Accusation in a mirror (AiM)[a] is a technique often used to incitehate speech, where someone falsely attributes their own motives or intentions onto their adversaries.[3][4][5] Along withdehumanization, accusation in a mirror is one of the indirect or cloaked forms ofincitement to genocide, which has contributed to the commission of genocides such asthe Holocaust, theRwandan genocide, and theArmenian genocide. By invoking collectiveself-defense, accusation in a mirror is used to justify genocide, similar to using theright of self-defense to justify individual homicide.[5][6][7]
TheUnited Nations Office on Genocide Prevention (OSAPG) defines mirror politics as a "common strategy to create divisions by fabricating events whereby a person accuses others of what he or she does or wants to do", and includes it as a factor in their Analysis Framework on Genocide, which is used to assess whether a given situation poses a risk of genocide.[8] Scholars such asKenneth L. Marcus andGregory S. Gordon have investigated ways in which accusation in a mirror is used to incite hatred and how to mitigate its impacts.
Accusation in a mirror is a false claim that accuses the target of something that the perpetrator is doing or intends to do.[4][5] The name was used by an anonymous Rwandan propagandist inNote Relative à la Propagande d'Expansion et de Recrutement (French: "Note Relating to Expansion and Recruitment Propaganda"). Drawing on the ideas ofJoseph Goebbels,[disputed –discuss] he instructed colleagues to "impute to enemies exactly what they and their own party are planning to do".[5][9][10] By invoking collective self-defense, propaganda is used to justify genocide, just as self-defense is a defense for individual homicide.[5] Susan Benesch remarked that while dehumanization "makes genocide seem acceptable", accusation in a mirror makes it seem necessary.[6]
TheUnited NationsGenocide Convention defines genocide as "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such".[11] The OSAPG prepares The Analysis Framework on Genocide which comprises eight factors used to "determine whether there may be a risk of genocide in a given situation". The fourth of the eight categories is the "motivation of leading actors in the State/region; acts which serve to encourage divisions between national, racial, ethnic, and religious groups".[12] "Mirror politics"—defined as a "common strategy to create divisions by fabricating events whereby a person accuses others of what he or she does or wants to do"—is included in this category as one of five issues to be considered.[8]
The tactic is similar to a "false anticipatorytu quoque" (alogical fallacy which charges the opponent withhypocrisy). It does not rely on what misdeeds the enemy could plausibly be charged with, based on actual culpability or stereotypes, and does not involve any exaggeration, but instead is an exact mirror of the perpetrator's own intentions. The weakness of the strategy is that it reveals the perpetrator's intentions, perhaps before it can be carried out. This could enable intervention to prevent genocide, or alternatively aid in prosecutingincitement to genocide.[13]Kenneth L. Marcus wrote that despite its weaknesses, the tactic is frequently used by genocide perpetrators (including Nazis and Hutus) because it is effective. He recommends that courts should consider a false accusation of genocide by an opposing group to satisfy the "direct" requirement, because it is an "almost invariable harbinger of genocide".[14] Marcus described AiM as a deceptively simple "rhetorical practice in which one falsely accuses one's enemies of conducting, plotting, or desiring to commit precisely the same transgressions that one plans to commit against them. For example, if one plans to kill one's adversaries by drowning them in a particular river, then one should accuse one's adversaries of plotting precisely the same crime".[15]
InAtrocity Speech Law: Foundation, Fragmentation, Fruition (2017),Gregory S. Gordon—who had served as a Prosecutor in International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda—discussed the tension between protecting free speech while regulating hate speech, citing that the use of accusation in the mirror as a form of hate speech is an indicator of violence.[16] He said that the Nuremberg International Military Tribunal (IMT) "recognized straight away that Nazi barbarities were rooted in propaganda."[17][b] Gordon traced the early use of propaganda to theArmenian genocide in the Ottoman Empire duringWorld War I. Gordon wrote that the "Young Turk government created the template for the modern genocidal propaganda campaign".[18] International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) and the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia investigated the "atrocity-triggering speech in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda".[19]
