History of Global Arms Transfer, 17 (2024), pp. 51-79

The Israeli War on Gaza from a
Comparative Genocide Studies
Perspective
By TETSUYA SAHARA*
The Israeli war on Gaza has resulted in very heavy civilian casualties. Somepeople have called the war “horrific,” the “deadliest,” or a “humanitariancatastrophe-tsunami.” Others claim that it is a genocide. In order to grasp theextent of the war’s brutality, this article compared it with three cases that arerecognized as genocides either by international institutions or Western authorities:
the Herero and Nama massacre (1904–5), the Armenian deportation (1915–6),
and the fall of Srebrenica (1995). The analysis found many common aspects
among the four cases. The scale of violence of the recent Israeli war has alreadyexceeded the initial stages of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and is becoming animmense ethnic cleansing comparable with the Armenian case. In light of thebellicose discriminatory discourses of the Israeli leaders, systematic destructionof civilian targets, forced starvation, and rapidly deteriorating hygiene conditions
in Gaza, there are ample grounds to believe that the war on Gaza will develop
into a full-fledged genocide if unchecked.
The Israeli military campaign against the Gaza Strip, following the October 7 attacks, hasclaimed (at the time of writing of this article) more than 26,000 Palestinian lives, mostly
women and children. Experts have described the campaign in the following terms:“horrific” (AA 2023b), “outpacing any other conflicts” (Axios 2023), “unparalleled andunprecedented” (UN 2023d), “the most destructive” (CBC 2023), the “deadliest in the 21st
century” (WP 2023), and “a perfect kind of humanitarian catastrophe-tsunami” (FT 2023).
Some Muslim and Latin American leaders have even called it a “genocide.”1 Probably oneof the harshest denouncers is Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who has not only
repeatedly used the G-word but even described Israeli Premier Benyamin Netanyahu as noless evil than Adolf Hitler (AA 2023d). The frequent use of the G-word, however, does notseem effective to deter the Israelis from acting more brutally against the Gazans.
There is another concern: The political instrumentalization of the word “genocide” risks* Professor, School of Political Science and Economics, Meiji University
1 Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi accused the campaign as being “genocide” against Palestinians (Reuters

2023). Former Malaysian Prime Minister, Mahathir Mohamad, posted on X on December 5, 2023: “What we areseeing is an attempt by the Israelis to commit genocide on the Palestinians.” Ramzan Kadyrov, President of
Chechnya, commented that “What is happening in the Gaza Strip is clear evidence of the genocide of Palestinian
Muslims” (Caucasus Watch 2023). Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro called on the world to “react and say
no to the genocide against the people of Gaza.” Cuban President Miguel Diaz Canel accused the “Zionist
barbarism” for “the genocide that is being perpetrated against the Palestinians.” Brazilian President Luiz Inacio
Lula da Silva referred to “a genocide that led to the killing of [thousands of] children who had nothing to do withthis war.” The Minister of the Presidency, Maria Nela Prada of Bolivia, condemned the Israeli campaign of“genocide unfolding inside the Gaza Strip” (Cradle 2023).

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the banalization of the term and makes obsolete the notion as the crime of crimes. In
exchange for Erdoğan’s slander, for example, Netanyahu replied that “Erdogan, who iscommitting genocide against the Kurds, is the last person who can preach morality to us”(GI 2023k). For Netanyahu, it is Hamas who are committing a genocide, and “Hamas are
the new Nazis” (TI 2023a). Therefore, Netanyahu asserted that the Israeli military is “themost moral army in the world,” fighting to eliminate “the most abhorrent and brutal
terrorist organization in the world” (GI 2023k). Some Western leaders echoed his views.
For instance, Ursula von der Leyen, head of the European Committee, described theOctober 7 attacks as “the most heinous assault against Jews since the Holocaust” (European
Commission 2023). John Kirby, US National Security Council spokesperson, when asked
by a journalist about his response to those who called the US President “Genocide Joe,”remarked that “What Hamas wants is genocide ... Israel is trying to defend itself against a
genocidal terrorist threat … If we are going to start using that word [genocide], fine, let’s
use it appropriately” (JP 2023). The proposal for an appropriate use of the term sounds
nice, but one may wonder if Kirby’s and Netanyahu’s use of the word is appropriate?

I. What is a genocide?
According to the International Criminal Court (ICC), a genocide is a crime committed withthe specific intent to destroy in whole or in part a “national, ethnic, racial or religious
group” by killing its members or by “causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of
the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about
its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births
within the group; or forcibly transferring children of the group to another group” (ICC).
The definition is rather vague; therefore, it is necessary to establish eligible criteria basedon concrete examples. Since it started in 2002, however, ICC has filed only one person for
genocide, Omar Bashir, former Sudanese President, and the case remains in the pre-trial
stage. The other cases judged as genocides by international judicial organizations are thoseconcerning the massacre in Rwanda in 1994 and the civil war in Bosnia-Herzegovina in
1992–5. Thus, to date, we have very few examples of genocide confirmed as such byinternational law courts. Looking back in history, however, there are many cases that are
believed to be applicable to the ICC rulings. The widest accepted case is the Holocaust—
the Nazi persecution of European Jews before and during WWII. The 1930s–40s saw
several other atrocities on a genocidal scale, such as “Holodomor” (1932–3), the Rape of
Nanking (1937), the Serb massacre by the Independent State of Croatia (1941–5), the“Devil’s satiety” of the Japanese 731 unit (1940–5), and the mass deportation of the
Crimean Tatars, the Chechens, and the Ingush by the Stalin regime (1944–8). Later, theKhmer Rouge atrocities in Cambodia (1975–9), the elimination of the East Timorese(1974–99) and the Guatemalan Mayans (1962–96), and the Sabra and Shatila massacre of
the Palestinian refugees (1982) are often classified as genocides.
Just mentioning a handful of cases, we can notice that these incidents are grossly
dissimilar, taking place in different socio-political contexts, with a variety of scale andquite diverse methods of atrocities. This testifies that every genocide is unique in essence.
Yet those diversities may perplex the people who are looking for a simple answer or acertain reference point. However, of what use is a reference point for genocide and for
gauging the degree of genocidalness of respective cases? Does it make sense to say that
one case is more genocidal than the other? Or is it morally acceptable to say that “It’s

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acceptable, because this case is less genocidal than that”? Of course not. Instead, it is ourmoral duty to condemn and prevent any atrocity against anyone. Having said that, however,the discussion does not exclude any attempts for comparison. Quite the contrary. Indeed,
one cannot grasp the nature of what is taking place in front of his/her eyes, without taking
into consideration similar incidents from the past. The importance of comparative genocide
studies lies in this context. The comparison of past genocidal incidents enriches ourknowledge of human atrocities and helps us find the way to prevent them from recurring.
What will be the starting point? Before starting our discussion, it is prudent to define thenotion of comparison. A comparison is an act of taking up different things to findsimilarities and dissimilarities among them. This is quite different thing from an equation
which considers one thing to be the same as another. To compare a past genocide withanother does not mean equating them. Unfortunately, there is a dominant trend for this typeof confusion in a wide circle of intellectual societies. The ungrounded reproach against
Masha Gessen for her essay on the Holocaust is one of the latest examples of the confusion.
Gessen, a well-known Russian-American journalist of Jewish origin, who had been
awarded the German Hannah Arendt Award for Political Thought, was treated withdispleasure by the two sponsors of the prize, the Heinrich Boll Foundation and the City ofBremen, because she compared the Warsaw Ghetto with the Israeli policy concerning the
Gaza Strip (Gessen 2023). Tarik Cyril Amar criticizes the “extremely aggressive lobbies in
the West” who set the rules that “comparing the Holocaust with anything is absolutely
verboten” (RT 2023). His alarm is especially pertinent, as we are witnessing such people asErdoğan preaching about what democracy is, based on the assumption that the West hasgiven Netanyahu a free hand in Gaza, because “The slightest criticism [of Israel] issuppressed by attaching [to it] the label of antisemitism, and is considered a crime” (AA2023d).
Apart from such emotional reactions, there are at least two reasons that make it better toavoid a comparison with the Holocaust. First, the Nazi policy of exterminating European
Jews was a very complex phenomenon that had several different phases and dimensions. In
a way, one can say it was a set of genocidal incidents, albeit committed by a single bodypolitic. Second, the Holocaust was exceptionally immense and dwarfs all the otheratrocities ever committed in human history. It was the genocide of genocides. This very
fact, however, makes it unsuitable to be a “model case,” with the attendant risk of sayingthat no other incidents are genocide because they are less atrocious than the Holocaust. To
properly access the Israeli campaign in Gaza, it is necessary to find other reference points.
To this end, the author takes up the following three cases: the German colonial massacre of
the Herero and Namaqua people in Namibia (1904–5), the Armenian deportation by the
Ottoman government during WWI, and the Serb atrocities against Bosnian Muslims in the
1990s. There are many other (possibly more suitable) cases for comparison, but the author
picks up the three on the basis that they are relatively well-documented studies and widely,
if not unanimously, accepted as cases of genocide.
Before entering into a close comparison among the four cases, it may be useful to survey
the general course of events of the respective cases and to highlight the essence of theirbrutalities.

