Commentary on Germany and Israel: “Never again” is an attitude

Chancellor Scholz supported Israel with clear words – without reservation. He has breathed life into the German reason of state, which includes Israel’s security. But one doubt remains.

Sometimes it is the hours of greatest distress and despair that make hope shine even brighter. Today in the Bundestag was one of those rare hours. A chancellor who could hardly spell out more clearly what Germany’s unrestricted solidarity with Israel really means.

And a Bundestag that says unanimously, from the far right to the far left, in the end: Israel receives all support and has our full solidarity.

No yes, but. No restriction. No justification. Just this one message. “We are one.” This is what Green Party leader Omid Nouripour, the Muslim from Hesse, shouted to the Jew Ron Prozor, the Israeli ambassador, today in the audience gallery in the Bundestag. We are one.

Scholz has breathed life into the German reason of state

A phrase? Today, Scholz has breathed life into the reason of state that encompasses Israel’s security. We help and give what you want. We ban hate-mongering associations, we call Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ silence on Hamas terror shameful. We mourn and fear with you. We will defend ourselves with you.

That day, Parliament stood where it had to stand: on Israel’s side. But, unfortunately, there is a but: Is Germany there as a whole? In the end, “Never again” are just two words. “Never again,” says SPD leader Lars Klingbeil in the face of the Holocaust, there should be no end date. “Never again” is an attitude.

Never again?

But we say “never again” and experience that the Jewish football club, the upper league team TuS Makkabi, stops training and playing. Because the players in today’s never-again Germany are no longer safe. Never again?

This is also part of it if Israel’s security is German reasons of state. That Jews in this country never again have to doubt that they are safe. Not everyone has grasped the magnitude of the threat Israel is currently facing. What the Russian war of aggression was and is for us, Hamas terror is now for the Jewish state. A turning point.

Today is not the day to lecture Israel

Therefore, today is not the day to instruct Israel to comply with international law of war in its suspected ground offensive. Today is not the day to accuse Israel of whatever mistakes the Jewish state has made in the past. Today was the day for the Chancellor to make it clear: At this moment there is only one place for Germany. On the side of Israel.

Rolf Mützenich, the SPD parliamentary group leader, put it very cleverly. He is sure that Israel applies the humanitarian law of war. He trusts that Israel’s democracy will work through its own mistakes, not now, not in the middle of the fight for survival, but at some point. There was applause in the German Bundestag, which, in the midst of all the despair, made the hope of being a strong ally to a strong Israel shine brightly today. Not blindly. But out of conviction.