THE PLETHORA OF REASONS ISRAELIS AND ZIONISTS USE TO DENY THE GENOCIDE AND SECOND HOLOCAUST IN GAZA

𝑇ℎ𝑒𝑠𝑒 𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑚𝑎𝑛𝑦 𝑓𝑎𝑙𝑠𝑒 𝑑𝑒𝑏𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑝𝑜𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑍𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑠 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝐼𝑠𝑟𝑎𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑠 𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑒𝑖𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑤𝑟𝑜𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑦 𝑜𝑟 𝑛𝑎𝑖𝑣𝑒𝑙𝑦 𝑎𝑡𝑡𝑒𝑚𝑝𝑡 𝑡𝑜 𝐷𝐸𝑁𝑌 𝐴 𝐺𝐸𝑁𝑂𝐶𝐼𝐷𝐸 𝐼𝑆 𝑇𝐴𝐾𝐼𝑁𝐺 𝑃𝐿𝐴𝐶𝐸 𝐼𝑁 𝐺𝐴𝑍𝐴.

𝐻𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑚𝑦 𝑎𝑙𝑚𝑜𝑠𝑡 𝑑𝑒𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑎𝑙𝑠𝑜 𝑚𝑦 𝑏𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑓 𝑜𝑟 𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑔𝑒𝑟 𝑎𝑛𝑠𝑤𝑒𝑟𝑠 (𝑎𝑠 𝑖𝑛𝑐𝑙𝑢𝑑𝑒𝑑 𝑖𝑛 𝑚𝑦 𝑛𝑒𝑤 𝑏𝑜𝑜𝑘, ‘ 𝑂𝐶𝑇𝑂𝐵𝐸𝑅 7 - 𝐸𝑋𝑃𝑂𝑆𝐼𝑁𝐺 𝑇𝐻𝐸 𝑍𝐼𝑂𝑁𝐼𝑆𝑇 𝐿𝐼𝐸𝑆 𝐴𝑁𝐷 𝑃𝑅𝑂𝑃𝐴𝐺𝐴𝑁𝐷𝐴 ‘):

GENOCIDE AND HOLOCAUST DENIAL - THE PLETHORA OF REASONS GIVEN FOR DENYING A GENOCIDE (in no particular order; the most common reasons given are listed first)

“GENOCIDE IS THE DELIBERATE MASS MURDER OF CIVILIANS, SO THESE DEAD CIVILIANS ARE JUST THE COLLATERAL DAMAGE OF WAR”

In the context of the Israel-Gaza Conflict, there has been numerous clear blatant and hidden mass murder and smaller scale murder of civilians, including deliberately bombing homes, schools and UN displacement camps, as well as repeated sniping of the young and old. At least half of the civilian deaths in Gaza are not collateral damage, if not many more. The evidence is out there for all to see. Don’t turn a blind eye to it.

“GENOCIDE MEANS TOTAL EXTERMINATION, OR AT LEAST AN ATTEMPT CLOSE TO EXTERMINATION, SUCH AS IN THE NAZI HOLOCAUST DURING THE SECOND WORLD WAR, YET THIS NATION OR GROUP STILL EXISTS”

This is sometimes more of an assumption, than a deliberate attempt to deny a genocide. There were, in the past, a number of genocides where the majority, or nearly all, of a group were murdered. The First Holocaust during the Second World War is just one example of many, over many centuries. However, the definition of a genocide is the destruction (murder) of a group or nation in whole, or in part, whether it is 5,000 people being 20% of their population, or 50,000 people being 2% of the population.

“IT IS NOT EITHER A GENOCIDE OR HOLOCAUST BECAUSE HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF CIVILIANS, LET ALONE MILLIONS, HAVE BEEN KILLED”

The actual number is largely irrelevant, particularly when it has reached the hundreds or thousands. Mass murder of hundreds or thousands of civilians is genocide, just as the murder of a 100,000 civilians is genocide.

“BOMBS AND MISSILES ARE NOT THAT ACCURATE, EVEN WITH THE BEST OF INTENTIONS”

This is an old, expired excuse to deny a genocide, which may have been true in a number of more distant historical wars and conflicts. The vast majority of modern weaponry, bombs, missiles and bullets are very accurate to extremely accurate. The only main exceptions to this is more basic hand-controlled rockets and more basic hand-controlled grenade launchers. In this conflict, Israel are very rarely using such weaponry, so there is no excuse.

