Germany has chosen Israel over international law
Berlin’s backing for Israel in the current context has irrevocably ruined Germany’s international standing.
At the same time, as a result of Germany’s neoliberal restructuring, processes of de-democratisation have been ongoing for years.
The deliberate erosion of democracy has paved the way not only for the selective application of international law, but also for the restriction of fundamental rights within Germany itself.
The German population is firmly against their country’s participation in the extermination of the Palestinian people. In a recent poll, 73 percent said they had a negative view of Israel, while 80 percent have rejected further weapons exports to Israel. Despite this, German arms export licenses to Israel have surged, enabling the state to continue committing war crimes.
While the German government’s blatant disregard for the will of its own people already points to a process of de-democratisation, this is exacerbated by domestic restrictions on fundamental rights, including freedom of assembly, freedom of opinion and speech, and academic freedom, alongside violations of due process - all in the service of the Zionist slaughterers.
https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/germany-has-chosen-israel-over-international-lawOpen linkView original on lemmy.ca
124 replies
Typical of the Merz government. Instead of any actual consequences for crimes against humanity, they prefer to suck up to Israel.
Merz is a tiny little coward.
Actually he is a quite tall coward.
Just as tiny as his little hair island. I'm sad that there is no legal way for the population to force him and his greedy and irresponsible cabinet to resign.
Put him in a little castle for prison, surround the castle with a moat guarded by well paid, trans, synchronized swimmers who get good quality healthcare and support for being employed to keep Merz at bay 24/7 in shifts while putting on beautiful routines for the crowd watching from the far embankment above.
Every square inch of the far embankment of the moat around Merz's castle/prison must be covered with ethnic food stalls of every type imaginable, all wafting smells that as much as Merz wants to get a Xenophobic hard on from hating... kind of smell good.. but Merz will only be fed a narrow diet of unseasoned boiled food in his prison. The prison will be self funding and be Merz's most successful project as it transforms into a popular international tourist destination for people coming to "pay their respects" by laughing at the sad tiny man finally safe and supreme in his throne....
In this castle will also be a free (unless you are a white man, in which case you must apologize for being a white man to pay for your entrance) Tower of Terror-esque ride where it is rumored sometimes when the doors open on the hallway full of smoke, lasers and theatrical effect to deliver the thematic punch right before the coaster drops into freefall that you can spot the real monster through a real window pane, ugly and mundane sitting at a desk reading Mein Kempf, all alone.
what about the others, like Reiche, Spahn, Klingbeil, Dobrindt, ...
And that castle sounds like a huge investment we lifestyle part-time jobber can't possibly afford.
And a big a-hole
Merz leck Eier Merz suck balls
Don’t let the other parties get off this easily, it’s an elite project supported by the Greens, SPD, FDP, CDU and all major news organizations public or private.
Basically from the 17th of October 2023 onward it was a genocide, the intent had been made clear by multiple figures in the Israeli government and army, and it had been put into practice by indiscriminately bombing civilians and civilian infrastructure. The Ampel government was completely aware of this (any functioning country has departments whose job it is to know what is actually happening on the ground) and they decided to make this genocide Staatsräson.
This had nothing to do with Merz.
Nah, for the Greens it is a really mixed bag and hotly debated within the party. Like half of the people elected into office are against supporting Israel and the other half is for it.
That's why knowing who you vote for specifically matters. It's also reasons why I press my fellow Greens to not vote for candidates who ignore Israel's crimes.
The more people within the party we have who hold Israel to the correct standards (not violating international law, not committing warcrimes and not violating human rights), the better it gets. It is not a lost cause.
The party as an institution is complicit in genocide, there might be historic reasons for this, there might be individuals within that are unhappy about it, but once an institution is complicit in genocide, it’s time to dismantle it.
Do you want to dismantle Russia, China, Serbia, Turkey, France, UK, Japan, Canada, US, etc. then?
Dismantling institutions isn't going to do shit unless they are built upon genocidal ideology to begin with.
In cases like the Greens, you simply need reappraisal and atonement.
I hope you understand that countries and political parties are incommensurable.
As a voter you have the choice to boycott a party that is complicit in genocide, I would strongly argue you even have the moral duty to do so.
