Subject: A Call for Change
Hi Martin,
I want to be very clear about my position. I support the elimination of
Israel and advocate for a one-state solution. Israel must pay reparations
to the Palestinian people for a hundred years and rebuild Gaza and the West
Bank. The genocidal Israeli war criminals must be held fully accountable,
just like the Nazi war criminals. As a secular Jew, I find no value in
Hebrew scripture; to me, it is merely creative writing and fantasy at best.
The nations that have stood up to the Nazi-like Israeli state are the true
heroes.
Avram “Eliminate Israel Now” Finkelstein
On Sun, Jul 20, 2025 at 7:26 PM Martin Wasserman
wrote:
> The Hebrew Scriptures predict a time when all the nations will gather
> together against Israel, and God will then intervene on Israel’s behalf and
> judge all those nations with truth and justice. We appear to be approaching
> that time very rapidly, and I strongly suspect that those people and
> nations who have dedicated themselves to Israel’s destruction will fare
> very poorly in those judgments!
>
>
> Martin Wasserman
>
>
>
>
> On Jul 20, 2025, at 3:30 PM, Aram James wrote:
>
> Condemn Israel or be complicit in genocide: Colombias Gustavo Petro
>
> - ByAl Mayadeen English
> - Source: The Guardian
> - 8 Jul 2025 13:47
> - 2 Shares
>
> 4 Min Read
>
> Colombian President Gustavo Petro, in a Guardian op-ed, accuses Netanyahu
> of genocide in Gaza and urges global action.
> Listen
>
> On Tuesday, *The Guardian* published an opinion piece by Colombian
> President Gustavo Petro, in which he accused Israeli Prime Minister
> Benjamin Netanyahu
> of
> orchestrating a "campaign of devastation" in Gaza and called on the
> international community to move beyond symbolic outrage toward concrete
> action in defense of international law.
>
> Petro has emerged as one of the most outspoken world leaders condemning
> "Israel’s" war on Gaza, and his latest opinion piece adds to a growing
> series of forceful critiques directed at the ongoing Israeli genocide.
>
> Denouncing what he described as 600 days of systematic atrocities, Petro
> wrote that the worlds inaction risks legitimizing a model of impunity
> where colonial violence, ethnic cleansing, and siege warfare are normalized
> against a captive population.
>
> "If we fail to act now," he wrote, "we not only betray the Palestinian
> people, we become complicit in the atrocities committed by Netanyahus
> government."
> Moral break
>
> The president highlighted a landmark United Nations General Assembly
> resolution adopted in September 2024, which called for "Israel" to end
> its illegal occupation within 12 months
> .
> He noted that Colombia was among the 124 countries that voted in favor,
> thereby assuming binding obligations that include sanctions, legal action,
> and trade measures.
>
> "The clock is now ticking," he warned, reaffirming Colombias commitment
> by recalling its concrete step: suspending coal exports to "Israel."
> Related News
> [image: 650 days of genocide: 125,000 tons of bombs 2.4 mln lives
> shattered]
>
> 650 days of genocide: 125,000 tons of bombs 2.4 mln lives shattered
>
> [image: Starved by Israel: People of Gaza are dying while the world
> watches]
>
> Starved by Israel: People of Gaza are dying while the world watches
>
>
> In his piece, Petro mentioned that he had declared earlier this year: "We
> cannot fuel the machinery that slaughters Palestinian children and then
> claim neutrality."
>
> This is not the first bold move by the Colombian president. In May, his government
> formally cut diplomatic ties with "Israel,"
> citing
> what Petro explicitly described as a "genocide." His administration also
> appointed Colombia’s first ambassador to Palestine, pledging medical
> treatment in Colombian hospitals for injured children from Gaza. The newly
> appointed ambassador, Jorge Iván Ospina, later echoed Petro’s position,
> warning of a "macabre intention to erase the identity of a people."
>
> In Tuesdays article, Petro praised similar actions taken by countries
> like Malaysia, which banned Israeli ships from its ports, and South Africa,
> which brought "Israel" before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on
> charges of genocide. It is worth noting that Colombia joined that case as
> an intervening party
> ,
> further deepening its legal opposition to "Israels" war.
>
> *Read more: US defends Israeli use of starvation as weapon of war before
> ICJ
> *
> Global reckoning
>
> Looking ahead, Petro mentioned that Colombia and South Africa, co-chairs
> of the Hague Group, will host an emergency summit regarding Gaza on July 15.
