Palestine solidarity demonstrations have gripped Germany each day since the Israeli bombing of Gaza began after Hamas’s attack on October 7. Protesters in Berlin routinely march through the streets chanting slogans like “Free Palestine from German guilt!,” which is meant to call out what they see as Germany’s unfair and uncritical support for Israel—based on the country’s historical guilt for perpetrating the Holocaust.
Following the Hamas attack, German police flooded Berlin’s Neukölln neighborhood. Neukölln is home to much of Berlin’s Arab population, including many Palestinians. Germany, as a whole, is home to one of the largest Palestinian diaspora communities in Europe, with an estimated 25,000 Palestinians residing in Berlin.
Nearly every afternoon and evening on Berlin’s Sonnennallee, a long street stretching through Neukölln, people spontaneously gather to show their support for Gaza and Palestine. They confront dozens of groups of armored police. On October 18, protesters recorded an officer stomping out a candle vigil for a demonstrator’s deceased Gazan relatives.
Germany, in recent weeks, has been one of the most vocal European nations in its support for Israel; and its response to pro-Palestine demonstrations across the country has been particularly harsh.
Germany, in recent weeks, has been one of the most vocal European nations in its support for Israel; and its response to pro-Palestine demonstrations across the country has been particularly harsh.
As spontaneous and planned demonstrations pop up around Germany, police are quick to ban and disperse them—sometimes using violent tactics.
Protests are diverse, but almost all share a call for the end to the bombing of Gaza and the mass displacement that has continued since Israel was formed in 1948. None of these have endorsed Hamas or supported anti-Semitic actions. Still, Germany has banned dozens of demonstrations so far, and continues to do so.
In addition to banning protests, the federal and local governments in Germany have proposed or passed a number of anti-Palestinian measures.
In Berlin, a letter sent on October 13 from Berlin’s state education department instructed schools to monitor and reprimand children for wearing keffiyehs or saying “Free Palestine.” Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced a national ban on the pro-Palestinian group Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Network. Some politicians have even proposed the idea of expelling “pro-Hamas” non-nationals and limiting immigration—without clarifying what counts as pro-Hamas.
Scholz used the opportunity in a recent Spiegel interview to explain his own position regarding immigration. Without explicitly saying so, he declared—in the context of a conversation about anti-Israel positions in Germany—“we finally have to deport people on a large scale.”
The rhetoric strikes a new, tough tone in immigration policy compared to the Wilkommenskultur (“welcome culture”) of the Merkel era that welcomed 1.2 million Syrian refugees fleeing war in their homeland.
Scholz was the first foreign leader to visit Israel, meeting with Israeli President Isaac Herzog and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He called it a “visit among friends” and made a strong show of support for Israel and its ability to “fight back against terrorism.”
Scholz made no comment toward restraint or criticism of Israel’s intense offensive.
Since the war began, Israel has dropped more bombs on Gaza than an average year of U.S. bombing during the War in Afghanistan. Israel’s blockade of water and electricity to Gaza has been called “illegal and inhumane” by Amnesty International. One Holocaust scholar has called Israeli’s treatment of Gazans during the war “a textbook case of genocide.”
Recent rhetoric and action from the German state only builds on years of anti-Palestinian repression in Germany. In May 2022, for example, several demonstrations commemorating the seventy-fourth anniversary of the Nakba—an Arabic term for “catastrophe” that refers to the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in 1948—were shut down by the local police. Human Rights Watch condemned the violent police response as “undue interference with rights to free expression and assembly.” Nakba memorial demonstrations were banned again in 2023.
In the several weeks, banning Palestine solidarity demonstrations has become commonplace. And when they do take place, police have responded with tear gas, water cannons, and hundreds of arrests. “We were shocked but not surprised at the level of violence with which the German state is willing to use,” says a spokesperson of Palästina Kampagne, who chose to remain anonymous to avoid legal repercussions.
In the several weeks, banning Palestine solidarity demonstrations has become commonplace. And when they do take place, police have responded with tear gas, water cannons, and hundreds of arrests.
Palästina Kampagne is a German organization seeking to bring attention to the repression of Palestinians, which was formed as a response to the bannings of Nakba demonstrations. In the first days of the protests, members of Palästina Kampagne witnessed police telling people to remove their keffiyehs and making arrests for waving the Palestinian flag. “In Berlin, Palestinians aren’t even allowed to grieve,” the spokesperson says. “It’s become clear that anyone who has paper situations, whether they’re on visas or paperless or refugees, or anyone that looks Arab, has to take extra care in going to these demonstrations.”
Mainstream German news media continues to feed an uncritical pro-Israel stance. Tagespiegel, one of Germany’s major newspapers, applauded Scholz’s early visit, claiming that Germany has a “special responsibility for the security of Israel” because of the Holocaust. Axel Springer, the giant media company that prints the highest-circulating newspapers in Germany, requires all of its employees to sign a written commitment to five “essential” values—one of which is the “right of existence of the State of Israel.”
In its haste to support Israel, mainstream German media often conflates any criticism of Zionism as a settler-colonial political project which continues to displace Palestinians to this day, with criticism of Judaisim. Within this logic, they create a false binary narrative which equates pro-Palestinian with pro-Hamas, and any criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism.
“There’s a refusal by the German state and the German media to make distinctions and to realize that Israel is a state open to criticism just like any other state—and that Israel is committing crimes that no other state is now committing,” the Palästina Kampagne spokesperson tells The Progressive.
Despite the banning of pro-Palestinian demonstrations, protests show no sign of slowing.