Fauda's October 7 episodes are essential, not skippable

The review says that when Fauda returned to the events of October 7 on yes, it arrived the same day House of the Dragon returned with its third season of massive battle scenes and dragons. The contrast, the writer argues, only made Fauda feel more urgent, because the Israeli series is depicting a real atrocity, not fantasy spectacle, and its lower budget does not diminish its impact.

Although a trigger warning before the episode said viewers could understand Fauda even if they skipped the two October 7 episodes, the review says that is only partly true. It may be enough for plot mechanics, but not for understanding the characters, especially in the fifth season, where creators Lior Raz and Avi Issacharoff have, in the critic’s words, deliberately abandoned some of the ambitions they had in earlier seasons.

The review highlights the split between Doron and Steve after a crucial field decision, and Eli’s collapse after seeing what was done to his family. More broadly, it says director Omri Givon and the series’ action set pieces are used to show the rage, humiliation, broken trust, and desire for revenge that many Israelis felt after the scale of the failure and disaster became clear.

The critic says international viewers will be interested to see how they react to these two episodes, which bring up images and testimony much of the world preferred to suppress, while also including a Muslim victim of Hamas fighters. But in Israel, the review argues, these episodes have become a foundational internal document, and skipping them would mean avoiding the dark mirror in which the whole country is reflected. The article was first published at 00:00 on 23 June 2026.