Russia Says Israel Has Forgotten Lessons of the Holocaust

Consortium News
Volume 30, Number 221 — Sunday, August 10, 2025


Russia Says Israel Has Forgotten Lessons of the Holocaust


Russia’s deputy representative to the United Nations told the Security Council on Sunday that Israel is putting “Palestinians in ghettos” and seeks their “complete annihilation.”


By Joe Lauria
Special to Consortium News




Dmitry A. Polyanskiy, Russia’s deputy permanent representative at the U.N., laid into Israel at an emergency Security Council meeting on Sunday (1:50.29), accusing Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Sa’ar, of shedding “crocodile tears” about the Israeli hostages and charging Tel Aviv with forgetting the lessons of the Holocaust by seeking the “annihilation” of the Palestinian people in Gaza.

The meeting was called in response to the Israel’s intention to occupy all of Gaza City and expel its roughly 800,00 inhabitants. Polyanskiy told the council:


“We firmly condemn the Netanyahu government’s intention to seize Gaza. Unfortunately, West Jerusalem has once again heeded neither the appeals of the global majority nor the voices of reason within Israel, nor the calls from the relatives of the hostages. … It turns out that the Israeli foreign minister – who was among us here on August 5, hypocritically shedding crocodile tears over the fate of the Israeli hostages – already knew then that the Israeli cabinet was about to take such a decision which would essentially rule out any possibility of the hostages returning home alive.

Apparently, Mr. Saar was seeking to lay the groundwork for such a decision through creating a required media image of solidarity and sympathy among UNSC members only to continue killing Palestinians. Such an attempt to manipulate the Security Council for internal Israeli purposes is simply beyond comprehension! Nor can one comprehend how the Jewish people, who endured the Holocaust during World War II, can today put Palestinians in ghettos and seek their complete annihilation… How quickly one forgets the lessons of history!”

Dmitry Polyanskiy, Russia’s deputy representative at the Security Council on Sunday. (U.N. TV Screenshot)


Genocide, Genocide, Genocide

Riyad Mansour, Palestine’s U.N. envoy, told the council: “Israel is killing Palestine in Gaza. … We owe them to act now to stop this genocide.” He said, “Your actions today will determine the fate of millions of people tomorrow, at least those who would have survived by then, and the fate of our region for generations to come,” and he questioned, “How on earth is Israel still allowed to sit around this table?”

Somalia’s deputy representative Mohamed Rabi Yusuf called the plan to take over Gaza City “a chilling blueprint for the next chapter of devastation.” For 2 million people trapped in Gaza, it means the “escalation of what has already become hell on earth, literally and figuratively, leading to the world’s worst man-made famine.” The current moment, he said, is “a test for all of humanity.” Silence “is not neutrality. For all the victims, it is a verdict.”

Algeria’s envoy Amar Bendjama accused Israel of “war crimes, and those who draw their maps in blood must not walk in the shadow of impunity.” He told the council: “What we are witnessing is not erratic. It is methodical. Call it what it is. Genocide. Genocide. Genocide.”

US Denies, Denies, Denies

The acting U.S. representative, Dorothy Shea, echoed the extremist Israeli cabinet’s rhetoric by denying Israel is committing genocide and blaming Hamas for starvation in Gaza. She said:

“It is unfortunate that members have again taken advantage of today’s meeting to accuse Israel of genocide. These accusations are politically motivated and categorically false. They are part of a deliberate, cynical propaganda campaign as Hamas attempts to win symbolic victories to compensate for total defeat in war. The United States refutes these allegations entirely. Israel has taken numerous measures to limit harm to civilians and to address humanitarian needs. The loss of civilian life in Gaza is tragic, but the responsibility for this rests with Hamas.”

Joe Lauria is editor-in-chief of Consortium News and a former U.N. correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, and other newspapers, including The Montreal Gazette, the London Daily Mail and The Star of Johannesburg. He was an investigative reporter for the Sunday Times of London, a financial reporter for Bloomberg News and began his professional work as a 19-year old stringer for The New York Times. He is the author of two books, A Political Odyssey, with Sen. Mike Gravel, foreword by Daniel Ellsberg; and How I Lost By Hillary Clinton, foreword by Julian Assange.

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The thick-skinned brazenness of the wankees in defending the shailok perpetrators of the genocide in Gaza is staggeringly unbelievable. Such devotion to another country smacks of blind idolism or dark enchantment by the Witch of Endor