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II. Israeli military operations in Gaza
The Gaza Strip was a part of the Ottoman administrative unit, the Kudüs Sancağı
(Jerusalem district) or Filistin (Palestine). During the Ottoman rule, Muslim Arabs andChristian Arabs comprised the overwhelming majority (more than 90% at the beginning of
the 20th century). After WWI, Palestine became a British mandate of the League of Nations,and many European Jews immigrated to Palestine. Their share increased from 12% in 1922
to 31% in 1947 (Hagopian & Zahlan 1974). In the wake of WWII, the United Nations
proposed the partition of Palestine into Jewish and Arab states. As Arab countries rejected
the plan, the first Arab–Israeli war broke out in 1948. The victorious Israel annexed 77% of
the territory, and more than 700,000 Palestinians were forced to flee their homes. Many ofthem took shelter in Gaza. After the 1967 war, Israel took possession of the Strip and put
the Palestinians under its occupational regime. As a result, the Gazans were to endure
constant oppression, economic exploitation, and confinement. In 1987, Gaza Palestinians
started the First Intifada. The protest continued until the early 1990s and eventually gave
rise to the Oslo Accords, which were signed in 1993 (King 2007). However, as Israel did
not fulfill its promise of the two-state solution, the Second Intifada broke out in 2000.
Weary of the strenuous mass resistance, Israel unilaterally announced the withdrawal of its
military and settlers, leaving Gaza for the Palestine Authorities in 2005. The next year,
Hamas won the elections and subsequently took control of Gaza. In response, Israel
introduced a heavy blockade. During the long siege, restrictions were tightened on the
movement of people and goods, making life unbearable—families were separated, medical
and educational services were degraded, the economy slumped, and poverty andunemployment were perpetuated (Vox 2023). The UN chief, Antonio Guterres, pointed outthat “The Palestinian people have been subjected to 56 years of suffocating occupation.
They have seen their land steadily devoured by settlements and plagued by violence; theireconomy stifled; their people displaced and their homes demolished” (UN 2023g).
Additionally, Israeli troops killed more than 3,000 Palestinian civilians in the four
consecutive invasions (2008–09, 2012, 2014, and 2021). According to Human Rights
Watch, the Israeli occupation of Gaza was characterized by unlawful killings, forced
displacement, abusive detention, unjustified confinement, and other discriminatory
policies—major violations of international human rights and humanitarian law (IHRW
2016). Amnesty International has described these situations as “apartheid” (AI 2022). It isprudent to say that the Israeli policies mentioned are the background to the October 7
incidents.
Let us take a brief look at the Israeli military operations in Gaza that have started since
October 7, 2023. At 6:30 a.m. local time, Palestinian militants launched massive attacks
against the border posts manned by the Israeli Defense Force (IDF). After neutralizing
military bases, the Palestinian militants infiltrated Israel, killing 375 IDF soldiers and 764
civilians, and took some 248 persons hostage. Although the main force was the al-Qassam
Brigades, a military wing of Hamas, the raid was in fact a joint operation of six different
groups, including Communist DFLP (Flashpoint 2023). Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu
tweeted a state of war, and his government formally declared war against Hamas the nextday, mobilizing 300,000 reservists with the aim to “eliminate Hamas.” As part of theirtactics, Israel started a siege against Gaza. On October 9, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav
Gallant announced a total blockade of the Strip, and Israeli authorities began cutting
electricity and stopping the entry of food and fuel. As a result, the sole power plant in Gaza
stopped its operations on October 11. The Israeli government reiterated that Gaza would

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not receive water, fuel, or electricity so long as the hostages were not freed. On October 15,
the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) announced that drinking water
was running out in Gaza. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who visited the Rafah
Crossing on October 20, stated that “Two million people are suffering enormously, have nowater, no food, no medicine, no fuel, under fire, that needs everything to survive” (UN2023b). Subsequently, human aid was allowed to enter Gaza, but the amount was far from
adequate. On December 7, a UN representative declared its aid program no longer
functioning (UN OCHA 2023c), and civic order began to “break down” (Guardian 2023).
As a result, many Gazans began to starve. According to a UN report on December 21, over
570,000 people were starving (France 24 2023). The UN aid chief warned of a serious riskof starvation and famine, saying that “Half the people in northern Gaza and more than one
third of displaced people in the south are simply starving” (UN 2023f). Furthermore, theabrupt breakout of a large number of refugees seriously deteriorated the sanitary conditionsin the Strip. The UN rights chief Volker Türk remarked on December 28 that “The lack offood and basic essentials as well as poor hygiene are making the already dire living
conditions of displaced people even worse and fueling disease.” Indeed, as the Israelis had
inflicted serious damage on hospitals, medical service was unavailable for most Gazans.
The UN emergency relief coordinator Martin Griffiths warned that “Gaza is a public healthdisaster in the making” (UN 2023h).
In the meantime, the Israelis intesified military operation. The Israeli Air Force (IAF) has
been conducting massive air strikes over Gaza since October 7, destroying a large numberof residential buildings, including schools, universities, and refugee camps. More than 70%
of Gazan homes had been destroyed by the end of 2023 (Aljazeera 2023d). The oldest
church (the Greek Orthodox St. Prophyrius Church) and mosque (the Great Omari Mosque)in Gaza were reduced to rubble. The bombing resulted in a massive amount of civilian
victims. In early December, the UN aid chief described the civilian casualties of IDF
operations thus: “More than 17,000 Palestinians have reportedly been killed since the startof Israel’s military operations, including over 4,000 women and 7,000 children. Tens of
thousands are reported to have been injured, and many are missing, presumably under the
rubble” (UN 2023f). To make things worse, the IDF targeted many shelters for the
displaced people. By December 5, 2023, at least 222 IDPs sheltering in UNRWA camps
had been killed (UN OCHA 2023b). These acts have been condemned as intentional killingof civilians. For instance, Human Rights Watch denounced IAF for having used white
phosphorus against civilian targets (HRW 2023). Amnesty International claimed to haveenough documentation attesting to the IDF’s intentional massacre of civilians (AI 2023).
Even US President Joe Biden conceded that Israel had been carrying out “indiscriminate
bombing” (AP 2023). Also, an IDF official, after killing 68 people in the Maghazi camp,
admitted that the type of munition did not match the nature of the attack, causing extensive
collateral damage that could have been avoided (TI 2023g).
The IDF started a large-scale ground operation on October 28. As the troops advanced
into dense, urban neighborhoods, the civilian casualties rose rapidly. The IDF had divided
the Strip into two by November 5 and encircled its northern half with a total
communications outage (Aljazeera 2023b). Pressured by the US and international appeals
for a brief pause to get aid to desperate civilians, Israel accepted a temporary ceasefire. The
IDF withdrew from Gaza City without achieving any of its initial objectives on November
24. During this short interlude, the humanitarian situation in Gaza did not improve at all.
The second ground operation started on December 1. The IDF announced that it would

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expand ground operations into all of Gaza, including the southern enclaves that had
previously been designated as “safe zones.” During the land operation, Israeli soldierscommitted a variety of atrocities, including storming several hospitals, arresting many
medical staff, and randomly shooting at and killing many civilians, who were apparently
noncombatants. For example, a sniper massacred a Christian mother and daughter
sheltering at the Holy Family Catholic Church (TI 2023h). The IDF even executed three of
their own soldiers who had taken hostages. The hostages somehow escaped and wereapproaching for help, half naked and with a white flag, on December 15. Two were killedon the spot, and the third took shelter in a nearby building. A soldier chased this third man
and shot him dead (TI 2023i). The IDF said that this was a mistake, but the suspicion of
willful killing increased when the IDF disclosed that 18 troops were dead due to “mistaken
identification” (TI 2024b). There are also suspicions of random roundups of civilians andhostage-taking. For instance, the IDF announced that they had taken captive more than
1,000 “Hamas members” on December 17. Their allegation was rebutted by Euro-Med
Monitor, who accused the Israeli army of severe human rights abuse against the detained
Palestinian civilians (EMHRM 2023). Despite these accusations, the IDF expanded its
scope of operation, making the daily death toll well exceed the level of 250 deaths toward
the end of 2023.
The Israeli operation has also brought about large-scale displacement. On October 13, theIDF warned Palestinians to leave northern Gaza within 24 hours on the pretext that the area
would be a battlefield. By October 20, about 1.4 million people had been internallydisplaced, and more than 544,000 had taken shelter in a total of 147 UNRWA improvised
facilities (UN OCHA 2023a). As the second land operation started, the number of IDPs
grew. On December 3, the UN human rights chief said the following: “As a result ofIsrael’s conduct of hostilities and its orders for people to leave the north and parts of thesouth, hundreds of thousands are being confined into ever smaller areas in southern Gaza
without proper sanitation, access to sufficient food, water and health supplies, even as
bombs rain down around them. There is no safe place in Gaza” (UN 2023e). UNRWA
confirmed that 85% of the population had been displaced by December 8.
Many experts have expressed their deep concern that these atrocities by the Israeli army
amount to war crimes. As for the siege and blockade of the Strip, the UN human rights
chief expressed “grave concerns around willful killing of civilians, firing of indiscriminate
rockets, indiscriminate attacks using explosive weapons with wide-area effects in populatedareas, forms of collective punishment, obstruction of humanitarian aid, and – all forbidden
under international law” (UN 2023e). Oxfam’s Regional Middle East Director accused
Israel of using starvation as a weapon of war (Oxfam 2023). As for the massive
displacement, Antonio Guterres mentioned that people in Gaza were “being told to movelike human pinballs – ricocheting between ever-smaller slivers of the south, without any ofthe basics for survival” and denounced the increasing pressure for mass displacement
across the border into Egypt (UN 2023f ). Egyptian authorities shared the same concern andwarned Israel not to push Palestinians into its territory. The Palestine Permanent Observer
described these pressures as ethnic cleansing. He even claimed that “wholesale slaughter of
innocent civilians, destruction of life-sustaining infrastructure, intentional starvation, anddisplacement of Palestinians from their land with no prospect of returning” attested to“Israel’s overt intention to destroy the Palestinian people” (UN 2023c ). South Africa, for
its part, filed a case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on December 29, 2023,
accusing Israel of committing an act of genocide (ICJ 2023). Subsequently, the ICJ’s

