{"id":246971,"date":"2023-10-30T12:00:41","date_gmt":"2023-10-30T12:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=246971"},"modified":"2024-07-01T08:20:08","modified_gmt":"2024-07-01T07:20:08","slug":"germany-bans-public-grieving-and-solidarity-with-palestine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2023\/10\/germany-bans-public-grieving-and-solidarity-with-palestine\/","title":{"rendered":"Germany Bans Public Grieving and Solidarity with Palestine"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Demonstrators in Berlin take the streets in solidarity with Palestine.
(Photo: Montecruz Foto)<\/p><\/div>\n

Germany\u2019s criminalization of solidarity with Palestine has taken on entirely new dimensions since October 7.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

23 Oct 2023<\/em> – Germany is home to Europe\u2019s largest Palestinian community, with roughly 80,000 Palestinians living in the country. For years, German authorities have tried to stifle Palestinian activism in the country, viewing it as a nuisance to its explicit policy of \u201cunconditional support for Israel.\u201d Demonstrations, such as one earlier this year to mark the 75th<\/sup> anniversary of the Nakba, have been sporadically banned in recent years and organizations, like the Palestinian prisoner solidarity network Samidoun, have also come under increasing scrutiny.<\/p>\n

Yet the criminalization of solidarity with Palestine on a national level has taken on entirely new dimensions since October 7. After a small demonstration on Berlin\u2019s busy Sonnenallee street on the evening of October 7, the German media and body politic have been up in arms about Palestinians supposedly celebrating terrorism and antisemitism on German streets.<\/p>\n

Talking points that were two weeks ago only uttered by far-right AfD politicians are now being openly expressed by politicians from all parliamentary parties in Germany. Playing off the idea of \u201cimported antisemitism,\u201d the social democratic Chancellor Olaf Scholz is now arguing that \u201cwe must finally deport on a large scale\u201d residents who do not hold German citizenship and openly protest against Israel. The Christian Democrats (CDU) are even demanding that the recognition of Israel\u2019s right to exist must become a precondition for German citizenship.<\/p>\n

Samidoun has been made into public enemy number one, as the media presents the group as a bastion for \u201csympathizers of terror\u201d that poses \u201ca particular danger, because as a secular organization, they are building bridges between Islamists and radical leftists.\u201d In a speech before parliament on October 12, Chancellor Scholz personally announced a ban on Samidoun along with a ban on the activities of Hamas in Germany.<\/p>\n

In Berlin specifically, which is home to one of the largest Palestinian diaspora communities outside the Arab world, the authorities have been particularly hostile towards any signs of solidarity with Palestine. Since October 7, every demonstration explicitly or implicitly referring to Palestine has been banned, leaving the roughly 30,000 Palestinians living in Berlin with no means of expressing their anguish at the siege and bombardment of Gaza.<\/p>\n

Solidarity groups have been trying to bypass this censorship by avoiding political statements and focusing on humanitarian campaigning, yet even demonstrations and slogans such as \u201cChildren in Gaza need help\u201d and \u201cSolidarity with the civilian population in the Gaza Strip\u201d were banned. On October 13, the police went so far as to ban a demonstration registered by the group \u201cJewish Voice for a Just Peace in the Middle East\u201d entitled \u201cJewish Berliners against violence in the Middle East.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sonnenallee, a busy street in the district in which many Arab migrants live, has become a focal point of dissent against Israel\u2019s attack on Gaza. The police patrol Sonnenallee every evening with tight controls on the public squares. Racial profiling and brutal arrests<\/a> are commonplace and often recorded and posted to social media. One particular video shows police officers stomping out a candle-lit vigil<\/a> with their boots.<\/p>\n

In a letter to all Berlin schools, the city\u2019s Department for Education, Youth and Family set out strict guidelines on how to discuss the situation in Palestine with students. \u201cAny demonstrative action or expression of opinion that can be understood as advocating or approving of the attacks against Israel or support for the terrorist organizations carrying them out, such as Hamas or Hezbollah, constitutes a threat to school peace in the current situation and is prohibited.\u201d According to the letter, these may include the following: \u201cvisibly wearing relevant clothing (for example, the kuffiyeh known as the Palestinian scarf), displaying stickers and patches with inscriptions such as \u2018free Palestine\u2019 or a map of Israel in the colors of Palestine (white, red, black, green), and shouting \u2018free Palestine!\u2019 and demonstrating verbal support for Hamas and its terrorism.\u201d<\/p>\n

At one high school on Sonnenallee, a 61-year-old teacher attempted to confiscate a Palestinian flag from a 14-year-old student and ended up in a physical altercation with a second 15-year-old student. The parents\u2019 association of the school tried to organize a demonstration under the slogan \u201cNo place for racism, no place for violence\u201d as a reaction to the incident, yet it was promptly banned by the police, ostensibly as a \u201ca precautionary measure\u201d. The Central Council of Palestinians in Germany has since sent a letter in response to Berlin\u2019s Department for Education, expressing their \u201cgreat concern about the psychological and educational development [of their children]\u201d in Berlin schools.<\/p>\n

As other European states are witnessing mass protests in solidarity with Palestine, the German state has been able to use force and violence to prevent such scenes on German streets. Yet it is unlikely that the government will be able to ban these sentiments of solidarity indefinitely, especially as the images of Israel\u2019s brutal attack on Gaza continue to circulate around the world.<\/p>\n

Go to Original – peoplesdispatch.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

23 Oct 2023 – Germany is home to Europe\u2019s largest Palestinian community, with roughly 80,000. Its criminalization of solidarity with Palestine has taken on entirely new dimensions since October 7.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":246972,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[1268,87,739,88,2524,715,427,2418,1025],"class_list":["post-246971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-europe","tag-european-union","tag-gaza","tag-germany","tag-israel","tag-mass-murder","tag-massacre","tag-palestine","tag-palestinian-rights","tag-west-bank"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246971"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246971\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":246973,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246971\/revisions\/246973"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/246972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=246971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=246971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}