“OUR NATION IS DOING THEIR VERY BEST TO AVOID CIVILIAN CASUALTIES”

In the context of this conflict, there is numerous video, photographic, journalistic and first-hand witness evidence. On top of which, there are also both public and private admissions and confessions by Israel that show this is blatantly untrue.

“THE MURDER OF CIVILIANS IS NOT TAKING PLACE OR THERE ARE, AT MOST, THERE ARE JUST A FEW ISOLATED INCIDENTS”

Again, in the context of this conflict, there is numerous video, photographic, journalistic and first-hand witness evidence. On top of which, there are also a number of both public and private admissions and confessions by Israel that show this is also untrue.

“THE RATIO OF MILITARY VERSUS CIVILIAN DEATHS IS VERY LOW”

The proportions stated by Israel in this conflict massively misrepresent the reality on the ground. Israel have stated in later 2023 that, for just one example, that just one in thirty civilians were dying in comparison with the number of Hamas freedom fighters killed. When, in actual fact, it is has been at least 1 in 4 civilians being killed or murdered. Indeed, during some days, weeks and months, far more civilians have been killed or murdered than Hamas fighters.

It is accepted that the actual numbers of Hamas deaths and injuries are currently unknown, but taking an average of Hamas’ rare claims or refutations, and Israel’s claims, would - at first - seem a reasonably logical estimate of casualties. However, Israel are notorious for repeatedly declaring very significant exaggerations of Hamas’ military casualties when it suits their purposes and, conversely, very significant downplaying IDF and IAF military casualties when it suits them. I am, therefore, going to rely on reliable expert neutral estimates of military casualties.

The Gaza Ministry of Health casualty numbers do not provide the proportion of casualties who are civilian; as a result, varying estimates have been given by analysts. A study by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in The Lancet, covering the period 7–26 October 2023, estimated 68.1% of casualties were children, women or elders and therefore likely non-combatants. This percentage is now far higher. An analysis published in December in Ha'aretz by Israeli sociologist Yagil Levy estimated at least 61% of the casualties were in this category. Both studies were based on figures from Gaza's Ministry of Health. However, considering only women, children and elderly as civilians (i.e., classifying all adult men as Hamas or Intifada combatants) is utterly outrageous and very wrongly gives an extremely conservative figure for civilian deaths. Even in early December 2023, Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor estimated that as many as 90% of the casualties were likely to be civilians. In December 2023, even Israel's IDF military said it estimated two out of three (67%) of those killed to be civilians. This was later hugely contradicted by other public IDF statements that claimed only 10 to 20% (at least 1 in 10 to 1 in 5) deaths were civilian. Even the extremely conservative figure of 61% (excluding all adult men) is higher than the average civilian death rate in all world conflicts "from the Second World War to the 1990s", according to Yigal Levy. Neta Crawford of the Costs of War Project at Brown University stating, even as early as 2024, "This is, in the 21st century, a significant and out-of-the-norm level of destruction".

The number of civilian casualties in this conflict is far higher than in any single conflict in Gaza’s recent history. Indeed, very depressingly, it is even far higher than all previous conflicts combined. On 31 December 2023, Al Jazeera stated 2023 was by far the deadliest year for Palestinians since the 1948 Nakba (massacre, theft, displacement and ethnic cleansing.) Even more shocking, highly alarmingly and worrying, during this current Israel-Gaza Conflict, the percentage ratio of children and babies killed or murdered is even far, far higher than those murdered or killed during the Nazi Third Reich‘s Holocaust - the incorrectly so-called First Holocaust - during the Second World War. On top of which, it is horrific to realise that babies and children are dying at a faster rate than in any recent conflict or war. Furthermore, statistically, over 99% of these children and babies are Palestinian, and under 1% are Israeli.

In early December 2023, an Israeli official claimed Israel had killed 5,000 militants, but provided no evidence to support the claim. On December 29 2023, the IDF said it had killed 8,000 Hamas fighters. On 30 December 2023, Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor estimated 2,353 militant deaths (30,034 total deaths, with 27,681 civilian deaths). On 19 February 2024, a Hamas official told Reuters about 6,000 of its militants had been killed, but another official denied this figure in an interview with BBC. Hamas also put out an official statement strongly denying the 6,000 figure. The same day, the IDF claimed it had killed 12,000 militants up to that point, this making a total of three official statements of 5,000, then 8,000 then 12,000 in just 2 1/2 months. The IDF did not confirm that number to the BBC, but in two separate responses, later said the figure is "approximately 10,000" and then "more than 10,000", with the Israeli embassy in London also giving a similar figure. On 7 April 2024, the IDF said that more than 13,000 operative of Hamas and its allies had been killed by Israel in Gaza in the fighting (although an IDF press release stated 12,000+), in addition to the alleged 1,000 Hamas fighters killed on 7 October 2023. The IDF said these deaths included 5 Hamas brigade commanders or equivalent, 20 battalion commanders, and over 100 company commanders or equivalent.