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preliminary ruling confirmed that “the right of the Palestinians in Gaza to be protectedfrom acts of genocide [of Israel]” is “plausible” (ICJ 2024:19).
Discourses of Israeli Leadership
Since the hostilities broke out, the Israeli leadership has made clear their war aims: “Thefirst goal is the elimination of Hamas. The second goal is returning all of our hostages. The
third goal is to ensure that after Hamas is eliminated, the Gaza Strip does not go back tobeing a threat to the State of Israel, to any part of the State of Israel” (GI 2023i). However,they insist that these aims are necessary for national security and are therefore defensive
measures. They repeatedly underscored the defensive nature of their military operations.
Netanyahu took the October 7 attacks not only as a provocation but also as an undeclared
war by Hamas, saying that “Hamas invaded Israeli territory and murdered innocent
citizens, including children and the elderly. Hamas has started a brutal and evil war.” For
him, the military actions of the IDF were not reprisals but self-defense: “We defend theright of Israel existing, of defending itself [and its] security for its people” (GI 2023e). For
Netanyahu, the grand operation was a part of the defensive measures, “our second war of
independence” (GI 2023f ), and “They [the IDF soldiers] are defending our home” (GI2023h).
The Israeli leadership, however, has articulated that their “defensive” measures have nolimit. On October 7, Netanyahu made it clear that he would destroy the Gaza Strip andordered its entire population to “evacuate.” He also said that “All of the places which
Hamas is deployed, hiding and operating in, that wicked city, we will turn them into rubble.
I say to the residents of Gaza: Leave now because we will operate forcefully everywhere”(GI 2023a). Two days later, Yoav Gallant announced, “We are fighting human animals and
we are acting accordingly” (TI 2023d ), and the next day, he reiterated that “Gaza will
never return to what it was” (TI 2023b). The same day, Ghassan Alian, the head of
Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), uploaded a video
statement in which he said as follows: “The residents of Gaza are celebrating [Hamas].
Human animals must be treated as such [...] You wanted hell, you will get hell” (TI 2023c).
Those remarks suggest that the Israeli leadership had conceived the idea to impose
inhumane conditions for the entire population in Gaza. If so, this can amount to a collective
punishment, prohibited by Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention and Article 4 of theAdditional Protocol II. This suspicion grew when Israeli President Isaac Herzog made it
clear that Israel was not distinguishing between militants and civilians in Gaza by saying,“It’s an entire nation out there that is responsible. It’s not true: this rhetoric about civilians
not aware not involved. It’s absolutely not true.” (ITV 2023). Israeli Heritage Minister
Amichai Eliyahu echoed Herzog by saying, “There is no such thing as uninvolved civilians
in Gaza” (TI 2023e ).
Subsequently, Netanyahu changed his tone slightly and called civilians “to go south tosafe zones” (GI 2023c). However, when the IDF started bombing southern Gaza inDecember, the “safe zone” effectively disappeared. This action suggests that the Israeli
leadership intends to eliminate all of the Palestinians from Gaza. There are many remarksthat support this assumption. For instance, on November 5, Eliyahu was reported as sayingthat “They [the Palestinians] can go to Ireland or deserts, [but] the monsters in Gaza shouldfind a solution by themselves” (TI 2023e). Two Knesset members, Danny Danon, former
Israeli ambassador to the United Nations, and Ram Ben-Barak, former deputy director of
the intelligence agency Mossad, published an article in The Wall Street Journal on

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November 13, 2023 in which they called for “countries around the world to accept limited
numbers of Gazan families who have expressed a desire to relocate” (WSJ 2023). The nextday, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich posted on Facebook, “I welcome theinitiative of members of Knesset Ram Ben-Barak and Danny Danon on the voluntary
immigration of Gaza Arabs to the countries of the world. This is the right humanitariansolution for the residents of Gaza and the entire region” (Aljazeera 2023c). LikudIntelligence Minister Gila Gamliel supported the plan by saying that “The international
community should promote the voluntary resettlement of Palestinians in Gaza, forhumanitarian reasons” (TI 2023f ). Subsequently, the “voluntary resettlement” of thePalestinians has become a key agenda of the Netanyahu government. The Israeli prime
minister discussed the “voluntary migration” during a Likud party meeting on December
25, 2023 and was reported as saying, “Our problem is the countries that are willing toabsorb [the Palestinians], and we are working on it” (Aljazeera 2023a). The National
Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir and Finance Minister Smotrich proposed the deportationof Palestinians as a prerequisite for securing stability during the respective party faction
meetings on January 1, 2024. Gvir told members of his far-right Otzma Yehudit party thatthe war had presented an “opportunity to concentrate on encouraging the migration of theresidents of Gaza” and called such a policy “a correct, just, moral and humane solution.”
Smotrich, on his part, told members of his Religious Zionism party that the “correct
solution” to the conflict was “to encourage the voluntary migration of Gaza’s residents tocountries that will agree to take in the refugees” (TI 2024a). On January 3, 2024, The Times
of Israel reported that the government had secretly contacted Congolese authorities to thisend (TI 2024c). In light of the ongoing Israeli wanton destruction of civilian targets, there
are ample grounds to believe that the Israeli authorities are mulling over ethnic cleansingof Gazans.
No matter whether the IDF operations are a part of an Israeli plan for ethnic cleansing or
not, it is undeniable that there has been an immense number of Palestine civilian casualties.
However, Netanyahu rebuffs Israeli responsibility and puts the blame on Hamas by saying,“This will be a different kind of war ... Every day, they [Hamas] perpetrate a double war
crime: targeting our civilians while hiding behind their civilians, embedding themselves in
the civilian population and using them as human shields ... As Israel legitimately targets
terrorists, civilians are unfortunately harmed. Hamas is responsible and should be held
accountable for all civilian casualties” (GI 2023d). Netanyahu attempts to justify such asophism by employing moral infusing discourses. From time to time, he describes Hamas
as an “absolute evil.” When he met the German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, he said that“Hamas is the savagery that we only remember from the Nazi crimes from the Holocaust.
Hamas are the new Nazis. Hamas is ISIS, and in some instances, worse than ISIS ... This isa part of an axis of evil: of Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas ... We must take action to defeat
Hamas to ensure that this doesn’t happen again. But this is ... the battle of civilization
against barbarism. And if it’s not stopped here, this savagery will reach you very soon andreach the entire world” (GI 2023c). Yet even after international society fully realized theimmense civilian casualties in Gaza and the pressure for a ceasefire rose high, Netanyahu
stated that “Calls for a ceasefire are calls for Israel to surrender to Hamas, to surrender toterrorism, to surrender to barbarism. That will not happen” (GI 2023g). By the same token,
he vindicated the IDF war crime charges by saying that “They [the IDF soldiers] arecommitted to eradicating this evil from the world … Whoever dares to accuse our soldiersof war crimes are hypocritical liars ... Israel is fighting … the war of humanity against

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barbarism” (GI 2023f ).
These moralistic remarks can entail serious consequences, with Netanyahu choosing torecite sinister phrases from the Tanakh. On October 12, 2023, in a speech at the Knesset, hementioned that “The ancient command ‘Remember what Amalek did to you’ [is] ringing in
our ears” (GI 2023b). On October 28, when Israeli forces were preparing for their landinvasion of Gaza, Netanyahu told the soldiers, “You must remember what Amalek has done
to you” (AA 2023a). He repeated the same phrase in a letter addressed to the Israeli soldiersand officers on November 3 (AA 2023c). The legend of the Amalekites in Tanakh can beconsidered an ancient case of genocide. The English translation of the phrase goes asfollows: “So said the Lord of Hosts, ‘I remember that which Amalek did to Israel ... you
shall smite Amalek, and you shall utterly destroy all that is his, and you shall not have pity
on him: and you shall slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel
and ass ... Saul completely destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword” (Tanakh).
As sociologist Michael Freeman put it, the moral theories of just war that are deeply rooted
in Judeo-Christian values can also justify genocide (Freeman 1994: 280). In this regard,
Netanyahu’s insistence on the “just war against evil,” coupled with the ominous Biblicallegend, can incite some extreme forms of brutality.

III. Three Cases of “Genocide”
Now we compare these Israeli actions with past incidents that are recognized as genocides.
We will take three cases as examples: the German colonial massacre of the Herero andNama people (1904–05), the Armenian deportation (1915–16), and the Bosnian civil war(1992–95). The three incidents took place in different times and contexts, with different
methods, and on varying scales. The target populations differed as well: an indigenous
population in a European colony, a religious minority in a Muslim state, and fellow citizens
in a former socialist country. For all these differences, they are all recognized as cases of
genocide by international institutions in general and the Western nations in particular. The
Namibian case is classified by the UN Report on Genocide (1985) as one of the earliest
cases of genocide in the 20th century (UN 1985). In March, 2021, Germany acknowledgedthat their colonial army had committed an act of genocide “from today’s perspective” (Joint
Declaration 2021). The same UN report also classified the Armenian case as genocide. The
US officially recognized the “Armenian Genocide” on May 28, 1951. The Reagan
administration proclaimed the Armenian Genocide as such on April 22, 1981, and the US
Parliament adopted the resolution of official recognition for three times (1975, 1984, and2019) (USHR 2019). The European Parliament declared in 1987 that “the tragic events in
1915–1917 involving the Armenians living in the territory of the Ottoman Empire
constitute genocide” (European Parliament 1987). The Bosnian case was officially judged
as a crime of genocide by the ICTY and its successor organ, the International Residual
Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT). Now, let us take a brief look at each case tofind general common features.
The massacre of the Herero and the Nama
The massacre of the Herero and the Nama peoples took place in the context of colonialism.
Germany formally colonized the territory of today’s Republic of Namibia in 1884, began to
deprive the native people of their land and properties, and subsequently used the people asslave labor. This was a part of the well-defined policy to turn Namibia into German land,

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and several thousands of German settlers were brought in to do so. The Germans seized thehuge swaths of land and a large number of cattle possessed by the Herero, the largest ethnic
group in the colony. The dispossession led to pauperization, and many Hereros were forced
to work either in German farms or in construction plants as cheap laborers under systematicsurveillance and discrimination. As a result, more than 8,000 Hereros stood in arms against
German colonial rule in January 1904 (Drechsler 1980: 181–3). Unprepared for such a
massive attack, the German colonial force could not fight off the Herero, and more than
100 German settlers and soldiers were killed (Bridgman 1981: 74) The reinforcements, led
by Lieutenant General Lothar von Trotha, arrived in June and started a counteroffensive,
destroying the Herero settlements to stamp out the resistance. Faced with the brutal tacticsof the Germans, many Herero fighters, together with their wives and children, escaped into
the desert area. Von Trotha escalated the violence and ordered the extermination of all
Herero people on October 2, 1904. His soldiers ruthlessly pursued the Herero by shooting
and killing thousands of men, women, and children. The Germans blocked the rest of theHerero into the desert, expecting them to perish from thirst and starvation (Sarkin 2011:
114–6). The next year, the Nama, the second largest ethnic group, stood up to fight against
the Germans. Von Trotha issued the second order on April 22, 1905, threatening the Nama
with a similar fate to that of the Herero unless they surrendered. His soldiers then executed
the order in cold blood. Thousands of Nama, regardless of age and gender, were brutally
massacred, and their properties were destroyed (Zimmerer 2008: 52–3). The Herero–Namauprising ended in 1907, but the German policy of extermination did not end then. The
remaining Herero and Nama were incarcerated in concentration camps and subjected toharsh treatment—poor hygiene, little food, forced labor, and medical experiments. The
camps were closed in 1908. By this time, however, roughly half of the incarcerated
population had perished. It is generally accepted that, in the course of the genocide,
50,000–65,000 Herero and 10,000 Nama were murdered. The number corresponded to 80%of the Herero and 50% of the Nama population, respectively, before the war. The surviving
Herero and Nama faced radical changes in their living conditions. Their properties,
including land, cattle, and other assets, were expropriated under imperial regulations in1905 and 1906, and possession of land and cattle was prohibited in 1907. The policy
resulted in the deprivation of the peoples’ means of economic reproduction, and many of
their descendants have been condemned to perpetual and institutionalized poverty (UN2023a).
Armenian Deportation
The Armenian case is even more controversial and not easy to summarize. First of all, there
are different views on how to define the incident. The Armenian government calls it theatrocities committed against the Ottoman Armenians by the government of the Committeeof Union and Progress (CUP) during WWI (Armenia). The Armenian Genocide Museum–
Institute (AGM), on its part, defines the incident as the extermination of Armenians in the
Ottoman Empire and the surrounding regions during 1915–1923 (AGM 2007). The US
Parliament adopted this view. But such broad definitions make it difficult to grasp thenature of the incident, as there were several different phases, especially the reprisal killingof Muslims by the Armenian paramilitaries in Cilicia and the subsequent eviction of thelatter. Therefore, it is better and more suitable for the purpose of this article to adopt theview of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM), which is that “the Armenian
genocide refers to the physical annihilation of Armenian Christian people living in the60

