When there was a demonstration for Palestine in Frankfurt last weekend, Kaihan was also there.
A woman on Instagram wanted to know what the demo is all about, the fight for a two-state solution?
Kaihan wrote: "Palestine belongs to us Muslims, why should I give half to these Zionists for no reason?"
So in the end around 2500 people did it, shouting “Israel child murderer” and “Allahu Akbar”.
Livia Gerster
Political editor for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.
Follow I follow
Three days later everything is quiet in downtown Frankfurt.
Kaihan was only skeptical when he saw my message on Instagram.
He doesn't have a good opinion of "the media", they always twist everything.
He came anyway, and first of all he wants to make something clear: “I understand that many Jews are now afraid.
Screaming 'fucking Jews' is not an option, that's not normal.
What do the Jews in Germany have to do with it? "
We sit on a bench and pick up the cell phones.
So that nothing is twisted.
How was the demo?
“Good, lots of people,” says Kaihan.
Because of Corona, everyone was bored at home anyway.
Many would have lost their jobs, "then they can still see our people being bombed and say: Hey, today we're going to let everything out."
"Our people are dying, but Germany is only ever on Israel's side"
Kaihan is not one of those who lost their jobs.
He is currently doing his apprenticeship as a technical system planner, after which he wants to study.
He brought a couple of handwritten index cards with him.
On it are the points that are most important to him: the evictions, the settlements, the retaliatory strikes.
Yes, of course Hamas is a terrorist organization, yes, of course Israel is allowed to defend itself, he says when asked.
Then the sentences with “but” come, and so we go around in circles.
Kaihan shows the pictures on his mobile phone that he receives every minute: Screaming mothers from Gaza.
Wipe.
An Israeli mob that beat a Palestinian.
Wipe.
Collapsing high-rise buildings.
Wipe.
Children's corpses.
There are pictures in which only the Palestinians are the victims.
As if there weren't any on the Israeli side.
“It's all live,” he says.
"I don't understand how you can be so cold-hearted that you don't care."
Because of these pictures, he came to the demo last Saturday with a Palestine scarf.
Kaihan has no connection to Israel.
His parents came from Afghanistan, where they were persecuted as Shiites by the Taliban.
Nevertheless, he always says "we Muslims" or: "Our people are dying, but Germany is always only on Israel's side."
Kaihan knows the historical reasons, he has watched documentaries about the Holocaust on Netflix and Arte. Nevertheless, the debate in Germany seems strange to him. “People pretend that we Muslims invented anti-Semitism.” He shows another picture from his cell phone, black and white, of Holocaust survivors on a ship. Of course, the Palestinians would have accepted them, says Kaihan. But too many came.