Sources have doubted the Israeli figures by questioning the IDF's ability to distinguish civilians from casualties (for just one of many examples, the IDF mistakenly identified 3 Israeli civilians as Palestinian militants). Many observers believe Israel simply treats all adult male casualties as militants. This has also been clearly evidenced by Israel’s IDF photographs and videos of captured men and older boys. Other observers argue that Israel could be arriving at inflated figures of militant deaths by also including all Hamas government civil servants as militants.

The BBC’s ‘BBC Verify’ repeatedly asked IDF for its methodology on counting militant deaths, but the IDF never responded. BBC Verify attempted to count militant deaths by compiling all announcements of militant deaths on the IDF's official telegram channel; it found the IDF had made 160 such announcements, summing up to 714 total militant deaths in the Gaza Strip (as of 29 February 2024). BBC Verify also viewed all 280 videos which had been posted on Israel’s IDF YouTube channel of Gaza Operations. Shockingly, they found that only 1 single video actually apparently showed a small number of dead bodies of Palestinian militants (and even then, there was no way to independently verify the true identity of the bodies.)

An analysis by Zoran Kusovac in Al-Jazeera pointed out that IDF's own numbers imply 62 Hamas fighters killed for every 1 single Israeli soldier killed in Gaza operations. Kusovac argued that if only 1/2 the militants were killed in combat, a constant loss exchange ratio of 31:1 over many months would be so demoralising that Hamas fighters would rout, yet as Hamas continues to fight, and win many battles, its losses must be far smaller than claimed by Israel. Indeed, taking Israel’s IDF figures at face value, Hamas would likely have completely ceased to exist by May or June 2024. In late April 2024, Khalil al-Hayya, a top Hamas official, said no more than 20% (1 in 5) Hamas fighters has been killed.

“THE RATIO OF MILITARY VERSUS CIVILIAN DEATHS IS NORMAL OR NOT UNUSUAL”

Again, this is wholly false in relation to this particular conflict, as explained in detail above.

“THE CASUALTY NUMBERS ARE MASSIVELY OR LARGELY EXAGGERATED”

This has been proven to be an almost entirely false claim. Even conservative, neutral news media, such as the BBC NEWS and SKY NEWS, for just two examples, have publicly stated that Hamas’ Gaza Ministry of Health’s death and injury statistics are, in their professional experience, very reliable. On the complete contrary, Israel’s stated estimates are patently false and a deliberate massive understatement of the true number of civilian casualties.

“YOU CAN’T TRUST THE HEALTH MINISTRY, BECAUSE IT’S RUN BY HAMAS”

See above.

“WHERE IS THE ACTUAL EVIDENCE OF ALL THESE DEATHS?”

The clear evidence is over the place in Gaza. Videos, photographs, doctor and medical records, burials, mass graves, etc.

“WHERE ARE THE MASS GRAVES?”

They are all over the place in Gaza. Many were actually dug by Israel. Many also show clear and repeated evidence of the torture and systemic, often highly cruel and brutal, mass murder of Gazan Palestinian civilians.

“SELF-DEFENCE SHOULDN’T BE CALLED GENOCIDE”

Nothing whatsoever can ever justify a genocide. A genocide or Holocaust is never ‘self-defence’.

“IF A GENOCIDE IS ATTEMPTED, THE INITIAL VICTIM IS ALLOWED TO RETALIATE WITH A GENOCIDE OF ITS OWN”

Again, nothing whatsoever can ever justify a genocide. A genocide or Holocaust is never ‘self-defence’. Group punishment (also known as collective punishment) is also specifically prohibited under International Law. Besides which, a genocide was never attempted on October 7, nor has it ever been attempted at any time in history. Yes, it was mass murder on October 7, but it was on a relatively small scale, and around half of the victims were military or otherwise armed. It was also a one-off hit-and-run event, including hostage-taking for return to Gaza.

“IF A COUNTRY WISHED TO EXTERMINATE A NATION OR GROUP, IT COULD JUST DROP AN ATOMIC OR NUCLEAR BOMB ON THEM”

Honestly, this is a simplistic and stupid argument. No sane or even vaguely intelligent nation would ever do such a outrageous and frankly ridiculous thing. It would also nearly always result in that nation also being destroyed or decimated, so would be almost totally counter-productive to the safety of that particular nation.