The Israeli War on Gaza from a Comparative Genocide Studies Perspective
Ottoman Empire from spring 1915 through autumn 1916” (USHMM 2019).
The number of casualties is another focal point. The UN Report on Genocide of 1985
estimated the casualties as being “at least 1 million,” but other institutions assert larger
numbers. Both the European Parliament and the US Parliament assert the number ofcasualties as being 1.5 million. The Armenian government and AGM adopted the following
view: “There were an estimated two million Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire on
the eve of WWI. Approximately one and a half million Armenians perished between 1915
and 1923. Another million found shelter abroad or Islamized.” This means that the
Armenians produced half a million children in the middle of persecution, which sounds
implausible. Instead, USHMM adopts the following view: “There were approximately 1.5
million Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire in 1915. At least 664,000 and possibly as
many as 1.2 million died during the genocide.” On the other hand, the Turkish government,
who denies genocide, claims that “Prior to World War I, fewer than 1.5 million Armenians
lived in the entire Ottoman Empire [of which] slightly less than 600,000 Anatolian
Armenians died during the war period of 1912–22” (Türkiye 2022). The fact that theminimum number put forward by the US semi-official guardian of the records of humanatrocities coincides with that of Turkey merits attention, as it shows that, albeit a gap in theestimated victims, Turkey recognizes that a mass killing did indeed take place.
The disputing parties, moreover, share very similar views on the causes of the massive
fatalities. USHMM describes the course of events as follows:
In spring 1915 the Ottoman government began the deportation of the Armenian
population from its northeastern border regions. In the months that followed, theOttomans expanded deportations from almost all provinces regardless of distance fromcombat zones. The victims of the Armenian genocide include people killed in local
massacres that began in spring 1915; others who died during deportations, underconditions of starvation, dehydration, exposure, and disease; and Armenians who diedin or en route to the desert regions of the southern Empire. (USHMM)
The Armenian government and AGM posit a similar picture. According to them, thegenocide started on April 24, 1915, when several hundred Armenian elites were arrested in
Istanbul, only to be subsequently eliminated. Shortly thereafter, some 60,000 conscripted
Armenian military personnel were disarmed and killed. The third phase was thedeportations of women, children, and elderly people into the Syrian deserts. Hundreds ofthousands of people were killed during the deportation. Others died of famine, epidemic
diseases, and exposure to the elements. The Turkish version of events is not so different. It
admits that the mass deportation of Armenians in eastern Anatolia took place by the orderof the Ottoman government. It also agrees that a large number of people were dead in thecourse of and after the deportation. The people were killed by attacks, robberies, disease,famine, and many other of war’s privations.
So far, it can be said that the Turkish and the Armenian views are not very different fromeach other, except for the estimated number of victims. This means that what matters mostis not the cognizance of the crime constituting facts but their interpretation. For example,
the Turkish and Armenian views on the murderers of the deported people differ in thefollowing way. The AGM relates that hundreds of thousands of people were murdered by“Turkish soldiers, police officers, [and] Kurdish bandits” (AGM 2007). In contrast, theTurkish government asserts that they were murdered “mainly by local Muslims” (Türkiye2022). According to the former’s view, the mass murder was a military operation, but thelatter denies this on the grounds that none of the instructions commanding the relocation

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ordered killings. There were many incidents, however, in which the Armenian deportees
were killed by the bandits in full view of the soldiers or by the soldiers themselves. The
Armenian side interprets this as proof of the well-organized killing operation. In contrast,
the Turkish side asserts these acts as derelictions or were due to out of capacity. The mostcontested focus of the dispute, however, is whether the CUP had a specific intent of
genocide. The Armenian side claims that the CUP, who had long dreamed of a GreatTurkish state, saw the Armenians as the main obstacle to their plan. Thus, the CUP had
secretly developed a well-coordinated plan to eliminate Armenians by the eve of WWI, andthe war came as a suitable opportunity for its implementation (Akçam 2006; Hovvanisian2007). On the other hand, the Turkish government, while admitting that the CUP had
caused a mass murder by ordering “relocation,” denies it was an act of genocide, as they
did not have such a will, and put forward that the “relocation” was a preventive measure toward off the general uprising of Armenians in cooperation with the Entente powers. In
other words, the Armenians assert an unprovoked, one-sided massacre, while the Turks
argue due response to nationalist intrigues. Avoiding being trapped by the partisan disputes,
Donald Bloxham, a historian, proposes a synthesist approach and puts forward a theory of
cumulative radicalization. He admits that the feared prospect of Armenians joining with
Entente forces was not ungrounded and that the fear led the CUP to the partial deportation.
Those local measures gradually enlarged the CUP’s sphere, leading to the decision toremove the entire Armenian population from eastern Anatolia once and for all. At the sametime, Bloxham refutes the Turkish assertions by saying, “Any claim that the murder of the
Armenians when it unfolded was not a genocide, simply because there might not be
unequivocal evidence of genocidal intent prior to May 1915, is as absurd as the suggestionthat the Nazi ‘final solution’ was not a genocide because it was not inscribed before theinvasion of Poland or the USSR that every Jew was to be murdered.” The idea ofdestruction of the Armenian community, he argues, “developed and was augmented overtime around broad principles of discrimination and xenophobia, progressing from notionsof removal by dilution and/or forced assimilation to physical removal by deportation and/or
murder.” Borrowing a term from the Austro-Hungarian ambassador during WWI, Bloxham
concludes that the Armenian deportation was “a means of creating a national state throughthe annihilation of foreign elements” (Bloxham 2005: 94). Namely, the Armenian
deportation was an example of extraordinary large-scale ethnic cleansing that eventually
took the form of genocide.
The Bosnian Civil War
Bosnia and Herzegovina (Bosnia) was one of the six republics of the Socialist Federal
Republic of Yugoslavia. According to the census of 1991, its population was 44% Bosniak(Bosnian Muslim), 31% Serb, 17% Croat, and 8% others. They were defined as equalshareholders of the sovereignty of the republic. In March 1992, the Bosnian government
declared its independence from Yugoslavia. Bosnian Serbs opposed this, and created theirown state, later called Republika Srpska (RS). As Bosnian Croats followed suit, a triangularcivil war broke out. During the war that lasted until 1995, an estimated 102,622 people
were killed, and 2.2 million were displaced. In the early phase of the war, Serbs seized twothirds of Bosnia and committed atrocities against Bosniaks and Croats in the areas under
their control. Bosnian Croats had their own strongholds in the western part of the country
and committed similar atrocities. In 1993, for example, the Croat forces destroyed Bosniak
homes, mosques, and cultural monuments and raped and murdered civilians in Ahmici and

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Stupni Do. As a result, the Bosniaks suffered the most. It is often claimed that 80% of thecivilians killed or displaced during the war were Bosniaks. However, this sounds a little
exaggerated. According to the estimate of the ICTY, 16,700 (30%) of Serb civilians were
killed out of a total 55,261.2 Out of the total of 47,360 soldiers killed, an estimated 28,000(59%) were Bosniaks, 6,000 (13%) were Croats, and 14,000 (29%) were Serbs (Bartrop
2016 xxxviii ). Thus, the Bosniaks were not one-sided victims of the atrocities. Rather, theirforces, albeit on a smaller scale, committed similar crimes against Serb and Croat civilians
in the territory under their control (USHMM 2013).
When the three parties systematically expelled the civilians based on their ethnicity, they
employed identical methods. They were “carried out by means of murder, torture, arbitraryarrest and detention, extra-judicial executions, rape and sexual assaults, confinement ofcivilian population in ghetto areas, forcible removal, displacement and deportation ofcivilian population, deliberate military attacks or threats of attacks on civilians and civilian
areas, and wanton destruction of property” (UN 1992). Such practices, locally called“etničko čišćenje,” led to the term “ethnic cleansing” getting international circulation andsubsequently being recognized as a particular form of crime against humanity. The notion
is defined as “a purposeful policy designed by one ethnic or religious group to remove byviolent and terror-inspiring means the civilian population of another ethnic or religious
group from certain geographic areas. To a large extent, it is carried out in the name of
misguided nationalism, historic grievances and a powerful driving sense of revenge” (UN1992).
During the war, and its aftermath, there was a broad public debate about whether ethnic
cleansing was a euphemism for genocide, as there were several suspected cases of ethnic
cleansing on a genocidal scale. The Siege of Sarajevo is one of these cases. From April
1992 to February 1996, the city was encircled by the RS army (VRS). The civilians
endured incessant shelling for nearly four years, with their living quarters being burnt
down, and many cultural monuments, public spaces, and religious institutions weredestroyed. As a result, more than 10,000 people were killed (HMDT). Another, but not thelast, contested case was the north-western Bosnian municipality of Prijedor. In 1992, thePrijedor town and surrounding villages were occupied by Serb forces. After neutralizing
the Bosniak resistance, the Serbs started sending non-Serbs into concentration camps,
where the inmates endured various forms of maltreatment—torture, malnutrition, random
killings, and explosions. Their properties were confiscated or subjected to wanton
destruction. The international courts, however, classified the two cases as ethnic cleansing,not genocide. This is clear in the judgement against Ratko Mladić, the supreme commander
of VRS during the war. Mladić was indicted for the following counts: “The killing of
Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats” in Biljani, Foč a, Prijedor, and Vlasenica, “thedetention of thousands of Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats in detention facilities inliving conditions calculated to bring about their physical destruction” in the camps in Banja
Luka, Prijedor, Foča and Bijeljina, and “the killing of over 7,000 Bosnian Muslim men andboys of Srebrenica” (ICTY Mladić). Mladić was acquitted of the charge of genocide in theabovementioned municipalities except for Srebrenica on the grounds that although thephysical perpetrators in several municipalities intended to destroy the Bosnian Muslims,“the people targeted in each municipality formed a relatively small part and were not inother ways a substantial part of the protected group.” The same logic was applied to the
2 The rest were Bosniaks and Croats. The ICTY does not separate the number of Bosniak noncombatantvictims from those of Croats.

