By Seraj Assi
Genocide is a crime. It’s unfolding in Gaza before our eyes as we speak. Genocide experts like Jewish scholar Raz Segal have described Israel’s actions in Gaza as “a textbook for genocide.” UN experts have warned: “We remain convinced that the Palestinian people are at grave risk of genocide. Time is running out to prevent genocide and humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.”
Yet the mainstream media has been reluctant to call out Israel’s genocide, despite all the evidence on the ground, much of which has been provided by Israeli officials themselves, who have not been shy of their genocidal intentions. Why?
The word genocide carries a tremendous moral weight that implies grave consequences for those who commit it. It was coined by Raphael Lemkin, a Polish Jew who wanted to create a word that would carry high moral salience. Ultimately, he succeeded far beyond his expectations: for most people today, the word genocide conveys the worst crime humanity can inflict on a group of people.
This perhaps explains why Israeli officials have been vocal about their genocide mission in Gaza, while at the same time refusing to state it directly or call by its name.
Instead, they use other euphemisms. One common euphemism is “second Nakba.” As one Israeli lawmaker put it at the star of Israel’s war in Gaza, “Right now, one goal: Nakba! A Nakba that will overshadow the Nakba of 48. Nakba in Gaza and Nakba to anyone who dares to join!” Or as Israel’s Minister of Agriculture Avi Dichter, referring to the unfolding mass exodus of Palestinians from Gaza, has brashly put it: “We are rolling out Nakba 2023.”
Another related euphemism is “finish the job,” which also implies conducting a new nakba to “finish the unfinished job of 1948.” As Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s finance minister, once told Palestinians: “You are here by mistake, it’s a mistake that Ben-Gurion didn’t finish the job and didn’t throw you out in 1948.”
Other common euphemisms include “mowing the grass,” “turning Gaza into a soccer field,” “wiping Gaza off the map,” “erasing Gaza from the face of the earth,” and, to cite Benjamin Netanyahu’s chilling phrase, “thinning out the Gaza population to a minimum.” Or as Foreign Minister Eli Cohen told Army Radio, “At the end of this war, not only will Hamas no longer be in Gaza, but the territory of Gaza will also decrease.”
Threatening to drop a nuclear bomb on Gaza, as did Israel’s Minister of Heritage Amichai Eliyahu, also qualifies as a genocidal threat. You may call it atomic genocide.
Sometimes, astonishingly, an official would issue a whole genocidal statement without evoking the word genocide, as when Eliyahu boasted on social media: “North Gaza is more beautiful than ever. Razing and blowing up everything is amazing to see. When finished, we will hand over the lands of Gaza to soldiers and settlers who lived in Gush Katif.”
Denying the existence of civilians in Gaza is a recipe for genocide. So is depicting the people of Gaza as “human animals” and “Children of Darkness.” Or as an Israeli lawmaker warned from the Knesset podium: “the children of Gaza have brought it against themselves.”
And genocide is not confined to killing. Mass displacement and transfer also qualifies as genocide. There have been a flurry of official Israeli proposals explicitly calling for the expulsion of Palestinians from Gaza. According to a document revealed by local Israeli sources, the Israeli Ministry of Intelligence has recommended the forcible and permanent transfer of Gaza's 2.2 million Palestinians to the Sinai desert, and the repopulation of Gaza with Jewish settlers. An Israeli think tank with close ties to the Israeli government suggested that the war in Gaza presents a “unique and rare opportunity” to permanently expel Palestinians from Gaza and repopulate it with Jewish settlers.
Since October 7, Israel has killed more Palestinians in Gaza than it did in all Palestine during the Nakba. It has displaced twice as many. If what happened in 1948 was ethnic cleansing, as Israeli founders themselves would admit, then what do you call what’s happening in Gaza now?
So call it what you may, it’s genocide. Or perhaps it’s time to start calling the thing by its name.
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