Omer Bartov, one of the world’s foremost scholars on the holocaust and genocide studies, has said Israel is guilty of “genocide, ethnic-cleansing and annexation” in Gaza. Professor Bartov added that the United States is “totally complicit”. He said Israel faces “a terrible future” and if it does not consciously change it could “implode”.
In a 45-minute interview to Karan Thapar for The Wire, to mark the first anniversary of the start of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, which is on October 7, Bartov said that US President Joe Biden could have insisted in November or December of 2023 that Israel must ceasefire and find a political solution to the crisis in Gaza but he consciously and deliberately refused to do so.
Bartov said if Israel continues the way it has been behaving for the last year it will become “increasingly isolated” and “impoverished”. The people who will suffer the most are the Palestinians who are 50% of the population in the land area that Israel controls. However, Bartov added that the Jewish people will also suffer.
