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‘I’m a Genocide Scholar’ … And I’ve Been Prepping My NYT Genocide Case Against Israel for Years

The headquarters of The New York Times. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

“I’m a genocide scholar,” proclaims the headline of Omer Bartov’s recent guest essay in The New York Times. And therefore, he assures us, “I know it when I see it.”

Except this isn’t the first time that Bartov, a professor of Holocaust and genocide studies at Brown University, has thought he saw genocide, or something like it, in Israel’s actions toward the Palestinians.

In fact, it’s not even the first time since last year.

Although Bartov opens the piece by saying that “a month after the Hamas-led terrorist attacks on Israel on October 7, 2023,” the situation “did not seem to me to rise to the crime of genocide,” a quick review of his public record suggests he had been laying the groundwork for this accusation long before the war in Gaza began.

July 2025 wasn’t some dramatic moral epiphany he revealed to readers of The New York Times. Bartov had already publicly declared Israel’s actions a genocide back in December 2024 in an interview with the fringe website Democracy Now! His NYT op-ed is simply a polished retread of that declaration.

In the Times piece, Bartov writes:

By May 2024, the Israel Defense Forces had ordered about one million Palestinians sheltering in Rafah […] 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.

He concludes that at this point, “it appeared no longer possible to deny” that Israeli operations matched what he calls statements “denoting genocidal intent.”

But Bartov’s definition of genocide has always been suspiciously elastic, at least when it comes to Israel. And his eagerness to draw Holocaust analogies long predates this war.

In 2019, Bartov signed an open letter in The New York Review of Books attacking the US Holocaust Memorial Museum for criticizing Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY)’s use of the phrase “concentration camps” to describe US immigration detention centers.

The Museum had objected to invoking Holocaust-era language for partisan ends. Bartov disagreed, calling the Museum’s stance “fundamentally ahistorical,” and claiming it undermined Holocaust memory and education.

In other words, Bartov has a habit of defending far-fetched analogies, so long as they point in the direction he favors.

This pattern continues in his commentary on Israel.

In May 2021, during a short war triggered by a Hamas rocket barrage on Israeli civilians, Bartov wasn’t focused on terrorism, incitement, or Hamas’ genocidal charter. Instead, he urged American universities to “teach about Israeli state violence against Palestinians” and to feature “Palestinian scholars and activists” in conferences on genocide and mass violence. He has used the term “Nakba” (catastrophe in Arabic) to describe modern Israel’s founding in 1948, when the new Jewish State was attacked by a coalition of neighboring Arab armies that sought its total destruction.

When the New York Times Needs a (Jewish Israeli) Genocide Scholar

When The New York Times wants to amplify accusations of genocide against Israel, it doesn’t turn to fringe activists or anonymous social media accounts. It finds a Jewish Israeli professor willing to say it in their pages. Bonus points if he’s spent years blurring the definition of genocide and repurposing “Never Again” for unrelated political causes.

Let’s also be honest. Identity politics plays a role here. The Times knows that featuring a Jewish Israeli lends the accusation a veneer of credibility and “internal dissent.” It’s not subtle. It’s strategic.

But if we’re going to talk about genocidal intent, we have to look at the actual statements Bartov cites.

HonestReporting board member Salo Aizenberg has done just that, and found Bartov’s examples either wildly out of context or plainly misrepresented.

Phrases like “the enemy will pay a huge price” or “turning Hamas strongholds into rubble” are spun as genocidal, despite clearly referring to Hamas. Warnings for civilians to evacuate are presented as evidence of extermination. Even Netanyahu’s use of the biblical phrase “Amalek,” found on memorials at Yad Vashem and The Hague, is treated as uniquely sinister.

Bartov’s case, in short, relies on selective quoting and distortion. (Full breakdown embedded below.)

And when the main Israeli leadership fails to meet even the loosest standard for genocidal intent, Bartov simply pivots to fringe figures with no operational control, like Smotrich or Nissim Vaturi. That move alone concedes how weak his central thesis really is.

The New York Times wants readers to see Bartov’s genocide declaration as a bold moral stand. But it isn’t. It’s the culmination of years of unfair and unfounded accusations against the Jewish State, now rebranded as expert opinion.

What else is new?

The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.

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Munich Residents Form Human Chain to Protect Synagogue From Anti-Israel Protest Marked by Antisemitic Chants

Anti-Israel protesters march through Munich’s city center near the main synagogue during Shabbat prayers. Photo: Screenshot

Munich residents formed a human chain around a local synagogue in a show of solidarity with the Jewish community in Germany, as an anti-Israel protest marched through the city center during Shabbat prayers.

On Friday night, around 750 people protested against the war in Gaza in central Munich, rallying near the main synagogue at Jakobsplatz as Shabbat prayers took place inside — a demonstration that sparked fear among members of the Jewish community and prevented some from attending services, German media reported.

