Israel's Gaza War Has Made Me Ashamed to Be a Jewish Zionist

Israel's fight against Hamas started as a just war, but is now a moral travesty

This column has been gut-wrenching to write—months in the making as I’ve searched for the right words.

I speak plainly from the heart.

As a Jewish Zionist, I am ashamed by Israel’s conduct in its war in Gaza. That shame deepens daily as more Gazans are killed or starved in a war that I believe is now illegal and immoral.

Hamas is detestable and primarily responsible for the suffering of Gaza’s civilians. Every Hamas official that played a role in seizing, detaining, or killing any of the hostages must be held accountable and brought to justice.

Yet Hamas’ grotesque conduct does not excuse Israel’s failure to live up to universal moral standards. As a nation-state and signatory to the UN Charter and key humanitarian treaties, Israel must meet higher standards than a mere terrorist organization that violently seized power in Gaza. More importantly, Israel embodies Judaism and represents the Jewish people in the modern world. It exists today because Jewish people built a compelling moral case through the Zionist movement that Jews were entitled to a national homeland. Israel’s moral failings in Gaza contravene the moral basis for Zionism and are a stain on the Jewish people. If Israel continues to pursue this course in Gaza, the damage may be irreversible.

The Zionist Cause

To explain my distress at what Israel is doing in Gaza, I begin by explaining what Zionism means to me and why I am a Zionist.

To me, Zionism is the belief that the Jewish people are entitled to a nation-state in their ancestral home. The core justification for such a homeland is the persistent scourge of antisemitism that has unjustifiably plagued the Jewish people wherever they have settled. For centuries, Jews have struggled against persecution, yet overcome these obstacles and earned respect in the places they settled. But the virulence of Jew-hatred, and the violence attached to it, became intolerable through much of Russia and Eastern Europe after publication of the conspiratorial Protocols of the Elders of Zion in the late 19^th century, spawning a mass exodus of Jews to Palestine—at the time part of the Ottoman Empire. The notion that these persecuted migrants journeyed to Palestine on a colonial mission to settle the land of indigenous Arabs is a vicious lie. They were refugees fleeing violence, no different from migrants of all races and creeds who for centuries have left their homes to seek safety from tyranny, oppression, and violence.

As a Zionist, I celebrate Israel’s creation and believe that it has an inviolable right to exist in peace and within secure borders, like every other nation-state.

But I also take very seriously the promise that this State was created for a special purpose—that is, to be a place governed consistent with Jewish ethical values. Israel is not just a safe haven for Jews; its founders, in my view, set out to demonstrate, following the unthinkable horrors of the Holocaust, that this Jewish nation-state could—and should— conduct itself in accordance with the Jewish moral principles passed down through millennia. I have always taken seriously the promise in Israel’s Declaration of Independence that:

[The State of Israel] will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel; it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions; and it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.

I have been proud and unapologetic identifying as a Zionist because throughout most of its history, Israel has strived to uphold these principles despite massive—at times existential—security threats posed by hostile Arab states in the region, non-state actors, like Hamas and Hezbollah, and anti-Zionist and antisemitic movements around the globe. Israel’s humanitarian record in this regard has been far from perfect but certainly comparable to that of other democracies and far superior to every other Middle East government, especially in light of the threats Israel has faced.

The Conflict in Gaza: From a Just to an Illegal War

Israel’s conduct in Gaza, however, has fallen far short of even the most permissive interpretation of modern human rights standards.

Israel’s military intervention in Gaza started out as a morally valid, just war, but that war is now illegal and immoral.

When the war began, it was a justified use of military force to defend Israel against a violent organization that had just executed the most substantial terrorist attack Israel has sustained in its history. Both civilian casualties and severe impingements on civilian life in Gaza were the unfortunate, but lawful, by-product of this just use of military force. The many thousands of civilian deaths that occurred in the first phases of the war were attributable directly to Hamas’ heinous conduct.

Pinpointing precisely when the war in Gaza crossed from a just to an unjust war is a subjective endeavor, but I believe that this line should be drawn sometime around the negotiated cease-fire in January 2025 or earlier.

By this time, after 15 months of war, Hamas’ military force had been completely “destroyed” (according to the Institute for the Study of War) and its remaining scattered cells were “incapable of launching an October 7-style attack anytime soon.” Israel had also gained complete control of the Gaza-Egypt border, and therefore the ability to prevent the resupply of weaponry and long-term reconstitution of Hamas’ military. During this first year of war, the Israel Defense Force had occupied and controlled every acre of Gaza territory, enabling it to destroy most of Hamas’ weaponry and rockets. Hamas conceded that 95% of its leadership had been killed and it had lost control in 80% of Gaza territory. In essence, Hamas has been defeated.

Under these circumstances, Israel’s refusal to extend the January cease-fire and decision to re-start the war in March is unjustifiable. The mass civilian death toll and the suffering of over 2 million people—including starvation, the spread of disease, the destruction of hospitals, housing, and schools, horrific environmental damage from the rubble and ordnance, and the complete devastation of the economy—are now grossly disproportionate to the limited military gains that can be obtained through continued warfare against the degraded Hamas.

