It’s Hamas’ Fault, You’re an Antisemite, and We Had No Choice: Techniques of Genocide Denial in Gaza

the Republic of South Africa filed an application against Israel before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) alleging that Israeli military operations in Gaza in response to the Hamas-organized attack on 7 October 2023 violate the 1948 Genocide Convention.The global commentariat immediately fractured into two broad camps: those who regarded the filing as the apotheosis of efforts to hold Israel morally and legally accountable for what they saw as a longstanding disregard of Palestinian life and basic rights; and those who viewed it as yet another politically-motivated attack -but one especially insidious in nature in light of the Jewish experience of the Holocaust -in what they saw as a broader and sustained global campaign to delegitimize and ostracize the Jewish state.The defending camp vigorously denied it was genocide and a substantial public archive of essays, including pieces in the opinion pages of major international newspapers such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal, variously denounced the claim as "a moral obscenity," a "blood libel," and a "media manufactured genocide". 1Some insisted Israel's conduct not only did not constitute genocide; but it did not transgress international law in any way at all. 2 Israel's retaliation was a legal right and a moral necessity and, while the war was brutal, Hamas was responsible for the civilian destruction as it started the war and used Gazans as human shields.The denialist camp pointed to the speed with which some in the accusatory camp moved to allege it was genocide and took this as proof of anti-Israel and even antisemitic bias. 3 In their view it exposed a willingness, a desire even, to believe Israel and Jews were capable of the most egregious of crimes. 4However, as the war continued, individuals and organizations with relevant expertise began independently to evaluate the mounting evidence.Human rights organizations, UN actors, international lawyers, and genocide scholars offered views on the relentless bombardment; on the siege and its impact on starvation levels inside Gaza; on the disturbing statements from senior Israeli political leaders; on the near-total destruction of Gaza's infrastructure; and on the ever-rising