>
> The conference aims to develop a coordinated, multilateral strategy to
> isolate "Israel" diplomatically and economically while restoring
> credibility to the global legal order. With the UNs proposed international
> peace conference indefinitely postponed, Petro cast the July summit as a
> necessary corrective to global paralysis.
>
> The Colombian president framed the Gaza crisis not just as a moral
> catastrophe but as an existential test for international law and nations of
> the Global South.
>
> "We can either stand firm in defense of the legal principles that seek to
> prevent war and conflict," he wrote, "or watch helplessly as the
> international system collapses under the weight of unchecked power
> politics."
>
> He concluded his piece by stressing that the choice is between complicity
> in colonial violence and collective resistance against it.
>
>
> -
>
>
>
>
>
> On Sun, Jul 20, 2025 at 3:12 PM Martin Wasserman
> wrote:
>
>> Aram,
>>
>> Amnesty International is not a credible source on this issue. It appears
>> that the once-respectable organization has been taken over by malevolent
>> actors with a political axe to grind. Their anti-Israel bias is evident
>> throughout the report.
>>
>> They accuse Israel of genocide but make no mention at all of Hamas’
>> explicit genocidal policy against Jews.
>>
>> They accuse Israel of violating international law, but make no reference
>> at all to the fact that Israel is facing a ruthless enemy that observes no
>> international laws whatsoever.
>>
>> When they mention Hamas’ transgressions at all, they do it in the mildest
>> language possible, and then use the most damning possible language when
>> describing Israels actions.
>>
>> They take it as a given that Israel is an apartheid state, a blatantly
>> false accusation that is very easily disproved.
>>
>> They take it as a given that Israel is illegally occupying Palestinian
>> land, as if the territories of Judea and Samaria, the heartland of the
>> ancient Jewish nation, dont belong to Jews at all, but are instead the
>> property of a fictitious country called “Palestine” which has never
>> actually existed in any historical period.
>>
>> In short, this entire report is a politically motivated “hatchet job”
>> that deserves no credibility whatsoever.
>>
>> Martin Wasserman
>>
>>
>> On Jul 20, 2025, at 11:39 AM, Aram James wrote:
>>
>> Amnesty International investigation concludes Israel is committing
>> genocide against Palestinians in Gaza
>>
>> Amnesty International’s research has found sufficient basis to conclude
>> that Israel has committed and is continuing to commit genocide against
>> Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip, the organization said in a
>> landmark new report published today.
>>
>> The report, *‘You Feel Like You Are Subhuman’: Israel’s Genocide Against
>> Palestinians in Gaza
>> *, documents
>> how, during its military offensive launched in the wake of the deadly
>> Hamas-led attacks in southern Israel on 7 October 2023, Israel has
>> unleashed hell and destruction on Palestinians in Gaza brazenly,
>> continuously and with total impunity.
>>
>> “Amnesty International’s report demonstrates that Israel has carried out
>> acts prohibited under the Genocide Convention, with the specific intent to
>> destroy Palestinians in Gaza. These acts include killings, causing serious
>> bodily or mental harm and deliberately inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza
>> conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction.
>> Month after month, Israel has treated Palestinians in Gaza as a subhuman
>> group unworthy of human rights and dignity, demonstrating its intent to
>> physically destroy them,” said Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of
>> Amnesty International.
>>
>> “Our damning findings must serve as a wake-up call to the international
>> community: this is genocide. It must stop now.
>>
>> “States that continue to transfer arms to Israel at this time must know
>> they are violating their obligation to prevent genocide and are at risk of
>> becoming complicit in genocide. All states with influence over Israel,
>> particularly key arms suppliers like the USA and Germany, but also other EU
>> member states, the UK and others, must act now to bring Israel’s atrocities
>> against Palestinians in Gaza to an immediate end.”
>>
>> Over the past two months the crisis has grown particularly acute in the
>> North Gaza governorate, where a besieged population is facing starvation,
>> displacement and annihilation amid relentless bombardment and suffocating
>> restrictions on life-saving humanitarian aid.
