It Isn’t True Just Because You Keep Saying It
If repetition alone made something true, then Jews have committed blood libels, secretly ruled the world, and caused the bubonic plague.
There is a pattern I keep seeing in debates about Israel and Gaza. It goes like this: “The ICJ, the UN, Amnesty – they’ve all accused Israel of genocide. You can’t just dismiss that.”
Buried in that argument is a dangerous sleight of hand. The accusation becomes the evidence. The number of accusers becomes proof of the crime.
And it gets repeated without end. Roughly 75% of all country-specific blame resolutions at the UN General Assembly have been aimed at Israel. That reflects political blocs and old grudges as much as it reflects any fair reading of the facts.
No society built on justice starts with guilt and works backwards. Charges matter. Scrutiny matters. But a charge alone is not proof. Not even when large bodies repeat it. Not even when the topic is raw and painful.
Civilian suffering in Gaza is real. Civilian deaths are real. No one disputes that. The question is whether the legal charge of genocide has been proven.
Through hard evidence. Through clear intent. Not simply assumed because enough voices say so.
History shows how dangerous that mix-up can be.
For centuries, Jews were accused of using Christian children’s blood to bake Passover matzah. It was said in courts, churches and newspapers. Kings, priests and crowds said it with total certainty. Jews were tortured and killed because of it.
There was enormous smoke. But there was never any fire.
The blood libel did not become true because high bodies endorsed it. It did not become true because doubt became a social risk.
I do not blame those who arrive at these views.
When media, bodies and social pressure all point one way, pushing back feels almost mad. In some circles, doubt itself is seen as moral failure.
But history should make us careful. Long before social media, whole societies talked themselves into believing things about Jews that were totally false. The tools change. The pattern does not.
The ICJ issued interim steps, not a verdict. Amnesty and HRW are lobby groups, not courts. A charge is not a conviction. That is not a small point. It is the whole of justice.
Antisemitism adapts. It finds new words, new reasons, new crowds in every age.
That makes it hard to fight. But I will keep trying.
The answer to a false charge is not silence.
It is clarity.
