Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., alleged at the Munich Security Conference on Friday that U.S. aid to the Jewish state enabled a genocide against Israel. AOC’s attack on the Jewish state in Munich unfolded in the birthplace of Adolf Hitler’s Nazi movement that carried out the worst genocide in human history.

AOC’s assault on Israel’s war campaign to defeat the U.S. and EU-designated terrorist movement in the Gaza Strip sparked outrage and intense criticism from academic military and Middle East experts.

During the town hall event in Munich, the Squad member said, “To me, this isn’t just about a presidential election. Personally, I think that the United States has an obligation to uphold its own laws, particularly the Leahy laws. And I think that personally, that the idea of completely unconditional aid, no matter what one does, does not make sense. I think it enabled a genocide in Gaza. And I think that we have thousands of women and children dead that don’t, that was completely avoidable.”

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She continued, “And, so I believe that enforcement of our own laws through the Leahy laws, which requires conditioning aid in any circumstance, when you see gross human rights violations, is appropriate.”

The Leahy Laws prohibit the Department of Defense and the State Department from funding “foreign security force units when there is credible information that the unit has committed a ‘gross violation of human rights.” Former Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-VT., introduced the bill in 1997.

Tom Gross, an expert on international affairs, told Fox News digital that “AOC has flown all the way to Munich — infamous as the city in which Hitler staged his Nazi Beer Hall Putsch that marked the beginning of the road to the Holocaust — in order to smear the Jewish people further with a phony genocide allegation.”

Gross added, “Such preposterous allegations of ‘genocide’ form the bedrock of modern antisemitic incitement against Jews in the U.S. and globally. This shocking ignorance and insensitivity by Ocasio-Cortez should rule her out of any potential presidential bid or other high office.”

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Military experts and genocide researchers have debunked the allegation that Israel carried out a genocide against Palestinians during its self-defense war against the Hamas terrorist organization that started after Hamas terrorists attacked communities in parts of southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023 that saw over 1200 Israeli and foreign nationals killed and 251 brutally kidnapped and taken into Gaza by Hamas and other terrorists.

Danny Orbach, a military historian from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and co-author of “Debunking the Genocide Allegations: A Reexamination of the Israel-Hamas War from October 7 2023, to June 1, 2025,” told Fox News Digital that Ocasio-Cortez accusation that Israel committed genocide is an “accusation that is incorrect both factually and legally. Under the Genocide Convention, genocide requires proof of a special intent to destroy a protected group, in whole or in part, and as a baseline condition, an active effort to maximize civilian destruction.

“The evidence shows the opposite: as demonstrated in our multi-author study Debunking the Genocide Allegations, Israel undertook unprecedented measures to mitigate civilian harm, including establishing humanitarian safe zones that independently verified data show were approximately six times safer than other areas of Gaza.”

Orbach added, “Israel also issued detailed advance warnings before strikes and facilitated the entry of over two million tons of humanitarian aid, often at significant cost to its own military advantage, including the loss of surprise and the sustainment of an enemy during wartime.”

He concluded, “These measures were taken despite Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre, its systematic use of human shields and hospitals for military purposes, and a tunnel network exceeding 1,000 kilometers — an operational challenge without historical precedent. Finally, no credible evidence demonstrates the kind of unambiguous, exclusive genocidal intent toward Palestinians that international law requires and that cannot be reasonably interpreted otherwise.”

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The conservative commentator Derek Hunter posted on X. “Imagine going to Germany to complain about a fake genocide by Jews…in Munich, of all places. @AOC is about as smart as clogged toilet.”

In Dec. 2024, Germany joined the U.S. in rejecting the allegations that Israel committed genocide in Gaza.

The “extermination” of the Palestinian people must end, the chairman of the African Union Commission, Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, has said, as dozens of heads of state gather for the regional body’s 39th summit in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.

“In the Middle East, Palestine and the suffering of its people also challenge our consciences. The extermination of this people must stop,” said Youssouf, who was elected to head the institution a year ago, declared on Saturday.

The annual meeting is expected to focus on ruinous wars and security in the region as well as governance challenges around the world, threats to democracy and climate change, including water sanitation and water‑linked climate shocks.

“International law and international humanitarian law are the basis of the international community,” Youssouf added, as he called for the lifting of the Israeli blockade of humanitarian goods into the besieged Palestinian territory.

Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza has killed at least 72,045 people and wounded 171,686 since October 2023, and continues despite a “ceasefire”.

Youssouf also touched on the multiple conflicts raging in Africa, calling for the “silencing of the guns” across the continent.

“From Sudan to the Sahel, to eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), in Somalia and elsewhere, our people continue to pay the heavy price of instability,” Youssouf said.

The summit brings together heads of state from the 55 member states of the African Union over two days.

In his speech at the summit, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres praised the AU as a “flagship for multilateralism” at a time of global “division and mistrust”.

Guterres also called for a permanent African seat in the UN Security Council, saying its absence is “indefensible”.

“This is 2026, not 1946. Whatever decisions about the African World around the table, Africa must be at the table,” he declared.

This year’s theme is water sanitation.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed highlighted the issue of water conservation on the continent, as he welcomed other leaders to the capital.

“Water is more than just a resource. It is a foundation of development, innovation and stability,” he said. “Here in Ethiopia, we have learned that responsible water management is central to guiding development wisely.”

In Africa, water cuts across interstate disputes, like Egypt and Ethiopia’s fight over the Nile, deadly tensions between farmers and herders in Nigeria over access to the same arable land, antigovernment protests over failed service delivery in Madagascar, and the outbreak of health epidemics in the wake of major floods and droughts.

Al Jazeera’s Haru Mutasa, reporting from Addis Ababa, said that while the issue of water is front and centre at this year’s summit, unresolved questions from last year’s gathering, including the cuts in global aide, continue to fester.

“There seems to be not enough money to the people who are in need,” our correspondent said.

She also added the ongoing deadly war in the DRC, which is causing mass displacement and famine, as well as the brutal, nearly three-year war in Sudan are also high on the summit agenda, as well as the reignited conflict in neighbouring South Sudan.

On Saturday, as the AU summit opened, at least four explosions were heard around the government-aligned Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) base in the city of Dilling in South Kordofan, as drones from the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group targeted the city.

The African continent makes up about a fifth of the global population, with an estimated 1.4 billion people, about 400 million of whom are 15 to 35 years old.

But it is also home to several of the world’s oldest and longest-serving leaders, many criticised as out-of-touch – a paradox that has contributed to an upsurge in military takeovers and other undemocratic means, notably in West African nations, such as Mali, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Niger, and Guinea-Bissau.

Some observers say the AU Summit will provide an opportunity to align continental priorities with international partners, especially at a time of discussions around a “new world order” stirred by US President Donald Trump, with foreign leaders signalling shifting global alliances and many looking towards China.