When trying to explain the us/israel relationship I always get hung up on this part, which is the most immediate experience people in western countries have with the conflict. Were people getting fired for voicing mild criticism of apartheid south africa at work?
it's a weird rhetorical trick to wrap people's heads around, it's US repression against US citizens for opposing US policy, it's all coming from inside the house. but because it's posed as support for 'another state' people's nationalist wires get crossed. i've got to wonder if the state intentionally designed their rhetoric this way or just accidentally fell into it from the antisemites propagating israel-as-controller narratives.
but maybe it'd be easy to explain by historical allusion: no one would take seriously the idea that South Vietnam was orchestrating US aid & deployments to itself or directing US troops to kill college students in the US. the illusion of Israel's freedom of action can be analyzed in the details today but even the overwhelming media perception of its independence will be swept away with time, just like the idea 'South Vietnam' was a real country the US was simply helping out