On Friday, Israeli novelist and Israel Prize recipient David Grossman publicly stated that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. Yesterday, Oser Kassif, a member of the Knesset, read Grossman’s statement out to the Knesset. He was forcibly removed from the Knesset podium to shouts of “He will not say ‘genocide’ in here!”

This reminds me of the period between 1836 and 1844 in Congress, when southern legislators were able to push through the Gag Rule, which prohibited the reading out, printing, or discussion of abolitionist petitions. The Gag Rule effectively ended all mention of abolition in Congress.

If Congress didn’t pass it, slaveholder John C. Calhoun warned the Senate, abolition would spread among “the young, and the thoughtless,” and the doctrine “would gradually extend upwards.”