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case of Radovan Karadž ić , the president of RS during the war. On March 24, 2016,
Karadžić was found guilty of genocide in the area of Srebrenica in 1995 but was acquitted
in other municipalities on the grounds that they were classified as crimes against humanity(ICTY Karadžić). Those judgements have clarified that ethnic cleansing and genocide aredifferent categories of crime. The view is supported by many researchers. One of them,Marie-Janine Calic, succinctly summarized the point: “Whereas in some cases, ‘ethnic
cleansing’ was aimed at the physical destruction of an ethnic community, there are othercases [in which] the objective was limited to the conquest of a strategically or economicallyimportant region through expulsion of the unwanted population, but without a clear intent
to exterminate that community in whole or in part. In conclusion, ‘ethnic cleansing’ should
not per se be identified with genocide” (Calic 2007: 106).
There still remains, however, the question of how one can distinguish genocide fromlarge-scale ethnic cleansing. The ICTY has already given us the answer when the court, forthe first time, found Radislav Krstić guilty of genocide on August 2, 2001, for the case of
Srebrenica. Krstić was a former Commander of the Drina Corps that took part in thecapture of Srebrenica in July 1995. Srebrenica was a small Muslim stronghold located ineastern Bosnia. When hostilities broke out, many Bosniaks were expelled in the region andtook shelter in Srebrenica. Cut off from the other Muslim-controlled areas, Srebrenica
became an enclave in the middle of the Serb-dominated territory. From the spring of 1992
to the early summer of 1995, VRS besieged the town and strictly controlled the movementof people and goods in and out of the enclave. As a result, the prevailing conditions for the
inhabitants became dire (ICTY Krstić). In March 1995, Karadžić issued a directive to VRS:
“By planned and well-thought-out combat operations,” VRS was directed to “create an
unbearable situation of total insecurity with no hope of further survival or life for the
inhabitants of Srebrenica.” VRS started restricting the logistics support of UNPROFOR to
the enclave, making the humanitarian situation deteriorate to a catastrophic level. On
March 31, General Mladić ordered the Drina Corps to conduct active combat operations
around the enclave, and they captured UNPROFOR observation posts. Subsequently, thecommander of the Drina Corps initiated the plan to reduce the enclave to its urban core,with the aim to plunge the Bosnian Muslim population into a humanitarian crisis and,ultimately, eliminate them. VRS began its final attacks against Srebrenica on July 6. At themeeting with UNPROFOR, Mladić made it clear that the Bosnian Muslims could survive
only by leaving Srebrenica and that their survival was conditional upon a military surrenderof the town’s men (ICTY 2017). By July 11, VRS had entered the town. As a result,approximately 20,000 to 25,000 Bosnian Muslims— mostly women, children, and theelderly—fled to seek shelter in Potočari, a compound used by the UN Protection Force.
Conditions were dire: food and water were scarce, and there was a shortage of medical
supplies. In the meantime, on the eve of the fall of Srebrenica, the vast majority of the ablebodied men, between 10,000 and 15,000, fled the enclave on foot in an attempt to reach the
Muslim-controlled area. A large number of them were subsequently captured by VRS. On
July 12, VRS soldiers systematically separated Muslim men of military age who had taken
shelter in Potočari from the rest of the population. Together with others captured from thecolumn fleeing on foot, the men were bussed to various execution sites and systematicallymurdered. The vast majority of them were executed over just a few days from 12 July until
17 July. The court estimated that the total number of executed men was within the range of
7,000 and 8,000 (ICTY Krstić).
The ICTY found Krstić guilty on the grounds that by killing all the men of fighting age,

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VRS made it impossible for the Bosnian Muslim community of Srebrenica to survive forthe next generation. The court also made an important decision: that it is not necessary fora plan of genocide to exist prior to perpetrators committing concrete genocidal actions. In
the case of Srebrenica, the court confirmed that the initial plan had been an ethnic
cleansing. No plan to commit genocide existed before or even right after the city fell.
However, for unknown reasons, the decision was then taken to kill all the men of fighting
age. The result would inevitably bring about the destruction of the Bosnian Muslim
population in Srebrenica. The murderers did it with full awareness of the consequences.
Thus, they had the clear intention of genocide while conducting the mass murder (ICTY2001). This ruling defined two important criteria. First, it is not necessary for clear
evidence that attests to the will of genocide prior to committing the crime. Second, ethnic
cleansing changes into genocide at a certain point.

IV. Comparison of the four cases
Having viewed the general characteristics of the four cases in question, now we canjuxtapose each phase of these incidents with others in accordance with the following five
key aspects: background, provocation, civilian targeting, displacement, and forced
starvation. These aspects are the most pertinent to apprehend the nature of ongoingviolence.
Background
As UN Secretary general Antonio Guterres put it, “the attacks by Hamas did not happen ina vacuum.” Before October 7, 2023, the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip had to endure aseries of dispossessions, eviction from their ancestral homes, and enclosure in a small,
overpopulated area with incessant threats of bombardment by the IDF forces. They also
suffered from systematic human rights abuses under the Israeli occupation regime. The
situation is comparable to that of the Herero and the Nama before the uprising. Due to the
steppe climate, the central plateau of Namibia was an area of extensive animal husbandry,and both the Herero and Nama subsisted as nomadic pastoralists. The systematiccolonization of white settlers that began in 1894 brought about rapid dispossession of theland and livestock of the native population. As the best grazing land had belonged to the
Herero, they saw much of their land and a good portion of their cattle pass into the handsof the white man. By 1903, the white population of the colony had risen to 4,640, and morethan 25% of all Herero land had already passed out of native hands (Bridgman 1981: 50).
As a result, many Hereros were forced to sell their labor to the colonists at an extremely
low price (Kuss 2017: 38) The German setters not only exploited the Herero; they alsosystematically mistreated them. They displayed a blatant racist attitude, describing theAfricans as baboons, and treated them as such. The German judges either dismissed thecharges against the settlers by the Africans or imposed very light sentences. Moreover, theGermans ignored their promise they had made in Article 3 of the treaty of protection with
the Herero that they would respect the latter’s habits and customs. Deprived of all theirrights, the Herero felt like slaves in their own country (Drechsler 1980: 133). The sense of
injustice and well-grounded fear of loss of tribal identities were the principal motives thatmade them take up arms in January 1904. The same was true for the Nama uprising. It wasalso motivated by the perception of a threat to their own existance (Kuss 2017: 42).

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Provocation
The Israeli government has justified their military operations in Gaza as an act of selfdefense, claiming that the October 7 attacks were the worst atrocities against the Jewish
people since the Nazis; therefore, the elimination of Hamas is necessary for national
security. The Western countries are upholding the claim and support the IDF’s operations
both militarily and financially. But is it permissive to carry out such a disproportional
reprisal against the Palestinians on the grounds that they had provoked first?
In the case of the Namibian genocide, the German operation started as a reaction to thearmed rebellion of the Herero and the Nama. On January 12, 1904, the Herero launchedtheir first attacks. “During the next ten days, almost every farm, village, and fort in
Hereroland was attacked or at least threatened by the marauding hands of natives. The
majority of the German farms were destroyed during those hectic days. […] All farmers
who fled lost everything: their livestock had been stolen; their possessions looted; and theirbuildings burned” (Bridgman 1981: 73) In all, more than 100 German settlers and soldiers
were killed. The Germans were overpowered at first, as a total of some 2,000 men had toface more than 8,000 Herero warriors. Though not more than half of them were armed withrifles, they were militarily sophisticated. Due to their tribal discipline and warlike
traditions, the Herero fighters proved to be “man for man equivalent to the Germansoldiers” (Bridgman 1981: 68). Initially, both sides suffered an even rate of casualties:
German losses amounted to 210, while that of the Herero was 250. The Germans saw thedeaths of a large number of officers in a series of battles. In the same vein, the Namastarted their rebellion as random destructions of German farms in September 1904.
Employing clever hit-and-run tactics, carefully avoiding open battles, they successfully
waged an attritional guerilla warfare. Organized into smaller units, the Nama bands
targeted smaller German formations such as patrols and transport columns. A testimony
revealed that “Marching and resting troops, columns, stations and posts were exposed toconstant danger from small groups of the enemy that would suddenly appear [fromnowhere]. The situation was best described by the phrase ‘enemy present everywhere’”(Kuss 2017: 43). As a result, the Germans suffered substantial losses. Moreover, theultimate objective of the revolt was not restricted to the protest against the colonial systembut to drive the Germans out of South West Africa, as both the Herero and Nama had felt
the existential threat (Bridgman 1981: 66).
The Bosniaks of Srebrenica were not always subjected to the one-sided violence of the
Serbs. They had their own forces. In early 1992, the Srebrenica Bosniaks began acounteroffensive against the Serbs, forcing thousands of Serb peasants to flee from thearea. Since then, the Bosniaks regularly attacked the Serb villages near the enclave,committing wanton destruction, pillage, torture, imprisonment, and murder of civilian
targets (Bartrop 2016: 169). The raids did not stop even after the UN designated the town
as a “safe area.” Heavy weapons were handed over, but Srebrenica was never disarmed.
Using the UNPROFOR as a shield, the Muslim forces continued to intrude into the Serbcontrolled area, searching for food to steal and killing civilians as a reprisal for the siege(Rohde 2017). In the meantime, Bosniak military police persecuted Serb citizens inside
Srebrenica. They were detained in several facilities and subjected to physical abuse, serious
suffering, and injuries to their bodies and health. In some cases, prisoners were beaten to
death (ICTY 2008).
To sum up, not all the past genocides were unprovoked, and both Namibians andBosniaks had committed atrocities against civilians, including willful targeting of non-66