In Germany there are multiple parties, you can vote for another. In Germany you have the right to found new parties and passive suffrage. The Greens can be dismantled wholly within legal and democratic means.
When's their next election?
and you have chosen Hamas over international law correct?
No. Fuck Hamas. But at this point the Israeli government and the IDF are no better. This stopped being defense like two months after Israel started it's incursion into Gaza and began to resemble a genocide not even a year after.
Israel's actions has shifted my opinion to supporting the Isratin solution.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isratin
Stopped being defense since the 70s.
The same exists in Australia
We’re actually holding a RC into antisemitism, it’s that bad
Around 80-85% of us disapprove of Zionist cunts but the federal government will not hear us of course.
Australia is spiralling down the drain as well with all this shit. I have a genuine concern for our sovereignty, if it exists at all.
The darkest irony is this all only puts jews more in danger sigh.
Precisely. It’s getting very hard now to hold up the distinction.
the entire goal of zionism, hell the orginal leaders of zionism helped hitler
racists generally don't have any qualms helping other racists
@IronBird @supersquirrel
And not a single member of the current Israeli govt had any direct ascendants imprisoned in the Nazi death camps.
tbf that's likely more a coindance than anything else, survivorship bias and all that
@IronBird
They were not IN the camps, whether victims or survivors.
There are many descendants of victims & survivors all around the world (many of whom are vocal opponents of Zionism), but none in the Israeli cabinet.
given the survival rate of the death camps..
There’s an Epstein email between him and the rothschilds discussing their direct involvement of helping Hitler become what he was.
What's an RC ?
A Royal Commission, it’s our highest level of inquiry
Is that like a parliamentary inquiry? I'm sorry I don't speak monarchy
It’s an inquiry held by a Kings Commissioner, it’s done by representatives of the crown so outside of parliament but within the functions of government.
I actually said Queen at first, it’s still difficult to get used to that change
Interesting that they are appointed by the executive. That might be a problem if their job is to find government misconduct. My country has something similar, called a Parliamentary Inquiry Committee - but they are appointed by parliament, because it's parliament that's supposed to check the government's doings.
Yeah we have parliamentary and senate inquiries as well
The KCs are appointed by the executive yeah but they serve the Crown so to speak. The announcement of this RC is the issue, not necessarily its outcome.
There should have been a…parliamentary inquiry into the Bondi shooting.
Israel are murderes and nothing else. As a german i'm ashamed of my government!
They're much more than murders, they are mass murderers.
Indeed. It is called faschism.
Genocide actually, ofc certain types of thinking lead to it though.
I am a german and i am also ashamed. Fuck fascism. Fuck Netanjahu.
And AfD couldn't be more happy about that...
Or putin
Same thing
Indeed
I'm pretty sure any country that sides with Israel really wants to suck up to Trump.
For many cases this is true, see this article on South America for example, but this is a much deeper of a problem I think for Germany.
No, but yes basically.
Germany's national founding myth currently relies on looking like "making it up to Israel as Jewish state". Through this, Germany thought/thinks it was able to minimise the insane amount of diplomatic eternal-damage it inflicted on the world before 1945/49. So, to many German nationalists like those that the CDU feeds from electorally, "The right of existence of the state Israel" comes priority-wise before many diplomatic relations, because it is responsibility-avoidance infrastructure many German nationalisms rely on.
Add Trump's worldwide shenanigans.
Or compete with him.
Israel is antisemetic
It seems to me a whole lot of really smart, amazing jewish scholars over generations and generations of jews have established a pretty rigorous body of knowledge and wisdom about how to integrate as a potentially targeted minority into society and how to immunize that society against being manipulated into xenophobia and racism/religious discrimination.
What is happening in Gaza and the West Bank... and Lebanon... as confident as I am there are no words to describe what is happening, I am confident there is no god that would ever call for that in their name, I guess that is not a statement I can prove or disprove... but at the same time I feel entirely sure any god that would demand that would be an abomination.... so what else can this genocide occurring be, other than first and foremost a betrayal of judaism at a basic level? An insult to god, whoever and whatever you identify god as?
