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Fighting Anti-Semitism in Contemporary Germany
Abstract
This paper examines the discourse around anti-Semitism in Germany since 2000. The discourse makes use of the figure of the Jew for national security purposes (i.e. via the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the trope of the “dangerous Muslim”) and the politics of national identity. The article introduces the concept of the “War on Anti-Semitism”, an assemblage of policies about national belonging and security that are propelled primarily by white racial anxieties. While the War on Terror is fought against the Muslim Other, or the War on Drugs is fought against predominantly Latinx and Black communities, the War on Anti-Semitism is ostensibly fought on behalf of the racialized Jewish Other. The War on Anti-Semitism serves as a pretext justifying Germany's internal and external security measures by providing a logic for the management of non-white migration in an ethnically diverse yet white supremacist Europe.
In 2000, a new citizenship law fundamentally changed the architecture of belonging and im/migration by replacing the old Wilhelminian jus sanguinis (principle of blood) with a jus soli (principle of residency). In the wake of these changes and the resulting racial anxiety about Germanness, state sponsored civil-society educational programs to fight anti-Semitism emerged, targeting predominantly Muslim non-/citizens. These education programs were developed alongside international debates around the War on Terror and what came to be called “Israel-oriented anti-Semitism” in Germany (more commonly known as “Muslim anti-Semitism”).
Triangulated through the enduring legacy of colonial racialization, the Jew and the Muslim are con/figured as enemies in socio-political German discourses. This analysis of the War on Anti-Semitism has serious implications for our understanding of “New Europe”. By focusing on the figure of the Jew and the Muslim, the implications of this work transcend national borders and stress the important connection between fantasy, power, and racialization in Germany and beyond.
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Die Zeit, CDU und CSU wollen antisemitische Zuwanderer ausweisen. Zeit Online.. January 6, 2018. My own translation. Last accessed May 27, 2020.
“The Causa Achille Mbembe”—Serious allegations and dispute over some passages. René Aguigah in conversation with Felix Klein and Andrea Gerk, Deutschlandfunk Kultur. Online Radio (in German), April 21, 2020. My own highlighting and translation. www.deutschlandfunkkultur.de/die-causa-achille-mbembeschwere-vorwuerfe-und-streit-um.1270.de.html?dram:article_id=475092&fbclid=IwAR3T4mK0o8nFAxGocG Uh9riyF7BxiDUbfdyVD_6gDzBj3LZa8UR_CtADqlA
1991 was the official year of German reunification with the ratification of the 2+4 treaties.
Originally, each independent German state had its own jus domicili (principle of residence). This, however, conflicted with homogenizing trends to build a German state, and thus, jus sanguinis (principle of blood) was adopted, first by Bavaria in 1818, then distributed through the Prussian citizenship law of 1842, and finally consolidated as German law with the emergence of the German Reich in 1871 and concretized by the German Nationality Law of 1913. See Howard (2008).
One of them was a stateless Palestinian youth and his friend was Moroccan German.
This imbalance in data collection has resulted in a distorted picture of racism and other forms of discrimination and violence in Germany. This distortion is, for instance, consistent with the common discourse of East Germany being the prime location for right-wing extremism, racism, and anti-Semitism.
None-European countries are, amongst others: Argentina, Canada, Israel, Switzerland, United Kingdom and United States of America. International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance website, last accessed, May 27, 2020.
https://dip21.bundestag.de/dip21/btd/18/119/1811970.pdf, p. 12.
The entire working definition can still be found on the homepage of the European Forum on Antisemitism, last accessed on June 2, 2015: www.european-forum-on-antisemitism.org/working-definition-of-antisemitism/english/ Some of the crucial wordings for which it was eventually taken down are the following: “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor. // Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation. // Using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism (e.g., claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel) to characterize Israel or Israelis.” The homepage of the European Forum on Antisemitism remains unchanged, albeit showing the change in European policy. One can thus still read that “This ‘working definition’ was adopted in 2005 by the EUMC, now called the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) and disseminated on its website and to its national monitors. Units of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) concerned with combating antisemitism also employ the definition. The US State Department's report, Contemporary Global Anti-Semitism, released earlier this year, makes use of this definition for the purpose of its analysis.” After an initial introduction one can click on one of the 32 translations of the “working definition” in various languages.