“THE MAJORITY, OR A VERY LARGE AMOUNT OF CIVILIANS, HAVE NOT BEEN KILLED”

True, but this is irrelevant under the definition of genocide. Besides which, even a Holocaust is not defined by hundreds of thousands or millions.

“ONLY 1-5% OF CIVILIANS HAVE BEEN KILLED. A 95-99% CIVILIAN SURVIVAL RATE IS NOT A GENOCIDE”

See above.

“THEIR POPULATION IS STILL GROWING, SO IT CAN’T BE A GENOCIDE”

Irrelevant. Also, this is highly misleading and wholly incorrect during this particular conflict. Yes, it WAS growing prior to October 7, but since then, in average, the population has actually been decreasing between at least 2 to 3%, due to bombings, sniping, starvation, dehydration and disease, as well as numerous false male boy and men civilian arrests and also abductions of mostly children and female adults.

“THEIR POPULATION ISN’T SHRINKING, OR IS BARELY SHRINKING, SO IT CAN’T BE A GENOCIDE”

But it is shrinking. And by a significant amount each month. Besides which, the number of births versus the number of civilian deaths or murders is totally irrelevant.

“THEY ARE USING THE CIVILIANS AS HUMAN SHIELDS - THAT’S WHY NEARLY ALL OF THEM ARE DYING”

This has been proven to be untrue on innumerous occasions. However, on the contrary, it is Israel who have been proven to use civilians as human shields, including in the West Bank. Some may still say that Hamas are using the general population as a human shield, by occasionally hiding near or under them. It is readily accepted that there is indeed some logic to this argument but, yet again, it doesn’t negate the fact that a genocide and Second Holocaust is taking place.

“THEY DESERVE IT”

The suggestion that predominantly innocent, totally unarmed civilians “deserve” a genocide or Second Holocaust of death, murder, bereavement, maiming, starvation, dehydration, disease and repeated mass displacement, is utterly repulsive. It is also blatant dehumanisation and highly unethical, illegal group punishment of civilians (also known as collective punishment.)

“THEY SHOULD HAVE JUST GOT OUT OF THE COUNTRY”

Forced migration, to wit, deliberately turning a country’s citizens into effective refugees is, once again, clearly against International Humanitarian Law. Indeed, it is blatant form of ethnic cleansing.

“THEY SHOULD HAVE HEEDED THE EVACUATION WARNINGS”

The majority of the civilian population did heed the evacuation warnings. However, they were still bombed and killed. In later months, since early 2024, civilians have been forced to repeatedly relocate, often numerous times. This is clear harassment and terrorising fear-inducement of a civilian population.

“THEY ARE ALL TERRORISTS, OR NEARLY ALL SUPPORT TERRORISTS”

Hamas is actually an elected government in Gaza. It has both a political and military wing. The vast majority of Palestinians regard the Hamas military wing as Freedom Fighters, NOT Terrorists. Hamas fighters are nearly all simply the sons, grandsons and brothers of the killed, murdered and maimed Gazan Palestinians who died, or were seriously injured, in the Strip next to the South West of the State of Israel. Furthermore, there are approximately 30% of Gazan Palestinian civilians who either do not support Hamas, or strongly object to their very significant provocation of Israel on October 7 2023 (mostly because of the ensuing bombing and massacre of civilians.)

“ALL, OR NEARLY ALL, OF THOSE CHILDREN ARE FUTURE TERRORISTS”

This rhetoric is clearly highly provocative and highly dangerous. It is also highly misleading, presumptive and careless propaganda.

“EXPERTS DISAGREE”

There will always be differences of opinion and perspective between experts, but highly or generally very reliable sources are key to knowing the truth of what is taking place and being said and written. A general consensus of consistently reliable experts and specialists is usually a reliable test of truth. This is inextricably linked to the next genocide denial point below...

“REPORTERS AND JOURNALISTS GIVE DIFFERENT ACCOUNTS”

...As well as the above, it must be said that Pro-Israeli Zionism and the Jewish community as a general whole, together with the far more prevalent Pro-Israeli Christian Zionism, have seriously affected the balance of TV news channels and newspapers, both online and offline, in favour of Israel. Indeed, the bias in favour of Israel, and against Palestinians and pro-Palestinians, is often regretfully and sadly blatant, even politically corrupt on many occasions. In other words, everyone should take Pro-Israeli and Pro-Zionist news media with a huge pinch of salt. People should always do their best to double or triple-check stories, and alleged evidence and facts, against both neutral and Palestinian or Pro-Palestinian news sources and online commentary.

