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The Real Genocides the World Ignores
The UN’s International Court of Justice (ICJ). Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
JNS.org – “Genocide” is a word that should never be used lightly.
According to legal scholars Amichai Cohen and Yuval Shany, the definition of genocide is “well settled” and “commonly agreed.” There is a consensus that “genocide involves killing members of a national or ethnic group, causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group and inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the group’s physical destruction in whole or in part.”
Despite the baseless accusations against Israel at the International Court of Justice, this is not happening in Gaza. Nonetheless, the ICJ blood libel is an object lesson in how the international anti-Israel mob works. Slandering Israel and Jews is a time-honored method of diverting attention from the depredations of others. It also erases the victims of these crimes without so much as a crocodile tear.
Here are some examples of such depredations:
Darfur, Sudan: In 2007, then-U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell described the situation in Darfur as genocide. The U.N. estimates that by 2016, 300,000 people had been killed and there was credible evidence that the Sudanese government used chemical weapons against the local population. Since Feb. 2023, government-sponsored militias have killed an estimated 400,000 people through starvation and disease. Mass rape has also occurred. More than 2.5 million people have been internally displaced and over 200,000 have fled to Chad.
Rwanda: From April-July 1994, an estimated 800,000 people—one-tenth of the entire population—were killed and much of the remaining population displaced.
Bosnia: In 1992, more than 200,000 Muslim civilians were systematically murdered and two million became refugees at the hands of the Serbs. Rape was a systematic part of these atrocities.
Cambodia: From 1975-1979, 25% of the population died from starvation, overwork and execution under the Khmer Rouge.
East Timor: During a 24-year occupation by Indonesia that ended in 1999, more than 20% of the population was massacred and 80% of structures in the country were incinerated.
Guatemala: From 1978-1983, government forces carried out massacres and civilian executions of an estimated 200,000 people. There were at least 40,000 “disappearances.” The Maya population constituted 83% of the identified victims. The event is known as the Maya Genocide.
Armenia: From 1915-1916, between 664,000 and 1.2 million Armenians were killed by Turkey, either in mass executions and individual killings or from the brutality and deprivation of forced deportations.
Add to that the horrific death counts that may or may not meet the precise definition of genocide. Approximately 500,000 Syrians, mostly Sunni Muslims, have been killed by dictator Bashar Assad’s regime, including through the use of chemical weapons. More than 11 million Syrians have become either internal or external refugees.
Nearly 400,000 have been killed in Yemen. The International Rescue Committee estimates that 5.4 million Congolese have been killed in a war that continues today, with Christians being disproportionately targeted. As of 2023, 187,000-210,000 are estimated to have been killed in Iraq and 236,000 in Afghanistan.
China gets special mention.
The country’s 1958 “Great Leap Forward” destroyed the agricultural system, causing a famine in which 27 million people starved to death. This was not directed at a specific ethnic group, so it may not qualify as genocide; but in 2021, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken called China’s treatment of its Turkic Muslim Uyghur population a genocide.
Findings by Genocide Watch bear him out:
Since 2017, between 800,000-2,000,000 million Uyghurs have been held in Xinjiang’s concentration prisons, commonly referred to as “reeducation camps.” Uyghurs are forced to participate in [Chinese Communist Party] indoctrination programs in which detainees are forced to abandon their Muslim faith and culture. The CCP forbids use of the Uyghur language and imposes Mandarin Chinese within these camps. Inside camps, CCP officials subject Uyghurs to physical beatings, sexual assault and gang rapes of women.
Despite all this, the international community prefers to focus on defaming Israel for daring to conduct a legitimate war of self-defense launched only after Hamas raped, tortured, mutilated and burned to death 1,200 Israelis and carried off 240 more as hostages.
One of the most powerful denunciations of this campaign of slander came from a country that actually committed a genocide: Germany.
German government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit said in a statement last week, “In light of German history and the crimes against humanity of the Shoah, the German government is particularly committed to the [U.N.] Genocide Convention.” For this reason, he said, “We stand firmly against a political instrumentalization” of the Convention.
Acknowledging divergent views in the international community on Israel’s military operations, he nonetheless asserted, “The German government decisively and expressly rejects the accusation of genocide brought against Israel before the International Court of Justice. The accusation has no basis in fact.”
The post The Real Genocides the World Ignores first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War

Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests

A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan

Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.