The God of the Old Testament commanded genocide (e.g., the Canaanites).

Several complementary moves, in increasing depth. (1) Hyperbolic ANE war rhetoric: Paul Copan, Nicholas Wolterstorff, and Matthew Flannagan (Did God Really Command Genocide? 2014) show that "utterly destroy, leave nothing alive" is stereotyped Ancient Near Eastern military language, used by Moab, Egypt, and Assyria in inscriptions describing campaigns where survivors demonstrably remained (the same book of Joshua that says all were killed also has the Canaanites still there a generation later - Judges 1). The genre is boast, not body-count. (2) The ḥerem was targeted not at ethnicity but at specific fortified military-religious sites (Jericho, Ai, Hazor) that were strongholds of a child-sacrificing, ritually predatory culture documented in both biblical and extrabiblical sources. Civilians in open towns had the option to flee, be absorbed (Rahab, the Gibeonites), or remain. (3) The Canaanite expulsion is explicitly framed as delayed justice: Genesis 15:16 says Abraham's descendants will not receive the land for 400 years "for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete" - God waits centuries. This is not ethnic cleansing; it is judicial response to documented, large-scale atrocity. (4) The principle is never generalized: these commands are explicitly limited to a unique historical moment in the inauguration of Israel's covenant land and are never reauthorized. No Christian has ever read Deuteronomy 7 as a general template for war. (5) Euthyphro: Christian theism answers the dilemma by locating the good neither in arbitrary divine fiat nor in a standard above God, but in God's own necessary character - so "good" is not empty, nor is God constrained by something higher.