YES. Some will argue they need optics or can escalate more but the thing is they will escalate anyway. Think of it like Venezuela recently. Venezuela behaves like people say protestors should. They didn’t lash out, attack, or make any super provocative statement against the US. How did the US respond? By bombing the country and kidnapping Maduro.

Play their optics game and you give them what they want anyway: more time to build up and prepare for whatever action you might take. You of course need to be more organized instead of mindlessly lashing out but organized resistance makes a huge difference.