Cide has a Latin and French derivation and is used in terms such as regicide, matricide, patricide, algicde, fungicide, avicide, parricide, avicide and homicide which all describe types of killing or destruction of humans, animals and biological material.
The word “genocide” was first coined by Polish lawyer Raphäel Lemkin in 1944 in his book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe. It consists of the Greek prefix genos, meaning race or tribe, and the Latin suffix cide, meaning killing. Lemkin developed the term partly in response to the Nazi policies of systematic murder of Jewish people during the Holocaust, but also in response to previous instances in history of targeted actions aimed at the destruction of particular groups of people. Later on, Raphäel Lemkin led the campaign to have genocide recognised and codified as an international crime.
Given the use of the examples above of cide it is surprising that the use of genocide has been used by so many to describe their hatred of Jews. So rather than saying "I hate Jews" which certainly is impolite, using genocide to describe the war with Hamas in Gaza provides cover for university students, journalists and others who mask their Jew hatred by minimising the atrocious acts of 7/10 against innocent youth at a music festival and families in kibbutzim in Israel.
Genocide as a description befitting its actual meaning is at risk of meaning nothing. Zach Goldberg, a Research Faculty member at Florida State University’s Institute for Governance and Civics (IGC) has written a research paper on "How the Media Manufactured a ‘Genocide’" in which he explains its current use by media outlets describing Israel's war in Gaza as genocide, including the Guardian and Associated Press as exceeding the use in the genocides each outlet used in documented genocides including Rwanda, Darfur, Bosnia, Myanmar and the Yazidis. He also explains surges in other popular terms such as racist and racism and white supremacy and provides a chart which shows the surges being consistent with the politics of the day.
The New York Times "pairing Israel and genocide reached levels more than nine times higher than the peak for Rwanda. The Guardian references Israel and Genocide in more than 1 percent of all articles."
Privileged and presumably rich studnts at elite universities in Australia and the USA protesting the Gaza war have used the word genocide in describing Israel's destruction of Hamas which has resulted in civilan deaths.
How is it that so many educated people could be induced in using a word to describe what Israel is doing by fighting Hamas? Are those using the term Dishonest, Deceptive, Deceived or Dumb?
Dishonesty requires an assumption that people can distinguish a genocide from defensive action to fight an enemy. If you use the term and you know that a genocide is the deliberate destruction of groups of people then you are an anti semite promoting Jew hatred.
Deception suggests you recruit others to your cause by invoking a word that means something it clearly does not, accuse the object of your hatred in recruiting others, knowing that if this was a genocide the destruction of the people of Gaza would have been completed much sooner.
Or maybe you are one of the elite university students, smart enough to go to university but you have been deceived by the deceivers. You haven't done any reading of history, but been motivated by emotional responses to war activities and believed what you have been fed. Hopefully your university professors will be kind to you if that is the way you approach your assignments and exams.
Finally you may be just plain dumb. Dumb as defined in the Coillins dictionary meaning stupid or foolish. More to be pitied but carried away with the need to belong so you just follow the crowd. Whether a university student or a professor you wouldn't let your intelligence get in the way of joining a good protes or hating the Jews. You are in good company historically. As Jewish writers have asked, how could a country like Germany, cultured, educated, advanced in so many ways allow the persecution and deaths of so many of its citizens who identified as German citizens.
For thse comfortable using the word genocide, can you read some history? The rates of civilan deaths in Gaza is not to minimise the deaths of its civilians but as the Mid East Journal notes in its paper "Bloodbath? The Ratio of Civilian Casualties in the Gaza War" the civilian casualty ratio and the rate per bomb droped is low in comparison to previous armed conflicts.
So to those who have drunk the genocide kool aid, rouse yourselves from your stupor, read some history and understand that what is happening in Gaza is far from genocide.