The phrase "accusation in a mirror" was introduced asl'accusation en miroir in a 1970 adult continuing education book by French social psychologist and authorRoger Mucchielli.[3] The book,Psychologie de la publicité et de la propagande, was written against the backdrop of theprotests of 1968, and discussed the history of the social psychology behind publicity and propaganda. The book's intended purpose included deepening understanding of psychology and the human sciences, and increasing the reader's ability to recognize true values and to resist manipulation.[20] In the conclusion of his book, Mucchielli likened his seminar to the work of Columbia University's professor,Clyde R. Miller, who established theInstitute for Propaganda Analysis (IPA) in 1937, to educate others to be able to identify propaganda techniques in order to thwart them.[21]
Mucchielli described accusation in a mirror as imputing to the adversaries the intentions that one has oneself or the action that you are in the process of enacting. Mucchielli explained how the perpetrator who intends to start a war will proclaim his peaceful intentions and accuse the adversary of warmongering; he who uses terror will accuse the adversary of terrorism.[22] In this section in which Mucchielli describes accusation in a mirror, he referred to the work ofSerge Tchakhotine[23][24] who was known for his opposition to theBolshevik regime (1917–1919) and who warned against the rise offascism in Europe in the 1930s. Tchakhotine's work on how to resist propaganda, like that of Mucchielli, was informed bySigmund Freud,Ivan Pavlov, andFrederick Winslow Taylor. Mucchielli also referred to the work ofJoseph Goebbels, theNazi Party's chief propagandist.[5][9][10]
The description ofaccusation en miroir occurs in a single paragraph of the first chapter of the fourth unit, entitled"La propagande d'endoctrinement, d'expansion et de recrutement" ("The psychology of propaganda used in politics").[c] Mucchielli included three other chapters in this section on the propaganda of agitation, integration, and subversion. The three main units preceding the one on the political use of propaganda include the first unit—a comparison between the psychology underpinning publicity and propaganda; the second unit examines publicity used by commercial enterprises, and the third investigates public relations.[citation needed]
In 1925, eight years before hisrise to power,Adolf Hitler concluded in his bookMein Kampf that Jews were planning to completely destroy Germany and the German people.[25]Some authors say Roger Mucchielli attributed the mirror argument to Nazi propagandistJoseph Goebbels.[5][9][10][verification needed] In her work on dangerous speech,Susan Benesch defined accusation in a mirror as follows:[7] "Claims that members of the target group pose a mortal or existential threat to the audience, aptly dubbed 'accusation in a mirror' ... The speaker accuses the target group of plotting the same harm to the audience that the speaker hopes to incite, thus providing the audience with the collective analogue of the only ironclad defense to homicide: self-defense. One of the most famous examples is the Nazi assertion, before the Holocaust began, that Jews were planning to wipe out theGerman people".[7][verification needed][26] The Nazi party opportunistically misrepresented the assassination of a German diplomat by Jewish teenagerHerschel Grynszpan as evidence for a fabricatedinternational Jewish conspiracy preparing aterror campaign against theentire German people.[27][28][26]
In the 1990s, a team of human rights activists working withHuman Rights Watch, led byAlison Des Forges, found a mimeographed document in a Rwandan Hutu hut entitledNote relative à la propagande d'expansion et de recrutement, by an anonymous author.[29] The document was a detailed description ofRoger Mucchielli's 1972 analysis of the psychology underpinning propaganda, transforming his writing into a propaganda manual. Des Forges' work was "instrumental in assisting the International Criminal Tribunal in its prosecution of those responsible".[30] Her description of accusation in a mirror was included in her bookGenocide in Rwanda: the planning and execution of mass murder (1999) and in the posthumously publishedLeave None to Tell the Story: Genocide in Rwanda (2014).[30][31]
