The charge of "genocide" is not based on fact but based on wish (well, and also on Jew hate).
The Anti-Israel Hate Machine has been charging Israel with "genocide" for decades. Both the Soviets and Edward Said, patron saint of Left academia, were charging Israel with "genocide" back in the 1970s; Noam Chomsky, everyone's favorite Communist grandpa, has been charging Israel with "genocide" since the 1980s; the Western Left, picking up where their Soviet benefactors left off, has been charging Israel with "genocide" since at least the 2001 UN Conference against Racism, in Durban, South Africa.
What people need to understand is that the charge of genocide has nothing to do with facts or reality and certainly has nothing to do with the welfare of the actual Palestinian people, who exist as props and symbols in the minds of Western liberals. Charging Israel with genocide is an attempt to transform Jews into Nazis and thereby morally delegitimize the Jewish state and the Jewish desire for self-determination. It's not enough that Jews be demonized and attacked, they must be humiliated and stripped of any claims to protected status or as victims, which is the great moral credential of our time.
When a member of the Islamo-Leftist alliance spouts lies about "the millenarian hostility of the Israeli government towards its neighbors", what they're really expressing is an impotent rage over the fact that Israel refuses to give in and let itself be destroyed, that Israel not only fights back but fights better. It drives Muslims crazy that Israel not only turned backwater swampland into a rich prosperous modern country, but also that it's the only outpost of Western Civ not consumed by guilt and shame and that not even a massive assault of propaganda can convince it to surrender.
All the claims about the evils of Israel—settler-colonial white-supremacist imperialist apartheid genocide etc—aren't based in fact or reality, but are all smears designed to turn Israel into a pariah state and ultimately lead to its destruction. Every one of these lies needs to be called out the moment they're uttered.
Glad to find you here mate. Great comment, I wish people knew that the “genocide” charge is now a long-standing trope, not an isolated feature of the Gaza war. The more I’ve zoomed out from the war, and thought about the role of the Islamic Republic as the orchestrator of the multi-front war, the more I wonder whether the timing of South Africa bringing the claim to the ICJ was also at the behest of the regime, given their close diplomatic ties. Opening another “front”, legally and diplomatically, against Israel.
“Israel has tested the land-for-peace formula again and again. It accepted the UN partition plan in 1947; Arab leaders rejected it. It withdrew from Gaza in 2005; rockets, wars, and kidnappings followed. Israeli Prime Minister Olmert offered 97 percent of the West Bank in 2008; the Palestinians turned it down. The problem is not how much land Israel controls. The problem is that Jews — the subordinate, cowardly dhimmis (second-class citizens) — control any land at all, and dare not only to fight for what is rightfully ours, but to do it successfully.
This is the true root of the conflict. It was never just about borders; it is about whether Jews can be permitted to be sovereign in a land once conquered and ruled by Islam. For Islamists, the answer is no, and until that reality is confronted, every concession will fail, because the demand is not compromise; it’s elimination.”
A truly stupendous essay, Ben that is chalked full of important and insightful facts! No, Israel haters on the hard left and far-left, Israel’s reputation is not forever tarnished nor has the West lost its moral authority. These are absolutely ridiculous claims. First off, there was no Gaza genocide. The IDF in the Gaza War has the lowest combatant to civilian killed ratio in human history. Second, there are plenty of real genocides going on in the world. Saudi Arabia’s brutal campaign in Yemen, the mass murder of black African ethnic groups in Sudan by the Sundanese government and their allies in the Janjaweed Militia that has been going on for twenty-years or what Syria’s Jihadist government is currently doing to its minorities right now. That is ACTUAL genocide, not Israel’s historically humane war in Gaza!
