If you haven’t visited Israel or the Gaza Strip or spent much time thinking about their geography, it can be hard to understand how compact they are and how violence in one spot can feel immediate and personal throughout the area.
Maps of the region often look like this: Israel fills the frame. To people who are used to looking at maps of the United States, there seems to be plenty of space between major cities.
It’s like how Las Vegas hyper-concentrates fun or Portland hyper-concentrates (mostly good) weird.
Except they do it with, you know, zealous hatred.
I visited Portland last year, and I have to say that the once zany vibe of the city has really eroded with their drug and homelessness crisis. Entire blocks of the city sidewalks packed building to curb with tents and people and trash. I took my boys on a trip and stopped in Seattle, Portland, LA, San Diego, and Phoenix, and Portland was easily the hardest hit.
The housing crisis is really bad, and a lot of those homeless people in Portland are refugees from other States. I know a trans woman who had to live out of a trailer on airBNB for a while after fleeing west