanaticism and religious extremism are underestimated.

And yet, twenty five years after the attacks of September 11, 2001, I look at the world and wonder how much we have actually learned.

Yesterday, Iran aligned Houthi forces seized the strategic island of Mayun, also known as Perim, in the Bab el Mandeb Strait, one of the most important maritime passages in the world. This tiny island sits at the entrance to the Red Sea, in a position that can affect international shipping, energy supplies and global economic stability.

Think about that for a moment.

An extremist armed movement backed by Iran expands its position around one of the world’s critical shipping routes, and still an enormous part of the international public conversation remains obsessively focused on Israel.

Israel.

Israel.

Israel.

The Jewish state is scrutinized under a microscope while a network of armed movements across the Middle East openly threatens countries, civilians, international shipping and regional stability.

At what point will people understand that this story was never only about Gaza?

Israel has been fighting an existential war against enemies that have repeatedly made their intentions toward the Jewish state unmistakable. Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis and the Islamic Republic of Iran are different organizations with different interests, histories and structures, but hostility toward Israel connects them.

And still millions of people around the world behave as though Israel is the source of the region’s instability.

That requires an extraordinary refusal to look at the wider picture.

Israel did not create the Houthis.

Israel did not create Hezbollah.

Israel did not create the Iranian regime.

Israel did not create Hamas.

And the Houthis did not seize an island in the Bab el Mandeb today because somebody built an apartment in Jerusalem.

The obsession with explaining virtually every manifestation of Middle Eastern extremism through Israel has become intellectually absurd.

What frightens me almost as much as the extremism itself is the willingness of ordinary people to follow a crowd without asking difficult questions.

We have seen that phenomenon before.

Whenever I mention the Nazi era, somebody immediately becomes uncomfortable. Good. History should make us uncomfortable.

I am not saying that today’s protesters are Nazis, nor am I claiming that our era is identical to the 1930s. History does not repeat itself that neatly.

But there is a human behavior that absolutely deserves comparison: conformity.

Millions of ordinary people can become convinced that something is morally acceptable simply because enough people around them repeat it. Propaganda becomes easier to believe when friends believe it. A slogan becomes a substitute for knowledge. Repetition becomes evidence. Belonging to the crowd becomes more important than asking whether the crowd is right.

That mechanism did not disappear in 1945.

Today it has social media.

People chant words they cannot define. They share maps whose history they do not understand. They repeat accusations without checking evidence. They glorify people carrying weapons while condemning those fighting them. Some cannot locate Gaza, Judea and Samaria, Yemen or Iran on a map, yet suddenly speak with absolute certainty about one of the most complicated conflicts on earth.

Critical thinking has been replaced by hashtags.

And that terrifies me.

This week I finished watching season five of Fauda.

Yes, Fauda is fiction. It is television, not documentary evidence, and it should never be confused with journalism. But its fictional portrayal of terrorism, infiltration, fear, loss and the impossible decisions surrounding asymmetric warfare can nevertheless hit painfully close to realities Israelis have lived with.

I cried.

I cried because after October 7, certain images and storylines no longer feel distant.

And I simply cannot understand how people who witnessed the massacre of October 7 can romanticize Hamas or excuse terrorism as resistance.

There is no political grievance that makes murdering civilians heroic. There is no territorial dispute that makes kidnapping families noble. There is no historical argument that turns deliberate attacks against civilians into liberation.

And this is where I refuse to sugar coat my opinion.

I cannot understand people who celebrate terrorism.

I cannot understand those who saw October 7 and immediately searched for reasons why Israel somehow deserved it.

I cannot understand activists who demand endless accountability from Israel while finding endless excuses for armed organizations whose ideologies include the destruction of Israel.

And I especially reject the assumption that supporting the Palestinian national cause requires excusing Hamas or pretending that radicalization and support for violence within Palestinian society do not exist. Palestinians are individuals, and no population should be treated as collectively guilty. But neither should uncomfortable attitudes, indoctrination, glorification of violence or support for terrorism be erased simply because acknowledging them complicates a fashionable political narrative.

Peace cannot be built on denial.

Look beyond Israel today.

Look at Yemen.

Look at Iran.

Look at Hezbollah.

Look at Hamas.

Look at what happened in the Bab el Mandeb.

Then ask yourself a very simple question.

If Israel disappeared tomorrow, would the Houthis suddenly become democrats?

Would the Iranian regime suddenly become liberal?

Would sectarian warfare disappear?

Would Islamist extremism disappear?

Would the struggle for regional domination disappear?

Of course not.

Israel is not the disease of the Middle East. Too often, Israel is the convenient excuse used to avoid diagnosing the disease.

And the seizure of Mayun Island should be another wake up call.

The fire is spreading far beyond Israel’s borders. It threatens shipping routes, economies and countries that have absolutely nothing to do with the Israeli Palestinian conflict.

Yet somehow, the world’s finger keeps pointing toward the Jewish state.

On September 11 of all days, we should understand the danger of waiting until fanaticism arrives at our own doorstep before taking it seriously.

Israel has been warning the world for years.

You do not have to agree with every Israeli government decision. I certainly do not believe supporting Israel requires blind agreement with every politician or every policy.

But there is an enormous difference between criticizing a government and refusing a nation its right to survive.

Israel is fighting for that survival.

The question is whether the rest of the world will recognize the wider threat before it discovers that Israel was never the final destination.

It was simply standing closer to the front line.