Furthermore, these folks saying the West has lost its moral authority never put much stock in it anyway. Regional integration will not be changed by the war. Work will have to be done on the Palestinian issue for sure, but it’s still going to happen. The Gaza War did nothing to break the Abraham Accords. At Trump’s recent peace summit 14 Muslim nations produced a memorandum which extolled “friendly and mutually beneficial relationship[s] between Israel and its regional neighbors.” Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates all expanded their military coordination with Israel during the war. Wow! Israel has lost so much credibility and squandered the chance for peace! 😉 Heck, even the Sheikhs of Hebron have reached out to Israel about joining the Abraham Accords. Plus, just because a country commits a genocide against another doesn’t mean they can’t live in peace together. The Hutus and Tutsis live in peace together in Rwanda, Germany and Israel established relations, Serbia and Croatia today have relations with one another, etc. Not to mention, Pakistan committed genocide in Bangladesh and yet it stills exists as a state. Neither Israel nor the Palestinians are going anywhere anytime soon.
"the provocations of Israel’s own extremists, certainly don’t help matters."
Would you kindly advise the public here what exactly bothers you with "the provocations" and who in your mind are "Israel's extremists"? Why do you think 🤔 so?
Hell no to any of this. Israel doesn't need wealthy Arab muslims buying property and certainly no to a "palestinian" state. This feels like a strategy to destroy Israel as a Jewish state by other means. If diminishing Israel's Jewish character is the price to pay for regional integration, it's not worth it. F the saudis and the rest of them. Let the saudis create a "palestinian" state inside their own country. They have plenty of territory.
"One Saudi royal source even said that with a new Israeli government and a commitment to the two-state principle, “you’ll see the Saudi royal family — myself included — buying homes in Nahariya [an Israeli coastal city] and vacationing there twice a year.”
Although Sudan is Muslim and Arabic-speaking, it isn't generally considered part of the Middle East. If we expand the list to include Africa, we could also include Ethiopia's Tigray war, but I wanted to stick to Israel's immediate region.
"it seems unlikely that Israel will forever be blamed for the third-deadliest Middle Eastern conflict in the last 15 years, even if we factor in double standards, antisemitism, unequal media attention, displaced American racial politics, heightened religious sensitivities, and so forth."
History may not agree with the essay's assessment.
The atrocities in the Muslim world were largely ignored by Europe, Africa, and the UN because they missed one crucial element — Jews weren't involved in these blatant violations of International Humanitarian Law.
As one popular expression that applies to media may well apply to the public and political excoriation of Israel: "No Jews, no news."
To put it another way, "Israel is the Jew among the Nations."
You point out accurately all the hypocrisies surrounding the defamation of Israel as beyond reasoning or humanity. Especially as this has become the London and Hollywood celebrity ultra hypocritical stance. If Mamdani the communist about to be elected mayor in NYC wants to unrecognize states that he alleges prioritizes one people over another let him begin with apartheid Pakistan and Uganda. India..Nehru pleaded with Ali Jinnah to create a united India....he refused. And said that whatever superficially they have in common with Hindus, their central identity is as Muslims. Let him look at Ireland and Norway...Spain and Slovenia for who is favored. Why can't I claim Irish citizenship just because name doesn't begin with O or Mc.....like Rose O Donnell.....aren't I as good as she is? So Ireland is racist and apartheid.
You have some interesting points, but for the sake of facts, you quote the highest estimate for the death toll in the Bangladesh genocide and the lowest death toll for the Gaza war.
The "3 million" figure for Bangladesh is a bit of a myth concocted by Bangladeshi nationalists. Independent analysis estimates a death toll closer to 300,000-500,000. Still terrible of course.
Now for Gaza: To date, there has been no credible evidence that the "Hamas-run health ministry" has been inflating the figures. Additionally, the 67,000 figure is almost certainly an understatement as it counts only those physically confirmed dead. So those trapped under the rubble or killed in Israeli occupation zones are not counted. Indeed, academic studies estimate direct traumatic deaths in Gaza have been underestimated by ~40%, and indirect deaths in Gaza such as from collapsed health care systems and poor access to food and water could push the true death toll much higher.
I say in the article that "Perhaps up to 3 million Bengalis were killed" to acknowledge that the death toll is disputed. Still, even the low end exceeds that of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict as a whole. R.J. Rummel, an expert on what he terms "democide," puts the estimated death toll at 1.5 million. See https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.CHAP8.HTM for his calculations.