The Israeli War on Gaza from a Comparative Genocide Studies Perspective
combatants and wanton destruction of their properties, some of which may have amounted
to crimes against humanity. Nevertheless, the Germans and the Serbs were not acquitted
from their crimes of genocide. Thus, provocations cannot justify disproportionate reprisals.
Civilian massacre
The Israelis have so far killed more than 26,000 Palestinians, more than 70% of whichwere women and children, but the Netanyahu government vindicates this as collateral
damage, claiming that Hamas are using the civilian population as human shields. When hemet the ICRC chief on December 14, 2023, for example, Netanyahu was reported as sayingthat “There’s a difference between the deliberate and systematic murder, maiming andmenacing of civilians, which is what terrorism is, and the unintended consequences,
unintended casualties that accompany any warfare” (GI 2023j). It is highly doubtful that
Netanyahu’s soldiers are doing their best to avoid civilian casualties. An independent media
study has confirmed that the AI-based systems used by the IDF to automatically generatetargets were inflicting civilian casualties at an astonishing rate and that the fact was wellknown among the Israeli leaders. An anonymous source was cited as saying, “Everything is
intentional. We know exactly how much collateral damage there is in every home.” It has
also been confirmed that Israeli officials approved an attack they knew would kill up to
hundreds of civilians in a bid to assassinate a single Hamas military commander. The reportconcludes that the ongoing Israeli military operations “more resembled the indiscriminate
bombing of World War II than the modern era of codified civilian protection underinternational humanitarian law” (Wilkins 2023).
The German colonial troops employed a similar method when they pursued the counterinsurgency operations against the Herero and the Nama. Having destroyed the major
Herero forces at the Battle of Waterberg in August 1904, the Germans continued the war of
extermination of all Herero fighters, pursuing them into the Omaheke desert andindiscriminately killing every man, woman, and child whom they spotted (Kuss 2017: 42).
When the Germans broke into the Herero camps in search of the guerrillas, they showed nomercy for women and children. A testimony reported that “The Germans spared no one.
They killed thousands and thousands. I saw this slaughter for day after day” (Bridgman
1981: 126). The Germans adopted the same tactics against the Nama. One of the former’s
military commanders wrote that “We must not allow the Hottentotts to escape, rather wemust encircle and destroy them before they do so” (Kuss 2017: 45).
In the case of the Ottomans, it is highly dubious if they paid the slightest attention toprotecting Armenian non-combatants when fighting against the rebels in such places as
Van, Bitlis, Erzurum, and Zeytun in the spring 1915. Moreover, there are ample records of
the Ottoman agents who committed random killings of civilians during the deportation(Lewy 2005: 224–6). It is also well-known that the Bosnian Serbs subjected the Srebrenica
town and its surrounding villages to daily shelling from all directions and sporadic
incursions of paramilitaries between April 1992 and March 1993, inflicting a great numberof civilian casualties (Bartrop 2016: 169).
Those examples clearly show that the military operations that entailed immense loss ofcivilian life constituted a part of actions that would eventually amount to genocide.
Contemporary American and European leaders seem to understand this well. For instance,
EC President Ursula von der Leyen said that “Targeted attacks on civilian infrastructurewith the clear aim to cut off men, women, children of water, electricity and heating withthe winter coming, these are acts of pure terror” (Reuters 2022). The German Chancellor

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Olaf Scholz asserted that drone attacks on civilians in the cities constituted “war crimes”(DW 2022). In addition, US Vice-President Kamala Harris denounced the wanton
destruction of cities where enemy units were entrenched as “barbaric and inhumane”
atrocities against civilians and classified them as “crimes against humanity” (BBC 2023).
US President Joe Biden was more eloquent in saying that such actions would amount to a
genocide (BBC 2022). These leaders have applied these criteria against the Russian actions
in Ukraine, but, for unknown reasons, they still hesitate to apply the same judgment to thecase of Israel.
Displacement
The Israeli military ordered the Gazans who lived in the northern part of the Strip toimmediately “evacuate” from their homes on October 13, 2023. The measures wereannounced as though for their safety, and Netanyahu designated the southern Gaza areas as“safe zones.” However, the IDF subsequently enlarged their sphere of operation into thewide swaths of southern Gaza in December, and the “safe zones” effectively disappeared.
To make things worse, the IDF demolished most of the residential buildings and destroyedsocial infrastructures, making it impossible for those who were “evacuated” to return totheir homes and to resume their previous way of life. This fact leads us to the suspicion thatthe “evacuation order” was designed to serve the Israeli military aims and not the good of
the Palestinians. If so, it was not a temporary safe measure but forced displacement.
Forced displacement itself does not always constitute an act of genocide. The Tsarist
deportations of Germans, Jews, Poles, and Latvians during WWI were no doubt atrocities
but a bit short of genocide. This was also the case for the Austro-Hungarian eviction of theBosnian Serbs. The Stalinist deportation of the Chechens, the Ingush, and the Crimean
Tatars can be considered examples of ethnic cleansing but are not unanimously accepted as
genocide. Furthermore, the Greco-Turkish population exchange in 1924, though it caused
enduring suffering to 1.5 million Orthodox Anatolian Greeks and half a million Hellenic
Muslims, was internationally recognized as legitimate policies of nation states. On theother end of the spectrum, however, there are many examples of deportation with genocidal
dimensions. The Ottoman Armenian case is the best known. In this case, the deportation
was the central piece of genocide. Donald Bloxham explains the reason as follows:
The very nature of the deportations is sufficient evidence of genocide[e] […]. Where
the first anti-Armenian measures did not distinguish innocent individuals from ‘guilty,’
the new ones did not differentiate between communities with revolutionary traditions or
the great majority without, nor between border regions and the interior. Unlike the first
Zeytun deportees, the Armenians were not to be sent to places where settlement waspossible, if difficult; they were sent, defenseless and without provision or the means ofsubsistence, to desert regions where natural attrition could take its deadly toll.
(Bloxham 2005: 86)
In a similar vein, the Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica saw the following two stages offorced displacement prior to the genocide. Although bordering with the Serbian proper,
eastern Bosnia used to be a Muslim majority region. With the objective to ethnically purify
the territory, the Serb nationalist forces launched well-organized eradicating operations
against the Bosniak population in early 1992. They engaged in looting homes, burning
villages, and slaughtering the civilian population in the neighboring municipalities of
Srebrenica. Even after the completion of military conquest, the Serbs systematically evicted
the Bosniak citizens who were found in their territory to Srebrenica, which had remained

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under Muslim control. According to a 1991 census, the Srebrenica municipality had apopulation of 36,000 (25,000 Bosniaks and 8,500 Serbs). Due to the influx of refugees
from the surrounding municipalities, the population of the enclave swelled to over 50,000
people by mid-May, creating a humanitarian crisis, with a serious shortage of shelters,
food, and medical services (Srebrenica Memorial). The plight lasted for more than three
years. The Serbs then embarked on the second stage of displacement in May 1995. VRS
began attacking the outposts of the enclave, gradually tightened a ring, and finally entered
the town on July 11. During the attacks, the Serbs systematically burned Muslim houses
and evicted the inhabitants with the aim to force them to concentrate in the Srebrenica town
and then to escape to Potočari. By July 12, most of the noncombatant civilians of
Srebrenica had gathered in and around the compound. Conditions there were dire, withalmost no food, water, or shelter. VRS frightened the people, either by shelling near thecompound or by abducting some of them. General Mladić insisted on the total “evacuation”
of the civilians, and subsequently, women, children, and the elderly were transported to the
Muslim-controlled areas. In the meantime, the military-aged men, together with those who
had previously been captured by the Serbs, were all executed (ICTY 2017). In this regard,
the “evacuation” of the Srebrenica population was a part and parcel of ethnic cleansing anda prelude to genocide.
The Israeli policy of forced “evacuation” of the Palestinians in Gaza shares many
common features with the two cases. Just like the Armenians, the Gazans areindiscriminately displaced, based on Israeli President Herzog’s axiom that “an entire nationout there […] is responsible.” As the Ottomans forced the Armenians to move from one
place to another in accordance with the notorious 10% limit, the Gazans were being told tomove like “human pinballs.” The Srebrenica Muslims, on their part, were first driven into
the enclave, then concentrated into a much smaller space, and finally evicted once and forall. Just like the Ottoman Armenians who were randomly killed during the “relocation,” thenorthern Gazan refugees were bombed while moving to the southern “safe zones.” The
Armenians were executed while staying in their encampments in Syria, and the Gazans areleft defenseless against the air strikes, random shelling, and sniping of the IDF in the
middle of the “safe zones.” The Serbs did the same to the Bosniaks hiding in the “safearea.” Although Israel has not yet destroyed a large portion of the population, nor rounded
up and executed the majority of the male population, the deportation of the Gazans has
already gone well beyond the scale of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and reached the level ofthe Armenian case.
Siege and Forced Starvation
Since October 7, 2023, the Israeli forces have put Gaza under a complete siege, prohibiting
free movement in and out of the Strip and strictly restricting the import of any kind ofgoods, including humanitarian aid. Moreover, the Israelis are not providing the refugees
with any kind of shelter and have systematically destroyed residences, schools, warehouses,
and religious institutions. This policy has brought about a general malnutrition in the
population, who suffer from starvation and exhaustion by exposure. There conditions are
extremely unhygienic, and many people are dying of diseases accordingly. In light of
Netanyahu’s remark on December 5, 2023, that “We know that if there would be a collapse— diseases, pandemics, and groundwater infections — it will stop the fighting [of Hamas]”(CNN 2023), it is plausible that the creation of these insanitary conditions for the refugees
is a part and parcel of the Israeli strategy.