>>
>> “Our research reveals that, for months, Israel has persisted in
>> committing genocidal acts, fully aware of the irreparable harm it was
>> inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza. It continued to do so in defiance of
>> countless warnings about the catastrophic humanitarian situation and of
>> legally binding decisions from the International Court of Justice (ICJ)
>> ordering Israel to take immediate measures to enable the provision of
>> humanitarian assistance to civilians in Gaza,” said Agnès Callamard.
>>
>> “Israel has repeatedly argued that its actions in Gaza are lawful and can
>> be justified by its military goal to eradicate Hamas. But genocidal intent
>> can co-exist alongside military goals and does not need to be Israel’s sole
>> intent.”
>>
>> Amnesty International examined Israel’s acts in Gaza closely and in their
>> totality, taking into account their recurrence and simultaneous occurrence,
>> and both their immediate impact and their cumulative and mutually
>> reinforcing consequences. The organization considered the scale and
>> severity of the casualties and destruction over time. It also analysed
>> public statements by officials, finding that prohibited acts were often
>> announced or called for in the first place by high-level officials in
>> charge of the war efforts.
>>
>> “Taking into account the pre-existing context of dispossession, apartheid
>> and unlawful military occupation in which these acts have been committed,
>> we could find only one reasonable conclusion: Israel’s intent is the
>> physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza, whether in parallel with, or
>> as a means to achieve, its military goal of destroying Hamas,” said Agnès
>> Callamard.
>>
>> “The atrocity crimes committed on 7 October 2023 by Hamas and other armed
>> groups against Israelis and victims of other nationalities, including
>> deliberate mass killings and hostage-taking, can never justify Israel’s
>> genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.”
>>
>> International jurisprudence recognizes that the perpetrator does not need
>> to succeed in their attempts to destroy the protected group, either in
>> whole or in part, for genocide to have been committed. The commission of
>> prohibited acts with the intent to destroy the group, as such, is
>> sufficient.
>>
>> Amnesty International’s report examines in detail Israel’s violations in
>> Gaza over nine months between 7 October 2023 and early July 2024. The
>> organization interviewed 212 people, including Palestinian victims and
>> witnesses, local authorities in Gaza, healthcare workers, conducted
>> fieldwork and analysed an extensive range of visual and digital evidence,
>> including satellite imagery. It also analysed statements by senior Israeli
>> government and military officials, and official Israeli bodies. On multiple
>> occasions, the organization shared its findings with the Israeli
>> authorities but had received no substantive response at the time of
>> publication.
>> *Unprecedented scale and magnitude*
>>
>> Israel’s actions following Hamas’s deadly attacks on 7 October 2023 have
>> brought Gaza’s population to the brink of collapse. Its brutal military
>> offensive had killed more than 42,000 Palestinians, including over 13,300
>> children, and injured over 97,000 more, by 7 October 2024, many of them in
>> direct or deliberately indiscriminate attacks, often wiping out entire
>> multigenerational families. It has caused unprecedented destruction, which
>> experts say occurred at a level and speed not seen in any other conflict in
>> the 21st century, levelling entire cities and destroying critical
>> infrastructure, agricultural land and cultural and religious sites. It
>> thereby rendered large swathes of Gaza uninhabitable.
>>
>> Mohammed, who fled with his family from Gaza City to Rafah in March 2024
>> and was displaced again in May 2024, described their struggle to survive in
>> horrifying conditions:
>>
>> “Here in Deir al-Balah, it’s like an apocalypse… You have to protect your
>> children from insects, from the heat, and there is no clean water, no
>> toilets, all while the bombing never stops. You feel like you are subhuman
>> here.”
>>
>> Israel imposed conditions of life in Gaza that created a deadly mixture
>> of malnutrition, hunger and diseases, and exposed Palestinians to a slow,
>> calculated death. Israel also subjected hundreds of Palestinians from Gaza
>> to incommunicado detention, torture and other ill-treatment.
>>
>> Viewed in isolation, some of the acts investigated by Amnesty
>> International constitute serious violations of international humanitarian
>> law or international human rights law. But in looking at the broader
>> picture of Israel’s military campaign and the cumulative impact of its
>> policies and acts, genocidal intent is the only reasonable conclusion.
>> *Intent to destroy*
>>
>> To establish Israel’s specific intent to physically destroy Palestinians
>> in Gaza, as such, Amnesty International analysed the overall pattern of
>> Israel’s conduct in Gaza, reviewed dehumanizing and genocidal statements by
>> Israeli government and military officials, particularly those at the
>> highest levels, and considered the context of Israel’s system of apartheid,
>> its inhumane blockade of Gaza and the unlawful 57-year-old military
>> occupation of the Palestinian territory.
