Israel should make every Jew incredibly proud right now.

They say that to be Jewish is to carry memory, but to be Israeli is to carry responsibility. Naturally, Israel has embraced this burden.

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Every Jew should be incredibly proud of Israel right now.

Not just for its innovations, its culture, its defense establishment, or its Nobel Prizes, but for its courage. For standing alone, again. For doing what every Jewish heart, no matter how secular or skeptical, has quietly hoped it would do: Defend us when no one else will.

In making the first move to eliminate Iran’s nuclear program, Israel has done what the so-called “international community” refused to do, what the United Nations debated for two decades, what the West warned against, what the headlines minimized, what every Jew with half a brain understood could not be left to chance.

The Iranian regime is not just another adversary; it is the most dangerous foe the Jewish People have faced since Nazi Germany. Its leaders speak in the language of genocide. They do not hide their ambitions. Their slogans are “Wipe Israel off the map!” and “Death to Israel!”

Iran’s longtime Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has repeatedly called Israel a “cancerous tumour” that “should be removed from the region,” and that there would be “no cure for Israel but annihilation.” He has also claimed “the Holocaust is an event whose reality is uncertain” and shared Holocaust-denial content on state media, including a poster citing “final solution” language reminiscent of Nazi Germany.

And Iran is not alone; its proxies and partners share the same genocidal vision. Foremost among them is Hezbollah, Iran’s Lebanese terrorist arm which for decades was led by Hassan Nasrallah (whom Israel rightly assassinated last year). Some years ago, Nasrallah expressed a wish that every Jew in the world would gather in Israel.

Why?

So that he and his ilk wouldn’t have to chase us around the globe; they could simply wipe us out in one shot. “If they [Jews] all gather in Israel,” he said, “it will save us the trouble of going after them worldwide.”

Following October 7th, in the early days of the Israel-Hamas war, IDF soldiers discovered Arabic translations of Mein Kampf — Hitler’s manifesto — among operatives of Hamas, which is chiefly sponsored by Iran. That wasn’t an accident; it was a symbol, a declaration. The same genocidal ideology that drove the ovens of Auschwitz now fuels the tunnels of Gaza and the missile stockpiles of Iran.

These enemies don’t want compromise. They don’t want borders. They don’t want diplomacy. They don’t want mutual respect. They don’t want coexistence. They don’t want peace. They want Jews dead, and they say so openly.

These are not metaphors; they are mission statements. And while the world dismissed them as rhetoric, Israel took them at their word, because Jews know what happens when genocidal threats are not taken seriously.

Of course, those with more years of experience know this isn’t the first time Israel has stood alone. In 1967, the tiny state faced annihilation. Surrounded on all sides by Arab armies, with global powers warning Israel not to act preemptively, the Jewish state struck first — and won. In six miraculous days, it not only survived, but reshaped the map and redefined Jewish dignity.

And the world took notice. The world’s greatest power took notice. It was that unlikely, stunning victory against impossible odds that made the United States re-evaluate its alliance and begin the special relationship with the Jewish state that we know today.

Jews around the world, from Paris to Buenos Aires to Brooklyn, stood taller. For the first time in 2,000 years, we were not an exiled people desperate for shelter. We were no longer history’s punching bag. We had a homeland, and that homeland could fight. That homeland could win.

This matters more than many Jews realize. Because a strong Israel isn’t just about national pride; it’s about Jewish survival. Everywhere. A weak Israel means a weak diaspora. It means emboldened antisemites, from Tehran to TikTok. It means Jews walking hunched through life, apologizing for our existence, begging others to tolerate us.

But a strong Israel? That changes everything.

For centuries, Jews were accused of being too weak. Now, we are condemned for being too strong. But Israel’s power is not brutish; it is restrained, ethical, targeted. In a region of human shields and beheadings, the IDF remains a masterfully moral army — because Jewish power, at its best, is power with principles.