If you think god is a many armed spaghetti ball floating in the ether and I think god is a giant spacecrab, we can disagree about a whole lot in how those two beliefs intersect in political and real world ways, but on the other hand it is pretty easy to establish that whether god is a many armed spaghetti ball or a giant spacecrab, god made the universe and thus doing something that feels needlessly violent and destructive clearly can't be something god desires to be done, in general.... Would the spaghetti ball really want you to do needless violence upon the spacecrab heretics even if they worship forbidden beliefs? Vice versa would the spacecrab desire their followers to obliterate followers of the flying spaghetti monster just because their path to worshiping god erred in the details?
What is happening now goes beyond any distinction between one human and another you can possibly draw, it goes beyond any single evil act anybody or anything could commit to deserve an equally evil response, it is an atrocity and it threatens to drag us into WW3 :(
All hail his noodle-y appendage! ;)
Their god is not a kind one. The xtians literally rebranded him with the whole big j loves you schtick because the old testament god was so brutal.
It didn't make them any better as a people though, and other religions haven't faired so great in the 'be good to each other' department either, so maybe it's a problem with the source material and most humans just suck.
I am not religious and I am not here to claim that religion has been a net good, but on the other hand many aspects of modern ethics and philosophy that are unarguably good came out of religious schools of thought, or perhaps to put it another way most of what we all accept as ethical and what we frequently point to as philosophical standpoints to begin difficult negotiation (i.e. "we can all agree human beings are all created equal even if we disagree on...") has come out of or been heavily influenced by religion... which isn't to argue that these ideas should have stayed confined within one particular religion's school of thought but rather to point out the opposite.
No religion was the sole source for this logic and development of thought around human rights and the human condition and there is no reason to believe religion was a necessary precursor for these things to form, rather I mean to say our knowledge of these things came as a dawning awareness that the good aspects of disparate religions and ideologies could be connected and translated via shared universal statements of solidarity like "treat others as you want to be treated" and "tolerate your neighbor". The details might not agree, but it is easy to do the math, draw the shared connections out and confidently say "yeah, they both pretty much think you should be a decent person and try to pursue happiness in a way that doesn't hurt others".
I am not saying religion isn't dangerous however, and in particular I think religion becomes exceedingly dangerous when the followers of that religion become convinced the structures of their formal religious institutions are not inherently political the same way any power structure composed of humans unavoidably is... which is why the separation of church and state (and the associated freedom to practice or not practice whatever religion you so choose so long as it does not hurt others) in a free society is existentially necessary.
I think you maybe misunderstood me, or I've misunderstood you?
I'm saying that most people suck and that is why the world sucks and no religion has followers who are predominantly good people.
The world we live in would not be the way it is if most people were kind to each other.
No surprise here, they are criminals too. Embezzling funds meant for roads and infrastructure to fund pensions as well as being openly corrupt.
They're just arseholes who have no real economic agenda except filling their own poket.
Germany is more than the current CDU government. Chancellor Merz is the most unpopular chancellor ever in the history of the federal republic.
Before you praise the German public let's wait who's the next, and possibly last, chancellor. Since WWII Germany has a strong habit of copying the US.
Both countries are suffering from the unmitigated effects of a decade-long propaganda campaign paid for and orchestrated by Russia.
It would be easy to stop it: make social networks take responsibility, the same way normal media does. But the rich do not wish it, so it does not happen.
What I mean to say is that yes it is the gullible idiot portion of the respective populations voting for the fascists, but they're not the real cause. Blame the con men, not the conned.
Had similat thoughts when reading about the far right polling in Australis. The author asked what has changed... well we have a facist regime on the rise in the US which incidentally happens to own the major social media plattforms and messengers used by the majority of citizens.
Maybe it's too blunt but it's very likely that you fell for propaganda. Think about who owns the algorithms.
FB has discovered a long time ago that no other reaction generates as much engagement as outrage. The propagandists have realised this, and are using it, very successfully.
You're right, it doesn't have to be this way - that's what I meant by forcing the social media companies to take responsibility.
Don't you think they already cooperate and stifle Russian content as much as possible? In my opinion, social media promotes as much as possible what the American elite wants.
