by Brendan O’Neill, spiked
Israelophobic claims about the ‘genocide’ in Gaza are finally crashing against the shores of truth.
Now we know: Gaza must be a genocide because Adolf Hitler says it is. And that man knows a thing or two about genocide. His name crops up in the list of experts behind the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS), which last week decreed that Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians. He seems to have moved, though: he’s now ‘Adolf Hitler of Gaza City’ rather than of Berlin. Yet there he is, alongside Emperor Palpatine and the Cookie Monster, proudly aligning himself with this organisation whose latest ‘resolution’ says Israel has engaged in ‘systematic and widespread crimes against humanity, war crimes and genocide’.
It’s not actually Hitler. He’s been dead for 80 years. It’s not even some Nazi fanboy in Gaza City who’s taken his favourite murderer’s name. No, it’s an online wag who wants the world to know that the IAGS is not all it’s cracked up to be. For a start, any chump can become a member for $30. Hence why, for a period of time last week, this esteemed gathering of human-rights boffins included not only the usual tenured worthies who think their word counts for more than everyone else’s, but also the Cookie Monster, sporting a fetching, Hamas-style bandana.
When future historians look back on the Israelophobic delirium of the post-7 October moment, last week might strike them as the week the genocide lie finally died. For it started with media outlets across Christendom reporting with naked glee that ‘the experts’ have ruled that Israel really is the genocidal loon of world affairs. And it ended with those experts looking damn foolish, not to mention partisan, opportunistic and cynical. As the Free Press put it, the lesson is that when you see the phrase ‘experts say’ in a headline, it’s a sign to think twice and for yourself’.
Read also: Debunking the Genocide Allegations by Danny Orbach, Yagil Henkin, Jonathan Boxman and Jonathan Braverman, BESA
Israel Rallies around Netanyahu as the World turns against it by David Virtue