The author of the memo proposed two techniques that would become commonly used in incitement of the Rwandan genocide. The first was to"'create' events to lend credence to propaganda", and the second was accusation in a mirror, through which "his colleagues should impute to enemies exactly what they and their own party are planning to do." The memo states: "In this way, the party which is using terror will accuse the enemy of using terror."[1] The memo described how "honest people" can be made to feel justified in taking whatever measures are necessary "for legitimate [self-] defense".[32] Des Forges said that accusation in the mirror was used effectively in the 1992Bugesera invasion as well as in the "broader campaign to convince Hutu that Tutsi planned to exterminate them".[1] While Rwandan officials and propagandists used both these techniques as described in the memo, Des Forges found no proof they "were familiar with this particular document".[1]
As part of their strategy, Hutu hard-liners had founded their own radio station (Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines, or RTLM).[1] Des Forges described how "Rwandans learned from experience that RTLM regularly attributed to others the actions its own supporters had taken or would be taking. Without ever having heard of'accusations in a mirror', they became accustomed to listening to RTLM accusations of its rivals to find out what [its own supporters] would be doing".[1]
Léon Mugesera, a Rwandan politician convicted ofincitement to genocide, was named in Des Forges's work as an example of accusation in a mirror. His inflammatory anti-Tutsi speech, which was reported in the Rwandan newspaperKangura, was alleged to be a precursor to the 1994Rwandan genocide. In 2016, he was convicted ofincitement to genocide and sentenced to life in prison.[33] Des Forges wrote that Mugesera and Kangura appeared to "have been implementing the tactic of 'accusation in a mirror' by connecting the Tutsi with the Nazis". She added that "copies of films about Hitler and Naziism" were allegedly found in the residence ofJuvénal Habyarimana after he and his family left in early April 1994.[34]
Andrew Wallis described accusation in a mirror as a "simple idea" but a "winning formula to win over the masses to participation and sympathy for the crime at hand". The technique, which "especially targeted journalists" in Rwanda, was a "direct and easily persuasive strategy to ensnare those who knew little about the reality of the Rwandan situation".[35]
The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) 1998 ruling inThe Prosecutor v. Jean-Paul Akayesu case considered testimony by Des Forges on "mirror politics", which included incidents of accusation in the mirror such as the 1992Bugesera invasion.[36]Jean-Paul Akayesu was a former teacher who served as mayor ofTaba commune inGitarama prefecture who was convicted ofgenocide for his role ininciting theRwandan genocide. Trial documents described how mirror politics was used in Kibulira and in the Bagoguye region where the "population was goaded on to defend itself against fabricated attacks supposed to have been perpetrated by RPF infiltrators and to attack and kill their Tutsi neighbours".[36] The document noted "the role that Radio Rwanda and, later, the RTLM, founded in 1993 by people close to President Habyarimana, played in this anti-Tutsi propaganda. Besides the radio stations, there were other propaganda agents, the most notorious of whom was a certain Léon Mugesera ... who published two pamphlets accusing the Tutsi of planning a genocide of the Hutu".[36]
ICTR prosecutorGregory S. Gordon said that the Akayesu judgement should have included a greater discussion of propaganda methods, saying the "anemic treatment of the range and specific characteristics of speech techniques (such as accusation in a mirror or predictions of violence) leaves it woefully underdeveloped and incapable of capturing the full range of liability inherent in atrocity speech".[d]
According to a 2007 book co-published by theInternational Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (IDRC) the University of Butare had a copy of Mucchielli's 1972 book, which has a paragraph onaccusation en miroir in the unit called"Psychologie des propagandes politiques". The anonymous author referred to Mucchielli's "accusation in a mirror"—accusation en miroir.[32][34]
In theInternational Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda's 2007 bookThe Media and the Rwanda Genocide, historian Jean-Pierre Chrétien described the psychology of those who perpetrated the mass slaughter of the Tutsi minority in Rwanda in 1994 by the Hutus by referring to Muchielli's book. Chrétien described the propaganda tools such as "accusations in the mirror" as "the mechanisms for moulding a good conscience based on indignation toward an enemy perceived as a scapegoat".[37]