It doesn't seem like it, especially since Russia supports the current leader of the US government.
In any case, I don't care what the companies are doing of their own accord. They must be compelled by, and regularly and transparently audited by, a law.
Why is the german government doing this?
Isn't it obvious? Because they feel they have a debt towards Jewish people and the state of Israel that can never be repaid
Actual white guilt, lol.
We don't do the "white" categorisation in Europe. They are Germans.
I’m sure everyone coming to Europe from an Islamic country can attest to there being no concept of whiteness in Europe
Yea right.
More like pedophiles of a feather flock together.
Because of WWII hangover. The pendulum has swung to the other extreme.
Overcompensation.
Helping Israel kill brown people will make everybody see how bad the Jews really are: 4D nazism
Because they don’t like brown people. Simple as.
Mostly money and intelligence sharing?
That's total bullshit.
Because it implies an actual dedication to preserve democracy. There is none. Like all "conservatives" they understand that they can either do at least some amount of reasonable policies for the people of work to undermine democracy to keep catering to their billionaire buddies. And like all "conservatives" they chose the latter and are (once again) planning for fascism and an authoritarian regime over democracy.
"Conservatives" as well as the alleged "centrists" only have one single playbook: Flood everything in populism and culture war and parrot far-right talking points to push far-right parties. Extort other parties to support them in the name of democracy ("or we have to -with a very sad face of course- cooperate with the far-right for majorities"). Cooperate with the far-right once they burned through every other partner stupid enough to play along. Look surprised when they get inevitably eaten up by the far-right after spending years brain-washing the population into believing that everything not on the very right side of the spectrum is dangerous radical left ideology.
So no. The German government is not at all sacrificing democracy because of their support for Israel. They are actively trying to destroy democracy to stay in power despite their insane governing against the people. Cozying up to other far-right movements like Israel's insane pseudo-fascists and US' MAGA is just a byproduct born of common interest and a united hatred for actual democracy.
The situation is a bit different in Germany though, because there isn't just one "conservative" party. It won't help the CDU (Chancellor Merz's party) to cozy up to fascist positions because people then will just vote for the original fascists instead (Afd Party) and they will lose their power. There are some studies proving that this strategy does not give them more votes. So this will fail - unless they are willing to form a coalition with the Afd which will alienate them from the non-fascist portion of their voters (which do exist - they are a large faction among traditional CDU voters)
Yes, there is one big "conservative party". And the moment two smaller parties coordinated between themselves first to see who of the bigger parties would give them the better deal (FDP-Greens in 2021 obviously chose SPD over CDU) the CDU understood that they could either show some capacity for compromise and sane politicies or never get to power again. At exactly that moment they decided to abandon democracy for power, started parroting far-right bullshit and spread culture-war bullshit 24/7, thus pushing the AfD's lies into the main stream discussion. Not even surprising given that they are completely corrupt and beholden to the whims of their billionaire donors and lobbyists, and couldn't do policies for the catual people even if they wanted to.
Alas the then 11% fascists are now standing at 27%... With the result that -just as planned- there can be no majority without the CDU anymore. Either other democratic parties bows down to their insanity (getting totally demolished in the process - see their coalition partner SPD at the moment) to keep the fascists away from power in the name of "democracy" or the CDU will cooperate and bring the AfD to power themselves (the narratives of needing to respect the voters will and cooperating with the AfD are spread strategically by back-benchers every other day, by more prominent members every other week, to normalise the idea - the moment Merz is gone they will pretend that he was the only reason to keep a distance from those fascists). And it's working like clockwork.
Sure, you can argue that it will kill the long run but a) I already addressed the fact that they will eventually end up getting eaten and b) the corrupt idiots in power don't care. They will just jump ship in one way (some well-paid board memberships in the companies they actively worked for) or another (joining the AfD, like we already saw with their spiritual predecessors joining the NSDAP back then), because all they care for is staying in power and keeping the corruption/self-enrichment-pipeline going.
looks like someone has krompromat on merz or his government.
I think "matching geopolitical interests" is a better fitting reason.
That and kompromat lmao
Or they're being paid. I figure sleazeballs like him have a low price.
and i thought that Auschwitz had ruined Germany's international standing.
