Against anti-German anti-Semitic agitation
On the lack of German raison d’état – a tightrope walk
Now that we are dealing in ever greater detail with the creation of a first, truly sovereign, German constitution based on 1871, it is appropriate to think about raison d’état, especially against the background of recent German history, the two world wars, the Holocaust, the division of Germany and the failure of the Federal Republic of Germany in the Corona crisis. Any criticism of the existing conditions, the exposure of the legends of those currently ruling over us, is almost without exception killed by the mainstream media and the established party-political elite of the Federal Republic of Germany with accusations of anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial, as if criticism of rapid vaccination approvals, restrictions on basic rights and deprivation of liberty due to a supposed “epidemic situation of national proportions”, criticism of global financial capitalism, the imperialism of the USA and its allies and the neoliberal predatory capitalism of the past 30 years were a question of being Jewish or left-wing.
It is strange who puts on which shoe without being asked, because why should “Corona” or the financial crisis have anything to do with just one population group or religious community? Why is it claimed that critics of the Corona regulations, the “Infection Protection Act” or the banking union are anti-Semitic Holocaust deniers?
To put it the other way around, is the good citizen who bravely swallows the lies of those who rule over us and the mainstream media like bitter medicine a good democrat and thus an anti-fascist who stands on the side of the Jews and Israel?!This impression is deliberately fueled in order to have killer arguments at hand and to simplify things: anyone who questions the restrictions on basic rights and the obligation to wear masks must be a NAZI who is against Jews and bankers.
These cheap propaganda tricks only work because the corresponding decades of brainwashing by the state and corporate media have left their mark.
The people of Germany want to be one of the “good guys”, not to be the evil Nazi for once, not to be responsible for eugenics, world war, concentration camps and persecution, and are clearing the dock of the Nuremberg trials by quickly putting others in it, preferring the vaccine sceptics, climate change deniers, Merkel critics and Putin sympathizers, because they are all supposedly homophobic and racist because they do not unconditionally believe in Greta, do not like “gender”, expose Me-too campaigns as half-hearted and reject police violence not only against black people in the USA but also against all people regardless of skin color.
All of these must be Holocaust deniers and homophobic anti-Semites deep down inside. Our tense relationship as Germans with people of the Jewish faith stems from the fact that after 1945 we no longer defined a reason of state and we are just maneuvering our way through the Middle East conflict because Auschwitz and Israel, Mengele and the new German miracle vaccine stand between us, the citizens of Israel, and the Palestinians.
In this very situation, it is reported that the majority of Israelis have been “supplied” with the German vaccine. Sometimes you don’t even know where to look away to first. So let’s clarify our reason of state for the time after the Federal Republic of Germany once and for all. How do we feel about our history, about Israel, about the Palestinians, about mutual violence?
Let’s be honest: Hamas is not free from terrorist tactics that most Palestinians would reject under normal circumstances. Likewise, right-wing Zionism does not represent the people of Israel, especially by mocking the victims of the Holocaust, by using the Shoah as a justification for the killing of civilians, many of them children. Israel has the right to self-defense like any other nation. But it should be understood that Hamas was born of pressure. Arafat and Rabin agreed to the two-state solution called for by the Gromyko Plan back in 1947. Since then, one mistake has been added to another, mainly by the Israeli government through settlement policy, oppression and apartheid. If there were two states, Hamas would not exist or would have very little influence, since no population rises unless it is oppressed.
Nelson Mandela, once a “terrorist” by definition, said in an interview with me in 1994 when I confronted him with his rebellious past that “the choice of means of struggle lies with the oppressor and not the oppressed.” No one will say, I am sure, that Nelson Mandela was an anti-Semite, and neither am I.
But the Israeli government, when criticized for its crimes against humanity, always uses the term anti-Semitism. It often feels like trampling over the graves in Auschwitz. There is a deliberate restriction of freedom of expression here, especially for us Germans. To say that it is not true that we are not free to say what we want to say because we do not do it is a threat of fascism.