>>
>> Before reaching its conclusion, Amnesty International examined Israel’s
>> claims that its military lawfully targeted Hamas and other armed groups
>> throughout Gaza, and that the resulting unprecedented destruction and
>> denial of aid were the outcome of unlawful conduct by Hamas and other armed
>> groups, such as locating fighters among the civilian population or the
>> diversion of aid. The organization concluded these claims are not credible.
>> The presence of Hamas fighters near or within a densely populated area does
>> not absolve Israel from its obligations to take all feasible precautions to
>> spare civilians and avoid indiscriminate or disproportionate attacks. Its
>> research found Israel repeatedly failed to do so, committing multiple
>> crimes under international law for which there can be no justification
>> based on Hamas’s actions. Amnesty International also found no evidence that
>> the diversion of aid could explain Israel’s extreme and deliberate
>> restrictions on life-saving humanitarian aid.
>>
>> In its analysis, the organization also considered alternative arguments
>> such as ones that Israel was acting recklessly or that it simply wanted to
>> destroy Hamas and did not care if it needed to destroy Palestinians in the
>> process, demonstrating a callous disregard for their lives rather than
>> genocidal intent.
>>
>> Our damning findings must serve as a wake-up call to the international
>> community: this is genocide. It must stop now.
>> Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International
>>
>> However, regardless of whether Israel sees the destruction of
>> Palestinians as instrumental to destroying Hamas or as an acceptable
>> by-product of this goal, this view of Palestinians as disposable and not
>> worthy of consideration is in itself evidence of genocidal intent.
>>
>> Many of the unlawful acts documented by Amnesty International were
>> preceded by officials urging their implementation. The organization
>> reviewed 102 statements that were issued by Israeli government and military
>> officials and others between 7 October 2023 and 30 June 2024 and
>> dehumanized Palestinians, called for or justified genocidal acts or other
>> crimes against them.
>>
>> Of these, Amnesty International identified 22 statements made by senior
>> officials in charge of managing the offensive that appeared to call for, or
>> justify, genocidal acts, providing direct evidence of genocidal intent.
>> This language was frequently replicated, including by Israeli soldiers on
>> the ground, as evidenced by audiovisual content verified by Amnesty
>> International showing soldiers making calls to “erase” Gaza or to make it
>> uninhabitable, and celebrating the destruction of Palestinian homes,
>> mosques, schools and universities.
>> *Killing and causing serious bodily or mental harm*
>>
>> Amnesty International documented the genocidal acts of killing and
>> causing serious mental and bodily harm to Palestinians in Gaza by reviewing
>> the results of investigations it conducted into 15 air strikes between 7
>> October 2023 and 20 April 2024 that killed at least 334 civilians,
>> including 141 children, and wounded hundreds of others. Amnesty
>> International found no evidence that any of these strikes were directed at
>> a military objective.
>>
>> In one illustrative case, on 20 April 2024, an Israeli air strike
>> destroyed the Abdelal family house in the Al-Jneinah neighbourhood in
>> eastern Rafah, killing three generations of Palestinians, including 16
>> children, while they were sleeping.
>>
>> While these represent just a fraction of Israel’s aerial attacks, they
>> are indicative of a broader pattern of repeated direct attacks on civilians
>> and civilian objects or deliberately indiscriminate attacks. The attacks
>> were also conducted in ways designed to cause a very high number of
>> fatalities and injuries among the civilian population.
>> *Inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about physical
>> destruction*
>>
>> The report documents how Israel deliberately inflicted conditions of life
>> on Palestinians in Gaza intended to lead, over time, to their destruction.
>> These conditions were imposed through three simultaneous patterns that
>> repeatedly compounded the effect of each other’s devastating impacts:
>> damage to and destruction of life-sustaining infrastructure and other
>> objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population; the
>> repeated use of sweeping, arbitrary and confusing mass “evacuation” orders
>> to forcibly displace almost all of Gaza’s population; and the denial and
>> obstruction of the delivery of essential services, humanitarian assistance
>> and other life-saving supplies into and within Gaza.
