A lot of Israel's actions doesn't make sense if you try to look at it from a logical self-defense perspective. This Haaretz article covers a bit on how there is a disconnect between the Zionist action and narrative. Content Warning It is an interesting read, but it's not for the faint of heart.
It's interesting what happens when the rhetoric used is applied to both sides.
Why don't the citizens of Israel stand up against their governments war crimes?
If the citizens of Israel didn't all want to be complicit in their government's war crimes, why haven't they risen up to outlaw mandatory military service?
Why don't the citizens of Israel do anything about the settlers committing terrorist acts in plains clothes, and instead just let them blend with the rest of the population?
Why do the citizens of Israel not stand against their military protecting, supporting, legitimizing the terrorist acts of the settlers?
The list goes on...
There is no two sides. One foreign people wanted another people's land, and they used some past ancestry / religious fanaticism / racism to commit atrocities in the process of stealing the land.
Burying the Nakba: How Israel Systematically Hides Evidence of 1948 Expulsion of Arabs
Classified Docs Reveal Massacres of Palestinians in '48 – and What Israeli Leaders Knew
When former IDF soldiers and Holocaust survivors take a firm anti-Zionist stance, it's probably because the Zionist side is shit.
Breaking the Silence is also an Israeli organization composed of IDF veterans giving testimonies such as the IDF using ambulances to conceal combatants or using human shields.
Good, now think about how the Palestinians felt from the beginning.
If you want you can read more about the Deir Yassin massacre, Abu Shusha massacre, Lyda and Ramle massacres, Al Dawayima massacre, and lastly but definitely not least the Sabra and Shatila Massacre.
There's gems such as:
"On 14th April at 10 a.m. I visited Silwan village accompanied by a doctor and a nurse from the Government Hospital in Jerusalem and a member of the Arab Women's Union. We visited many houses in this village in which approximately some two to three hundred people from Deir Yassin village are housed. I interviewed many of the women folk in order to glean some information on any atrocities committed in Deir Yassin but the majority of those women are very shy and reluctant to relate their experiences especially in matters concerning sexual assault and they need great coaxing before they will divulge any information. The recording of statements is hampered also by the hysterical state of the women who often break down many times whilst the statement is being recorded. There is, however, no doubt that many sexual atrocities were committed by the attacking Jews. Many young schoolgirls were raped and later slaughtered. Old women were also molested. One story is current concerning a case in which a young girl was literally torn in two. Many infants were also butchered and killed. I also saw one old woman who gave her age as one hundred and four who had been severely beaten about the head with rifle butts. Women had bracelets torn from their arms and rings from their fingers and parts of some of the women's ears were severed in order to remove earrings."
and
"A soldier of Kiryati Brigade captured 10 men and 2 women. All were killed except a young woman who was raped and disposed of. At the dawn of 14 May, units of Giv'ati brigade assaulted Abu Shusha village. Fleeing villagers were shot on sight. Others were killed in the streets or axed to death. Some were lined up against a wall and executed. No men were left; women had to bury the dead."
and
Israeli writer Amos Kenan, who served as a platoon commander of the 82d Regiment of the Israeli Army brigade that conquered Lydda told The Nation on 6 February 1989: "At night, those of us who couldn't restrain ourselves would go into the prison compounds to fuck Arab women. I want very much to assume, and perhaps even can, that those who couldn't restrain themselves did what they thought the Arabs would have done to them had they won the war."[85] Kenan said he heard of only one woman who complained. A court-martial was arranged, he said, but in court, the accused ran the back of his hand across his throat, and the woman decided not to proceed.[85] The allegations were given little consideration by the Israeli government. Agriculture Minister Aharon Zisling told the Cabinet on 21 July: "It has been said that there were cases of rape in Ramle. I could forgive acts of rape but I won't forgive other deeds, which appear to me much graver. When a town is entered and rings are forcibly removed from fingers and jewellery from necks—that is a very grave matter."
and
Ben-Gurion, quoting General Avner, briefly referred in his war diary to the 'rumours' that the army had 'slaughtered 70–80 persons.' One version of what happened was provided by an Israeli soldier to a Mapam member, who transmitted the information to Eliezer Peri, the editor of the party daily Al HaMishmar and a member of the party's Political Committee. The party member, Sh. (possibly Shabtai) Kaplan, described the witness as 'one of our people, an intellectual, 100 percent reliable.' The village, wrote Kaplan, had been held by Arab 'irregulars' and was captured by the 89th Battalion without a fight. 'The first [wave] of conquerors killed about 80 to 100 men, women, and children. The children they killed by breaking their heads with sticks. There was not a house without dead,' wrote Kaplan. Kaplan's informant, who arrived immediately afterwards in the second wave, reported that Arab men and women who remained were then shut away in houses 'without food or water.' Sappers arrived to blow up the houses.
One commander ordered a sapper to put two old women in a certain house ... and to blow up the house with them. The sapper refused ... The commander then ordered his men to put the old women in the house and the evil deed was done. One soldier boasted that he had raped a woman and then shot her. One woman, with a newborn baby in her arms, was employed to clean the courtyard where the soldiers ate. She worked a day or two. In the end they shot her and her baby.
and I am not going to even go into what happened in Sabra and Shatila. Just know that just like in Deir Yassin, Zionists and Jewish extremists reneged on peace pacts. The reason why both of these massacres were so devastating was explicitly because the Palestinian people demilitarized themselves in exchange for peace and co-existence. However, we all know how that played out.
Now, the current people of Israel flourish off the atrocities of the Zionists and Jewish extremists. Rather than recognizing the war crimes as they were, many try to re-write history and revere war criminals as war heroes. For some, that is not even necessary because they believe that Palestinian life is below them. The verbiage that many have used to describe Palestinians is very akin to how other ethnocentric societies have described racial minorities in the past, present, or future. As for you, you stand not only on the shoulders of giants, but on the countless bodies of those who were massacred, tortured, and raped. If you cared for justice, then would it not be right to give back? If you knew that just by living in Israel, you are perpetuating the status quo, then would it not be right to at least balance it out through some form of disruption?
But no, ignoring history, you now call for violence. As we all know, violence begets violence.
I mean... they kind of already did that in the October 7th attack. They would rather their people be dead than be used to release Palestinians imprisoned without trial.
Maybe it depends on the type of Israeli too. There is a lot of inter-Israeli racism and Arab-Israelis which were historically set near borders to act as buffers, aren't as valued as their European counterparts.
Shouldn't we put the onus of responsibility on Israeli's leadership and all that support this kind of ruling which blurs the lines between civilian and combatant?
It doesn't help that Israel uses its military to protect and bolster settlers in plain clothes as they commit terrorism against the indigenous populations. In a sense, Israel is using its noncombatant civilian population as a "human shield" as sorts because they know that Palestinian resistance groups lack the luxury to sift through potential targets because time and technology is limited, and the risks are sky high. Perhaps, this was done by design to force everybody to have a stake in the conflict, whether they wanted to or not.
It sounds bad, but it makes sense when you look at things through a historical context.
Well. . . it sounds bad because it is bad.
but they do not wish a genocide
Also, when Palestinians resist against Israel, I'm not sure many people are informed about the differences between what Israel's actions are and the narrative it gives out. An example would be found in this Haaretz article covering how Israel systematically hides evidence of Arab expulsion.