Sir Afilonius Rex

Mountain View, CA, USA – 7th November 2025

The article by Bassem Eid in The Times of Israel (Nov 2025) asserts that Hamas’s actions on October 7, 2023, and its use of human shields constitute genocide against Jews. It cites Golda Meir’s 1957 remark (“We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children… but we cannot forgive them for forcing us to kill their children”) to frame Hamas’s strategy as deliberately engineering Palestinian civilian deaths to provoke Israeli retaliation—thus meeting the legal threshold for genocide.

This is a bold, provocative claim that weaponises a revered Israeli leader’s words but fails under scrutiny on legal, factual, and rhetorical grounds.

Below is a structured takedown.

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1. Legal Definition of Genocide (UN Convention, 1948)

Genocide requires:

1. Acts (killing, causing serious harm, etc.)
2. Targeted group (national, ethnic, racial, religious)
3. Specific intent to destroy, in whole or in part, that group as such

Element	Hamas on Oct 7	Genocide?
Acts	✓ Murder (~1,200), rape, mutilation, abduction	Yes, atrocities
Targeted group	✓ Israeli Jews (mostly)	Yes
Intent to destroy Jews as such?	✗ No evidence of exterminationist ideology	No

• Hamas’s charter (1988, revised 2017) calls for Israel’s destruction but frames it as anti-Zionist liberation, not racial extermination of Jews. Contrast: Nazis aimed to eradicate Jews globally; Hamas seeks territorial/political goals.
• Oct 7 was a war crime/terror attack, not a systematic attempt to annihilate Jews. Scale: ~1,200 killed vs. 7M Israeli Jews. No death camps, no gas, no “Final Solution.”

Verdict: Fails specific intent—the sine qua non of genocide (ICJ, ICTY precedents).

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2. Human Shields & “Forcing Israel to Kill” = Genocide?

Eid’s core argument: Hamas deliberately places civilians in harm’s way → Israel kills them → Hamas wins propaganda → this is genocidal intent against Jews.Logical & Legal Flaws:

Claim	Reality
“Hamas forces Israel to kill Palestinians”	Israel has agency. It employs military tactics (e.g., 2,000-pound bombs in densely populated areas). Blaming Hamas 100% is infantilising Israel.
Israel has agency. It employs military tactics (e.g., 2,000-pound bombs in densely populated areas). Blaming Hamas 100% is infantilising Israel.	This inverts causality. Palestinian deaths are the harm, not Jewish survival. Genocide requires harm to the targeted group (Jews), not collateral damage to another.
Golda Meir quote	Poignant but not legal evidence. It expresses moral anguish, not proof of genocidal intent. Misusing it here is rhetorical sleight-of-hand.

• Human shields: A war crime (ICC Rome Statute Art. 8(2)(b)(xxiii)). But not genocide. Even if Hamas uses shields, Israel must still uphold proportionality and distinction (Geneva Conventions).
• Propaganda victory ≠ genocidal intent: Hamas wants high civilian tolls for PR. That’s cynical, criminal, but not intent to destroy Jews.

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3. Factual Errors & Omissions

Article Claim	Correction
“No one forced Hamas to invade on Oct 7”	True, but context matters: Gaza blockade, settlements, etc. Not justification—explanation. Omitting this flattens history.
“250 hostages”	Accurate (229 civilians + soldiers). But hostage-taking ≠ genocide. It’s a war crime (Art. 8(2)(a)(viii)).
“Largest slaughter of Jews since Holocaust”	True in raw numbers (post-1945). But scale matters: Holocaust = 6M systematic murders. Oct 7 = terror attack. Equivalence is Holocaust relativism.

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4. Rhetorical Strategy: Emotional Blackmail

• Weaponises Jewish trauma: Invoking the Holocaust and Golda Meir triggers reflexive defence. Critics risk being labelled “Hamas apologists.”
• Deflects scrutiny of Israel: By calling Hamas’s actions “genocide,” it preempts debate on Israel’s response (40,000+ Palestinian deaths, per Gaza Health Ministry, Nov 2025).
• False binary: You’re either with Golda or with Hamas. There is no room for both sides to commit atrocities.

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5. What Would Make Hamas’s Actions Genocide?

• Evidence of extermination camps for Jews.
• Statements like “We will kill every Jew on Earth” (not just “end Zionist entity”).
• Systematic murder of all captured Jews (vs. holding for leverage).

None exists.

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Final Verdict

Criterion	Score
Legal accuracy	4/10 – Some truths, significant distortions
Factual rigor	4/10 – Some truths, major distortions
Logical coherence	2/10 – Causality inverted
Rhetorical impact	8/10 – Emotionally resonant, intellectually hollow

Summary:
The claim is legally baseless, factually selective, and rhetorically manipulative. Hamas committed war crimes and crimes against humanity on Oct 7, not genocide. Using “genocide” here dilutes the term, shields Israel from accountability, and exploits Jewish pain for political cover.

Better framing: “Hamas’s Oct 7 massacre and human shield tactics are war crimes designed to maximise Palestinian suffering for propaganda. This is monstrous—but it is not genocide against Jews.”