I can certainly understand the sense of alienation and how appalling it is how people fall into the left-right dichotomy on this. Not to defend Hamas or its actions, it needs to be destroyed. But people are correct in holding Israel accountable for mass bombings and disproportionate responses.

But of course, people would be idiots to conflate Hamas with Palestinians or to think these terrorist acts are a blow to "oppression." They would also be idiots to think Netanyahu and his right-wing coalition represent Israelis. In truth, both civilian populations reject these leaders, but are powerless to do much of anything as long as rockets fly and bombs fall.

And that's the point: Hamas was created with the help of the IDF to offset the growing influence of the PLO.

Nowadays, the far-right of the Likud Party are not-so-secretly supporting Hamas because their extremism gives Netanyahu the excuse he needs to reject a two-state solution and maintain his grip on power.

Meanwhile, Gaza remains under embargo and fenced in, the Israeli government is still building settlements in the West Bank, and Palestinians are still denied the right of return. The status quo endures because extremists on both sides are afraid of peace and democracy.

If it's unsafe to be Jewish in America, I would imagine the real threat comes from the Christian right and white supremacists. I would further imagine that moving to Israel would be a lovely thing to do, mainly because people like yourself are needed to remove Netanyahu and his coalition of hard right lunatics from power. Hopefully, with assistance, the people of Gaza can do the same.