Season 2 of Fauda build upon the excitement and tension of the first season

The first 6 (of 12) episodes of Season 2 of the Israeli series Fauda carry on with the excitement and tension from Season 1 without missing a beat or a step. It takes a while to regain our familiarity w/ the key characters and the complex events of Season 1 (a longer recap would have been helpful) and the plot lines are every bit as complex, so the first episode or two require a lot of a attention, but soon we're into the pace and the tension as Doron and a squad of Israeli counter-terrorists deal with the Hamas forces out for revenge - a quest that splinters along ideological lines: The Hamas leaders are urging a degree of caution and restraint while a young hothead is out for family revenge and is building an alliance with the more frightful ISIS. Among the strengths of the series, aside from the excellent pacing and continuous tension, are the glimpses of family life of both Israelis and Palestinians - it's not exactly a Sopranos, but we see enough of the strained father-son, husband-wife, parents-children relationships on both sides to help us understand the forces that drive the action and the lives taht are at stake. There's a lot of violence of course, some inexcusable and cowardly - on both sides (it's especially painful to watch Israeli officers beat a Palestinian prisoner, who is in fact a terrorist, while his hands are cuffed to a chair). I also tip my hat to the sound crew: the soundtrack is subtle but relentless and does a lot toward maintaining the constant sense of living on the edge of crisis.