Israel’s actions since it reinitiated the war in March are especially morally repugnant. This cease-fire was welcomed around the world as a first step towards ending the war and it allowed desperately needed aid to flow to the civilian population in Gaza. Had Israel transitioned to a permanent cease-fire at that point, it could have secured freedom for the hostages and worked with the international community to disarm what remains of Hamas and establish a new government for Gaza.

Yet, Israel chose to unilaterally end the cease-fire, re-invade Gaza, resume aerial bombardments, and most damningly, imposed a total embargo on food, medical supplies, and other vital supplies. The complete aid embargo lasted 11 weeks, driving Gaza from a humanitarian disaster to the precipice of total famine.

Continuing the war under these circumstances is a serious violation of international humanitarian law and, in my view, the moral principles of Judaism.

Israel Does Not Need to “Annihilate” Hamas to Restore Its Security

Israel claims that continued warfare is justified because its security will not be ensured until Hamas has been fully “annihilated.” But the laws of war do not allow the use of force until the enemy is annihilated. Rather, the U.S. Department of Defense War Manual, states that “force may be used in self-defense, but only to the extent that it is required to repel the armed attack and to restore the security of the party attacked.” As noted above, Israel had achieved this legitimate war aim by, at the very latest, the cease-fire agreement in January 2025 (and perhaps months earlier).

Claiming that only Hamas’ full annihilation can make Israel safe, even though Hamas has been dramatically degraded, is untenable and wildly inconsistent with recent Israeli conduct.

First, it is well established that from 2018 to 2023, Israel approved millions of dollars in Qatari financial support to Hamas, even though Hamas doctrine during this time called for the destruction of Israel and Hamas frequently launched offensive attacks on Israeli territory. Allowing this huge cash flow directly to Hamas leadership demonstrates that Israel believed the security threat from Hamas was manageable. If Israel could tolerate the threat from Hamas and even allow it to be strengthened by Qatari funding prior to October 7, then surely it could manage a far reduced threat from the Hamas of 2025, which has been devastated by 15 months of full-bore warfare. Hamas’s annihilation was never, and is not now, essential to Israel’s security.

The success of Hamas’ October 7 attack does not undercut this reality. The Israeli government was grossly negligent in defending the country against the October 7 attack. First, the government and military establishment disregarded intelligence that Hamas was preparing a military invasion, deeming Hamas incapable of executing a successful invasion of the border. The government was wrong. Hamas breached the border in 30 locations allowing over 3,000 heavily armed fighters to storm into Israeli territory unimpeded. Moreover, of the 1,500 troops Israel had assigned to protect its border with Gaza, over half were allowed to go on leave for the Sukkot holiday. The government also unwisely co-located three battalions on Re’im military base, which Hamas successfully raided on October 7, pinning down the only troops in close enough proximity to protect the Israeli communities under assault. Orders for reinforcements were not made until hours after the Hamas attack commenced, and even then, military personnel deployed largely on their own, without being organized in tactical units or equipped with proper armaments to rebuff the invaders.

After the horrors of October 7, Israel will never be so unprepared again. With an appropriate level of border defense, Israel will be able to effectively defend itself, even if Hamas continues to exist and tries to rebuild.

Israel’s position that its security depends on the complete destruction of Hamas also stands in stark contrast to how Israel has addressed the threat from Hezbollah. Prior to the recent war, Hezbollah was a much more substantial military threat than Hamas, with a large and sophisticated arsenal of as many as 200,000 weapons. In September 2024, Israel engaged in a highly successful intelligence and military campaign that devastated Hezbollah leadership, wiped out substantial portions of Hezbollah’s rockets, and killed thousands of its fighters. Yet, after this month-long operation, Israel agreed to a permanent cease fire, even though Hezbollah retained political power in Lebanon and a substantial arsenal of weapons capable of harming Israel. There is no logical basis for Israel’s assertion that its security is gravely threatened unless Hamas is completely wiped out, but considers the threat from the relatively stronger organization, Hezbollah, to be entirely manageable.

If Israel could “annihilate” Hamas without causing mass harm to civilians, there would be no moral issues at stake. The world would surely be a better place without any vestige of Hamas. But the IDF has demonstrated over the past 22 months of warfare that it is incapable of wiping out Hamas without killing tens of thousands of civilians and triggering a humanitarian catastrophe. Pursuing Hamas’ annihilation in Gaza is therefore morally indefensible.

Israel’s Use of Military Force to Compel the Release of the Hostages Is Causing Excessive Harm to Civilians

Israel also maintains that it has a right to use military force to secure the release of the hostages. While Israel is correct that this is a legitimate military objective, the war is causing egregiously disproportionate harm to Gaza’s civilian population, which is a s violation of the laws of war and common morality.

There is no question that Israel may use military force against an organization that has held its citizens in captivity for almost two years. But like all uses of lethal force, Israel’s continued warfare to free the hostages is subject to the principle of proportionality, which bars uses of force resulting in “incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated (emphasis added).”

