> Is this a cultural thing

Israelis in general are very blunt and perfectly willing to question superiors and voice opinions and questions in situations where Americans never would. This includes the military where subordinates would question a superior in a way that would never fly in an American military (and probably others).

Israelis on the street will voice opinions to strangers in a way that would be perceived as incredibly rude elsewhere, but is normal in Israel.

> Israelis in general are very blunt and perfectly willing to question superiors and voice opinions and questions in situations where Americans never would. This includes the military where subordinates would question a superior in a way that would never fly in an American military (and probably others).

Well, they claim they are but you don't see anything at least from outside. From outside it seems they are easily buying whatever government is selling to them. Working on surveillance projects is rather embraced and you even receive strong social support for it.

So I don't get how do you compare it to the US! Whereas in the US you would have a hard time to convince people to work on surveillance projects and even then often people end up having a hard time with their moral values even when they are not directly doing anything wrong. Not to mention many anti-surveillance activists are based in the US. I believe that is a very unfair comparison.

The truth is every country you look people are a bag of goods and bads and they manage to find greedy people to work on surveillance projects even in the EU.

You have this strange assumption that people are supposed to find something wrong with surveillance projects.

> Working on surveillance projects is rather embraced and you even receive strong social support for it.

That's right, because there's nothing wrong with it.

> So I don't get how do you compare it to the US!

Because I'm not comparing surveillance projects, I'm comparing modes of speaking.

> Whereas in the US you would have a hard time to convince people to work on surveillance projects and even then often people end up having a hard time with their moral values even when they are not directly doing anything wrong.

Because it's quite obvious to the ordinary Israeli that surveillance projects save lives, so obviously they would want to work on it.

The US isn't under quite the same level of attack, although it's far from clear there is supposed to be something wrong with it in the US either.

> Israelis on the street will voice opinions to strangers in a way that would be perceived as incredibly rude elsewhere, but is normal in Israel.

What do you mean, for example?

If they think you didn't dress your child properly they'll tell you. Or they'll hear you talking about something and give you advice on what to do without any embarrassment on that fact that they overheard you.

You're fighting with your teen, in the US everyone would turn away and pretend not to hear, in Israel they'll just openly talk to you about their own teen and what they did, etc. and then half the bus would chime in. They're all really nice about it mind you, just trying to help.

Israelis think of everyone as part of their personal family, even strangers are really distant relatives, is I guess a good way to put it.

Israelis grow up with almost no notion of personal space. It’s just not a thing over there.