[somenameforme]

South Africa's genocide case against Israel [1] is chock full of quotes from high level Israeli officials, including Netanyahu. Check page 59. Obviously much more has been said since that claim was filed, but the nature of genocidal rhetoric is such that you can't get much more extreme. Netanyahu himself repeatedly referenced the biblical tale of Amalek [2] which reaches its climax with this passage [3] : "Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them. But kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey."

[1] - https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/So...

[2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amalek

[3] - https://biblehub.com/1_samuel/15-3.htm

[dlubarov]

He didn't reference that particular passage about Amalek though, he just said "Remember what Amalek did to you". And it was pretty clear from the context of his speech that he was talking about Hamas and their invasion, not regular Gazans.

His office pointed out that the same phrase appears at the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum, as well at a memorial in The Hague, in reference to the Nazis. Of course they're statements about remembering Nazi atrocities, and not calls to genocide the German people.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/pms-office-says-its-prepostero...

[somenameforme]

If you genuinely believe he wasn't appealing to genocide, then here's a sampling of the rest of the Israeli leadership - who generally speak more directly.

---

President of Israel: "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. … and we will fight until we break their backbone."

Minister of Defense: "[We are] imposing a complete siege on Gaza. No electricity, no food, no water, no fuel. Everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly."

Minister of National Security: "To be clear, when we say that Hamas should be destroyed, it also means those who celebrate, those who support, and those who hand out candy — they’re all terrorists, and they should also be destroyed."

Minister of Energy and Infrastructure: "All the civilian population in Gaza is ordered to leave immediately. We will win. They will not receive a drop of water or a single battery until they leave the world."

Minister of Heritage: "We wouldn’t hand the Nazis humanitarian aid”, and "there is no such thing as uninvolved civilians in Gaza."

---

This is also far from the most extreme. See the "motivational speech" sponsored by the Israeli Army on page 64. [1] I will not quote it because it makes the above seem like softball. And these were things all said more than a year ago - they have only become more radical with time. Their rhetoric isn't ambiguous and neither are their actions. So many people don't realize how the West will be seen when the future judges us, though I think more are starting to realize.

[1] - https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/So...

[dlubarov]

1. There’s no quantifier for “civilians”, so this is just a vague statement that some number of civilians support Hamas.

2. There have been many sieges throughout history, surely they weren’t all genocides? It was also lifted shortly thereafter. Or are you interpreting “human animals” as all Gazans rather than Hamas/PIJ/etc? If so why?

3. This is problematic but still not genocidal, since Hamas supporters are not a group of the sort that genocide can apply to.

4. Context was removed to make it sound as if “they” might mean Gazans. The preceding sentence was “We will fight the terrorist organization Hamas and destroy it.”

5. Not involved in the military.

6. Not any sort of leader.

We do see explicitly genocidal rhetoric from leaders of Hamas and other enemies of Israel, though.

[xg15]

> It was also lifted shortly thereafter.

It was not "lifted shortly after". It was lifted after several weeks, when the Biden administration pressured the Israeli government into doing so.

[dlubarov]

It was Oct 9-21, so 12 days; I wouldn’t call that “several weeks”.

[xg15]

Ah, true.

[dmos62]

Thanks for the context. Every other comment here is referencing the Amalek reference.

[Zacharias030]

If he had nothing to fear, then what is stopping him clearing his name in court?

[dlubarov]

Even if he could somehow be guaranteed a fair trial, why would Israel send anyone to a court whose jurisdiction it never consented to?

[xdennis]

GP asked for proof of "numerous clips of Rabbis openly promoting the extermination of Palestinians". If there are numerous, he should be able to post some.

South Africa has no moral authority given that it refuses to arrest Putin.