So once again, clearly and unambiguously: my solidarity goes out to the Israeli peace movement and all Palestinians seeking peace. The war between Israel and Gaza, like all wars, is also about resources. Religion and racism are only used to justify and cover up the real reasons. This has been the case since the first wars in human history. In the case of Israel and Palestine, the issue is obvious: the Tamar gas field, 90 km off the coast of Haifa, the birthplace of my paternal grandmother, contains 240 billion cubic meters of natural gas, while the Leviathan gas field, 130 km off the coast of Palestine, would yield 450 billion cubic meters of gas. Israel and Palestine agreed to cooperate in the energy sector in Oslo in 1993, but the ongoing war makes this impossible. Even the much narrower and easier exploration area near Gaza, just 30 km from the Gaza coast, is currently inaccessible due to ongoing fighting. Israel does not want to deal with Hamas, understandably, but nobody wants to see the point that Hamas would not exist or would have only marginal influence if Israel allowed the establishment of a Palestinian state.
After World War II, it became a “raison d’état” for us in the Federal Republic of Germany to support Israel, even though we knew that the UN’s conquest of Palestine in 1947 would have the same unhealthy side effects that occurred in the case of Ireland after it was conquered by King Henry II in 1171. It is not uncommon to overlook how viciously an occupied people can behave.
Nonetheless, we Germans, reunited under one nation since October 3, 1990, but not fully sovereign, and by including former East Germans who were taught a negative attitude towards Israel during Soviet rule, are still faced with what is known as “collective guilt”.
I believe that there is no such thing as “collective guilt”, but that there should be a collective responsibility to never let it happen again. But what is our reason of state now and how should it be structured in Germany after the end of the occupation? What does raison d’état really mean? It is usually attributed to conservative political doctrine. A remark by the Prussian King Frederick II is quite cynical: “You can think as much as you want, as long as you are obedient.” This is certainly a misinterpretation of what a “raison d’état” should represent.
Machiavelli wrote in 1525 that the “raison d’état” empowered the ruler to use morality, whether he wants to or not, in whatever way serves the purpose. Modern society in a democracy should carefully weigh its options when it comes to defining a reason for existence. Our democracies should not just resonate in a subordinate relationship to state power, which to this day rolls out the red carpet for multinational corporations and banks for tax evasion, downsizing, privatisation and deregulation.
Imperialism was literally dead after Eastern European socialism imploded, because since the fall of the Berlin Wall we have been told that globalization is not imperialist, but has brought freedom and democracy and will eventually bring peace to all nations. And celestial choirs will sing…The reality is different. Why is the imperialist approach of every US administration and the Israeli government directly linked to the trauma of Jewish threat and persecution for hundreds of years? Moshe Zuckerman said on April 14, 2008:
“Whatever ideologies may govern Israeli Holocaust commemoration, it cannot be denied that the Holocaust remains the fundamental matrix for the establishment of the State of Israel.” – Moshe Zuckerman
I fully agree, but would add that tragic mistakes were made in the establishment of the Israeli state, as the progressive movements in the Arab population of Palestine ignored the UN resolution on the British withdrawal and the establishment of two independent states, despite the revolt of the Arab League nations after May 15, 1948, and despite horrific terror.
The Arab population of Palestine fought against the withdrawal of the Arab interventionist forces and for the establishment of a Palestinian state as advocated by the United Nations, and for a democratic and independent government to cooperate and negotiate with the Jewish state on an equal footing. The wars against Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and the repression against Iran are clearly imperialist goals, but the term “Israeli imperialism” is de facto banned, although Israel does indeed play an important role in the imperialist goals of the USA and NATO states.
Israel’s right to self-defense is repeatedly referred to and no one can deny this right, but to use the connection with the Shoah as a justification does not do justice to the victims of the Nazi regime. Those who have survived camps like Auschwitz do not want war and exploitation, but peace and reconciliation!