As for Gaza, the 67,000 figure may ultimately rise, but it also includes both combatants and civilians. Rummel's Bangladesh estimate (if we want to use that as a midpoint between high and low estimates) includes only noncombatants. If we add Bengali fighters to the death toll, it would be even higher. Obviously, we could dispute and fine-tune the numbers indefinitely, but the broader point still stands: the Bangladesh genocide was on a vastly greater scale than the war in Gaza.
Regarding this quote in the essay: "Pakistan clearly isn’t going away, and neither is Israel. Nor, for that matter, are the Palestinians..." Once the New Middle East is well underway, with peace, prosperity, co-existence, and Gaza rebuilt and the "Palestinians" either have emigrated to other Muslim Countries or working/thriving in Gaza, I think the idea of a state for them will evaporate. Why? I don't think the "Palestinians" themselves will want one. I mean, if they are living better than ever in Gaza with a strong economy and a bright future for their children (who will no longer be educated to be Jihadists), why would they want to return to insecurity, war, Jihadis taking over, and possibly being isolated again? Then again, they might still want it, but I seriously doubt any sincere efforts will be taken and none of the other Arab states will want to risk it, either. We shall see, but either way, the idea of a separate state is far from being discussed now. As Marco Rubio said (paraphrasing), "We can't even consider it until the "Palestinians" are de-radicalized and willing to accept Israel's right to exist with peaceful co-existence."
The charge of "genocide" is not based on fact but based on wish (well, and also on Jew hate).
The Anti-Israel Hate Machine has been charging Israel with "genocide" for decades. Both the Soviets and Edward Said, patron saint of Left academia, were charging Israel with "genocide" back in the 1970s; Noam Chomsky, everyone's favorite Communist grandpa, has been charging Israel with "genocide" since the 1980s; the Western Left, picking up where their Soviet benefactors left off, has been charging Israel with "genocide" since at least the 2001 UN Conference against Racism, in Durban, South Africa.
What people need to understand is that the charge of genocide has nothing to do with facts or reality and certainly has nothing to do with the welfare of the actual Palestinian people, who exist as props and symbols in the minds of Western liberals. Charging Israel with genocide is an attempt to transform Jews into Nazis and thereby morally delegitimize the Jewish state and the Jewish desire for self-determination. It's not enough that Jews be demonized and attacked, they must be humiliated and stripped of any claims to protected status or as victims, which is the great moral credential of our time.
When a member of the Islamo-Leftist alliance spouts lies about "the millenarian hostility of the Israeli government towards its neighbors", what they're really expressing is an impotent rage over the fact that Israel refuses to give in and let itself be destroyed, that Israel not only fights back but fights better. It drives Muslims crazy that Israel not only turned backwater swampland into a rich prosperous modern country, but also that it's the only outpost of Western Civ not consumed by guilt and shame and that not even a massive assault of propaganda can convince it to surrender.
All the claims about the evils of Israel—settler-colonial white-supremacist imperialist apartheid genocide etc—aren't based in fact or reality, but are all smears designed to turn Israel into a pariah state and ultimately lead to its destruction. Every one of these lies needs to be called out the moment they're uttered.
Glad to find you here mate. Great comment, I wish people knew that the “genocide” charge is now a long-standing trope, not an isolated feature of the Gaza war. The more I’ve zoomed out from the war, and thought about the role of the Islamic Republic as the orchestrator of the multi-front war, the more I wonder whether the timing of South Africa bringing the claim to the ICJ was also at the behest of the regime, given their close diplomatic ties. Opening another “front”, legally and diplomatically, against Israel.
Well said, thank you
Thanks
Wow great comment. Thanks.
Matthew Nuriel, substack:
“Israel has tested the land-for-peace formula again and again. It accepted the UN partition plan in 1947; Arab leaders rejected it. It withdrew from Gaza in 2005; rockets, wars, and kidnappings followed. Israeli Prime Minister Olmert offered 97 percent of the West Bank in 2008; the Palestinians turned it down. The problem is not how much land Israel controls. The problem is that Jews — the subordinate, cowardly dhimmis (second-class citizens) — control any land at all, and dare not only to fight for what is rightfully ours, but to do it successfully.
