By Rev. Redeem G. Robinson (above), re-posted with permission from his Substack newsletter. Read more about his work at holytrouble.com.

Donald Trump has openly declared that the U.S. will take over Gaza, a proposal that amounts to nothing short of ethnic cleansing. Yet, rather than directing their outrage at the bipartisan imperialism that led to this moment, many Democrats have instead chosen to lash out at Jill Stein and third-party voters on social media. Their response is not a condemnation of Trump’s genocidal plans, nor is it an admission of how the Biden administration or previous administrations paved the way for this atrocity. Instead, their first reaction is a smug “We told you Trump was worse.”

This is the defining feature of neoliberal politics: a refusal to take responsibility for their complicity in imperialism, and then guilt those who refuse to “fall in line.” But let’s be real—Trump’s plan to take over Gaza didn’t just pop up out of no where. It is an extension of the genocidal policies already in place under Biden, who has armed Israel as it massacres hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. To act as though Trump’s rhetoric is some shocking departure from the status quo is pure gaslighting.

For months, the Biden administration has supplied Israel with weapons, and unwavering support as it bombs Gaza to clear it out for “development.” The U.S. vetoed multiple ceasefire resolutions, ensured that humanitarian aid was blocked or delayed, and rewarded Netanyahu’s war crimes with more military funding and even welcomed him with applause in Congress. Even as videos of starving children, children with missing limbs, and mass graves circulated globally, Biden stood firm in his defense of Israel’s so-called right to defend itself. Kamala Harris’ pathetic attempt to call for “pauses” in the genocide while continuing to arm the perpetrators should be a clear indication that this administration has never cared about Palestinian lives. Also, let’s not act like we forgot that the Palestinian voices were blocked and excluded at the Democratic National Convention. 

Now, Trump—seeing how easily the U.S. has already backed ethnic cleansing—is simply taking it a step further. He is making explicit what Democrats have been doing implicitly: endorsing the complete erasure of Palestinian existence in Gaza. The conditions for his proposal were set not by an abstract specter of “Trumpian fascism,” but by the bipartisan war machine that Biden, Harris, and their Democratic enablers have upheld.

Now that we know their party helped pave the way for ethnic cleansing, liberals and moderates do what they do best: deflect. Their rage is not directed at Biden for supplying the weapons, not at Congress for approving the military aid, not even at Trump for taking a step further. Instead, they channel their anger at Jill Stein, Cornel West, Claudia De La Cruz, third-party voters and at anyone who dares challenge these political parties that represent this evil empire. 

This knee-jerk reaction reveals something about them: they never gave a damn about Palestinians in the first place. If they were, their immediate response to Trump’s escalation wouldn’t be “See? We told you Trump was worse.” It would be a full-scale reckoning with how Biden and his administration laid the groundwork for this atrocity. Instead, neoliberals are so desperate to protect their political brand that they would rather fearmonger about third-party voters than admit their own complicity.

The truth is, they don’t care about Gaza except as a talking point to scare voters back into the Democratic cult. They only invoke Palestinian suffering when it’s politically convenient—when it allows them to justify another cycle of “vote blue no matter who” without actually demanding policy change. If they truly opposed genocide, they wouldn’t just be mad at Trump for saying the quiet part out loud. They’d be in the streets demanding an end to U.S. support for Israel and fighting this empire! They’d be calling for an arms embargo, an immediate ceasefire, and full Palestinian liberation but instead choose to fight third-party voters. 

So no, the problem is not Jill Stein. The problem is not third-party voters. The problem is an empire that props up war criminals, funds genocide, and then demands our loyalty under the threat of “but Trump is worse.” The real question is: how many more Palestinians have to die before liberals stop playing these pathetic electoral games and start demanding an actual end to U.S. complicity in genocide?