The speech of the chief delegate Andrei Gromyko on May 14, 1948 at the United Nations remains legendary:“One should not cover up the fact that Palestine is inhabited by two peoples, an Arab and a Jewish one. Both peoples have their roots in the area. The historical past and, above all, the reality that has been created in our time do not justify a unilateral solution to the Palestine question, neither by establishing an independent Arab state that does not correspond to the legitimate rights of the Jews, nor by establishing an independent Jewish state that contradicts the legitimate rights of the Arabs. (…) A just solution would best be expressed in the establishment of an Arab-Jewish independent and democratic state, (…) however, should it turn out that this has become impossible due to the broken relationship between Jewish and Arab Palestinians, then another solution must be considered, namely the secession and division of the country into two independent and self-determined states, one Jewish and one Arab.”
This is the solution that the one day sovereign Germany should pursue in an honest approach to ensure that the existence of the Israeli state, which must not be questioned, does not come at the expense of the Palestinian Arabs.
This can only be done through a complete withdrawal of troops from the occupied territories, an end to the settlement policy and a humanitarian solution for the refugees. There are no easy solutions to the most complicated and longest conflict in the history of mankind, but it is clear that there will be no peace for Israel or for the entire region as long as the rights of the Palestinians are disregarded.
In 2009, the Israeli peace movement “Gush Shalom” advertised in the daily newspaper Haaretz: “Only when the first Independence Day of a sovereign Palestine is celebrated will the future of sovereign Israel be secured.” There is nothing to add.Oppressed solidarity cannot claim to have learned from fascism and the Holocaust.
Justifying the settlement policy and occupation on the grounds that Israel’s rulers pretend to fight for the legitimate rights of a minority persecuted for centuries cannot be the policy of a European Union that actually relies on human rights, freedom and democracy.
Likewise, the EU cannot sympathize with religious fanatics who exploit the suffering of the people of the West Bank and Gaza for their own interests. Our solidarity as Germans and Europeans will be with both the peace movement in Israel and the oppressed in Palestine.If this becomes the official position of the then sovereign German government, German influence should be used to promote such a position among EU member states and institutions.
Unfortunately, the official position of the current German “federal government” is unequivocal support for Israeli policy, which refers to a moral obligation arising from our nation’s dark past.
But, history obliges us to commit ourselves fully to the fight against fascism, imperialism, racism, anti-Semitism and Islamophobia, and it obliges us to commit ourselves to a humane policy towards refugees and asylum seekers and at least a main criticism of capitalism.
None of this characterizes current German and EU policy. Rather, it is the case that the government and the predominantly private mainstream media focus on reducing the crimes committed by the fascists to their sick racial ideology, which was indeed unprecedented and horrific. But the crimes of the NAZI regime do not allow themselves to be reduced to that.
The industrially organized, most brutal mass murder of Jews, Roma, Sinti, communists, homosexuals and many other people who stood in the way of the fascists would have been impossible without the Second World War initiated by German heavy industry and high finance united in the Düsseldorf Industrial Club. For some time now, the German mainstream media have been reporting on this war, which was directed against many peoples of the world, but above all against the Soviet Union and Germany’s direct neighbours, Poland, France and Czechoslovakia, mainly by focusing on the suffering endured by German civilians when the war returned from where it began.
The question arises whether the official attitude of all West German and post-unification governments was that of a forked tongue in dealing with the German past: on the one hand, the historical obligation arising from the Holocaust, and on the other hand, the permanent relativization of fascist perversion, especially through the so-called doctrine of totalitarianism.
In the post-occupation period, we must advocate an open approach to the Holocaust, because anything else neither allows an honest commemoration of the Shoah, nor would it prevent the recurring emergence of anti-Semitism. This new reason of state is our collective responsibility, which grew out of the guilt of the German fascists for the Holocaust.Never again war, never again fascism!
Addendum from October 7, 2023:
Sure, Hamas was founded by the Mossad, even the Washington Post wrote (link behind subscription barrier) in order to counter Arafat’s left-wing PLO according to the principle of “divide and rule”. When Yassir Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin agreed to the two-state solution in the Oslo Accords in 1995, with each party sharing 50/50 in resources such as natural gas and water, they had to go. Hamas murdered Arafat because otherwise they themselves would have become superfluous, and the Mossad had Rabin shot. The USA supplied Israel and, via Ukraine, Hamas with weapons.
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