This is the true root of the conflict. It was never just about borders; it is about whether Jews can be permitted to be sovereign in a land once conquered and ruled by Islam. For Islamists, the answer is no, and until that reality is confronted, every concession will fail, because the demand is not compromise; it’s elimination.”
Except Jews are always blamed, never forgiven and the hate tropes just morph into something else
We shall weather their blame and hate for as long as it takes.
Never been prouder to be Jewish x
Me too.
Very thoughtful essay. I learned some things. Thank you!
Interesting! I agree and thankfully the arc is toward normalization.
A truly stupendous essay, Ben that is chalked full of important and insightful facts! No, Israel haters on the hard left and far-left, Israel’s reputation is not forever tarnished nor has the West lost its moral authority. These are absolutely ridiculous claims. First off, there was no Gaza genocide. The IDF in the Gaza War has the lowest combatant to civilian killed ratio in human history. Second, there are plenty of real genocides going on in the world. Saudi Arabia’s brutal campaign in Yemen, the mass murder of black African ethnic groups in Sudan by the Sundanese government and their allies in the Janjaweed Militia that has been going on for twenty-years or what Syria’s Jihadist government is currently doing to its minorities right now. That is ACTUAL genocide, not Israel’s historically humane war in Gaza!
Furthermore, these folks saying the West has lost its moral authority never put much stock in it anyway. Regional integration will not be changed by the war. Work will have to be done on the Palestinian issue for sure, but it’s still going to happen. The Gaza War did nothing to break the Abraham Accords. At Trump’s recent peace summit 14 Muslim nations produced a memorandum which extolled “friendly and mutually beneficial relationship[s] between Israel and its regional neighbors.” Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates all expanded their military coordination with Israel during the war. Wow! Israel has lost so much credibility and squandered the chance for peace! 😉 Heck, even the Sheikhs of Hebron have reached out to Israel about joining the Abraham Accords. Plus, just because a country commits a genocide against another doesn’t mean they can’t live in peace together. The Hutus and Tutsis live in peace together in Rwanda, Germany and Israel established relations, Serbia and Croatia today have relations with one another, etc. Not to mention, Pakistan committed genocide in Bangladesh and yet it stills exists as a state. Neither Israel nor the Palestinians are going anywhere anytime soon.
Ben, you write:
"the provocations of Israel’s own extremists, certainly don’t help matters."
Would you kindly advise the public here what exactly bothers you with "the provocations" and who in your mind are "Israel's extremists"? Why do you think 🤔 so?
Hell no to any of this. Israel doesn't need wealthy Arab muslims buying property and certainly no to a "palestinian" state. This feels like a strategy to destroy Israel as a Jewish state by other means. If diminishing Israel's Jewish character is the price to pay for regional integration, it's not worth it. F the saudis and the rest of them. Let the saudis create a "palestinian" state inside their own country. They have plenty of territory.
...............................................................................................................................................................................................
"One Saudi royal source even said that with a new Israeli government and a commitment to the two-state principle, “you’ll see the Saudi royal family — myself included — buying homes in Nahariya [an Israeli coastal city] and vacationing there twice a year.”
This was my reaction as well. We don't need that Trojan horse.
Errata: you should add Sudan to the list of middle eastern wars larger than Gaza, pushing us down to fourth place.
Although Sudan is Muslim and Arabic-speaking, it isn't generally considered part of the Middle East. If we expand the list to include Africa, we could also include Ethiopia's Tigray war, but I wanted to stick to Israel's immediate region.
"it seems unlikely that Israel will forever be blamed for the third-deadliest Middle Eastern conflict in the last 15 years, even if we factor in double standards, antisemitism, unequal media attention, displaced American racial politics, heightened religious sensitivities, and so forth."
History may not agree with the essay's assessment.
