Something seems different now. After 22 months of seemingly endless genocide in Gaza carried out by the Israeli military, suddenly there is a sense of heightened outrage around the world, including from voices that have thus far held off from being more critical of Israel’s actions. The images of starving children in Gaza, victims of a calculated Israeli policy to restrict the entry of humanitarian aid and desperately needed medicine and supplies, have rocketed around the world across the covers of mainstream newspapers and in nightly broadcasts. If there is a defining characteristic of the genocide in Gaza, the most live-documented genocide in history, it is that every time you think you have seen the most horrifying image you can possibly imagine, there is a worse one the next day.

But why is this happening now? Why is it that only now does it seem a critical mass of consciences around the world have been stirred? Have we not seen enough before this? Was the little body of the massacred 6-year-old Hind Rajab, after she was fired at over 300 times, not enough to shock us? Was the systematic destruction of Gaza’s civilian infrastructure, from its hospitals to its universities, not enough cause for alarm? Has the constant stream of images of mutilated bodies of children, courtesy of American-made Israeli-dropped bombs not been enough? These questions should forever haunt us.

This week, a U.S. Army Green Beret who worked for the “Gaza Humanitarian Foundation,” the organization concocted by Israel to supplant the United Nations and other humanitarian aid delivery mechanisms toward the purpose of starving and forcibly displacing the remaining population in Gaza, began to tell all about the war crimes he witnessed in Gaza. His firsthand testimony is nothing short of remarkable and required listening for every American taxpayer funding this all. He detailed how a young Palestinian boy walked several kilometers to get the littlest bit of food from the distribution site he was working at. The boy thanked and kissed him, and after leaving was gunned down by the Israeli military who had fired into the crowds.

At the same time, Israel’s two best-known human rights organizations publicly concluded that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza, broadening the already well-established consensus among human rights organizations and scholars about the nature of the crimes being carried out against Palestinians. Numerous European states have spoken out about the starvation in Gaza with harsher language than before and in a concerted fashion. Several have also announced intentions to recognize a state of Palestine, signaling their severe disapproval of Israeli actions.

Perhaps it is a cumulative effect. Perhaps the images of children reduced to skin and bones was the final straw. Whatever the reason ultimately is, the critical question is: Now that we are here, what is going to be done about it?

And action is needed more urgently than ever. For far too many in Gaza, it is too late. Over 60,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza in these 22 months, according to local health authorities, but many believe this is likely a significant undercount. Even those who have not been killed yet face irreparable harm from starvation and malnutrition, particularly the most vulnerable members of society; children in developmental stages, the elderly, and the sick.

Now it seems the Israeli government is moving toward annexing parts of the Gaza Strip after declaring the vast majority of it an annihilation zone where anything that moves can be destroyed. Meanwhile, in the West Bank, the situation also only continues to turn for the worse. Israeli settler violence is setting new records on a regular basis. Earlier this summer, a Palestinian American from Florida was beaten to death by Israeli settlers in the village of Sinjil. This week, an Israeli settler shot and killed a Palestinian man who had played a key role in the production of the Oscar-winning film No Other Land.

That settler, previously sanctioned by the Biden administration, only to have sanctions on him lifted by Trump a few months later, shot and killed Awda Hathaleen in broad daylight and on camera. He has already been released by Israeli authorities. The Israeli government, drunk on impunity for war crimes, is eyeing annexation in the West Bank as well. A nonbinding resolution in the Knesset around annexation of the West Bank passed overwhelmingly this month, laying the political groundwork for the next formal steps.

Inside Israel, hateful rhetoric and attacks on its Palestinian citizens are escalating to a fever pitch. In recent weeks a campaign to oust Palestinian Knesset member Ayman Odeh got 73 votes, and while it failed to reach the very high threshold of 90, it succeeded in ginning up mob violence against him. He was attacked in his car, which was surrounded by violent, screaming thugs. Arab cafeteria workers at a Jerusalem cinema were attacked by a racist mob of patrons. Not long before that, an Arab bus driver was mercilessly beaten by a mob of Jewish bus riders.

In all these cases, the mobs break out into a common chant: “Death to the Arabs,” a genocidal slogan their military is implementing daily. Polls show that alarmingly large swaths of the Israeli public are supportive of war crimes, with a significant majority of Jewish Israelis supporting the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza and nearly half supporting the idea that the Israeli military “when conquering an enemy city, should act in a manner similar to the way the Israelites acted when they conquered Jericho under the leadership of Joshua, namely, to kill all its inhabitants.” Israel’s government and society seem to have lost any sense of logic or decency and are on a fast track toward increasing violence in all directions.

Polls of Americans, however, show growing alienation and disgust with what Israel is doing in Gaza. The latest numbers from Gallup show that only 32 percent of Americans support Israel’s actions in Gaza now, the lowest since November 2023. These numbers are driven by Democrats and independents, among whom support for Israel’s actions in Gaza are at 8 percent and 25 percent, respectively. Netanyahu, who fancies himself a glorious man of history, is also hitting new lows among Americans. History is of course littered with famed villains, and Netanyahu is on track to take his place among them in the American imagination.

The longer-term impact of all of this cannot be overstated, especially given the demographic divide so clear in these numbers. The younger you are, the more likely you are not just to disapprove of Israel’s actions but also to see them as genocidal. Unlike their parents, who grew up thinking about Israel in the context of genocide and seeing it as a historic victim, the generations that will inherit America see it as a perpetrator. This is the new public context in which U.S.-Israel relations will take shape in the years to come. Perhaps this is finally the Abu Ghraib moment, where public unease crosses the line into public anger and opposition over our actions.

If Zohran Mamdani’s primary election victory in New York is any indication, the genocide in Gaza, and American support for it, will also help shape Democratic Party politics in the years to come, and probably national politics as well, given that independents trend much more closely with Democrats on this issue than with Republicans. The Democratic race for the nomination in 2028, much like 2008, might hinge on how right a candidate is perceived to have been on the most pressing moral question facing this generation: the genocide in Gaza.

For the children of Gaza, however, who are being starved and bombed to death every day, there is little time to waste wondering how this will play out in the years to come. They need immediate action now. Gimmicks like airdrops or performative recognition of Palestinian statehood are mere distractions. Real and urgent action from Western leaders in the form of ending all support for the Israeli military and imposing sanctions on its leaders is needed to bring an end to this monstrous genocide.

The entire world has now seen the fruit of our support for Israel in the images of children’s spines protruding from their deliberately starved bodies, and it leaves us with only one question: When will our leaders find their backbones?