A “Campaign with a Genocidal Logic”: A Holocaust Historian on Israel’s Destruction of Gaza

In this interview with the Frankfurter Rundschau journalist Michael Hesse, the Holocaust historian Omer Bartov discusses the misleading characterizations of the Hamas attack of October 7 and the nature of Israel’s military operation in Gaza. Exposing the political reasons for depicting the massacre by Hamas as a pogrom and its operatives as Nazis, Bartov speaks to the manner in which invocations of the Holocaust resonate in Israel, the United States, and Israel; comments on the use of allegations of antisemitism to silent criticism of Israel; and explains why, to his mind, the IDF is implementing a genocidal policy in Gaza.