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TETSUYA SAHARAThe Serbs adopted similar measures during the siege of Srebrenica. At that time, theenclave was totally besieged by VRS and cut off from the rest of the Bosniak-controlled
territories. The situation worsened progressively, with the refugees and townsfolk runningout of food and water. As pre-war food supplies were rapidly depleted, people began to eat
anything they could find. From the spring of 1993 onward, Srebrenica was completelydependent on the humanitarian aid provided by the UNPROFOR. The aid, however, wasoften blocked by VRS (Bartrop 2016: 214). As a result, the Srebrenica enclave became theworst-affected case from food shortages in the Bosnian civil war. Contrary to the pretext
that the blockage was a measure to prevent the Bosniak fighters from attacking the Serb
territories, those who suffered most were those vulnerable elements such as pregnant andlactating women, as well as small children (Conley & de Waal 2019: 722; Slavková 2020:78–9). The forced starvation was a well-planned policy aimed at a voluntary evacuation of
the Bosniaks. In July 1994, for example, the commander of the Bratunac Brigade instructed
his soldiers as follows: “The enemy’s life has to be made unbearable and their temporary
stay in the enclave impossible so that they leave the enclave en masse as soon as possible”(ICTY 2003).
Forced starvation was also an integral part of the annihilation of the Ottoman Armenians.
Most of the deaths were due to hunger and thirst (Suny 2015). Considering the cumulative
radicalization of the deportation, the CUP did not have a wholesale plan of massive
starvation laid out, but the ad hoc nature of the policy resulted in many more victims. As
the local governments had to comply with the hectic “relocation” orders, they gave theArmenians only a few days to prepare for the journey. As a result, most of them could notcarry enough food. To make things worse, it was almost impossible to find something to
eat on the way, because the government had no plan (or will) for logistical support for
those who were deported. It is estimated that of the first deportees from the eastern
provinces who were ordered to move in May and June 1915, only 10 to 20% percent
reached Syria alive. Later, the situation improved a little. Namely, of those from western
Anatolia who were expelled in August and September 1915, some 80 to 90% could reach
Syria. George Shirinian postulates that this was because a structure for the deportations had
been established by the summer of 1915 (Shirinian 2017: 13). This fact by no means serves
as a sign that the CUP cared for the adequate provision of the deported Armenians. It wastrue that the government provided food and water. However, these things were rather
exceptional and far from adequate. A German consular official who traveled from Baghdad
to Aleppo recalled that “The way stations with water were about forty miles apart, andmany of the deportees did not have enough food or water to last even the three days ofwalking that it took to get from one station to the next. At some stations no food wasavailable at all” (cited by Lewy 2005: 222). In contrast, the Syrian Armenians and foreign
missionaries organized relief committees and actively supported the displaced people. They
sent aid and dispatched missions even to the remotest provinces. They were the primary,and often the only, means of subsistence for the deportees. For some time, those foreignand domestic philanthropists received tacit approval and even support from the local
authorities. But this was only because the CUP paid little attention to the deportees who
managed to arrive in Syria. Their attitude changed in the autumn of 1915. Thereafter, thecentral government exerted strong pressure on the humanitarian response to the survivorsof deportation. Namely, local Muslims who tried to give the Armenians food and water
were strictly reproached by the gendarmes (Shirinian 2017: 22). Furthermore, the Armenian
activists who supported the refugees were either arrested or persecuted. The CUP even

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thwarted the international aid programs. The US ambassador who attempted to distributethe relief funds that had been collected by the US Armenian Relief Committee wasprevented from doing so by the Ottoman government (Mouradian 2019: 252–5).
Even those who could reach Syria alive had to endure the daily threat of death byattrition. A large number of deportees who were destined for resettlement in Der-el Zor—
one of the major “relocation” sites—were detained in encampments along the Euphrates.
Many of them were put in an impossible position to acquire food and gradually died ofhunger. The camp at Meskene was one of these detention centers. In early February 1916,
the place hosted more than 2,000 tents and about 10,000 persons. Since the government did
not distribute any food, most of the detainees had to live by begging. Those who did not
manage to obtain any bread cooked and ate grass. Moreover, there was no latrine, and all
around the camp was covered with a wide belt of excrements and garbage (Lewy 2005:
223). The deterioration of hygiene conditions inevitably resulted in epidemics of diseases,
which took their heavy toll on the Armenian population.
The German colonial army adopted a similar tactic. On August 11, 1904, when theGermans gained the decisive victory over the Herero at the Waterberg, a large number ofmen, women, and children escaped from the encircling forces and fled into the Omaheke
desert. As the Germans knew what kind of human catastrophe would be played out there,
they expected the desert would complete “the task begun by German weapons.” Von Trotha
ordered his soldiers to occupy all the known water holes around the edge of the desert andto block all Herero returning from the Omaheke. That was the moment when “the actual
genocidal phase began” (Zimmerer 2008: 47). Trapped in the desert, the Herero franticallysearched for water, only to hasten their death by exhaustion. An eyewitness said that thetrails through the desert were littered with hundreds of carcasses. It is estimated that out of
50,000 and 60,000 Herero who had escaped into the desert, barely 3,000 could survive thedeath trap. (Bridgman 1981: 131). The Germans responded to the Nama uprising with thesame strategy of extermination. Their troops systematically occupied watering places,
destroying roughly half of the Nama population by starvation (Zimmerer 2008: 51).
According to Conley and de Waal (2019), who have studied historical cases of artificial
famine, examples of the deployment of mass starvation on the scale of mass extermination
are rare. The Namibian massacre and the Armenian deportation were among those few
unambiguous cases (Conley & de Waal 2019: 705–6). Other examples are the ghettos
during the Holocaust, the Ukrainian Holomodor (1932–1933), and the Nazi Hungerplan(1941–1945). The ongoing Israeli policy of forced starvation of the Palestinians has
seemingly not yet reached the same level as these cases. The policy shares morecommonalities with the Bosnian case. If one takes into consideration the remarks of Israeli
policymakers on “voluntary” ethnic cleansing, it sounds appropriate to say that, at thisstage, the Israeli siege of Gaza has fallen into the category of the use of starvation for
gaining territorial control. But in light of the fact that in contrast to Srebrenica, where mostof the besieged people could still stay under a roof, a large number of Palestinians have tobivouac under rubble or flimsy tents, so the situation in Gaza has already gone beyond thefirst stage of the siege of Srebrenica and is rapidly approaching the plight of the Armenians
in the concentration camps. The Gazan hygienic crisis also bears resemblance to the
Armenian case.

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V. Conclusions
The comparison of the ongoing Israeli war with the Namibian, Ottoman, and Bosnian cases
leads us to the following findings. First, the prewar conditions of the Palestinians in Gaza
shared many of the colonialist characteristics with the German rule in Namibia. Second, theprovocation of Hamas does not vindicate the scale of Israeli military actions in Gaza. The
Namibian and the Bosnian cases show that not all the victims of genocide were unprovoked
and that the disproportionate reprisals were the basic features of those two genocide cases.
Third, the Israeli allegation of “collateral damage” does not make sense. It is not only
because the wanton destruction of civilian objects is, as the Western leaders admit, a war
crime, but also because they are carried out with the explicit aim of collective punishment.
In this regard, the Israeli action shows a marked resemblance with those of the colonialist
Germans, the CUP, and the Bosnian Serb leadership. Fourth, the massive displacement of
the Gazans displays the same indiscriminate nature as the Armenian deportation and theBosnian ethnic cleansing. In both cases, the “evacuations” were carried out with the clear
aim of eliminating the unwanted elements from certain territories. The Israeli pretext of“safety measures” is almost identical with that of the Ottomans, who took no substantial
measure to protect the deportees and carried out the “evacuations” for purely strategic
purposes. The Bosnian Serbs employed the same hypocrisy. For them, the term“evacuation” is nothing but a euphemism for ethnic cleansing. Fifth, the Israeli siege,
blockades of humanitarian aid, and exposure of the Gazans to helpless situations areintentionally creating the conditions of forced starvation, characteristics in common withthe past three cases. The Germans imposed impossible living conditions on the Africans
either by expelling them into deserts or by blocking their access to food and water. The
Ottomans put the Armenians into starving conditions by sabotaging their logistic support,
detaining them in places with no or insufficient access to nutrition, and preventing
international aid. By doing so, they created extremely unhygienic conditions that resulted
in immense human loss. This has a strong resemblance to the contemporary situation in
Gaza. The Bosnian Serbs imposed a similar type of forced starvation on the people in
Srebrenica. They shut the Bosniaks into a small and overpopulated area with an inadequate
food supply and restricted the international aid to the minimal level before finallyeliminating them.
These findings constitute reasonable grounds for the conclusion that the ongoing war has
already shown several key symptoms of genocide. The Israeli military operations havegone well beyond the initial stages of the Namibian case (confinement in an unsustainable
environment), the Armenian case (mass displacement, mass killings, forced starvation, andunhygienic conditions), and the Bosnian case (enclosure and siege in a small place,incessant bombing, and the cutting off of outside aid). If the Israeli campaign goes onunchecked, it is plausible to believe that it will develop into a full-fledged genocide.
However, as to the question of whether the contemporary stage has already reached suchlevels, the answer is skeptical. The proportion of death is, so far, much lower than theprevious cases. Moreover, whether the Netanyahu government is pursuing the policy withgenocidal intention or not is not crystal clear. In light of the consistent remarks of theIsraeli leadership on the mass migration of the Gazans, their intentions seem to remain at
the level of ethnic cleansing. At the same time, however, compared with the ethnic
cleansing during the Bosnian war, the ongoing Israeli war is much larger in scale and akinto the Armenian case. It is true that the scale of mass starvation in Gaza is gradually
approaching those of the previous three cases. Regarding these developments, it seems

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prudent to call the Israeli war on Gaza an extraordinary immense ethnic cleansing that is on
the threshold of genocide.