Organized under the slogan “Stop the Genocide. Free Palestine,” the protest was marked by openly antisemitic chants, as demonstrators shouted “Death to the IDF [Israel Defense Forces],” “Zionists are fascists, child murderers, and racists,” and “There is only one state: Palestine.”

Participants in the demonstration not only deny Israel’s right to exist but also dismissed the suffering of Israeli hostages still held by Hamas as a “lie,” minimizing the atrocities perpetrated by the Palestinian terrorist group

One speaker at the rally asserted that the hostages are “mostly Israeli soldiers” and characterized them predominantly as war criminals.

In response to the anti-Israel demonstration, hundreds of Munich residents gathered to form a human chain around the synagogue, rallying under the slogan “Protect Our Synagogue.”

According to local media, one of the speakers at the protest dismissed the human chain around the synagogue as a staged performance by “friends of Zionists and fascists,” claiming that “Zionists are the real antisemites.”

The speaker also asserted that those participating in the human chain were trying to “buy their freedom” from the crimes of their parents’ generation.

Local law enforcement later took over synagogue security, deploying around 150 officers from the Munich Police Department, the Süddeutsche Zeitung reported.

Charlotte Knobloch, a Holocaust survivor and president of the Jewish Community of Munich (IKG), sharply criticized local authorities for allowing the protest to take place and condemned the demonstration as a “deliberate attempt at intimidation.”

She also expressed her gratitude to the “Munich is Colorful” alliance and the group “Grandmothers Against the Right” for their efforts to protect the synagogue and show solidarity with the Jewish community.

“This human chain sends an important message, especially to the city. Once again, they have proven they can be relied upon — they take action when it matters,” Knobloch said.

Bernhard Liess, the city council chairman, also criticized the decision to allow a pro-Palestinian demonstration with anti-Israel slogans to take place during Shabbat.

Even though demonstrations only require registration and not approval, local authorities can consult with organizers to discuss possible changes if any issues are anticipated.

Germany has experienced a sharp spike in antisemitism since the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct.7, 2023.

The number of antisemitic incidents in Germany almost doubled last year, the semi-official German body that tracks antisemitism reported last month.

The Federal Research and Information Point for Antisemitism (RIAS) said it had registered 8,627 incidents of violence, vandalism, and threats against Jews in Germany, almost twice the 4,886 recorded in 2023, and far ahead of 2020’s 1,957.

In just the first six months of 2024 alone, the number of antisemitic incidents in Berlin surpassed the total for all of the prior year and reached the highest annual count on record, according separate figured from RIAS.

The figures in Berlin were the highest count for a single year since the federally-funded body began monitoring antisemitic incidents in 2015, showing the German capital averaged nearly eight anti-Jewish outrages a day from January to June last year.

According to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), police registered 5,154 antisemitic incidents in Germany in 2023, a 95 percent increase compared to the previous year.

However, experts believe that the true number of incidents is much higher but not recorded because of reluctance on the part of the victims.

The post Munich Residents Form Human Chain to Protect Synagogue From Anti-Israel Protest Marked by Antisemitic Chants first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Ocasio-Cortez Campaign Office Vandalized With Anti-Israel Message Amid Backlash Over Iron Dome Funding Vote

US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) speaks during a press conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on March 21, 2024. Photo: Craig Hudson/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect

A New York campaign office for US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) was vandalized with what appeared to be red paint resembling blood and an anti-Israel message on Sunday night, amid backlash from fellow progressives following her vote last week against an amendment aimed at blocking US funding for Israel’s Iron Dome air defense system.

“AOC funds genocide in Gaza,” was written in red paint on the office windows, using the lawmaker’s popular nickname. The vandals also spread paint all over the building’s entrance. Police arrived to the scene early Monday morning.

A group calling itself the Boogie Down Liberation Front claimed responsibility, saying it “stands with the Palestinian people and condemns AOC’s hypocrisy.”

The vandalism came after Ocasio-Cortez on Friday voted against an amendment to the US House’s defense appropriations bill that would have cut funding for the Israeli Cooperative Program — an agreement through which the US provides Israel $500 million for missile defense programs including Iron Dome, which protects against from rockets and missiles launched by neighboring terrorist groups, such as Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The amendment was overwhelmingly defeated in the House by a vote of 422 to 6.

While Ocasio-Cortez ultimately voted against the broader appropriations bill (which ultimately passed the House), her decision not to support the stand-alone measure cutting funding to Israel’s missile defense has drawn strong criticism from fellow progressives, who argued that the left-wing lawmaker betrayed the pro-Palestinian movement.

