Steve, there is a real simple answer: If most Israelis and their defenders were Palestinian -- as if I was -- they'd want to not be ruled by jihadists dedicated to causing war and getting them killed. Unless, of course, they had already been brainwashed by Hamas into being jihadists themselves. You write as if you neither know the horrors that Hamas brings to its own people, nor of the history of the region (you suggest history is tiresome yet offer many fallacies that only history can answer - so maybe try learning it). Israel in 1948 did not shoot anyone who didn't leave which is why the country now has over 2m Arabs in its 10m citizens. The Palestinians could have had an independent state on many occasions had they ever accepted offers (the last was in 2009). For real : you want "empathy"? Empathize with the poor Palestinians and help them get rid of the crazies. And this is in no way a defense of Netanyahu. It is a wider view of a complex situation that you have reduced to woke caricature.