Henryk M Broder -> A new phenomenon: Anti-semitism without Anti-semites

[Ulli]

I will translate it bit by bit
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A new phenomenon: Anti-semitism without Anti-semites

Henryk Broder's today's speech in front of the Committee for the Interior of the German parliament:


Dear Sir and Madam, Dear colleagues, Dear Mrs. Köhler, Dear Mr. Edathy  

I thank you for the invitation to this hearing. It is a honour to me that I am allowed to speak here. I know, there were a few irritations because of my participation. But I am shure, that you will not regret my invitation, if I have finished.

This is not the first hearing of me that dealed with Anti-semitism, and it will not be the last. There have been been countless efforts to define Anti-semitism, to explain anti-semitism and to neutralize antisemitism since the author and self-confessed Jew-enemy Wilhelm Marr published his scripture  „Der Sieg des Germanenthums über das Judenthum – Vom nichtconfessionellen Standpunkt aus betrachtet“ in 1879 and became with this the leader of the anti-semite movement in the German empire - all efforts have been failed.

If this would not be the case, we would not sit here today. Every discussion about anti-semitism begins with a definition, a lot of discussion don't go further, and the end of all efforts is the result: "Anti-semitism is if you don't like Jews less, than it is necessary".

I want to focus on two points, which we should give our attention, two arguments we have to take serious, if we don't want to be in a "virtual" debate.


First: We handle with this anti-semitism not a prejudice, but a resentment. Prejudices are harmless; we need them to find our ways in life. I have prejudices, you have prejudices, every human has prejudices.

And we have only problems with negative prejudices. If I would tell you, that Germans are busy, have discipline and are hospitable, you will admit gladly. If I would tell you that the Germans are stingy, without humor and silly, you will be probably outraged. This is, you will say, an illegitimate    generalization. With the Jews it is axactly the same. Positive prejudices like the peoples of the book, the peoples of the esprit we like to hear, negative prejudices, which point to our disposition to misbehave, we see as an affront.

The difference between a prejudice and a resentment is like this: A prejudice points to the behaviour of a human, a resentment to his existence. The Anti-semitism belongs to the category of the resentments. The  anti-semite doesn't resent the Jew, who he is or what he does, but he resents that he is existing. The anti-semite resents the Jew both the assimilation and the differentiation. Rich Jews are exploiters, poor Jews are Parasites, smart Jews are arrogant and stupid Jews - yes they exist too - are a shame for Judaism. The anti-semite resists the Jew on principle all, and the opposite too. Because of this it is  senseless to discuss with an anti-semite and to try to convince them of the    absurdity of their views.
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Man muss sie ausgrenzen, sie in eine Art sozialer Quarantäne isolieren. Die Gesellschaft muss klar machen, dass sie den Antisemitismus und den Antisemiten verachtet, so wie sie die Prügelstrafe als Mittel der Erziehung und die Vergewaltigung – auch die eheliche – verachtet, wohl wissend, dass sie nicht alles kontrollieren kann, was hinter zugezogenen Gardinen und unter vier Augen passiert.

Zweitens: Wenn Sie dem Antisemitismus beikommen wollen, müssen Sie einsehen, dass er keine fixe Größe ist, wie der Urmeter in Paris oder die Definition für Volt, Watt und Ampere. Wie alle sozialen Phänomene unterliegt auch der Antisemitismus einem Wandel. Auch Armut ist heute nicht mehr das, was sie zur Zeit von Oliver Twist oder Aschenputtel war.

Der Antisemitismus, über den wir immer noch am liebsten reden, stammt aus der Asservatenkammer des letzten und vorletzten Jahrhunderts. Es ist, um mit Bebel zu sprechen, der Sozialismus der dummen Kerle, die noch immer einem Phantom nachjagen. Der gewöhnliche Antisemit hat vom Gegenstand seiner Obsessionen keine Vorstellung, nur eine diffuse Ahnung. Er tobt sich aus, indem er Hakenkreuze an Bauzäune malt und „Juda verrecke!“ auf Grabsteine schmiert – ein Fall für die Polizei und das örtliche Amtsgericht, nicht mehr. Niemand wird sich mit Rabauken solidarisieren, die den Arm zum Hitlergruß heben und dabei „Juden raus!“ schreien. Diese Art des Antisemitismus ist hässlich, aber politisch irrelevant, ein Nachruf auf sich selbst.

