Repeating the word ‘genocide’ doesn’t make it genocide

A few weeks ago I wrote an article pushing back on the claim that Israel is committing “genocide” in Gaza.

I received immediate attacks – most of which you wouldn’t have seen because they was expressed in the same vile, violent way that I’ve come to expect and, therefore, didn’t make it past my content filters.

But stripped of the profanity, the threats, the abuse, and the sickening glee at the events of 7 October – there was a consistency of argument amongst the handful of detractors who could actually spell. Essentially their message (expressed colourfully) was that genocide had ‘already been proven’. Not alleged. Not under investigation. Proven.

The common themes were that:

• “The ICJ has already found genocide.”
• “The ICC has confirmed it.”
• “The UN has ruled on it.”
• “Human rights organisations have proven it.”
• “Academics have declared it.”
• “Multiple countries have recognised it.”
• “The whole world knows.”

Quite a list – but does it have any validity?

Not really. There are a lost of accusations here – but as we’ll see in a moment, none of them actually stack up.

The last time the world saw this kind of sustained pressure against a state, the target was apartheid South Africa. Governments, institutions, activists, academics, churches, unions and public figures all pushed in the same direction for decades until the regime eventually gave way.

But Israel is not South Africa

The apartheid regime in South Africa was not a matter of debate. It was the law. It was written into the structure of the state. It was openly acknowledged. It was defended by the government. It was visible in every aspect of daily life.

South Africa didn’t deny apartheid. It enforced it – and that’s a critical difference.

Israel is not saying, “Yes, we are committing genocide and here’s why.” It’s saying the exact opposite – and it has the facts on its side with the weight of the evidence supporting its position.

Which means that in order to sustain the genocide claim, the critics are forced to ignore contrary evidence and, instead, elevate disputed claims to the level of certainty.

So the comparison does not hold, historically, legally or logically.

What has actually been found

But what about the claims that ‘genocide’ has already been found?

Let’s take these claims one at a time.

The ICJ

No, the International Court of Justice has not found genocide.

It is hearing a case brought by South Africa (ironically) alleging breaches of the Genocide Convention but there has been no ruling on the merits of the case and it is ongoing with no final judgment in sight. So there is no legal finding that Israel is committing genocide.

Any nation can bring a case in the same way that you can go to Court and bring a civil action against your neighbor. But bringing a case and proving your claim are two very different things.

In 2024, former ICJ president Joan Donoghue even went to the extraordinary extent of clarifying this very point because the media were doing the same thing that the detractors are now doing. She explained that the ICJ had not even ruled that the genocide claim was ‘plausible’ – but had simply noted that South Africa had the right to present the claim. That is not the same thing.

It’s also worth noting that South Africa itself is not a neutral observer. It has positioned itself politically alongside the Palestinian cause for years, has accepted funding from States with a declared goal of eliminating Israel and has taken a strongly adversarial stance toward the Jewish state.

The ICC

No, the International Criminal Court has not found genocide either.

The ICC is not a true international ‘Court’ in the same way that the ICJ is. It is a cooperative structure that only has jurisdiction over bodies that choose to be bound by it (Israel and the US are not signatories) – so its attempt to insert itself into this issue is a bit like the Residents Association representing the homes two streets over trying to tell you to change the colour of your fence.

The ICC is also operating in an increasingly troubling environment. Recent reports have emerged that Qatar offered to ‘take care’ of sexual allegation claims circulating around ICC prosecutor Karim Khan if he pursued arrest warrants against Netanyahu and (Israeli Defense Minister) Gallant.

Qatar denies wrongdoing, but the allegation is both serious and current. So let’s not pretend this is a clean, neutral process unfolding in isolation. This is a geopolitical battlefield.

So the ICC hasn’t handed down a finding of ‘genocide’ against Israel – and even if it eventually does, it will have little credibility.

Governments and countries

Yes, some countries have accused Israel of genocide. South Africa is the most prominent but Spain, Ireland, Türkiye, Colombia and Chile, have all also aligned themselves with that position in various ways.

But countries are not courts. They are political actors with domestic political incentives and/or membership of international blocs where anti-Israel positioning is useful. Some also have long-standing diplomatic hostility toward Israel.