We’ll see show much those 73/80% really care in the next election.
Ireland has a high support for the Palestinian plight (in the seventies last time I checked), but it doesn’t transfer electorally. However our poll did not ask the same questions of course, so the two electorates are not exactly comparable.
21% for CDU/CSU in the polls. So that pretty much accounts for the other 20%.
The issue is that the left in Germany is completely unable to have the discussion about paying reparations for a genocide against the Jews and what that means when a Jewish state namely Israel is committing a genocide. Unfortunatly extremists on both ends tend to become violent about that.
You know better than me, but surely this is not a serial issue, where one part must be dealt with before the other? Saying we can’t stop a genocide until we have taken care of prior business seems absurd to me from any party.
Reparations and hard sanctions do not work well together.
For example;
Reparations: we will fund your hospitals and universities, we will give you preferential access to our services and goods.
Sanctions: we will no longer offer you potential genocide supplies, military training or false-narrative complicity until you return all stolen land, prosecute settlers, begin reparations in Palestine, and define your fucking borders.
If that would work, then Hamas would have never done the October 7th attacks. As that is pretty close to what Germany did in the Gaza strip.
Even with weapon deliveries to Israel. Germany did stop those in late 2023 nearly fully silently, when the Gaza war became pretty bad and only restarted when the ceasefire was signed. There are also things like Germany being the single largest donor to the UNRWA to feed the people in Gaza. There are also EU sanctions against Israeli settlers and the like, which Germany does support.
There's a German citizen, Albert Einstein, who would tell these politicians to get lost for supporting a bunch genocidal maniacs.
Well, there isn't any more, also he wasn't a German citizen from 1933 on.
Merz cant do anything right. He even breaths thr wrong way. Threw this mouth
On the bright side, maybe someone broke his nose.
I wish I'll live to see germany on the right side of history for a change
Perhaps they're trying to build up their army and arms cache, let afd win the next elections and suddenly Hitler somehow returns?
Yeah that is exactly what happens.
What I find exasperating is the fact that many rightwing movements harbor antisemitism quite explicitly, including the AfD, and when it becomes politically undeniable how awful and incomprehensibly evil the Palestinian Genocide is, what conservative Germans will inevitably do to avoid reckoning with their hypocrisy and willing blindness to pretend not to see something so massively atrociously bad, is blame the jews for backstabbing them.
It is the same dumbshit story over and over again, I don't think this is a unique problem to Europe or Germany, it just feels more pathetic when this story is grafted onto a nation that literally already exterminated millions of jews.
I am sure there are plenty of centrist idiots in Germany who think they need to defend Israel because of Germany's past, so as not to make "the same mistake again" and yet if that is how they really felt with conviction wouldn't they step back and see that Germany is being set up along with the rest of Europe to recoil in horror at the Palestinian Genocide and then turn around and blame it on jews for making a conspiracy to bring good, christian and righteous nations of Europe into doing evil?
I must reiterate, this story never fucking changes and I hate this story.
edit also lots of rightwing military personnel and leaders in Germany have ties with russians, so part of it is just you know, building up the military to "defend" against the people you actually just want to give all that military tech to...
Speaking as a europhile, I am begrudgingly beginning to accept the EU project is cooked. We are being ruled by the billionaire Epstein-class whether we want to admit it or not. The voting public have the means to get rid of these tools and they have to go.
Yep. The UK exited under far-right influence. Italy has already elected fascist. France is nearing the end of 10 years of neo-liberalism, that of course includes a "fuck what the people wants" attitude and oligarchy's controlled medias. The far-right candidate is the favorite for next year's presidential election.
At the EU level, we're not there yet, but far-right is now well represented. It just drags a bit vs the nations.
Oligarchs wants the EU dead. They're getting there.
Good that you see it. You’re in the same trouble America is in. They are trying to divide the working classes of the world and eu leadership is in on it just as much as us leadership (and more).
Considering where the money is going, I wouldn't feel bad about not ratting out a German for committing tax fraud.
and for that, i am ashamed
Germany Will Defend Israel Against South Africa's Gaza Genocide Claim at ICJ - Business Insider
Jan 13, 2024 is when the "social democrats" (=liberals) and greens in Germany became guilty of aiding the genocide in Gaza and became unelectable. No wonder that the conservatives are joining the fray. And the democratic socialists aren't much better.
