A New Low in Rhetoric: Marjorie Taylor Greene Calls U.S. Support for Israel ‘Genocide Funding’

By: Fern Sidman

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), a lawmaker who has built her brand on provocation and incendiary statements, once again drew widespread condemnation this past weekend after publishing a social media post accusing Israel of committing “genocide” in Gaza with U.S. taxpayer funds. Her remarks, delivered in a lengthy thread on X (formerly Twitter), reflect a troubling departure from bipartisan consensus on U.S.–Israel relations, and as Israel National News (INN) reported on Sunday, her comments come within a broader pattern of conspiratorial and inflammatory rhetoric targeting Israel and Jews.

In her weekend post, Greene drew a clumsy analogy intended to elicit empathy for Gaza residents. She asked her followers to imagine if Americans were bombed “day and night” because of their government’s actions, only for the world to justify civilian suffering on the grounds that citizens are responsible for their government. “This is what is happening to Gaza,” she wrote, before claiming that “many innocent people and children are being killed” who “are not Hamas.”

Greene continued: “Does Hamas deserve it? Yes. Do innocent people and children deserve it? No.” She then accused Americans of displaying selective compassion—mourning the victims of Hamas’s October 7 massacre while allegedly ignoring civilian suffering in Gaza.

Finally, she targeted U.S. military aid to Israel, emphasizing the longstanding $3.8 billion annual package: “US taxpayers fund Israel $3.8 billion annually for military aid. That means every U.S. taxpayer is contributing to Israel’s military actions. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to pay for genocide in a foreign country against a foreign people for a foreign war that I had nothing to do with.”

The INN report observed that this is not Greene’s first foray into such rhetoric. Only weeks earlier, she accused Israel of committing “genocide” and presiding over “starvation” in Gaza, conflating legitimate military efforts to dismantle Hamas’s terrorist infrastructure with crimes against humanity.

The invocation of genocide carries heavy moral and historical weight. As INN reported, genocide is a crime defined under international law as the intentional destruction of a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group in whole or in part. Israel’s military campaign, directed against Hamas—an internationally designated terrorist organization that openly calls for Israel’s annihilation—does not meet this definition.

By accusing Israel of genocide, Greene engages in what INN characterized as a dangerous inversion of reality. Hamas not only seeks Israel’s physical destruction but also embeds its command centers, weapons stockpiles, and tunnel networks in civilian neighborhoods, deliberately endangering Palestinian lives. The tragic civilian toll in Gaza is a direct result of Hamas’s strategy of using civilians as shields, a fact repeatedly documented by both Israeli and international observers.

Greene’s rhetoric, therefore, not only maligns Israel’s defensive actions but also trivializes actual genocides—from the Holocaust to Rwanda—diluting the term for cheap political effect.

Greene’s recent outburst cannot be viewed in isolation. Her public record demonstrates a disturbing pattern of hostility toward Jews and Israel.

As the INN report indicated, in 2018 Greene posted a bizarre conspiracy theory on Facebook accusing the Rothschild family—a longstanding target of antisemitic tropes—of starting California wildfires using a laser from space. The claim, absurd on its face, nonetheless recycled centuries-old myths about Jewish financial and technological manipulation.

In 2021, Greene compared a supermarket’s decision to place logos on badges of vaccinated workers to the yellow stars forced upon Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe. The analogy was widely condemned as trivializing the Holocaust. Though Greene later visited the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and issued an apology, the incident reinforced concerns about her judgment and her willingness to exploit Jewish suffering for rhetorical gain.

Now, by accusing Israel of genocide, Greene continues this trajectory, positioning herself as a leading American voice for the delegitimization of the Jewish state.

A central pillar of Greene’s argument is that American taxpayers are footing the bill for Israeli atrocities. Yet as the INN report clarified, the U.S.–Israel security assistance package is not a discretionary slush fund but a carefully structured agreement designed to maintain Israel’s qualitative military edge in a region dominated by hostile regimes and terror networks.

The $3.8 billion figure, codified in a 10-year memorandum of understanding signed during the Obama administration, primarily supports joint military projects and defensive systems such as Iron Dome. This missile-defense shield has intercepted thousands of rockets aimed at Israeli population centers, saving countless lives—including, paradoxically, Palestinian civilians in Gaza, since many Hamas rockets fall short and land within the Strip.

Greene’s depiction of this aid as underwriting “genocide” fundamentally misrepresents its purpose and impact, weaponizing fiscal debates to promote anti-Israel narratives.

Perhaps most glaringly, Greene’s post minimized or relativized Hamas’s atrocities on October 7, 2023. That day, as INN has reported, Hamas terrorists murdered more than 1,200 Israelis, raped women, mutilated bodies, and abducted over 250 people into Gaza. The massacre was the deadliest single-day assault on Jews since the Holocaust.

By shifting focus to alleged Israeli “genocide” while acknowledging Hamas’s culpability only in passing, Greene obscures the asymmetry of this conflict: Israel is a democracy fighting for survival, while Hamas is a jihadist organization committed to extermination. To equate the two—or worse, to shift the moral burden onto Israel—is to engage in false moral equivalence.

Greene’s views do not reflect the mainstream of American politics. As INN reported, the House of Representatives decisively rejected her amendment earlier this year that sought to cut $500 million from Israel aid. Even among lawmakers critical of specific Israeli policies, support for the U.S.–Israel alliance remains robust.

Her insistence on casting Israel as a genocidal aggressor not only isolates her from both parties but also risks legitimizing fringe voices that seek to dismantle the U.S.–Israel partnership altogether.

The consequences of Greene’s rhetoric extend far beyond congressional debates. As the INN report has warned, high-profile statements accusing Israel of genocide embolden antisemitic movements worldwide, providing propaganda for Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran. They also stoke hostility toward Jews in the U.S., where antisemitic incidents have surged since October 7.

When a sitting member of Congress amplifies such accusations, they are laundered into mainstream discourse, no longer confined to the margins of social media or extremist rallies. The result is a normalization of anti-Israel rhetoric that corrodes bipartisan support and emboldens those who seek Israel’s destruction.

Marjorie Taylor Greene’s latest attack on Israel is more than a policy disagreement. It is a reckless, inflammatory, and dangerous distortion of reality. Her accusations of genocide invert the truth, ignore Hamas’s genocidal intent, and weaponize taxpayer debates to malign the Jewish state.

Her long history of antisemitic conspiracy theories—from Rothschild lasers to Holocaust trivializations—provides the backdrop against which her current rhetoric must be judged. Greene is not engaging in legitimate criticism of Israeli policy; she is trafficking in propaganda that undermines U.S. foreign policy, emboldens Israel’s enemies, and fuels antisemitism at home.

At a time when Israel faces existential threats, American leadership should project clarity, solidarity, and moral seriousness. Greene offers none of these. Instead, she has chosen the path of demagoguery, cynically deploying the language of genocide to score political points at the expense of truth, history, and the safety of the Jewish people.