Der moderne Antisemit dagegen tritt ganz anders auf. Er hat keine Glatze, dafür Manieren, oft auch einen akademischen Titel, er trauert um die Juden, die im Holocaust ums Leben gekommen sind, stellt aber zugleich die Frage, warum die Überlebenden und ihre Nachkommen aus der Geschichte nichts gelernt haben und heute ein anderes Volk so misshandeln, wie sie selber misshandelt wurden. Der moderne Antisemit glaubt nicht an die „Protokolle der Weisen von Zion“, dafür fantasiert er über die „Israel-Lobby“, die Amerikas Politik bestimmt, so wie ein Schwanz mit dem Hund wedelt. Der moderne Antisemit gedenkt selbstverständlich jedes Jahr der Befreiung von Auschwitz am 27. Januar, zugleich aber tritt er für das Recht des Iran auf atomare Bewaffnung ein. Denn: „Was man Israel oder Pakistan gewährt, kann man dem Iran nicht verweigern“ – Originalton Norman Paech. Oder er dreht kausale Zusammenhänge um und behauptet, die atomare Bedrohung gehe nicht vom Iran, sondern von Israel aus – wie es Professor Udo Steinbach vor kurzem in einer Sendung des WDR getan hat.

Der moderne Antisemit findet den ordinären Antisemitismus schrecklich, bekennt sich aber ganz unbefangen zum Antizionismus, dankbar für die Möglichkeit, seine Ressentiments in einer politisch korrekten Form auszuleben. Denn auch der Antizionismus ist ein Ressentiment, wie der klassische Antisemitismus es war. Der Antizionist hat die gleiche Einstellung zu Israel wie der Antisemit zum Juden. Er stört sich nicht daran, was Israel macht oder unterlässt, sondern daran, dass es Israel gibt. Und deswegen beteiligt er sich so leidenschaftlich an Debatten über eine Lösung der Palästina-Frage, die für Israel eine Endlösung bedeuten könnte, während ihn die Zustände in Darfur, in Zimbabwe, im Kongo und in Kambodscha kalt lassen, weil dort keine Juden involviert sind. Fragen Sie doch mal den außenpolitischen Sprecher der Linken, wie viele Stellungnahmen er in den letzten Monaten zu „Palästina“ abgegeben hat und wie viele zu Tibet. Danach reden wir weiter.

Früher – sagen wir: zurzeit von Wilhelm Marr, Karl Lueger und Adolf Stoecker – war alles ganz einfach. Es gab die Juden, die Antisemiten und den Antisemitismus. Nach 1945 gab es dann aus den bekannten Gründen einen Antisemitismus ohne Juden, und heute haben wir es wieder mit einem neuen Phänomen zu tun: einem Antisemitismus ohne Antisemiten. Neu ist auch das Berufsbild des Freizeitantisemiten, der tagsüber seiner regulären Arbeit nachgeht – unter Umständen sogar bei einer Bundesbehörde – und nach Dienstschluss „israelkritische“ Texte verfasst, die dann auf obskuren antizionistischen Websites erscheinen. Niemand will ein Antisemit sein, aber in der Hall of Shame der Antizionisten wird der Platz langsam knapp.

Antisemitismus und Antizionismus sind zwei Seiten derselben Münze. War der Antisemit davon überzeugt, dass nicht er, der Antisemit, sondern der Jude am Antisemitismus schuld ist, so ist der Antizionist heute davon überzeugt, dass Israel nicht nur für die Leiden der Palästinenser, sondern auch dafür verantwortlich ist, was es selbst erleiden muss.

Die Älteren unter Ihnen werden sich vielleicht noch an den Satz erinnern, mit dem ein grüner Politiker, der noch immer dem Bundestag angehört, zurzeit des Golfkrieges die irakischen Raketenangriffe auf Israel Anfang 1991 kommentierte: „Die irakische Raketenangriffe sind die logische, fast zwingende Konsequenz der Politik Israels.“ Derselbe grüne Politiker sprach sich damals auch gegen die Lieferung von Defensivwaffen wie den Patriot-Raketen an Israel aus, weil diese ebenfalls zur Eskalation der Lage beitragen würden. Heute, 17 Jahre später, hören und lesen wir ähnliche Sätze über Raketenangriffe aus dem südlichen Libanon und dem Gazastreifen auf Israel – dass sie die logische, fast zwangsläufige Folge der Besatzungspolitik Israels seien und dass Israel gut daran täte, nicht zu reagieren, um eine Eskalation zu vermeiden. Denn der moderne Antisemit verehrt Juden, die seit 60 Jahren tot sind, nimmt es aber lebenden Juden übel, wenn sie sich zur Wehr setzen. Er ruft „Wehret den Anfängen!“, wenn eine handvoll Hobbynazis in Cottbus aufmarschiert, rechtfertigt aber die Politik des iranischen Präsidenten und den Fortgang der Geschäfte mit dem Iran.