Some Jews in the Diaspora have the luxury of pretending they don’t need Israel. They’ve convinced themselves that their safety rests in “progressive” or “universal” values. But when the synagogue windows shatter and supposed allies keep their mouths shut as Jews are indiscriminately targeted, they are forced to remember, painfully, why Israel exists.

Those of us more in-tune with reality know that, when Iran arms proxies from Gaza to Lebanon, when it builds missile bases in Syria, when it plots attacks from Europe to South America, it does so not just to target Israeli soil, but to make Jewish life everywhere feel less safe. Israel’s decision to strike back — decisively, boldly, creatively — is not an act of aggression. It is an act of Jewish defense, on behalf of a global people still haunted by what happens when we remain passive.

To Jews still on the fence, you don’t have to agree with every Israeli policy, but know this: When the knives come out, it’s not policy they hate. It’s you. And when they chant “From the River to the Sea!” they’re not calling for peace; they’re calling for Jewish erasure. Israel is not perfect (obviously, no country is), but Israel is ours. And when the world goes dark again, Israel will be our light.

They say that to be Jewish is to carry memory, but to be Israeli is to carry responsibility. Naturally, Israel has embraced this burden. While others analyze, Israel acts. While others placate, Israel prepares. And when the time comes, as it did just last week, Israel does what must be done, even if no one claps, even if the world condemns.

Indeed, Israel has been condemned more times than one could imagine during the last 600 days, despite suffering the worst attack on Jews since the Holocaust on October 7, 2023. Nations like the United Kingdom, France, and Canada — so-called “enlightened democracies” — have chosen to “both-sides” the conflict. These are countries whose Jewish citizens have contributed disproportionately to their prosperity across science, business, education, medicine, and the arts.

And yet, when the Jewish state faces an existential threat from the modern-day Nazi regime in Tehran and its terror tentacles, these governments equivocate. They call for “restraint.” They wring their hands. They enable delay. They pressure the victim while the aggressor plots its next strike. They are not helping stop genocide; they are helping manage it.

It all smells eerily similar to the world that rationalized Hitler’s rise — signing deals, delaying intervention, and treating the Nazis like a legitimate diplomatic actor — just like it has treated the Iranian regime.

This isn’t about territory. It’s not about human rights. It’s not about the two-state solution. This is about annihilation, the kind that doesn’t negotiate, the kind that once wore swastikas and now waves the Iranian flag. And Israel, alone if it must, is standing between them and us.

So yes, every Jew should be darn proud right now. Proud that we are no longer at the mercy of empires. Proud that we are not asking others to rescue us. Proud that we have a state which sees existential danger coming and moves before it’s too late.

Less than 80 years ago, Jews had nowhere to run. Today, we have an F-35 fleet, a world-class intelligence service, strong leaders, and Jews who are ready to go to battle — and the will to use all of it not to conquer, but to remain free in our indigenous homeland.

We are not just survivors of pogroms and camps; we are heirs to prophets and kings. The rebirth of Israel is not just a refuge from hate; it is the restoration of Jewish agency, responsibility, and national purpose. For the first time in two millennia, Jewish destiny is in Jewish hands.

At this moment, Israelis are united like never before. Left, right, secular, religious — they know what’s at stake. The debates are gone, the differences paused. Because when the sirens wail and the enemy missiles close in, Israelis remember who they are and why they’re there.

“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is my political rival,” wrote Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid, “but his decision to strike Iran at this moment in time is the right one. The whole country is united in this moment, when faced with an enemy sworn to our destruction, nothing will divide us.”¹

It’s time Diaspora Jewry heeds this call as well.

All Jews, everywhere, should feel that same clarity, that same resolve. Our divisions are a luxury we cannot afford in this moment. Whether you live in Tel Aviv or Toronto, Jerusalem or Johannesburg, we must not forget: We are one people, with one fate. And when the Jewish state fights for its survival, it is fighting for all Jews.

That should make every Jew incredibly proud.

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1. “Yair Lapid: As Iran vows our destruction, Israel unites - opinion.” The Jerusalem Post.