Partners in Crime: The German Shibboleth, Israel, and Genocide

Karl Marx, the rebellious son of Jewish parents, once famously said, “In politics, the Germans think only of what others have already done.” However, this sarcastic remark needs to be reconsidered. In our times, Germans are doing things that others can’t even imagine. Almost all of the major institutions in the country are engaged in a campaign of bullying to silence and track down critics of Israel. Palestinians, Muslims, people of color, anti-Zionist Jews, writers, musicians, poets, rappers, filmmakers, and anyone who dares to criticize or question Israel is labeled “anti-Semitic.” On October 7, 2023, German Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck reaffirmed this narrative, setting the tone through a stern media statement. He asserted that the security of Israel is integral to Germany’s existence, justifying this “special relationship” as a result of Germany’s “historical responsibility” to atone for the Holocaust by supporting the establishment of Israel. He declared, “The security of Israel is a promise we have made to ourselves,” and concluded, “Germany knows this.”

It seems that few Germans noticed or cared that Habeck’s words essentially absolved Germany of any responsibility for Israel’s past crimes against the Palestinians. His statement implicitly granted Benjamin Netanyahu’s government the de facto sovereign right to endanger the lives of millions, including Palestinians enduring hunger and terror in Gaza and the West Bank, as well as Arab and Jewish citizens living within Israel itself.

Immediately after October 7, with little public resistance or opposition, Germany began doing the unthinkable. In the name of combating “anti-Semitism,” riot police systematically dispersed pro-Palestinian demonstrations. Commemorating the Nakba, wearing the keffiyeh, and displaying Palestinian flags or colors have become unwelcome acts—some even banned. Even gatherings of liberal and left-wing Jewish citizens opposing Netanyahu are prohibited, with police claiming that Palestinian “troublemakers” might misuse such events. Companies like Springer and others enforce a loyalty oath to Israel. German shipyards have long supplied Israel with U-boats equipped with nuclear warheads. In 2023, German arms sales to Israel increased tenfold. Even the German military is now ready to defend Israel. In February 2024, the warship Hessen sailed from Wilhelmshaven toward the Red Sea, carrying an unknown number of marines mobilized to counter threats from Yemeni Houthi militias to navigation in the region, without a mandate from the German Parliament.

So what do German intellectuals say about all these disturbing trends? Almost nothing. Their cowardice is shocking. There may be a few brave souls willing to take a stand, but even when intellectuals comment on Israel’s war on Gaza, as Jürgen Habermas, Rainer Forst, and others did a few months ago, their “declared solidarity with Israel” reveals itself as the German Shibboleth, unmistakably carved into the Israeli stone.

The ancient Hebrew word “Shibboleth” is fitting here. As readers of the Book of Judges know, it was used as a password by a group to distinguish themselves from their enemies, even exterminating them if necessary, as the Gileadites did to the Ephraimites. The German Shibboleth or “loyalty to Israel” combines two contradictions: extreme fragility and extreme power. It functions as a floating signifier with fully inclusive and exclusive effects, its semantic flexibility uniting followers while marking opponents as strangers and enemies. The “Archive of Silence,” based in Berlin, documents the growing list of German institutions collaborating with Israel’s genocide. The list is long and growing rapidly. Accusations are made based on suspicion, weak excuses abound, and shadows hang over universities and other institutions that claim to uphold enlightenment and logic. But it seems that evidence, truth, and integrity have lost their value in these times.

Loyalty to Israel is a Shibboleth or a symbol of bullying, a silencing force, as I discovered personally when I received a message from the notorious “kangaroo court” accusing me of supporting terrorism. The letter came from Jutta Allmendinger, president of the Berlin Social Science Center, where I had been a professor and researcher for a quarter-century. The court accused me of secretly supporting a “terrorist organization” known as Hamas, and therefore, I was at risk of prosecution under German law. In my resignation letter, I pointed out the president’s biased hatred of Hamas and her uncritical support of the state’s official definitions of terrorism. I posed two questions: Why did her letter remain silent on the ongoing airstrikes, settler violence, and the senseless destruction of hospitals, schools, mosques, churches, and universities? Why does the Social Science Center deny scholars the right to speak truthfully, to say what others fear, and to question a state that was born from the ashes of genocide, yet now seeks the “complete or partial destruction” of a people—the Palestinians—who have been uprooted from their ancient homeland, as specified in the Genocide Convention, Article 2(c)?