Gregory S. Gordon traced the early use of propaganda to theArmenian genocide in the Ottoman Empire duringWorld War I. Gordon wrote that the "Young Turk government created the template for the modern genocidal propaganda campaign".[18]TheIğdır Genocide Memorial and Museum in eastern Turkey, opened in 1999, promotes thepseudohistorical notion that it wasArmenians who committed genocide against the ruling Turks, rather than vice versa.[38]The morewidely accepted view, outside Turkey, is that theArmenians were the victims of a genocide, carried out by starvation and forced relocation.[39] These tactics have also been used as an act of genocide and war by others elsewhere.[40][41]TheArmenian genocide is recognised as such by 30 countries.[39]
In the bookBlood and Soil: A World History of Genocide and Extermination from Sparta to Darfur (2007), American historianBen Kiernan said that the accusation in a mirror propaganda technique had also been used in Vietnam and Cambodia.[42]
Bashar al-Assad often accused his opponents of using chemical weapons and sarin gas that only he had access to, perUnited Nations reports.[43][44][45]
According to a 2019 article by theSouthern Poverty Law Center, investigations on the rise of violence by far-right extremists had been "upended by conservatives who insisted the real threat came from the left".[46] The article described how theProud Boys often used the "rhetorical trick" of accusation in a mirror, by blaming "leftists andanti-fascist activists" for resisting their violence and asserting that self-defense by leftists was the real violence.[46] In a November 2018 YouTube video,Gavin McInnes, the founder ofProud Boys, said, "We are under siege... We are threatened with violence—real physical violence—on a regular basis".[46]
In 2024 and 2025,Donald Trump accusedFederal Reserve GovernorLisa Cook ofmortgage fraud and sought her removal from office,[47][48][49] while he himself had been found liable forbusiness andfinancial fraud in a New York civil case.[citation needed] Cook filed a lawsuit against Trump three days later accusing him of violating the Federal Reserve Act of 1913.[50][51][52][53] Although a New Yorkappellate court later threw out the monetary penalty in his fraud case for being "excessive", the finding of liability was upheld.[54][55][56][57]
Additionally, in July 2025, Donald Trump claimed without evidence that the "Epstein files," documents related to the sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, were fabricated by his political opponents.[58][59][60][61] In public statements and on social media, Trump accused former President Barack Obama, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and former FBI Director James Comey of having "made up" the files, calling them a "hoax" and a "scam."[62][63][64][65][66][67][68] These accusations were made despite the fact that the second federal investigation into Epstein, and his subsequent arrest on federal sex trafficking charges, occurred in 2019 during Trump's own presidency. Epstein was arrested on 6 July 2019, and the investigation was conducted by Trump's own Justice Department.[64][69][70] Furthermore, it was reported in August 2025 that the FBI had redacted Trump's name from the Epstein files, citing privacy protections because he was a private citizen at the time of the initial investigation.[71][72][73][69]
The Russian media's depiction of Ukraine during theprelude to the Russian invasion of Ukraine was "mirror image propaganda",CNN Moscow Bureau ChiefJill Dougherty wrote on 25 January 2022. For example, she wrote, NATO forces were described as "carrying out a plan that's been in the works for years: EncircleRussia, topple PresidentVladimir Putin and seize control of Russia's energy resources."[74] On 7 September 2022, Vladimir Putin claimed that Russia did not "start" any military operations, but was only trying to end those that started in 2014, after a "coup d'état in Ukraine".[75]
On 21 September 2022, Putin announced apartial mobilisation, following a Ukrainiancounteroffensive in Kharkiv.[76] In his address to the Russian audience, Putin claimed that the "Policy of intimidation, terror and violence" against the Ukrainian people by the pro-Western "Nazi" regime in Kyiv "has taken on ever more terrible barbaric forms", Ukrainians have been turned into "cannon fodder", and therefore Russia has no choice but to defend "our loved ones" in Ukraine. Putin also claimed that "The goal of the West is to weaken, divide and destroy our country."[77]
