Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan on Friday suggested that Germany supported Israel in the Gaza war out of guilt over the Holocaust and drew a contrast with Turkey, which he said was able to speak without bias.
I don’t understand why this is news, this is the position of the German government too that they have a special relationship with Israel because of the Holocaust.
Anyone who supports anything “beyond all questions” is an extremistic fundamentalist. This is dangerous in every context and especially Germany should know better from its history.
Heck there is even jokes in Germany revolving around the former chancellor Merkel announcing her “fullest trust” in ministers shortly before they had to resign because of the current scandal. Ther is an expression of someone “being above any doubt” that is often used in movies and books to show a character that is wrong about someone, yet fully convinced in his assessment.
The mindeset behind this statement is dangerous and it is setting a bad precedent. Also it is setting Germany up for being charged with complicity, as they refused to even ask the necessary questions.
You‘re equating people and nation states. Germany isn‘t an „extremist fundamentalist“ for supporting the existence of Israel come what may. You know why it does so. It doesn‘t necessarily support all Israeli policies. You know that relatives of Hamas‘ hostages are in Germany right now, because they have the feeling that Germany might be able to help them. They wouldn‘t think that if they believed Germany supported every Israeli policy.
I am not equating people and nation states. I am comparing ideologies and statements that express sthat ideology.
Now whether Scholz lied when he made that statement is another question, and as you point out there is good reasons to assume so. But the statement itself and also the “role model” that it is giving to the German citizens is highly problematic for the reasons i gave.
And with that it feeds into a larger ideological problem of Germany in the context of Israel, where jewish people protesting against the Israeli bombin in Gaza are taken into custody, and jewish demonstrations are banned, citing “likely antisemitism” as reason. Jewish people, Palestinian people and other critics of the Israeli government are excluded from political discussions and cultural events because of their stance on Israel or openly discussing topics such as the Nakba or crimes commited by the IDF and settler terrorists.
So even if Scholz lied, when he claimed “solidarity beyond all questions” it is setting dangerous precedent to continue the exclusion and sometimes persecution of voices critical of Israel in particular jewish voices critical of Israel. And this is really important in the context, that you said to be relevant. A big part of the context, and also what Erdogan claims, is that Germany has a special responsbility stemming from the crimes of the Holocaust. But instead of seeing that responsibility towards all jewish people, this responsibility is only seen towards Israel going as far as excluding and persectuing jewish people in Germany, who dared to voice there opinion. Germany is commiting antisemitism, claiming to fight antisemitism directed at Israel.
So i draw two conclusions: Germany does not care about antisemtism and it doesn’t care about the jewish people, aside from abusing them as a token of “look how we changed.” The historical context gives a convenient leverage for Israel over Germany and it is particularly practical for Germany to avoid questions of needing to be critical of Israel and evaluating problems when it comes to export and import of military equipment, surveillance systems, trainings etc.
For a more in depth explanation as to why Germany doesn’t genuinely care about antisemitism and what position towards the jewish communities in Germany the government takes, i recommend this exhaustive article:
The part where it becomes nonsense is that Germany does in fact not support a lot of stuff that Israel does. Especially the whole settlements issue. As far as the German government is concerned Israel still has the same borders as 1967 and its capital is Tel Aviv.
The fact that Germany is supportive of Israel in this case is more that our history has taught us that you should first blame your government, not your neighbour, if you’re getting bombed after your government started a war of aggression against said neighbour.
I don’t understand why this is news, this is the position of the German government too that they have a special relationship with Israel because of the Holocaust.
Even in this article it says:
Which is especially stupid given that the Holocaust was aided by a mentality of supporting and going beyond all questions.
sure if you‘re not interested in context you could say that
Anyone who supports anything “beyond all questions” is an extremistic fundamentalist. This is dangerous in every context and especially Germany should know better from its history.
Heck there is even jokes in Germany revolving around the former chancellor Merkel announcing her “fullest trust” in ministers shortly before they had to resign because of the current scandal. Ther is an expression of someone “being above any doubt” that is often used in movies and books to show a character that is wrong about someone, yet fully convinced in his assessment.
The mindeset behind this statement is dangerous and it is setting a bad precedent. Also it is setting Germany up for being charged with complicity, as they refused to even ask the necessary questions.
You‘re equating people and nation states. Germany isn‘t an „extremist fundamentalist“ for supporting the existence of Israel come what may. You know why it does so. It doesn‘t necessarily support all Israeli policies. You know that relatives of Hamas‘ hostages are in Germany right now, because they have the feeling that Germany might be able to help them. They wouldn‘t think that if they believed Germany supported every Israeli policy.
I am not equating people and nation states. I am comparing ideologies and statements that express sthat ideology.
Now whether Scholz lied when he made that statement is another question, and as you point out there is good reasons to assume so. But the statement itself and also the “role model” that it is giving to the German citizens is highly problematic for the reasons i gave.
And with that it feeds into a larger ideological problem of Germany in the context of Israel, where jewish people protesting against the Israeli bombin in Gaza are taken into custody, and jewish demonstrations are banned, citing “likely antisemitism” as reason. Jewish people, Palestinian people and other critics of the Israeli government are excluded from political discussions and cultural events because of their stance on Israel or openly discussing topics such as the Nakba or crimes commited by the IDF and settler terrorists.
So even if Scholz lied, when he claimed “solidarity beyond all questions” it is setting dangerous precedent to continue the exclusion and sometimes persecution of voices critical of Israel in particular jewish voices critical of Israel. And this is really important in the context, that you said to be relevant. A big part of the context, and also what Erdogan claims, is that Germany has a special responsbility stemming from the crimes of the Holocaust. But instead of seeing that responsibility towards all jewish people, this responsibility is only seen towards Israel going as far as excluding and persectuing jewish people in Germany, who dared to voice there opinion. Germany is commiting antisemitism, claiming to fight antisemitism directed at Israel.
So i draw two conclusions: Germany does not care about antisemtism and it doesn’t care about the jewish people, aside from abusing them as a token of “look how we changed.” The historical context gives a convenient leverage for Israel over Germany and it is particularly practical for Germany to avoid questions of needing to be critical of Israel and evaluating problems when it comes to export and import of military equipment, surveillance systems, trainings etc.
For a more in depth explanation as to why Germany doesn’t genuinely care about antisemitism and what position towards the jewish communities in Germany the government takes, i recommend this exhaustive article:
https://jewishcurrents.org/the-strange-logic-of-germanys-antisemitism-bureaucrats
thanks for the extensive reply! I‘ll check out the article, I‘m interested. Hopefully I’ll have some time to digest and discuss
The part where it becomes nonsense is that Germany does in fact not support a lot of stuff that Israel does. Especially the whole settlements issue. As far as the German government is concerned Israel still has the same borders as 1967 and its capital is Tel Aviv. The fact that Germany is supportive of Israel in this case is more that our history has taught us that you should first blame your government, not your neighbour, if you’re getting bombed after your government started a war of aggression against said neighbour.
The position you’re defending is exactly what the other person was talking about, you missed their whole point entirely.
As far as the German government is concerned it never denounced or sanctioned Israel over its expansion and repressive politics.
So long as that’s true, Germany does fully stand behind Israel.
Well, it isn’t true.
Here’s a denouncing from from nine months ago:
https://www.dw.com/en/germany-us-condemn-israels-settlement-plans/a-64702145 https://www.state.gov/joint-statement-of-the-foreign-ministers-of-france-germany-italy-the-united-kingdom-and-the-united-states-on-the-israeli-settlement-announcement/