Over a million people read my resignation letter on X and Facebook, and many others commented on it across social media. I received an outpouring of personal messages of support from all over the world. During my time in China, my resignation letter went viral. Many professors living outside Germany showed great courage, calling on Allmendinger and the Social Science Center to publicly apologize for the unscientific tone and offensive content of their accusations. But she remained silent, unconcerned about the current Israeli government’s brutal, terrorist behavior. The professors and researchers of the Social Science Center followed suit, setting down their pens, sealing their lips, closing their laptops, and staying their hands. But one must wonder: what logic or justification lies behind their silence? Perhaps they believe it’s better to do nothing, avoiding the risk of scorn, disgrace, or dismissal. Or perhaps, as the distinguished German philosopher Karl Jaspers predicted long ago, their silence is an illusion of righteousness—a belief that by acknowledging their ancestors’ guilt for past crimes and professing unwavering loyalty to Israel, they might attain absolution. Or more primitively, they may adhere to the German folklore: It’s better to be wrong than to be different; respect the rules of political correctness, submit, and be proud to be German. What grants the soul peace is the very truth.

Understanding silence is difficult, but what can be said with certainty is that the cowardly silence of one of Europe’s most prestigious research institutions reflects the general atmosphere in Germany, now gripped by a Shibboleth rooted in the era of Konrad Adenauer in the 1950s. Today, this Shibboleth leads to disastrous political, legal, and moral consequences. German Jews, motivated by their faith to condemn Israel, are angry and feel as though they don’t belong in a state that claims to atone for its past extermination of Jews. Meanwhile, the German government’s praise of Israel’s hard stance against “terrorism” and “Islamic extremism” fuels support for the far-right populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party. AfD, which is both pro-Israel and anti-foreigner, now commands support from around 20% of voters, with representation in 15 of Germany’s 16 state parliaments, tarnishing Germany’s global reputation. The efforts of the last generation to rid the country of fascist thinking through guilt and shame were impressive, but in just a few months, all the global gains in Germany’s reputation were lost due to foolish declarations of unconditional loyalty to Israel. By turning a blind eye to Israel’s self-destructive brutality, Germany’s moral bankruptcy benefits neither country. The damage inflicted by the German Shibboleth has legal ramifications, as Nicaragua pushes for Germany to be tried at the International Court of Justice for “facilitating genocide” through arms sales to Israel and cutting aid to UNRWA.

Worst of all, and most tragically, though not yet fully understood, is how the German Shibboleth casts doubt on the grand narrative of the state’s legitimacy. The preamble to Germany’s constitution, or Basic Law, declares that “the German people” form the foundation of the republic. Yet the harsh truth is that the Shibboleth reminds us of what W.G. Sebald, one of post-1945 Germany’s greatest writers, called the “secret history” of Germany’s recovery after the catastrophes of the first half of the 20th century. This secret: millions of victims of Nazi genocide and the Allied retaliatory bombings that killed 600,000 civilians and left over seven million homeless, as well as the genocide of the Herero and Nama peoples in German South-West Africa—the first genocide of the 20th century, for which German politicians have only recently, and reluctantly, acknowledged responsibility. But no compensation has yet been offered. Now, another secret is surfacing, filthy and grotesque: Germany’s complicity in genocide, with the foundations of the German state again mingling with the bodies of thousands upon thousands of innocent Palestinian women, children, and men, whose only desire is for a future free from the shackles of racial humiliation, colonial injustice, starvation, and systematic murder.