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The rally in Berlin: "Let us show that people with Jewish, Christian, Muslim and Arab roots can and want to live together peacefully in Germany," said Federal President Steinmeier
Photo: Annegret Hilse / REUTERS
At the start of the major rally against anti-Semitism in Berlin, Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier made an appeal to the citizens of Germany. "The protection of Jewish life is a task of the state – and it is a civic duty," the Federal President said on Sunday in front of several thousand rally participants at the Brandenburg Gate. "I ask all the people of our country to accept this civic duty."
This obligation applies to all people in this country, regardless of origin or political point of view. "Let us show that people with Jewish, Christian, Muslim and Arab roots can and want to live together peacefully in Germany," Steinmeier said. "That, and nothing less, is what is required of us."
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"Everyone who lives here must know Auschwitz and understand the responsibility it entails for our country," said the Federal President. "Let us be united in our rejection of terrorism and barbarism! Let us unite in condemning all forms of anti-Semitism and racism."
The rally at the Brandenburg Gate was called by a broad alliance of democratic parties and civil society organizations on the initiative of the German-Israeli Society. These include the CDU, SPD, Greens, FDP and Left Party, the Catholic and Protestant churches, the Central Council of Jews in Germany, the German Trade Union Confederation, the employers' umbrella organisation BDA as well as Campact, the Paritätischer Gesamtverband, the German Nature Conservation Association and the Muslim association Alhambra, among others.
"The whole world is watching this crime!"
In his speech, Steinmeier emphasised the value of freedom of assembly and freedom of expression. However, these freedoms must be exercised non-violently and within the framework of the law.
"Violence, however, sets limits to our freedoms," Steinmeier said. "Anti-Semitic incitement, attacks on Jewish synagogues, attacks on police officers are not a perception of freedom. They are criminal offences." He expects "everyone – wherever they stand – to respect these rules for peaceful coexistence".
In his speech, the Federal President also addressed the parties to the conflict in the Middle East. Germany is "firmly on Israel's side," he said, and he speaks almost daily on the phone with Israel's President Isaac Herzog.
Addressing the radical Islamic Palestinian organisation Hamas – which had attacked Israel with terror attacks and taken numerous hostages – Steinmeier said: "The whole world is watching this crime! End the barbarism! Release the innocent!"
Hamas' terror also affects "people in the Gaza Strip whose interests Hamas only pretends to represent," said the Federal President. It is the terrorists who have led Gaza into a destructive military war." The "innocent people of Gaza who do not support terrorism and are now suffering" should not be forgotten. We must and will work to protect civilians," he stressed. They need humanitarian aid and humanitarian corridors."
jae/AFP