By Alice Cuddy BBC News, Jerusalem
The call to Mahmoud Shaheen came at dawn.
It was Thursday 19 October at about 06:30, and Israel had been bombing Gaza for 12 days straight.
He’d been in his third-floor, three-bedroom flat in al-Zahra, a middle-class area in the north of the Gaza Strip. Until now, it had been largely untouched by air strikes.
He’d heard a rising clamour outside. People were screaming. “You need to escape,” somebody in the street shouted, “because they will bomb the towers”.
You’d think as an oppressed minority in the world, you’d be more outraged at Israel for their continued oppression of Palestinians. I know plenty of other Jews that feel this way.
Who says I don’t? Israel should definitely stop the settlements, push to join the Palestinians into the abrahamic accords, do what they can to bring actual peace instead of placating their religious fanatics for an easy vote.
I said I support Israel. In which I meant that I support Israel’s fight against Hamas. Yes, that entails hurting civilians. Yes, that is a sad state of affairs.