It all depends on your priors. If you think of Israel as a country, you could totally get behind a tit-for-tat, heavy-handed retaliation and forgive them for pretending it's "self defence".
If you think of it as a 50+ year-old ongoing invasion/genocide, then you'd feel differently.
https://archive.is/6b4lS (Washington Post article)
What’s not measured is how strongly people under the age of 45 feel about Israel. I know my social group went from abstract Palestinian support to extreme Palestinian support as they’ve been radicalized by Israel’s actions since Oct 7th.
I view it as a country and believe it has a right to take military action to get back its hostages. I also view it as euphemistic to describe its actions in Gaza as"heavy-handed retaliation". If it was any other country, there wouldn't be as much cowardice when it came to describing its actions as brutal and savage. We rightly villify Russia for doing less in Ukraine.