Türkiye, for example, is an Islamic country with historic antipathy toward Israel which has spent years positioning itself as a champion of the Palestinian cause while using increasingly hostile rhetoric against Israel. Ireland and Spain have also been among Europe’s most aggressively anti-Israel voices during this conflict. So these countries are not neutral judges – they have agendas – and their opinions are just that, opinions.

The UN and its agencies

UN bodies, commissions and rapporteurs have issued repeated condemnations of Israel – but the UN system has a long and well-documented pattern of disproportionate focus on Israel.

That is not controversial. The UK itself recently restated its objection to the UN Human Rights Council’s standing Item #7, saying it “unfairly and uniquely singles out” Israel and represents a disproportionate focus because no other country is treated that way.

So when a UN body issues a report on Israel, it is not descending from a position of neutrality – it is operating within a system that has already demonstrated a consistent and overwhelming bias.

NGOs and human rights organisations

The same applies to NGOs.

Amnesty, Human Rights Watch and similar organisations present themselves as neutral observers. They are not. They are heavily partisan advocacy organisations.

Their reports often rely on contested data, selective sourcing and legal interpretations that expose serious flaws of reasoning and are open to challenge.

In Gaza, that has frequently meant relying on figures provided by Hamas-controlled institutions, while downplaying or ignoring factors that complicate the narrative.

This doesn’t automatically mean everything they say is false – but it does mean that their conclusions are not objective findings of fact.

Academics

Then there are the academic claims – including the recent one that ‘the International Association of Genocide Scholars’ passed a resolution declaring that 86% of its members had found that Israel’s actions met the legal definition of genocide.

Compelling, right?

Well – no.

The IAGS isn’t a respected international body. Even its own website notes that its members include activists, students, museum professionals, policymakers, ‘educators’, ‘artists’ and others. In fact, anyone can join for just US$30 per year!

And the claim that 86% of its members found that Israel had committed ‘genocide’? Even the heavily partisan Guardian newspaper later had to clarify that 86% support meant 86% of those who voted, and those voters represented only 28% of the organisation’s total membership.

So let’s stop pretending this was a some solemn gathering of the world’s finest legal minds. It is not a court, it was not a judicial finding, and it certainly isn’t proof of genocide outside the deranged views of a subset of extremists.

The factor you cannot remove

So none of these claims of ‘genocide’ are credible – and they are not coming from a neutral field. They are emerging from a global environment where Israel is routinely singled out, judged differently, and treated as uniquely illegitimate.

Additionally, many of the organisations and actors making these claims have long histories of hostility toward Israel – so this is not a sudden outbreak of moral clarity. It is the continuation of a pattern. And that pattern has a name.

Antisemitism.

How do we know? Because Jews everywhere are targeted – not just Israel. Jewish People with no connection to Israeli policy are attacked, harassed and blamed.

That didn’t happen with South Africans who lived outside South Africa during the apartheid era.

It doesn’t happen with China. It doesn’t happen with Sudan, Syria or Yemen or a dozen other places where real atrocities are taking place

It only happens with Jews.

Every time.

So where does this leave us

At this point, the facts are clear.

No court has found that Israel is committing genocide.

What we have instead is a global campaign built on accusation, smears, repetition, political pressure, institutional bias and, in some cases, deeply troubling signs of external influence.

But repeatedly screaming the word ‘genocide’ and attacking anyone who presents evidence to the contrary, doesn’t make that claim any more real – nor is that tactic new.

None of this is new. For thousands of years, Jews have been accused of monstrous crimes. The accusations change but the pattern does not.

In medieval Europe, they were accused of spreading the plague by poisoning wells and of murdering Christian children in what became known as the blood libel.

In more recent centuries they were accused of secret conspiracies, of controlling money, of manipulating governments, of corrupting nations from within.

The Nazis accused them of racial contamination and tried to exterminate them.

Today, the accusation is genocide.

Different word. Same pattern.

The charge always changes just enough to sound vaguely credible if you don’t look too closely – but the target never changes. It is always the Jews.

And like every previous accusation, the genocide libel gains power, not because it is true, but because enough people repeat it loudly enough, often enough, to confuse those who don’t know any better.

That’s not justice. It’s just Jew hatred wearing modern clothes.