Meine Damen und Herren, wir werden das Problem des Antisemitismus nicht lösen, nicht bei dieser Anhörung und nicht bei der nächsten. Aber allein, dass Sie sich mit diesem Thema befassen, obwohl es andere und wichtigere Probleme gibt, die behandelt werden wollen, ist ein gutes Zeichen. Wenn ich Ihnen in aller Demut und Bescheidenheit eine Empfehlung geben darf: Überlassen sie die Beschäftigung mit dem guten alten Antisemitismus à la Horst Mahler den Archäologen, den Antiquaren und den Historikern. Kümmern Sie sich um den modernen Antisemitismus im Kostüm des Antizionismus und um dessen Repräsentanten, die es auch in Ihren Reihen gibt.

Ich danke Ihnen, dass Sie mir zugehört haben.

Source: http://www.achgut.com/dadgdx/index.php/dadgd/article/ein_neues_phaenomen_antisemitismus_ohne_antisemiten/

[Ultra Requete]

I tranalated this with language tools and I fully agree that antizionism is modern, fashionable antisemitism good find.

[Ulli]

I tranalated this with language tools and I fully agree that antizionism is modern, fashionable antisemitism good find.

Oh I am so sorry, that I don't translated it until now. There is so much to do 

[Ultra Requete]

Jewish Political Studies Review 16:3-4 (Fall 2004)



Anti-Semitism In Germany Today:
Its Roots And Tendencies1
Susanne Urban



The new millennium has witnessed a resurgence of anti-Semitism in the world, especially in Europe. Anti-Semitism certainly did not disappear in Germany after WW II. What is new is the blunt expression of anti-Semitism and the fraternization between left-wing and right-wing, liberal and conservative streams. Anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism continue to spread in German society and are more and more openly expressed.

Right-wing groups and neo-Nazis are no longer the only ones who agitate against Israel and Jews. Together with "traditional" anti-Semitism, Germany has seen a growth of leftist anti-Semitism along with anti-imperialist, antiglobalization, and anti-Zionist attitudes, all reinforcing the new German claim of having been victims in WW II.

There is a widespread animus against Israel, clearly not only toward Israeli policies, that often goes along with pro-Palestinian partisanship. This development is intensified by anti-Israeli media coverage in Germany, often accompanied by anti-Semitic language and images.

This "new" anti-Semitism in Germany correlates with changes in the nation's attitudes toward WW II and remembrance of the Shoah. Laying the blame for "immoral" conduct on Israel, and therefore "the Jews," makes clear that "they" did not learn the lessons of the Shoah; whereas Germans see themselves as having learned the lessons by being watchmen against "immoral" politics.



In 1967 Jean Améry wrote: "The classic phenomenon of anti-Semitism is taking a new shape. The old one still exists, this I call coexistence....To be clear: anti-Semitism, included in...anti-Zionism as the thunderstorm is part of the cloud, is again respectable....But: a respectable anti-Semitism is not possible."2

More than thirty-five years later, it seems nothing has changed. Although anti-Semitism masks itself above all as anti-Zionism or "criticism of Israeli policies," its roots are pure, traditional anti-Semitism.



The Devil in Disguise
Améry’s appeal not to become complacent toward anti-Semitism disguised as anti-Zionism has lost none of its importance. Born in 1912 in Vienna, Améry survived the Holocaust and after 1966 worked mainly as a journalist. His writings are responses to anti-Semitism by someone who lost faith in the world in Auschwitz. He committed suicide in 1978.

The new millennium has witnessed a resurgence of anti-Semitism in the world, especially in Europe. There is a clear link to the terror war in Israel, and a widespread animus against Israel (not just Israeli policies) and Diaspora Jews along with pro-Palestinian partisanship. This development is intensified by anti-Israeli media coverage including the use of anti-Semitic language and images.

In Germany, anti-Semitism certainly did not disappear after WW II. What is new is the blunt expression of anti-Semitism and the fraternization between left-wing and right-wing, liberal and conservative streams. Anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism continue to spread in German society.



