Why the World Believes Lies About Israel

Genocide, apartheid, colonialism—these words represent some of the greatest evils of modern history. And not only is Israel being accused of them, many people are actually believing these horrific charges, despite the clear evidence to the contrary.

The following should be self-evident:

Israel is not committing genocide.

Genocide is defined by the UN as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.” If Israel intended to eliminate Palestinians, it could have done so long ago. Gaza is a small, heavily surveilled territory—only 140 square miles. Instead, Israel takes unprecedented measures to avoid civilian casualties: warning civilians through leaflets, phone calls, and “roof-knocking” before strikes. Its efforts in urban warfare to protect noncombatants outpace those of any other modern army.

Israel is not an apartheid state.

“Apartheid” describes South Africa’s former system of legally enshrined racial segregation. In contrast, Israel's 20% Arab minority has full citizenship and equal rights. Arabs serve in the Knesset, on the Supreme Court, and in the military. Yes, there are societal challenges and inequalities—as in all democracies—but to call this apartheid is a gross distortion.

And in a painful twist of irony, the opposite is true in Gaza.

Hamas openly calls for and attempts genocide against Jews. On October 7, 2023, Hamas launched a barbaric assault: murdering 1,200 Israelis, wounding over 3,000, raping women, burning families alive, and kidnapping 251 innocent people. The world barely blinked before accusing Israel of wrongdoing for responding. Since then, Hamas has fired thousands of rockets aimed at Jewish civilians.

Meanwhile, Hamas's Gaza is an actual apartheid state. Jews and Christians are persecuted. Gays are executed. Political dissidents are murdered. Women are killed for being raped.

These facts are not hard to discover, yet the lies spread—relentlessly, globally—from elite universities to mass protests in the streets.

Why Believe Blatant Lies?

How can thoughtful, educated people—professors, journalists, UN officials, human rights activists—believe and propagate such blatant distortions?

For centuries, antisemitism has cloaked itself in the language of justice, virtue, and moral outrage.

How did Hamas know that the world would back them, rather than demand their surrender and support Israel’s right to self-defense?

Sadly, none of this is new. For centuries, antisemitism has cloaked itself in the language of justice, virtue, and moral outrage.

• During the Black Plague (1348–1351), Jews were blamed for poisoning wells—despite zero evidence—and entire communities were massacred.
• For centuries, both Christians and Muslims spread the blood libel, accusing Jews of murdering Christian children for ritual purposes. This led to mass killings from Norwich (1144) to Damascus (1840).
• In Nazi Germany, one of the world’s most educated societies embraced the lie that Jews were a parasitic race plotting global domination. The result: six million murdered, including 1.5 million children—often by neighbors they had lived beside for decades.
• Following the crucifixion of Jesus, Jews were collectively blamed for his death in perpetuity—a charge that led to pogroms, forced conversions, and expulsions for nearly two millennia.

The pattern is clear: Antisemitic lies don’t need to be true, they just need to sound good. Rationality has never been enough to stop the hate.

Modern Blood Libel

Today, the lies wear the mask of “human rights.”

People claim to care about Palestinian lives. So does Israel. Every innocent life matters. But where is the moral clarity that this war is Hamas’s responsibility?

Hamas started the war. It embeds itself in civilian areas, builds tunnels under homes and hospitals, fires rockets from schoolyards, and uses its own people as human shields—all war crimes.

Hamas’s charter (1988, reaffirmed in 2017) explicitly calls for Israel’s destruction and frames its campaign as an Islamic holy war. They don’t attempt to hide this fact. This is not a movement for coexistence. It is a jihadist death cult, fueled by billions in foreign aid, determined to sacrifice its own people for propaganda wins. And they vow to do it again until Israel is destroyed.

Why do liberal pundits whitewash this and pretend they just want a state in the West Bank and Gaza?

Has there ever been a mass terror attack anywhere else that was openly justified by the liberal West?

So why is it that liberal pundits, human rights groups, and elite institutions rush to justify Hamas’s actions and give credibility to blatant lies, while portraying Israel as the villain?

Jew-Hatred in New Clothing

The answer: This is classic antisemitism.

It’s not confusion about the facts that creates antisemitism, it’s antisemitism which blinds people to the facts.

It’s Jew-hatred dressed in new clothes. No longer shouted with swastikas and SS uniforms, antisemitism now appears in:

• Human rights slogans.
• Academic lectures.
• Anti-Zionist protest signs.

But the essence remains the same:

• It dehumanizes Jews.
• It distorts reality to justify hate.
• It dismisses Jewish suffering and brands Jewish self-defense as aggression.
• It makes violence against Jews feel righteous—whether in Sderot, Paris, London, or Colorado.

Philosophers, psychologists, and historians have all tried to explain the persistence of antisemitism.

But the reasons never matter as much as the results.

History shows: no matter how absurd the accusation, no matter how educated the audience, the outcome is the same.

We comfort ourselves with the belief that people are reasonable. That the truth will win out. That this can’t happen again.

But it can.

And when it does—it kills.

And we must stop believing that irrational hatred will somehow spare us. Because history teaches, again and again: it won’t.

This frightening realization causes a kind of cognitive dissonance. We want to believe in the goodness of humanity, but hasn’t our history taught us otherwise?

Hated For Who We Are

Jews are one of the oldest peoples on earth. We’ve given the world more than our numbers could ever justify—monotheism, ethics, prophets, literature, science, medicine, and law. We’ve survived exiles, slavery, pogroms, and genocide.

And still, we are hated.

Not for what we do. But for who we are.

We must continue to speak the truth—even if only for ourselves.

We must protect our people.

And we must stop believing that the irrationality of hatred will somehow spare us. Because history teaches, again and again: it won’t.

We can’t allow the world’s distortion of who we are to weaken our pride in who we truly are. Instead, we need to deepen our connection to Jewish life, wisdom, and community.

Our history is not only one of persecution, but of purpose. Let us respond not with fear, but with faith and strength—by living openly, proudly, and fully as Jews.