Wow what a turntable of history
Israel is committing a genocide. That has been extensively documented despite their best efforts at a cover up. They need to be stopped.
Nah.
Germany has never seen a genocide they didn't gleefully support.
Herero say what?
They are reverting to their old ways, even though the target has changed.
@melsaskca @supersquirrel
It hasn't though.
Zionists DO NOT REPRESENT THE JEWS that were victims of the Holocaust!
Reparations were supposed to be for the victims of the Holocaust, not for Zionist Israel!
According to Jewish historian Zachary Foster, Zionists only allowed wealthy, healthy, able-bodied Jews into Palestine/Israel, NOT weak, starving survivors of the camps.
None of the Israeli cabinet is descended from Holocaust death-camp victims or survivors.
https://dingo.news/voice/zionists-no-friends-of-jews-zachary-foster/
That also explains why there are more schoolshootings now.
There are more school shootings in Germany?
According ti wikipedia:
Ah, I see the misunderstanding. Wikipedia lists attacks, not just shootings. Many on this list are stabbing, not shooting.
Ah, I missed that. In that case "schoolshooting" is not the right term, but still an uptake in "schoolviolence"
The world is full of other countries doing nothing about Israel, so maybe we should cut the country known for that one time they tried to kill all the Jews a bit of slack in not feeling super comfortable screaming about the abomination that is the Jewish nation of Israel?
Come on. You know that the minute Friedrich Merz gave an impassioned speech on the evils of Israel the entire internet would start doodling the Hitler stache on his pictures and saying things like "O no, not again!"
Germany isn't "doing nothing", Germany is actively providing weapons to Israel to enable the genocide it is carrying out.
Germany understands how self-destructive hate politics can be.
Hamas is a hate movement. What has Hamas accomplished? Gaza now looks a lot like Berlin did in 1945. Do you rationalize Hitler the same way you rationalize Hamas? Or do you think the politics of hatred was the root cause of the destruction of Germany?
Why do you rationalize support for a group that wants to eliminate Jews from what they consider to be their land with blood and soil narratives?
Germany is a nice place to live now. It didn't get like that by perpetuating hateful politics. How do we get to a point where Palestinians can recognize that hatred isn't making their lives better as the German people did? It won't be from people on the sidelines in the west promoting hatred. It looks to me that too many people in the west want yet another generation of Palestinians to march into the meat grinder to perpetuate their own personal hatred of Israel.
Where the hell did I say anything about Hamas?
I understand why you project opinions on to others to argue with them, you clearly can't really construct an argument connected to reality.
Do you denounce Hamas?
Do you denounce Ted Bundy?
Of course, he murdered people. Hamas murdered more people than Ted Bundy, but I denounce both Ted Bundy and Hamas.
But I not that you're using distraction tactics instead of answering a very simple question, so I'll ask again:
Do you denounce Hamas?
That's quite some projection you've got going. OP posted an article about the Israeli government's war crimes and you start talking about Hamas war crimes and insist on OP denouncing them before the discussion can go on (and also semi implying he supports Hamas). That, itself, is a very clear distraction tactic.
I am sorry I am just stalling for time because I realize you have won the argument, so now I am just bringing up tangential shocking things in order to try to distract from the more important point here that I have stuck my foot in my mouth.
Ughh.....
You still haven't answered the question. Here, I'll make it easy for you:
I denounce Hamas.
Just copy and paste the sentence above and click post. Then you have proven that I am wrong to assume that you support Hamas. That's all you have to do and you win.
Who funded Hamas? Hint
Gaza is not a sovereign country but a prison. Nothing gets in or out without surveillance by Israel. They gambled on Hamas not hitting as hard as they did.
Idk man, listening to Israel politicians and settlers (Have you watched Louis Theroux's documentary?) it seems wayward to only point the finger at Palestinians who only ever experienced being beat down by an oppressor state.
I denounce Hamas terrorists and Israeli apartheid Ethnonationalists.