Jewish organisations in 19 countries on six continents, representing a multitude of members from diverse Jewish backgrounds and traditions, have declared their outrage and condemnation towards the resolution passed in the German Bundestag on November 7 under the title “Never Again Is Now: Protecting, Preserving and Strengthening Jewish Life”. The content of the resolution makes a mockery of its own title.
While paying lip service to “all the facets” of Jewish life, the resolution narrows that life down to one element: the state of Israel. A reminder of Germany’s responsibility after the crimes of the Holocaust is directly followed in the text by a reference to the attack of October 7,2023, from the Gaza Strip, which resulted from decades of Israel’s dispossession, oppression and murder of Palestinians and triggered a genocidal onslaught that has now lasted for over a year. Germany has been an accomplice in this genocide from the start through unceasing military and political assistance, becoming the second-biggest arms supplier and even promising its support for Israel in the genocide lawsuit initiated by South Africa at the International Court of Justice in The Hague.
The resolution reaffirms the approach taken by all major parties since the start of the genocide, focusing on opposition to Israel’s crimes as the most important site of anti-Semitism. This is used to place migrants and refugees, especially Arabs and Muslims, under particular suspicion of anti-Semitism, along with the sparse elements of the political left that support their rights. It is consistent with this that the parties of the supposed political centre were supported enthusiastically by the fascist Alternative for Germany (AfD), a party that has formulated a concrete plan to “remigrate” two million migrants from Germany to North Africa and has a higher approval rating than any of the governing parties; it expressed its joy over the adoption of its phrase “imported anti-Semitism”, language designed to minimize the anti-Semitism of white Germans and instead stigmatise migrants. Appropriately enough, this joy was voiced in a speech by AfD party member Beatrix von Storch, whose grandfather was Adolf Hitler’s finance minister. In joining forces with the fascists to support a resolution that calls for stricter immigration and citizenship guidelines based on attitudes towards Israel, all major parliamentary parties have clearly signalled their commitment to mass deportation and increasingly normalised racism.
While those most vulnerable to the policies affirmed and demanded in this resolution are migrants of colour and refugees, its cynical weaponisation of anti-Semitism also makes hostages of all Jews, whose safety is used as a pretext for the persecution of other minorities. We reject the conflation of our identity with the settler colonial ideology of Zionism and the genocidal actions of Israel, which we condemn as strongly as do the Palestinians whom it oppresses and destroys, with whom we stand in lasting solidarity. This conflation is anti-Semitism in itself.
As in past resolutions and declarations, the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) Working Definition of Antisemitism is taken as the gold standard in determining how anti-Semitism should be understood. The writings by scholars criticising the definition are too many to mention, and even one of its main authors, Kenneth Stern, has expressed his dismay at the use of the definition to stifle opposition to Israeli policies. Similarly, experts from the legal, cultural and academic fields, have warned against this resolution. And, like the Bundestag’s infamous anti-BDS resolution of 2019, the new one exploits its status as a non-binding statement to make demands that would be blatantly unconstitutional in actual legislation. As the 2019 resolution demonstrated, the repressive obedience found in German institutions is sufficient to turn even a text with no legal force into a de facto law, relying on the chilling effect that accompanies any potential accusation of anti-Semitism. And while that resolution called for combatting the boycott movement, the present one seeks to outlaw it.
Despite claiming that freedom of speech, art and science must be protected, the resolution paves the way for an even greater stifling of those freedoms than has already been widespread, especially since October 2023. All major parties are now officially in favour of preventing funding for any project challenging the pro-Israel consensus and of silencing, uninviting, dismissing or even deporting anyone associated with such activities. The centrality of such funding gives the state immense powers of censorship, which inevitably lead to increasing self-censorship by those who wish to avoid repression. Given the rightward shift of German society and politics, it will not take long for such tools to fall into the hands of fascists. We already see the far right cynically using philosemitism (itself a racist phenomenon) as a cover for racism, and we know all too well that the people itching to expel Muslims will not hesitate to do the same with Jews. Our solidarity with Palestinians is already exposing us to police violence, and the anti-Semitism of those who would force us to be Zionists blends perfectly with the anti-Semitism of those who would put us in concentration camps.
Instead of uniting society in the fight against all discrimination, any such resolution will divide minorities by focusing only on one. But the present resolution goes much further, demanding that the whole of German society accept the state’s support for Israel and its countless documented crimes, and that those who resist this doctrine of genocide should be punished by all available means, even though their position merely reflects international law.
The call of “never again” was meant as a warning against the very crimes being perpetrated by Israel in Palestine, yet this resolution desecrates it by using it for a racist agenda that promotes rather than prevents anti-Semitism, and harms Jews along with other minorities. It must be opposed in every possible way.
Signatories:
A Different Jewish Voice (Netherlands)
Agrupación mexicana de judíxs interdependientes
Alternative Jewish Voices of Aotearoa/New Zealand
Antizionist Jewish Alliance in Belgium – AJAB (Belgium)
Articulação Judaica de Esquerda (Brazil)
Boycott from Within (Palestine/Israel)
Dayenu – New Zealand Jews Against Occupation
Een Andere Joodse Stem (Belgium)
Erev Rav (Netherlands)
European Jews for Palestine
Global Jews for Palestine
International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (Canada)
International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (UK)
Israelis Against Apartheid (Israel/Palestine)
Jewish Call for Peace (Luxembourg)
Jewish Network for Palestine (UK)
Jewish Voice for Labour (UK)
Jewish Voice for Peace (USA)
Jews for Palestine – Ireland
Jews Say No! (USA)
Jøder for Retfærdig Fred (af 5784) (Denmark)
Judeobolschewiener:innen (Austria)
Judeus pela Paz e Justiça (Portugal)
Judies por una Palestina libre (Mexico)
Jüdische Stimme für Demokratie und Gerechtigkeit in Israel/Palästina (Switzerland)
Jüdische Stimme für gerechten Frieden in Nahost (Germany)
Junts – Associació Catalana de Judeus i Palestins (Spain)
MARAD, Collectif juif decolonial (Switzerland)
Sh’ma Koleinu – Alternative Jewish Voices (Aotearoa/New Zealand)
Tsedek! (France)
South African Jews for a Free Palestine
Union juive française pour la paix (France)
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