Political scientist and espionage scholarThomas Rid suggests theUkraine bioweapons conspiracy theory may be a case of the Kremlin "accusing the other side of the thing they are in fact doing" (accusation in a mirror) based on historical precedent.[78] In the 1980s, when the Soviets deployed chemical weapons in Laos and Afghanistan, Soviet-aligned press published disinformation alleging that the CIA was weaponizing mosquitoes.[78][79] False Soviet reports blamingHIV/AIDS on the United States, commonly calledOperation Denver,[e] also aimed to distract from contemporary Sovietbioweapons research.[81][78][82][83] The Kremlin has a history of fomenting conspiracy theories about ordinary biology labs in former Soviet republics, having previously spread propaganda aboutGeorgia andKazakhstan similar to recent accusations deployed against Ukraine.[84][85][86][87]
Human rights observers of the Gaza war have noted that Israel's justifications for its ongoing military campaign inGaza, theattacks by Hamas on 7 October 2023, have become overwhelmingly disproportionate as justification for its actions. Chief among the justifications include indiscriminate killing of civilians and medical workers,[88] and the use ofstarvation as a weapon.[89] These actions lead to aUnited Nations special committee labelling Israel's methods as "consistent with genocide".[90] Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu and others used the mirror argument to explain the intensity of Israel's retaliation to the7 October 2023 attacks.[91]In the face of mounting international pressure for aceasefire, Israel has employed the "accusation in a mirror" tactic, both to justify its killing of Palestinian civilians specifically, implying that Hamas would act similarly had the roles been reversed,[92] but also in response to international condemnation by accusing critics of Israel's actions asantisemitism,[93] theweaponization of which is a tactic frequently employed by Israel and its supporters.[94][95] The frequency with which accusations againstPalestinians andHamas in the Gaza Strip byIsrael's public messaging have been revealed to be projections of Israeli behaviour and attitudes towards Palestinians has given rise to the saying "every Zionist accusation is a confession".[96][97][98][99]
HALLMARKS OR TELLTALE SIGNS • References to the target group as pests, vermin, insects, or animals, since such dehumanization tends to make killing and atrocities seem acceptable. • Claims that members of the target group pose a mortal or existential threat to the audience, aptly dubbed 'accusation in a mirror' in a Rwandan Hutu propaganda manual. The speaker accuses the target group of plotting the same harm to the audience that the speaker hopes to incite, thus providing the audience with the collective analogue of the only ironclad defense to homicide: self-defense. One of the most famous examples is the Nazi assertion, before the Holocaust began, that Jews were planning to wipe out the German people. • Assertions that the members of the target group are besmirching the audience group, or damaging its purity or integrity. • Identifying the target group as foreign or alien, as if to expel them from the audience‟s group. [citation omitted]
... the Iğdır Memorial and Museum of Martyred Turks Massacred by Armenians was built to support the Turkish narrative of genocide denial, arguing that it was the Armenians who massacred Turks and Muslims, not the other way around.
Forced, deliberate starvation also played a role in the Holocaust. In the Jewish ghettos, the access to food was tightly controlled. It was up to the Nazis to decide who would have access to meat or bread, and the Jewish shops had a very small selection of foods.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)Accusation in a mirror ... everything that is 'bad' is projected outward. Casting their aggression and cruelty as collective self-defense, they exonerated themselves of guilt and justified this genocide through incitement, demonization, and dehumanization – making the genocide appear not only acceptable but necessary.
... the German police arrested about 17,000 Jews from Poland and deported them across the Polish border. A young man named Herschel Grynszpan, sent to Paris by his parents, received a desperate postcard from his sister after his family was forced across the Polish border. He bought a gun, went to the German embassy, and shot a German diplomat. He called this an act of revenge for the suffering of his family and his people. Nazi propagandists presented it as evidence of an international Jewish conspiracy preparing a terror campaign against the entire German people. Josef Goebbels used it as the pretext to organize the events we remember as Kristallnacht, a massive national pogrom of Jews that left hundreds dead.
Quotations related toJoseph Goebbels at Wikiquote
The dictionary definition ofevery accusation is a confession at Wiktionary