Anti-Semitism in Germany, 1945–2004
Anti-Semitism appears to be an essential part of the European cultural tradition, and in Germany, more or less conscious Jew-hatred exists by "tradition" as well. Former East Germany, and before that the Soviet Occupation Zone, never conducted a survey of anti-Semitism, and no data is available. Such surveys were, however, conducted in West Germany. In 1949, a quarter of the West German population described themselves as anti-Semites; in a 1952 survey, one-third said they were definitely anti-Semites.3

By 1980, however, the tracking of various population samples showed that anti-Semitism had decreased. Surveys conducted after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 revealed a huge gap in anti-Semitic attitudes between East and West Germany.4 Surprisingly, East Germany appeared to be very congenial to Jews with almost no anti-Semitism. This, however, was a fallacy related to the fact that many people and even researchers make a facile distinction between anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism, despite the fact that scholars from the Centre for Research on Anti-Semitism in Berlin5 pointed to the similarities. In addition, East Germans were used to saying what was officially required of them. And, as implied, anti-Zionism and attitudes toward Israel per se were not probed. Indeed, in subsequent surveys the gap between eastern and western Germany closed quickly.6

In May 2003, the Federal Office for Protecting the Constitution published a special study on anti-Semitism and its links with rightwing and neo-Nazi groups.7 The same institution recorded more than 1400 anti-Semitic crimes in 2001,8 confirming a steady rise including a 100 percent increase for Berlin. Anti-Israeli activities, however, such as attacks on the Israeli embassy, are not included in these reports because there is still no systematic monitoring of anti-Zionism.

In 2002, as the neoliberal FDP Party maligned Israel, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, and German Jewish leader Michel Friedman, anti-Semitism became an issue for the first time in a postwar German election campaign.

In April of that year, the Sigmund Freud Institute in Frankfurt am Main and the University of Leipzig confirmed a new height of anti-Semitism. In their joint study, 20 percent of the respondents agreed that "Jews are to blame for the major conflicts in the world," and another 26 percent shared this opinion to some extent.9

In May 2002, the weekly magazine Der Spiegel published a survey in which 25 percent agreed that "what the State of Israel does to the Palestinians is no different than what the Nazis did during the Third Reich to the Jews."10

As reported in 2003, studies now estimate overt anti-Semitism at around 23 percent, and covert anti-Semitism as existing among 30–40 percent of the German public.11


In 2002, the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC) in Vienna and the above-mentioned Centre for Research on Anti-Semitism conducted a study on "Manifestations of Anti-Semitism in the European Union: First Semester, 2002." In October 2003 the first version of the report was submitted to the EU, and by January 2004 the final report was in the hands of the EUMC, which kept the study - with the EU’s knowledge and approval - under lock and key. The research shows that, aside from the clear threat posed by "ordinary" right-wing anti-Semitism, Muslims and pro-Palestinian groups are also playing a crucial role. Furthermore, leftist and antiglobalization groups such as ATTAC were described as more or less anti-Semitic.12 The EUMC vaguely criticized the study, saying that "there was a problem defining anti-Semitism, the definition being too complicated," as a member of the Centre for Research on Anti-Semitism told the author. Once again, anti-Zionism was treated as distinct from anti-Semitism.

In April 2004, as the Conference on Anti-Semitism in Europe took place in Berlin, the Stephen Roth Institute of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism at Tel Aviv University revealed that the countries with the highest rates of anti-Semitic incidents in the world are Germany, France, Britain, Russia, and Canada.13 Compared to France or Britain, in Germany Islamic and pro-Palestinian groups are involved in only a very small percentage of anti-Semitic incidents: indigenous German anti-Semitism does not need "support" from others. Since there was never a time free of anti-Semitism, it is necessary to ask whether the current wave is really "new anti-Semitism" or centuries old anti-Semitism that has been "modernized" and adapted to the circumstances. Above all, it is a post-Auschwitz anti-Semitism. For many people, provided they are not Holocaust deniers or neo-Nazis, Auschwitz as the symbol of the Holocaust is the obstacle to expressing anti-Semitism and aversion to Jews and Israel. Hence Germans, like many other anti-Semites, use the "anti-Zionist" disguise. This enables declaring Israel "the most evil country" and "nazifying" Israel with comparisons to the Third Reich, or advocating that it vanish from the world’s stage. This, in turn, opens the door to proclaiming Jews to be evil people in general.

These manifestations of anti-Semitism in Germany are deeply linked to the German past from 1933 to 1945 and the wish to get rid of guilt or responsibility for dealing with that past. Germany’s ideological unification since 1989 has two main pillars: a strong anti-American and anti-Israeli attitude, and a new position toward the history of WW II.