The atrocities in the Muslim world were largely ignored by Europe, Africa, and the UN because they missed one crucial element — Jews weren't involved in these blatant violations of International Humanitarian Law.
As one popular expression that applies to media may well apply to the public and political excoriation of Israel: "No Jews, no news."
To put it another way, "Israel is the Jew among the Nations."
You point out accurately all the hypocrisies surrounding the defamation of Israel as beyond reasoning or humanity. Especially as this has become the London and Hollywood celebrity ultra hypocritical stance. If Mamdani the communist about to be elected mayor in NYC wants to unrecognize states that he alleges prioritizes one people over another let him begin with apartheid Pakistan and Uganda. India..Nehru pleaded with Ali Jinnah to create a united India....he refused. And said that whatever superficially they have in common with Hindus, their central identity is as Muslims. Let him look at Ireland and Norway...Spain and Slovenia for who is favored. Why can't I claim Irish citizenship just because name doesn't begin with O or Mc.....like Rose O Donnell.....aren't I as good as she is? So Ireland is racist and apartheid.
You have some interesting points, but for the sake of facts, you quote the highest estimate for the death toll in the Bangladesh genocide and the lowest death toll for the Gaza war.
The "3 million" figure for Bangladesh is a bit of a myth concocted by Bangladeshi nationalists. Independent analysis estimates a death toll closer to 300,000-500,000. Still terrible of course.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bangladesh_genocide#Estimated_death_toll
Now for Gaza: To date, there has been no credible evidence that the "Hamas-run health ministry" has been inflating the figures. Additionally, the 67,000 figure is almost certainly an understatement as it counts only those physically confirmed dead. So those trapped under the rubble or killed in Israeli occupation zones are not counted. Indeed, academic studies estimate direct traumatic deaths in Gaza have been underestimated by ~40%, and indirect deaths in Gaza such as from collapsed health care systems and poor access to food and water could push the true death toll much higher.
Sources:
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/les-decodeurs/article/2024/10/13/why-the-gaza-health-ministry-s-death-count-is-considered-reliable_6729264_8.html
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/how-many-palestinians-has-israels-gaza-offensive-killed-2025-03-24/
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/gaza-war-toll-likely-significantly-undercounts-deaths-says-study-2025-01-09/
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/25/world/middleeast/gaza-death-toll-israel-war.html
I say in the article that "Perhaps up to 3 million Bengalis were killed" to acknowledge that the death toll is disputed. Still, even the low end exceeds that of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict as a whole. R.J. Rummel, an expert on what he terms "democide," puts the estimated death toll at 1.5 million. See https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.CHAP8.HTM for his calculations.
As for Gaza, the 67,000 figure may ultimately rise, but it also includes both combatants and civilians. Rummel's Bangladesh estimate (if we want to use that as a midpoint between high and low estimates) includes only noncombatants. If we add Bengali fighters to the death toll, it would be even higher. Obviously, we could dispute and fine-tune the numbers indefinitely, but the broader point still stands: the Bangladesh genocide was on a vastly greater scale than the war in Gaza.
Regarding this quote in the essay: "Pakistan clearly isn’t going away, and neither is Israel. Nor, for that matter, are the Palestinians..." Once the New Middle East is well underway, with peace, prosperity, co-existence, and Gaza rebuilt and the "Palestinians" either have emigrated to other Muslim Countries or working/thriving in Gaza, I think the idea of a state for them will evaporate. Why? I don't think the "Palestinians" themselves will want one. I mean, if they are living better than ever in Gaza with a strong economy and a bright future for their children (who will no longer be educated to be Jihadists), why would they want to return to insecurity, war, Jihadis taking over, and possibly being isolated again? Then again, they might still want it, but I seriously doubt any sincere efforts will be taken and none of the other Arab states will want to risk it, either. We shall see, but either way, the idea of a separate state is far from being discussed now. As Marco Rubio said (paraphrasing), "We can't even consider it until the "Palestinians" are de-radicalized and willing to accept Israel's right to exist with peaceful co-existence."