>>
>> After 7 October 2023, Israel imposed a total siege on Gaza cutting off
>> electricity, water and fuel. In the nine months reviewed for this report,
>> Israel maintained a suffocating, unlawful blockade, tightly controlled
>> access to energy sources, failed to facilitate meaningful humanitarian
>> access within Gaza, and obstructed the import and delivery of life-saving
>> goods and humanitarian aid, particularly to areas north of Wadi Gaza. They
>> thereby exacerbated an already existing humanitarian crisis. This, combined
>> with the extensive damage to Gaza’s homes, hospitals, water and sanitation
>> facilities and agricultural land, and mass forced displacement, caused
>> catastrophic levels of hunger and led to the spread of diseases at alarming
>> rates. The impact was especially harsh on young children and pregnant or
>> breastfeeding women, with anticipated long-term consequences for their
>> health.
>>
>> The international community’s seismic, shameful failure for over a year
>> to press Israel to end its atrocities in Gaza, by first delaying calls for
>> a ceasefire and then continuing arms transfers, is and will remain a stain
>> on our collective conscience.
>> Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International
>>
>> Time and again, Israel had the chance to improve the humanitarian
>> situation in Gaza, yet for over a year it has repeatedly refused to take
>> steps blatantly within its power to do so, such as opening sufficient
>> access points to Gaza or lifting tight restrictions on what could enter the
>> Strip or their obstruction of aid deliveries within Gaza while the
>> situation has grown progressively worse.
>>
>> Through its repeated “evacuation” orders Israel displaced nearly 1.9
>> million Palestinians – 90% of Gaza’s population – into ever-shrinking,
>> unsafe pockets of land under inhumane conditions, some of them up to 10
>> times. These multiple waves of forced displacement left many jobless and
>> deeply traumatized, especially since some 70% of Gaza’s residents are
>> refugees or descendants of refugees whose towns and villages were
>> ethnically cleansed by Israel during the 1948 Nakba.
>>
>> Despite conditions quickly becoming unfit for human life, Israeli
>> authorities refused to consider measures that would have protected
>> displaced civilians and ensured their basic needs were met, showing that
>> their actions were deliberate.
>>
>> They refused to allow those displaced to return to their homes in
>> northern Gaza or relocate temporarily to other parts of the Occupied
>> Palestinian Territory or Israel, continuing to deny many Palestinians their
>> right to return under international law to areas they were displaced from
>> in 1948
>> .
>> They did so knowing that there was nowhere safe for Palestinians in Gaza to
>> flee to.
>> *Accountability for genocide*
>>
>> “The international community’s seismic, shameful failure for over a year
>> to press Israel to end its atrocities in Gaza, by first delaying calls for
>> a ceasefire and then continuing arms transfers, is and will remain a stain
>> on our collective conscience,” said Agnès Callamard.
>>
>> “Governments must stop pretending they are powerless to end this
>> genocide, which was enabled by decades of impunity for Israel’s violations
>> of international law. States need to move beyond mere expressions of regret
>> or dismay and take strong and sustained international action, however
>> uncomfortable a finding of genocide may be for some of Israel’s allies.
>>
>> “The International Criminal Court’s (ICC) arrest warrants for Prime
>> Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for
>> war crimes and crimes against humanity issued last month offer real hope of
>> long-overdue justice for victims. States must demonstrate their respect for
>> the court’s decision and for universal international law principles by
>> arresting and handing over those wanted by the ICC.
>>
>> “We are calling on the Office of the Prosecutor of the International
>> Criminal Court (ICC) to urgently consider adding genocide to the list of
>> crimes it is investigating and for all states to use every legal avenue to
>> bring perpetrators to justice. No one should be allowed to commit genocide
>> and remain unpunished.”
>>
>> Amnesty International is also calling for all civilian hostages to be
>> released unconditionally and for Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups
>> responsible for the crimes committed on 7 October to be held to account.
>>
>> The organization is also calling for the UN Security Council to impose
>> targeted sanctions against Israeli and Hamas officials most implicated in
>> crimes under international law.
>> *Background *
>>
>> On 7 October 2023 Hamas and other armed groups indiscriminately fired
>> rockets into southern Israel and carried out deliberate mass killings and
>> hostage-taking there
>> ,
>> killing 1,200 people, including over 800 civilians, and abducted 223
>> civilians and captured 27 soldiers. The crimes perpetrated by Hamas and
>> other armed groups during this attack will be the focus of a forthcoming
>> Amnesty International report.
