Fast forward to present day, as Israel’s war machine grinds Gaza into dust, we witness a genocide not hidden in the shadows, but broadcast in real-time, livestreamed, tweeted, TikToked, into our living rooms.
In the 1940's, after WW2 had begun, the world knew little of the Nazi's extermination camps; today, we watch Palestinian children being burnt alive by white phosphorus, entire families buried under rubble, mass graves and starving civilians shot while scrambling for poisoned flour. And yet, Western governments, complicit in arms and rhetoric, look on and do nothing to bring an end to this modern day atrocity.
The Nazi genocide unfolded largely beyond global scrutiny. Western nations, even those at war with Germany, possessed only fragmented intelligence on Hitler's extermination camps. The 1942 Riegner Telegram, confirming Hitler’s plan to annihilate European Jewry, was met with disbelief.
Newspapers buried reports; governments hesitated to act. By 1945, when Allied forces liberated Bergen-Belsen and Auschwitz, the scale of mechanised murder stunned the world, but by then, it was too late. This historical blindness is often invoked to excuse inaction. "We didn’t know," they said. But today, there is no such defence.
On Monday, the Guardian reported:
Israeli plan for forced transfer of Gaza’s population ‘a blueprint for crimes against humanity’
Military ordered to turn ruins of Rafah into ‘humanitarian city’ but experts call the plan an internment camp for all Palestinians in Gaza
Israel’s defence minister has laid out plans to force all Palestinians in Gaza into a camp on the ruins of Rafah, in a scheme that legal experts and academics described as a blueprint for crimes against humanity.
Israel Katz said he has ordered Israel’s military to prepare for establishing a camp, which he called a “humanitarian city”, on the ruins of the city of Rafah, Haaretz newspaper reported.
Palestinians would go through “security screening” before entering, and once inside would not be allowed to leave, Katz said at a briefing for Israeli journalists.
Israeli forces would control the perimeter of the site and initially “move” 600,000 Palestinians into the area – mostly people currently displaced in the al-Mawasi area.
Eventually the entire population of Gaza would be housed there, and Israel aims to implement “the emigration plan, which will happen”, Haaretz quoted him saying.
Since Donald Trump suggested at the start of the year that large numbers of Palestinians should leave Gaza to “clean out” the strip, Israeli politicians including the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, have enthusiastically promoted forced deportation, often presenting it as a US project.
Israel’s assault on Gaza has killed at least 57,645 Palestinians according to official counts, though the true death toll is catastrophically higher. With over 10,000 bodies still buried under rubble and thousands more missing, independent analysts estimate the actual fatalities likely exceed 150,000, a figure that includes entire families erased from civil records.
Among the dead are more than 20,000 children, many burned alive by US-supplied white phosphorus or crushed in their homes by 2,000-pound bunker-buster bombs. Hospitals, designated as shelters, have been systematically targeted and now serve as mass graves.
“This genocide is in 4k on your telly & your only answer, you're not gonna be able to say I didn't know, the only answer you're gonna be able to give to your kids is I didn't care...”
— The Resonance (@Partisan_12) July 8, 2025
🇮🇪Game Of Thrones Star Liam Cunningham pic.twitter.com/C2ZN3fTT7k
The UN reports that 90% of Gaza's children now suffer acute food deprivation, with Israeli snipers routinely shooting those who approach aid trucks. Unlike the Holocaust, this extermination campaign unfolds before our eyes, journalists document mothers cradling their children's severed limbs, teenagers bleeding to death in gutted streets, and bulldozers piling corpses into anonymous trenches.
These images flood social media in real time, yet Western leaders like Donald Trump, Keir Starmer and Friedrich Merz respond by accelerating weapons shipments to Israel.
The United States, Britain, Germany, and other allies have armed Israel to the teeth. Since October 2023, the Biden and Trump administrations fast-tracked over 100 weapons transfers, including 2,000-pound bunker busters that flatten entire blocks. British-supplied fighter jets bomb UN shelters. German-made tanks crush ambulances. This is not self-defence; it is extermination.
Worse still is the legal cover provided. The US vetoed multiple UN ceasefire resolutions. The ICC’s warrant for Netanyahu was met with outrage from Washington and London, the same capitals that once vowed "Never Again." The hypocrisy is staggering: Putin is a war criminal for Ukraine, but Netanyahu gets a blank cheque.
“If you supply weapons to somebody that is accused of acts of genocide, then you yourself become complicit in those acts as well”
— Nadeem Ahmed (@Muqadaam) July 5, 2025
Retweet if you agree with Corbyn pic.twitter.com/VglGmJfoAM
Some still parrot the fiction of Israeli "self-defence." But no nation has a right to "defend" itself by starving two million people to death, half of them children. No war justifies bombing hospitals, shooting paramedics, or executing entire families.
The International Court of Justice has ruled Israel’s actions a genocide, a finding largely ignored by Western media who still often try to justify Israel's actions by framing Palestinian deaths as "collateral damage." This is not war. It is slaughter. And it is funded by our taxes.
"The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil, but by those who watch them without doing anything." ~ Albert Einstein
What Must Be Done
Silence is complicity. The Holocaust was allowed to happen because the world turned away. Today, we cannot claim ignorance—only cowardice.
2. Streets, Not Petitions: Protests must escalate. General strikes. Blockades. The anti-apartheid movement didn’t win with polite letters.
3. Vote Out the Complicit: Donald Trump, Keir Starmer and Friedrich Merz all are complicit. Support candidates who call for an arms embargo.
4. Amplify Palestinian Voices: Share their testimony. Challenge media bias. The truth is their only weapon.
History will judge this moment harshly. When the next generation asks, "What did you do?" What will you be able to say?
