US State Department can’t explain why it’s Russian ‘genocide’ but an Israeli ‘situation’

When is a genocide not a genocide? If you’re the US State Department, the determination of what to label a ‘genocide’ depends entirely on how fashionable it is, rather than any actual numbers or intent. State Department Deputy Spokesman Vedant Patel was on the unfortunate end of a rather rare sight on the Hill: a journalist asking an unexpected and difficult question. As the subject turned to the recent Israeli government whitepaper discussing the forced relocation (or worse) of the Gazan population, a journalist asked ‘what metric are you using to determine genocide?’ Patel tried to dismiss the line of questioning by defining away the problem. ‘That is not a term that we have assessed pertains to this current conflict. We are of course monitoring the evolving situation.’

Not taking a non-answer for answer, the journalist pressed. ‘President Biden has accused the Russian government of genocide for its actions in Ukraine where in two years, it has killed as many civilians as Israel has killed in one month in the Gaza Strip. So how do you account for that disparity where you're assisting one country and accusing the other of genocide when the country you're assisting has systematically killed so many more people in one month?’

The answer is, of course ‘double standards,’ but saying so would be admitting the Biden administration actually has standards. Instead, Patel immediately accused the journalist of interrupting him, before giving the biggest non-answer you’ll ever non-hear. ‘Those circumstances are totally and completely not the same. And to make a comparison like that, candidly is incredibly uh uh uh inappropriate.’ Those ‘uhs’ are in the official transcript, by the way. Patel then reeled off the pre prepared answer to the question he wished he’d been asked instead.

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