In a post on the X social media platform, Ocasio-Cortez wrote that the amendment to the military funding bill “does nothing to cut off offensive aid to Israel nor end the flow of US munitions being used in Gaza. Of course I voted against it. What it does do is cut off defensive Iron Dome capacities while allowing the actual bombs killing Palestinians to continue.”

The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), a prominent far-left organization, repudiated AOC’s vote, accusing the congresswoman of assisting Israel carry out what it falsely described as a “genocide” in Gaza.

“Providing any aid to Israel as they carry out a genocide with US support is completely unacceptable,” DSA said in a statement. “This is even more true of military aid of any kind. Any funds that go to Israel assist this brutal genocide. Any support for Israel legitimizes its eliminationist campaign against the Palestinian people. The fact that Representative Ocasio-Cortez acknowledges that Israel is carrying out this genocide makes her support for military aid all the more disappointing and incongruous.”

DSA and Ocasio-Cortez have recently maintained a rocky relationship. Last year, the organization rescinded its endorsement of the congresswoman, citing her insufficient level of commitment to “Palestinian liberation.” The organization took umbrage with the lawmaker over her decision to co-host an event with the Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA), a Jewish organization that champions progressive policies. DSA also rebuked Ocasio-Cortez for a previous House vote which labeled “denial of Israel’s right to exist” as a form of antisemitism.

On Monday, Ocasio-Cortez took a shot at those criticizing her vote against the amendment, noting she opposed the broader appropriations bill.

“Google is free,” she posted on social media. “If you’re saying I voted for military funding, you are lying. Receipts attached. Drag me for my positions all you want, but lying about them doesn’t make you part of the ‘left.’ If you believe neo-Nazis are welcome and operating in good faith, you can have them!”

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Jewish Groups Applaud Major Teachers’ Union’s Rejection of ADL Ban

Rebecca S. Pringle, president of the National Education Association, speaks on Day 4 of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) at the United Center in Chicago, Illinois, US, Aug. 22, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Mike Segar

Jewish groups this week commended the National Education Association (NEA) teachers union for refusing to adopt as policy a ban on the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) voted for by the group’s Representative Assembly during an annual conference held in Portland, Oregon earlier this month.

“We welcome the NEA Executive Committee’s decision to reject this misguided resolution that is rooted in exclusion and othering, and promoted for political reasons,” said a joint statement issued on Friday by the leaders of the ADL, the American Jewish Committee, the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations, and the Jewish Federations of North America. “This resolution was not just an attack on the ADL but a larger attack against Jewish educators, students, and families.”

The statement added, “We are urging educators across the United States to recognize and act on the importance of education about Jewish identity, antisemitism, and the Holocaust that reflect the perspectives and experiences of the vast majority of the American Jewish community … divisive campaigns to boycott, reputable, centrist Jewish organizations and educators normalize antisemitic isolation, [and] othering.”

Passed by a razor thin majority, the ban would have proscribed the union’s sharing ADL literature which explains the history of antisemitism and the Holocaust. In the lead up to the vote, a website promoting the policy, titled #DroptheADLFromSchools, attacked the ADL’s reputation as a civil rights advocate and knowledgeable source of information about antisemitism, the very issue the group was founded to fight.

“Analysis by scholars and journalists makes it clear that the ADL systematically distorts people’s understanding of antisemitism by including criticism of Israel as an indicator of hatred toward Jews,” the website said. “We further urge you to join in nationwide efforts to drop the ADL from schools … Cut all ties with the ADL, including use or endorsement of their curricular materials, participation in their programs, and engagement in their professional development offerings.”

The ban garnered the support of extreme far-left groups — such as Black Lives Matter, Faculty for Justice in Palestine, and Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) — and others which have praised the use of terrorism in Israel and across the Western world to advance a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict which necessitates destroying the Jewish state. Its approval by the Representative Assembly prompted the ADL to say that the activists behind it were attempting to “isolate their Jewish colleagues and push a radical antisemitic agenda on students.”

In two statements following the vote, one issued by union president Becky Pringle, the NEA said it remains committed to fighting antisemitism and said it had foreclosed the idea of disassociating with the ADL altogether.

“Following the culmination of a thorough review process as governed by NEA rules, including a vote by NEA’s Executive Committee earlier this week, NEA’s Board of Directors — representing the broad and diverse membership of the NEA including representatives from every state — voted not to implement this proposal,” the union, which is the largest teachers labor group in the US, said in a statement on Friday. “After consideration, it was determined that this proposal would not further NEA’s commitment to academic freedom, our membership, or our goals.”

It added, “There is no doubt that antisemitism on the rise,” while noting that its decision to reject the proposal “is in no way an endorsement of the ADL’s full body of work” and implying that the ADL is hostile to “free speech and association.”

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

The post Jewish Groups Applaud Major Teachers’ Union’s Rejection of ADL Ban first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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