But why did it take a missile near Ben Gurion?
Let’s not sugarcoat it. For months, the Houthis have been lobbing rockets at Israel from 2,000 kilometers away, as if it’s some long-distance hobby. And what did we do? We yawned. We monitored. We held consultations. We let the grownups talk.
Then came Sunday.
A Houthi missile landed close enough to Ben Gurion Airport to disrupt international flights and send six civilians to the hospital. And suddenly—miraculously—Israel discovered its air force. Within 48 hours, Yemen lit up like a menorah on the eighth night.
Power stations, airports, drones, military facilities—gone. Finally, we brought out the iron hammer. Finally, we reminded the world that the Jewish state doesn’t just absorb punches. We can swing too.
But let me ask the obvious:
Why did it take that much?
Why did we wait until the literal doorstep of our international airport was struck before acting with force?
The Houthis have been clear from day one. They’re not fighting for “Palestine.” They’re fighting for “Death to Israel.” This isn’t strategy. It’s theology. And we treated it like noise—until the noise shook the runway at Ben Gurion.
Even now, the Houthis are threatening to hit us again—as if this is some back-and-forth tennis match. Are we playing Wimbledon or defending a sovereign country?
Meanwhile, the United States has launched over 1,000 airstrikes against the Houthis in the past few months, protecting global shipping routes. Admirable. But if you can bomb Yemen for interrupting oil flow in the Red Sea, why not decapitate their leadership for firing missiles at us?
The Houthis should’ve been flattened in December. Instead, they were allowed to build a brand as the “resistance from afar.” They became Twitter warriors with warheads.
The truth is, we’ve been playing defense for too long. We try to be the mature ones. The restrained ones. The morally superior ones.
But here’s a newsflash: morality without deterrence invites war.
Our enemies don’t fear condemnation—they fear consequences. And when the only consequence is a diplomatic memo or a strike on an empty warehouse, guess what? They keep coming.
Israel has the military might to be the regional power no one dares test. We just haven’t acted like it. Not consistently. Not decisively. Not loudly enough for the message to sink in:
You aim at Israeli civilians, you don’t get a warning. You get wiped.
This isn’t vengeance. It’s clarity. And clarity saves lives.
We showed that kind of clarity this week. Let’s not let it be a one-time event. Let it be a turning point. Let the message ring from Tehran to Sanaa to Beirut:
Israel doesn’t play ping-pong with terrorists.
We flip the table.