>>
>> Since October 2023, Amnesty International has conducted in-depth
>> investigations into the multiple violations and crimes under international
>> law committed by Israeli forces, including direct attacks on civilians and
>> civilian objects and deliberately indiscriminate attacks killing hundreds
>> of civilians, as well as other unlawful attacks on and collective
>> punishment of the civilian population. The organization has called on the
>> Office of the ICC Prosecutor to expedite its investigation into the
>> situation in the State of Palestine and is campaigning for an immediate
>> ceasefire.
>>
>> *For the Hebrew translation of this press release, click here.
>> *
>>
>> - INTERNATIONAL JUSTICE
>>
>> - ISRAEL AND THE OCCUPIED PALESTINIAN TERRITORY
>>
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>>
>> - MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA
>>
>> - NEWS
>> - PRESS RELEASE
>>
>> - WAR CRIMES AND CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY
>>
>>
>>
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>>
>> On Sun, Jul 20, 2025 at 10:03 AM Martin Wasserman
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Aram,
>>>
>>> If thats the definition of genocide, then Israel is clearly NOT
>>> committing genocide in Gaza. If Israel were trying to kill as many Gazans
>>> as possible, the death toll would be much, much higher than it is. They
>>> wouldnt allow any food or medicine in at all, and they wouldnt issue
>>> evacuation warnings before striking Hamas targets.
>>>
>>> The truth is, Israel goes to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties,
>>> but Hamas makes it very difficult by deliberately placing their command
>>> centers in civilian locations such as schools and hospitals.
>>>
>>> The only group that Israel wants to destroy is Hamas, which does have an
>>> explicit policy of genocide (by your definition) against Jews.
>>>
>>> Yes, the Gazans are suffering, but Hamas could end their suffering
>>> tomorrow if they wanted to. All they have to do is lay down their arms and
>>> release the hostages, and the war would be over immediately. But Hamas has
>>> no interest in ending the suffering of the Gazans. What theyre actually
>>> calling for is an open-ended war of attrition against Israel, no matter
>>> what the cost to their own people.
>>>
>>> Martin Wasserman
>>>
>>>
>>> On Jul 18, 2025, at 8:26 PM, Aram James wrote:
>>>
>>> Genocide defined: the deliberate
>>> killing
>>> of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with
>>> the aim of destroying
>>> that
>>> nation or group.
>>> "a campaign of genocide"
>>>
>>>
>>> On Fri, Jul 18, 2025 at 4:04 PM Martin Wasserman
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> It appears that "genocide" can be defined in several different ways.
>>>> Perhaps we should stop using that term altogether and stick to words that
>>>> have clear and unambiguous meanings.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Jul 18, 2025, at 12:25 PM, Aram James wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> *I’m a Genocide Scholar. I Know It When I See It”: Prof. Omer Bartov on
>>>> the Growing Consensus on Gaza*
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> *My inescapable conclusion has become that Israel is committing
>>>> genocide against the Palestinian people. Having grown up in a Zionist home,
>>>> lived the first half of my life in Israel, served in the I.D.F. as a
>>>> soldier and officer and spent most of my career researching and writing on
>>>> war crimes and the Holocaust, this was a painful conclusion to reach, and
>>>> one that I resisted as long as I could. But I have been teaching classes on
>>>> genocide for a quarter of a century. I can recognize one when I see one*
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> A month after the Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, I believed
>>>> there was evidence that the Israeli military had committed war crimes and
>>>> potentially crimes against humanity in its counterattack on Gaza. But
>>>> contrary to the cries of Israel’s fiercest critics, the evidence did not
>>>> seem to me to rise to the crime of genocide.
>>>> By May 2024, the Israel Defense Forces had ordered about one million
>>>> Palestinians sheltering in Rafah — the southernmost and last remaining
>>>> relatively undamaged city of the Gaza Strip — to move to the beach area of
>>>> the Mawasi, where there was little to no shelter. The army then proceeded
>>>> to destroy much of Rafah, a feat mostly accomplished by August
>>>>
>>>> .
>>>> At that point it appeared no longer possible to deny that the pattern
>>>> of I.D.F. operations was consistent with the statements denoting genocidal
>>>> intent made by Israeli leaders in the days after the Hamas attack. Prime
>>>> Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had promised that the enemy would pay a “
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>