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news/2023/10/12/israel-white-phosphorus-used-gaza-lebanon(ICC) International Criminal Court: How the court works, https://www.icc-cpi.int/about/how-the-courtworks/Accessed on 19 Jan 2023.
(ICTY) International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (2001): Radislav Krstic becomes thefirst person to be convicted of genocide at the ICTY and is sentenced to 46 years imprisonment, Press
Release [2 August 2001] https://www.icty.org/en/sid/7964(2003): Sentencing judgement of trial chamber, Momir Nikolić, 2 December 2003 https://www.icty.org/
x/cases/nikolic/tjug/en/mnik-sj031202-e.pdf(2017): Trial judgement summary for Ratko Mladić, 22 November 2017 https://www.icty.org/x/cases/
mladic/tjug/en/171122-summary-en.pdf
Karadžić: Case information sheet: Radovan Karadžić https://www.irmct.org/sites/default/files/cases/

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public-information/cis_karadzic_en.pdf
Krstić: Case information sheet: Radislav Krstić https://www.icty.org/x/cases/krstic/cis/en/cis_krstic.pdf
Mladić: Case information sheet: Ratko Mladić: https://www.icty.org/x/cases/mladic/cis/en/cis_mladic_
en.pdfOrić: Case information sheet: Naser Orić, https://www.icty.org/x/cases/oric/cis/en/cis_oric_en.pdf(ICJ) International Court of Justice (2023): Proceedings instituted by South Africa against the State ofIsrael on 29 December 2023, Document Number 192-20231228-APP-01-00-EN. https://www.un.org/
unispal/document/proceedings-instituted-by-south-africa-against-israel-on-29-december-2023-publichearing-icj-press-release-jan3-2024/(2024): Order [to the] request for the indication of provisional measures, [26.10.2024] https://www.icjcij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/192/192-20240126-ord-01-00-en.pdf
ITV (2023): “Israeli president Isaac Herzog says Gazans could have risen up to fight ‘evil’ Hamas,’[13.10.2023] https://www.itv.com/news/2023-10-13/israeli-president-says-gazans-could-have-risen-upto-fight-hamas
Joint Declaration (2021): Joint declaration by the Federal Republic of Germany and the Republic ofNamibia, https://www.dngev.de/images/stories/Startseite/joint-declaration_2021-05.pdf(JP) The Jerusalem Post (2023): “Kirby: Word ‘genocide’ thrown around inappropriately against Israel,”[21.11. 2023] https://www.jpost.com/international/article-774296
Oxfam (2023): Starvation as weapon of war being used against Gaza civilians, [25.10.2023] https://www.
oxfam.org/en/press-releases/starvation-weapon-war-being-used-against-gaza-civilians-oxfam
Reuters (2022): “Russian attacks on Ukraine infrastructure are war crimes - EU’s von der Leyen,”[19.10.2022] https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russian-attacks-ukraine-infrastructure-are-warcrimes-eus-von-der-leyen-2022-10-19/(2023): “Iran’s Raisi tells Putin in Moscow that West backs Gaza “genocide,” [08.12.2023] https://www.
reuters.com/world/middle-east/irans-raisi-condemns-gaza-genocide-moscow-talks-withputin-2023-12-07/).
RT (2023): Tarik Cyril Amar, “How a Jewish Kremlin critic was almost canceled in Germany for speaking
out against Israel,” [27.12.2023] https://www.rt.com/russia/589399-masha-gessen-award-israel/
Srebrenica Memorial: The siege of the Srebrenica enclave https://srebrenicamemorial.org/en/page/thesiege-of-the-srebrenica-enclave/24
Tanakh: Shmuel I, Chapter 15 https://www.chabad.org/library/bible_cdo/aid/15844/jewish/Chapter-15.htm(TI) The Times of Israel (2023a): “Visiting Chancellor Scholz says Germany’s place in hard times is‘alongside Israel’ [17.10.2023] https://www.timesofisrael.com/visiting-german-leader-says-nations-onlyplace-in-hard-times-is-alongside-israel/(2023b): “Gallant: Israel moving to full offense, Gaza will never return to what it was,” [10.10.2023]
https://www.timesofisrael.com/gallant-israel-moving-to-full-offense-gaza-will-never-go-back-to-what-itonce-was/(2023c): “COGAT chief addresses Gazans: ‘You wanted hell, you will get hell’” [10.10.2023] https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/cogat-chief-addresses-gazans-you-wanted-hell-you-will-get-hell/(2023d): “Defense minister announces ‘complete siege’ of Gaza: No power, food or fuel,” [9.10.2023]
https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/defense-minister-announces-complete-siege-of-gaza-nopower-food-or-fuel/(2023e): “Far-right minister says nuking Gaza an option, PM suspends him from cabinet meetings,”[05.11.2023] https://www.timesofisrael.com/far-right-minister-says-nuking-gaza-an-option-pmsuspends-him-from-cabinet-meetings/(2023f): “Likud minister suggests world should promote ‘voluntary resettlement’ of Gazans,”[19.11.2023] https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/likud-minister-suggests-world-shouldpromote-voluntary-resettlement-of-gazans/(2023g): “Improper munition said cause of high death toll in strike on Gaza’s Maghazi,” [28.12.2023]
https://www.timesofisrael.com/improper-munition-said-cause-of-high-death-toll-in-strike-on-gazasmaghazi/(2023h): “Christian mother, daughter killed while sheltering in Gaza church, patriarch says.”[17.12.2023] https://www.timesofisrael.com/christian-mother-daughter-killed-while-sheltering-in-gazachurch-patriarch-says/(2023i): “Halevi to troops, after 3 hostages killed: IDF doesn’t shoot people waving white flag,”[17.12.2023] https://www.timesofisrael.com/idf-chief-reiterates-rules-of-engagement-to-troops-after-3hostages-killed-in-error/

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TETSUYA SAHARA(2024a): “Far-right ministers call to ‘resettle’ Gaza’s Palestinians, build settlements in Strip,”[01.01.2024] https://www.timesofisrael.com/ministers-call-for-resettling-gazas-palestinians-buildingsettlements-in-strip/(2024b): “IDF: Deaths of 29 of 170 soldiers in Gaza op were so-called friendly fire, accidents,”[01.01.2024] https://www.timesofisrael.com/idf-deaths-of-29-of-170-soldiers-in-gaza-op-were-so-calledfriendly-fire-accidents/(2024c): “Israel in talks with Congo and other countries on Gaza ‘voluntary migration’ plan,”[03.01.2024] https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-in-talks-with-congo-and-other-countries-on-gazavoluntary-migration-plan/
Türkiye: Republic of Türkiye Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2022): The Armenian allegation of genocide:
The issue and the facts, https://www.mfa.gov.tr/the-armenian-allegation-of-genocide-the-issue-and-thefacts.en.mfa
United Nations (1985): Revised and updated report on the question of the prevention and punishment of
the crime of genocide prepared by Mr. B. Whitaker, UN, E/CN.4/Sub.2/1985/6 ]02.071985] https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/547800?ln=fr(1994): United Nations Security Council (1994): Final report of the United Nations Commission ofExperts established pursuant to SCR 780 (1992): S/1994/674, [27 May 1994] https://www.icty.org/x/file/
About/OTP/un_commission_of_experts_report1994_en.pdf(2023a): UN Special Rapporteur, Ref.: AL DEU [1/2023 23] https://spcommreports.ohchr.org/
TMResultsBase/DownLoadPublicCommunicationFile?gId=27875(2023b): Gaza: UN chief at Rafah crossing says aid convoy ‘the difference between life and death,’[20.10.2023] https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/10/1142592(2023c): Identical letters dated 19 November 2023 from the Permanent Observer of the State of Palestine
to the United Nations addressed to the Secretary-General, the President of the General Assembly and thePresident of the Security Council A/ES-10/970-S/2023/889, [2011.2023] https://www.un.org/unispal/wpcontent/uploads/2023/12/A_ES-10_970-S_2023_889-EN.pdf(2023d): Gaza: ‘Unprecedented and unparalleled’ civilian death toll, [21.11.2023] https://dppa.un.org/en/
gaza-unprecedented-and-unparalleled-civilian-death-toll-guterres(2023e): Gaza: Unbearable suffering of civilians demands end to violence – Türk, [03.12.2023] https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2023/12/gaza-unbearable-suffering-civilians-demands-end-violenceturk(2023f): US vetoes resolution on Gaza which called for ‘immediate humanitarian ceasefire,’ [08.12.2023]
https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/12/1144562(2023g): Secretary-General’s remarks to the Security Council, [24.10.2023] https://www.un.org/sg/en/
content/sg/speeches/2023-10-24/secretary-generals-remarks-the-security-council-the-middleeast%C2%A0(2023h): UN rights chief warns of ‘dehumanization’ of Palestinians amid West Bank violence as Gaza
crisis deepens, [28.12.2023] https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/12/1145132
UN OCHA (2023a): Hostilities in the Gaza Strip and Israel: Flash update #14, [28.10.2023] https://www.
unocha.org/publications/report/occupied-palestinian-territory/hostilities-gaza-strip-and-israel-flashupdate-14(2023b): Hostilities in the Gaza Strip and Israel: Flash update #60, [05.12. 2023] https://reliefweb.int/
report/occupied-palestinian-territory/hostilities-gaza-strip-and-israel-flash-update-60-enarhe(2023c) UN relief chief: ‘No place safe’ for civilians in southern Gaza, [07.12. 2023] https://www.
unocha.org/news/un-relief-chief-no-place-safe-civilians-southern-gaza(USHMM) US Holocaust Memorial Museum: The Armenian Genocide (1915-16): Overview, https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/the-armenian-genocide-1915-16-overvie(2013): Bosnia and Herzegovina, 1992–1995 https://www.ushmm.org/genocide-prevention/countries/
bosnia-herzegovina/(2019): Bosnia, https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/bosnia
US House of Representatives (USHR) (2019): Affirming the United States record on the Armenian
Genocide, [29.10.2019] H. Res. 296 https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-resolution/296
Vox (2023): Nicole Narea, “A timeline of Israel and Palestine’s complicated history,” [19.10. 2023] https://www.vox.com/world-politics/23921529/israel-palestine-timeline-gaza-hamas-war-conflict(WP) The Washington Post (2023): “More than 20,000 dead in Gaza, as U.N. calls for fighting pause andaid,” [22.12.2023] https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/12/22/gaza-israel-war-20000-dead/(WSJ) The Wall Street Journal (2023): Danny Danon and Ram Ben-Barak, “The West should welcome

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Gaza refugees,” [13.11.2023] https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-west-should-welcome-gaza-refugeesasylum-seekers-hamas-terrorism-displacement-5d2b5890

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