A growing number of experts, including two respected Israeli NGOs and a genocide scholar, have recently determined that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has challenged these allegations, asserting that if Israel wanted to commit genocide, “We could have done the Dresden bombing on them, but we don’t because that’s not the way we conduct war.”

Netanyahu’s invocation of the February 1945 firebombing of Dresden is presumably meant to create a stark contrast to an episode that represents a nonpareil example of excessive wartime devastation. But the dreadful reality is that Israel effectively has “done the Dresden bombing” in the course of its military campaign in Gaza.