Those reports were published by the Berlin-based Center of Democratic Culture (Zentrum Demokratische Kultur), an independent institute that defines itself as representing the values of a “functioning democratic, humane and solidarity-based meritocracy.” This institute has been sponsored by Xenos, a government program against right-wing extremism led by the Ministry of Family, Youth, Women and the Elderly, by the European Social Fund, as well as the weekly tabloid magazine Der STERN. The program out of which the reports emerged was initiated by civil society and its outline mentions at the outset that it is committed to not getting consumed by the ivory tower of academic research (see the same report, p. 6). Their methodology is also important to note: “qualitative social science research” conducted through guided interviews, observations, group discussions, external material (media, internet, etc.) with the aim of collecting “dense description” as opposed to a quantitative measuring of phenomena. They found that around ten young people out of 100 hold right-wing extremist attitudes, concluding, thus, a 10% margin of right-wing extremism amongst youth.
As a former Russian citizen, dissident, and political prisoner, he quickly rose to fame in Israeli politics, founded his own party, and became popular due to, amongst other factors, the support of the Russian-speaking constituency. He held several high positions in Israeli politics, and became known for his pro-Zionist, conservative stance. He rose to particular and disputed fame by heading a secret committee responsible for the annexation of spaces in (Palestinian) East Jerusalem.
The first D is the test of demonization. When the Jewish state is being demonized; when Israel's actions are blown out of all sensible proportion; when comparisons are made between Israelis and Nazis and between Palestinian refugee camps and Auschwitz—this is anti-Semitism, not legitimate criticism of Israel. The second D is the test of double standards. When criticism of Israel is applied selectively; when Israel is singled out by the United Nations for human rights abuses while the behavior of known and major abusers, such as China, Iran, Cuba, and Syria, is ignored; when Israel's Magen David Adom, alone among the world's ambulance services, is denied admission to the International Red Cross—this is anti-Semitism. The third D is the test of delegitimization: when Israel's fundamental right to exist is denied—alone among all peoples in the world— this too is anti-Semitism.
Die Zeit, CDU und CSU wollen antisemitische Zuwanderer ausweisen. Zeit Online. January 6, 2018. Online. My own translation.
Important discussions were the debate around collaboration in France and the Netherlands; the discussion in England about the non-bombardment of the railways leading to Auschwitz. In Austria, these debates have only started in the 1990s, for instance.
The AfD and the Left did not take part.
Since 2006, there has existed a Special Representative for Relations with Jewish Organizations (such as American Jewish Committee, World Jewish Congress, but also Jewish communities abroad) for issues relating to Anti-Semitism (also working with OSCE, EU, IHRA, UN), the Holocaust and World War II, as well as, since November 4, 2015, also international issues relating to Sinti and Roma in the German Foreign Ministry. Additionally, in March 2020, the Jüdische Allgemeine newspaper reported that Germany voluntarily took over the chairmanship of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). The current special representative, Michaela Küchler, stated Germany decided on purpose to take over the IHRA chair in 2020 in order to implement Holocaust remembrance and the fight against anti-Semitism in all 34 IHRA member-states. With her focus on international exchange, she also emphasized in her opening speech in March (in Berlin) that she believes in international cooperation, for which the Foreign Ministry has allocated €1 million to build a “Global Task Force” against Holocaust-falsification with international experts. Educational implementations in school curricula in all member states as well as a sharpening of criminal law with regards to anti-Semitism will also be tackled. See: Ralf Balke, IHRA—Das historische Erbe aufarbeiten, Jüdische Allgemeine, March 4, 2020, online. Last accessed May 27, 2020.
“The fact remains, however, that the discovery of America was the result of what was intended to be the last crusade against Islam…European colonial expansion began simultaneously with the institution of the Catholic Inquisition that replaced centuries of Islamic multiculturalism. It was a symptomatic beginning” (Young, 2001: 21).
“That anti-Semitism and…Orientalism resemble each other very closely is historical, cultural, and political truth that needs only to be mentioned to an Arab Palestinian for its irony to be perfectly understood” (Said, 1978: 28).
Silverstein (2008: 26), for instance, also views the dramatic entanglements of Jewish and Muslim subjectivities as being publicly “problematized” with the beginning of France's War on Terror since the mid-1990s.