This universally accepted principle of proportionality compels us to weigh the number of lives at stake in this horrific situation. There are about 50 hostages that have not yet been returned, and it is estimated that 20 are alive. In contrast, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)^[i] reported last week that 9,000 Palestinians have died since the cease-fire ended in March, with 1,239 people killed and over 8,000 injured while seeking food. OCHA also reported that 63 people died from malnutrition in July alone, with 81 percent of households reporting “poor food consumption,” and 24 percent of households experiencing severe hunger. These figures fail to capture the full scale of suffering—including life-altering injuries, illness, lack of medical care and medicine, homelessness, economic deprivation, and environmental degradation—being experienced by 2 million Gazan civilians.

I am not insensitive to the harrowing plight of the hostages and the trauma that their captivity is causing, not only to them, but to their families, their compatriots, and Jews around the globe. However, I am unaware of any theory of ethics that would justify killing thousands, injuring tens of thousands, and depriving food and shelter to millions to save the lives of 20 people. Yes, the hostages are innocents and have endured unspeakable hardship. But the vast majority of Gazan civilians whose lives have been devastated by this war are innocents as well. The numbers matter. I do not see how a people who rightly mourn the slaughter of 6 million can come to any other conclusion than that the magnitude of civilian suffering Israel is inflicting upon Gaza is “excessive,” even if the lives of the 20 hostages could be saved.

Beyond the excessive civilian suffering occurring, it is important to recognize that all of the devastation in Gaza today is happening even though a deal to release the hostages in exchange for ending the war has been under discussion for over a year. As members of the public, we do not know the precise terms of the secret negotiations. Nonetheless, it is morally fraught for Israel to continue using lethal military force—killing scores of civilians each day and worsening the humanitarian crisis—to achieve the release of the hostages, which could be accomplished through a peace agreement. How can continued warfare be justified to pursue a goal that could more readily be achieved through diplomacy?

Zionism and Morality

Before closing, I want to consider one other perspective, which is that many supporters of Israel reject the idea that Zionism depends on Israel conducting itself consistent with moral principles. The core imperative of Zionism, they argue, is for Israel to exist as a homeland and safe harbor for the Jewish people and Judaism, period, hard stop. In their view, Israel must do whatever is necessary, regardless of Jewish ethics or conceptions of human rights, to ensure its survival. These Zionists see Hamas as an existential threat to Israel in light of the October 7 massacres and therefore believe that a war to annihilate Hamas and free hostages is morally justified, regardless of its impact on Gazan civilians.

I cannot completely refute this perspective. It is a form of Zionism. But I believe this Zionism is fundamentally misguided and doomed to failure.

This vision of Zionism contradicts how Israel has long seen itself. I’ve already referenced the commitments made in Israel’s Declaration of Independence. In addition, by choice, Israel created a military committed to abiding by international humanitarian law. The Israeli Defense Force (IDF) subjects all of its operations and uses of lethal force to a legal review. The IDF investigates claims of illegal conduct by its forces and holds military personnel accountable for misconduct. The Israeli system even allows for judicial review of military actions and decisions, an accountability mechanism absent in mature (and far less threatened) democracies like the United States and United Kingdom.

Israel has voluntarily done this because it realizes that the moral principles embodied in international law provide nation states with the tools necessary to defend themselves. Whether expressed in the just war theories expounded by Saint Thomas Aquinas in the 13^th century or in the Manual of the International Red Cross, the laws of war empower states to do what is necessary to defend themselves and safeguard their existence. By creating armed forces constrained by the law of war, Israel has acknowledged that it is both possible and desirable to effectively defend itself while complying with fundamental, globally accepted, moral imperatives.

More importantly, the notion that Israel should ignore moral principles to safeguard its existence is a concept that has sown within it the seeds of Israel’s destruction. Yes, Israel is wealthy, has a formidable military, is allied with the most powerful country in the world, and possess nuclear weapons. But in my view, the reason that Zionism has succeeded and Israel has prospered over its short lifespan is not because it has accrued power, but because of global respect for the Jewish people and, until now, Israel’s honorable conduct. It is worth remembering that Israel has a population of about 10 million citizens and there are only about 16 million Jews worldwide. In the short term, Israel may be able to sneer at global public opinion or reflexively castigate its critics as antisemites. But in an interconnected world of 8.2 billion people, Israel cannot afford to believe it will be able to continue to prosper if it flouts widely accepted moral principles. Its ministers should not suggest, as one recently did, that it is “just and moral” for a modern nation-state to intentionally “starve and thirst” civilians, no matter what the reason. Tiny Israel cannot prosper as a morally bankrupt pariah state. It would be a state for Jews—but no longer a Jewish State.

*. * *

And so, here we are. The war in Gaza is churning into its 23^rd month. Netanyahu has pledged to continue the war until there is a complete conquest of Hamas. Aid trickles into Gaza but today the Gaza Health Ministry reported five more starvation deaths, bringing the reported total to 193. Israel may yet achieve total “victory” over Hamas, but in doing so, it will have lost something far greater.

---

^[i] The UN receives much of its data from the Gaza Ministry of Health, which many observers allege is an unreliable data source because it is run by Hamas. However, independent assessments have verified the methods the GMH uses to make casualty estimates and some believe GMH’s data actually underestimates the number of civilians impacted by the war.