The US is complicit in genocide. Let's stop pretending otherwise

The Guardian

3 days ago

Can we finally stop pretending that what we have been witnessing in Gaza over the past 22 months is a 'war,' a 'conflict,' or even a 'humanitarian crisis'? Many of the world's leading human rights and humanitarian groups – including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and Doctors Without Borders – agreed months ago that what is being livestreamed to our phones on a daily basis is indeed a genocide.
This week, Israel's own leading human rights group announced that it had reached 'the unequivocal conclusion that Israel is taking coordinated action to intentionally destroy Palestinian society in the Gaza Strip'. In other words, said B'Tselem, 'Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip'.
The debate over whether or not Gaza is a genocide is, effectively, over. So can we now also stop pretending that we are mere bystanders to this genocide? That our sin is one only of omission rather than commission? Because the inconvenient truth is that the US has not just looked the other way, as tens of thousands of Palestinians have been besieged and bombed, starved and slaughtered, but helped Israel pull the trigger. We have been complicit in this genocide, which is itself a crime under article III of the Genocide convention.
As retired Israeli Maj Gen Yitzhak Brick acknowledged in November 2023: 'All of our missiles, the ammunition, the precision-guided bombs, all the airplanes and bombs, it's all from the US. The minute they turn off the tap, you can't keep fighting. You have no capability … Everyone understands that we can't fight this war without the United States. Period.'
In fact, given Brick's assessment, I would argue that what we have witnessed in Gaza from the US government is worse than complicity. It is active participation in an ongoing genocide.
Donald Trump has given Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, and his far-right government not only the green light to 'clean out' Gaza and 'finish the job', but also the arms, intel and funds to do so. When Netanyahu launched his blockade of all food and aid going into Gaza in March, he emphasized it was done 'in full coordination with President Trump and his people'. 'Over the past six months,' Axios reported in late July, 'Trump has given Netanyahu an almost free hand to do whatever he wants in Gaza.' An Israeli official told the site: 'In most calls and meetings Trump told Bibi: 'Do what you have to do in Gaza.''
Trump's Republican allies in the House and Senate are even more gung-ho. Forget complicity; Congress is filled with GOP cheerleaders for genocide, from Senators Tom 'bounce the rubble in Gaza' Cotton to Lindsey 'level the place' Graham. The newest member of the House, Randy Fine, a Republican representative of Florida, has called for the nuking of Gaza and said just days ago that Palestinians in Gaza should 'starve away' until the Israeli hostages are all released. (A reminder that incitement to genocide is also a crime under Article III of the Genocide convention.)
But we cannot let Democrats off the hook either. The first 16 months of this mass slaughter unfolded on a Democratic president's watch. From the get-go, Joe Biden gave Netanyahu and his cabinet of génocidaires everything they needed – 2,000-lb bombs to drop on refugee camps filled with Palestinian children? Check. UN security council vetoes to prevent the passage of resolutions calling for a permanent ceasefire? Check. The burial of internal US government reports warning of war crimes and famine in Gaza? Check.
It wasn't just Biden. The vast majority of Democrats in Congress spent much of 2024 casting vote after vote to keep arming, funding and whitewashing the mass killing of Palestinian civilians. Even now, in the summer of 2025, seven high-profile Democratic senators were happy to take a smiling photo with Netanyahu, including the Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer, who claims talk of genocide is antisemitic and says his job 'is to keep the left pro-Israel'.
Then there is the US media's complicity in this genocide. It isn't just the Radio Rwanda wannabes over at Fox, where the morning host Brian Kilmeade has said it was hard 'to separate the Palestinians from Hamas' and the primetime host Jesse Watters has said 'no one wants' Palestinian refugees and 'demographically [Palestinians] are a threat'.
There are also genocide enablers in the liberal media. Those who repeatedly insist Israelis have a right to defend themselves while never asking whether Palestinians do. Those who parrot Israeli government talking points while sanitizing the violence inflicted on Gaza. Palestinians, remember, are not killed by Israeli bombs or bullets; they just 'die.'
US newsrooms have bent over backwards to present 'both sides,' even when one side has been deemed genocidal by some of the world's leading scholars on genocide. The New York Times, per an internal memo obtained by the Intercept, instructed journalists covering Gaza to limit the use of the terms 'genocide' and 'ethnic cleansing' and to 'avoid' using the phrase 'occupied territory' when referring to the West Bank and Gaza.
One study of media coverage, also published by the Intercept, found that 'highly emotive terms for the killing of civilians like 'slaughter', 'massacre', and 'horrific' were reserved almost exclusively for Israelis who were killed by Palestinians, rather than the other way around'. Another study, published in the Nation, found that 'with one exception the Sunday shows covered and debated [Gaza] for 12 months without speaking to a single Palestinian or Palestinian American'.
Go beyond the media. Elite US institutions are also disgracefully complicit in the annihilation of Gaza, from the Ivy League universities that punished anti-genocide protesters on campus; to the white-shoe law firms that disqualified anti-genocide applicants for jobs; to the big tech companies accused by a UN special rapporteur of profiting from the genocide.
Most Americans, of course, don't want to believe that our country is helping commit one of the 21st century's worst atrocities. But, again, we must stop pretending. Our complicity and collusion are clear. As my Zeteo colleague Spencer Ackerman has written: 'This is an American genocide as much as it is an Israeli one.'
The US supplied and then resupplied the bombs and bullets used to kill tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians; the US facilitated the destruction of homes and hospitals; the US signed off on the starvation of children. These are the undeniable facts.
And so to the Biden and Trump administrations, to Democrats and Republicans in Congress, to the US media, I say this: history will judge you. For the bombs you sent, the votes you cast, the lies you told. This will be your shameful legacy when the dust finally settles in Gaza, when all of the bodies have been pulled from the rubble. Not defending your ally or fighting terrorism, but non-stop complicity in a genocide; aiding and abetting the crime of crimes.
Mehdi Hasan is the founder, CEO and editor-in-chief of the media company Zeteo.