One of the most troubling threats to civil society—and Jewish safety—in the United States is the propagation of the false accusation of genocide against Israel. The genocide libel, which has been leveled at Israel for decades, has done more than legitimize violence against Israel before and after the October 7 massacre. It has also legitimized open hostility against Jews living in the Diaspora.
People who, in previous eras, would have been reluctant to expose themselves as antisemites now express open support for terror organizations and shamelessly express their contempt for Israel and Jews.
People who, in previous eras, would have been reluctant to expose themselves as antisemites now express open support for terror organizations and shamelessly express their contempt for Israel and Jews—all in the name of “peace and justice” or faux concern for the Palestinians.
This is particularly true in Dearborn, Michigan, where open support for Hamas and Hezbollah, terrorist organizations that have killed thousands of Israelis and American citizens over the past few decades, is not uncommon. For example, Dearborn newspaper publisher Osama Siblani, once expressed a willingness to be arrested for his support for Hezbollah and has used his newspaper, The Arab American News, to legitimize the October 7 massacre. And when a local pastor condemned Wayne County officials for naming a busy intersection after Siblani, Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud called the pastor an “Islamophobe” and said he was not welcome in the city.
The genocide lie served as the central component of a public ceremony in Dearborn, where city officials and elected representatives unveiled an outdoor art installation called the “Wall of Tears” which purports to list the names of all the children killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023. The city used its taxpayer-funded website to promote the event and quote Mayor Hammoud as follows:
Similar rhetoric was evident at the unveiling of the display on June 11, 2026. During the ceremony, Mayor Hammoud and U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Michigan) invoked the word “genocide” seven times while describing Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, with the mayor declaring that a genocide was still “unfolding in 2026.”
Congresswoman Tlaib repeatedly framed U.S. policy as the primary enabler of an “awful horrific genocide.” Hammoud declared, “Our U.S. tax dollars should not go on to fund bombs that are being dropped by the Israeli government to decimate and murder children day in and day out.”
Of course, at no point during the event did anyone acknowledge the systematic falsehoods that accompany the genocide slur, nor the role that Iran and Hamasplayed in starting the war that cost Palestinian and Israeli lives.
Phil Buehler, the artist who created the display, provided Dearborn officials with a ready-made public platform for advancing the charge of Israeli genocide by highlighting the thousands of children who have died in Gaza since the 2023 massacre without acknowledging that these deaths would not have taken place if Hamas hadn’t attacked Israel on October 7. With his artwork and his talk at the unveiling during which he said he felt close to the Palestinian people, Buehler did the bidding of the now-dead Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who said civilian deaths in Gaza were “necessary sacrifices” and that “We have the Israelis right where we want them” as a result of the deaths of noncombattants in Gaza.
Hammoud’s Longtime Habit
The unveiling wasn’t the first time Hammoud leveled the accusation of genocide at Israel. In a February 2024 New York Times guest essay, Hammoud wrote that the inhabitants of his city have been unable to sleep “after 130 days of genocide in Gaza,” adding that “the phrase has taken on new meaning.” He went on to assert that U.S. support for Israel’s military campaign enabled the slaughter of relatives of his constituents.
On October 8, 2024— one year and a day after the October 7 massacre—Mayor Abdullah Hammoud affirmed an anti-Israel divestment resolution that the Dearborn City Council had approved the previous week. During the meeting, he expressed his condolences to local residents who had lost loved ones during the war, declaring that “the bombardment, the genocide, and the ongoing war that seems to be expanding,” and adding that “what is occurring is apartheid and is occupation and what has happening is against all international law.” The allegation of “genocide” was levelled at Israel more than 20 times during the meeting, with, of course, little if any reference to the crimes committed by Hamas a year and a day before.
The upshot is that Jews are not safe in Dearborn and the surrounding towns. And rather than calming the atmosphere, Mayor Hammoud’s rhetoric has only contributed to the hatred.
All of this rhetoric has had a huge impact on the attitudes of non-Muslims living in the Dearborn area—Jews especially—according to local activist Anthony Deegan. “I’ve been told by many Jews that they are actually terrified to come to Dearborn. They do not want to come [to the city] at all,” Deegan said.
There’s good reason for Jews to be afraid. On March 12, 2026, the rhetoric put forth by Hammoud and his allies found expression in West Bloomfield, Michigan, when Ayman Mohamad Ghazali, a Lebanese-born resident of neighboring Dearborn Heights, carried out a targeted vehicle-ramming attack on Temple Israel. The FBI described it as a “targeted act of violence against the Jewish community.”
Ghazali waited more than two hours in the parking lot before driving a truck packed with fireworks and flammable liquids into the building and down a hallway. Security guards exchanged gunfire with him; his vehicle caught fire; and he ultimately died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. A security guard was injured and 140 young children attending school in the building escaped unharmed thanks to security training and rapid response.
This attack, which could have resulted in the deaths of dozens of young Jews, followed months in which Dearborn’s political leadership normalized the language of “genocide,” celebrated pro-terrorist figures, and treated any warning about the dangers of that rhetoric as bigotry.
The upshot is that Jews are not safe in Dearborn and the surrounding towns. And rather than calming the atmosphere, Mayor Hammoud’s rhetoric has only contributed to the hatred.