“THAT’S NOT HOW IT HAPPENED”

If this is simply a statement as a wish to disagree with the definite or seemingly clear circumstances and facts, without evidence to back it up, it should be immediately dismissed as unhelpful conjecture or supposition.

If there are genuine corrections to be made, let them clearly and logically be presented for all to see, test and evaluate for themselves.

“BUT HAMAS...!”

When Israelis, right-wing and centrist Zionists, and quite a few non-Zionist Jews, together with sadly most Christian Zionists, run out of arguments and logical reasoning to deny or defend the genocide in Gaza, they nearly always resort to the phrase, “BUT HAMAS...!” as though it were a final and definitive explanation and excuse as to why Israel is perfectly entitled to commit a genocide in Gaza. In other words, by resorting to the leading sentence, “BUT HAMAS...” is simply an instinctive, but highly unethical and immoral defence of the group punishment of Gazan Palestinian civilians by Israel (also known as collective punishment.)

“WHAT ABOUT ALL THE ROCKET ATTACKS BY HAMAS?”

All of the rocket attacks by Hamas are simply certain angry and despairing Palestinians exercising their perfect right to Resist an Occupation. However, if and when these missile attacks are deliberately aimed at either mostly or solely civilians areas, they should be condemned, in my and many other peoples’ opinion.

“DEFINE ‘PROPORTIONATE RESPONSE’”

This is actually a very easy objection or excuse to quite quickly reject, particularly in relation to the Israel-Gaza Conflict. Historically, Israel have nearly always used large or massively disproportionate military responses to attacks or retaliatory revenge attacks. So much so, that the actual proportion of retaliatory violence and killing by Israel is always between 10 to 100 times more severe than whatever damage or killing was inflicted by Hamas (or Hezbollah from Lebanon, or the Houthis, or Iran, etc.)

“IT’S PALLYWOOD! A LOT OF THOSE DEAD OR MAIMED CIVILIANS ARE JUST TOY BABIES OR ACTORS!”

Again, this is a very easy, nearly always deliberately bogus and utterly disgusting objection or excuse, to quickly dismiss. Furthermore, it is also explicitly against and rightly contrary to X’s (Twitter’s) Code of Conduct and Terms of Service. There is absolutely no logical reason why any Gazan Palestinian, reporter or journalist, would resort to pretending atrocities and war crimes were occurring. Why? Because there is already a huge mountain of condemnatory evidence by Israel to be videotaped, photographed and documented. There is, therefore, no need whatsoever for either the fabrication or pretence of evidence against Israel.

“THERE WAS A HUGE PROPORTION OF CASUALTIES COMPARED WITH 9/11”

For the sake of argument, the accurately calculated proportions of deaths are as follows ( excluding later military deaths as a result, to wit IDF, IAF military and police ) :

U.S.A. 9/11 :

2,997 + 1,400 ( associated later illness and suicide related deaths of rescue workers, ambulance staff and police as direct result ) + 603 ( estimated later illness and suicide related civilian deaths as direct result ) = 5,000

POPULATION : 285 Million as of 11 September 2001

PROPORTION OF POPULATION KILLED :

1 in 95,734 or 0.00001755%

ISRAEL :

1,139 + 11 ( estimated later succumbed to injuries as direct result ) + 150 ( estimated later hostages deaths as indirect result ) = 1,300

POPULATION: 9.73 Million as of 7 October 2023

PROPORTION OF POPULATION KILLED :

1 in 7,485 or 0.00013361%

FACT DEDUCED : 13 Times More Died in ISRAEL from OCTOBER 7 in Comparison with 9/11 in THE UNITED STATES (proportionate to population size)

Great! You were right! But so what?

CORRECT FACT COMPARISON : If you compare the percentage of civilians Israeli deaths versus the percentage of civilian Palestinian deaths, including and since October 7, as of the end of August 2024, it’s still about 1 in 7,400 deaths in Israel and around 1 in 35 deaths in Gaza and the West Bank!

This means the death for civilian Palestinians is about 211 times greater than the rate of Israeli deaths, making the comparison with 9/11 almost irrelevant!

“ISRAEL IS PROVIDING LARGE AMOUNTS OF HUMANITARIAN AID, SO OBVIOUSLY IT’S NOT A GENOCIDE!”

...tbc...