Rewriting History
For more than fifteen years, German intellectuals, writers, politicians, and ordinary people have gradually worn down moral and political barriers that for decades kept the overwhelming majority away from open and extensive anti-Semitism.

It started with the Historikerstreit, a series of articles written in 1986, and did not end with the anti-Semitic election campaign in spring 2002. The Historikerstreit was mainly propelled by an article by the historian Ernst Nolte in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, which portrayed the National Socialist state and its terror as only a reaction to the Bolshevik threat, and the persecution of Jews and the Shoah as not really singular in human history. (Jürgen Habermas, a representative of the Critical Theory school and intellectual descendant of Theodor Adorno, sharply protested Nolte’s claims.) Germany is a country with far more memorials and museums to the concentration camps, as well as Jewish museums, than other European countries. The volume of Holocaust education in schools and other educational institutions, the number of conferences and workshops devoted to the subject, seems close to unique in Europe. As Yehuda Bauer, chief historian of Yad Vashem, said in an interview:

Germany is most active in promoting Holocaust education for which there is a very good reason. Given their history, they understand the importance of education as a means of preventing future disasters. The Holocaust today serves as a symbol for what we ought to oppose: racism, genocide, mass murder, ethnic hatred, ethnic cleansing, anti-Semitism and group hatred.14
Nevertheless, the opposition to inhumanity in general is no obstacle to German anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. Holocaust education in Germany may be intensive, but most of the textbooks use cliche's and stereotypes. Moreover, many of the teachers convey compassion for the murdered Jews along with strong reservations toward the Jews of today and, of course, the anti-Israeli attitude. Although Germany is proud of its well-developed culture of Holocaust remembrance and education, which for many years was seen as a force against anti-Semitism, the latter force has gone weak. It was a fallacy to think that knowledge about the Shoah would lead people to love their neighbors or even their Jewish neighbors. Holocaust education in Germany is being slowly but steadily undermined by the new trend of seeing Germans themselves as victims, with many people feeling that they are fed up with the Shoah.15 Well-intended rituals and remembrances have not proved an effective shield against anti-Semitism and the rewriting of history. This widespread "victim" trend in Germany needs to be monitored carefully, since in the long run it may lead to a rewriting of the history of WW II and, in the worst case, to a minimization of the Shoah.

The leading figure among the German "new historians" is Jörg Friedrich, who has published two books on the Allied bombings of Germany.16 The first book deals with the strategy of the Allied bombings and condemns them as inhuman and pointless. Friedrich’s popularized style helped this book become a bestseller. He uses terms that for decades were associated with Nazi persecution and the Shoah; thus, cellars and air-raid shelters in which Germans died are "crematoria," an RAF bomber group is an Einsatzgruppe, and the destruction of libraries during the bombings constitutes Bücherverbrennungen. In this way the Shoah is minimized through language.

Friedrich’s second book was also a bestseller and also depicts Germans as victims. There are no SA men, no SS, no soldiers involved in persecution, murder, and "aryanization." The book contains horrifying photos of the effects of the Allied bombings of Germany. Ruins, burnt bodies, and ashes everywhere evoke associations with the Warsaw Ghetto after its liquidation in 1943 and well-known images from Auschwitz and other extermination camps. Friedrich even declared openly, in several television interviews in winter 2002: "Churchill was the greatest child-slaughterer of all time. He slaughtered 76,000 children." Yet Friedrich, formerly known as a serious historian, never devotes a single word to the 1.5 million murdered Jewish children.

German historiography increasingly portrays Germans as victims in WW II and not as perpetrators, bystanders, or people deriving benefit from persecution. The revised perspective on German history - from the Allied bombings to the Germans’ expulsion from Poland and East European countries - undoubtedly reflects a historical consciousness that is newly embraced by the majority, though not new in itself. There was never any taboo on speaking about the Allied bombings or the postwar expulsions; documentaries, books, journals, and films have dealt with these subjects since the early 1950s, and WW II was commonly discussed in families and by certain organizations. What is new, however, is the public reinterpretation of history, encompassing intellectuals and politicians of both the Left and the Right.



From a Trickle to the Mainstream
A few examples will illustrate this trend. In Frankfurt in 1998, when he received the Peace Prize of German Publishers, the famous German writer Martin Walser gave a speech in which he expressed his weariness at being confronted with Auschwitz; he was supported by large numbers of Germans including intellectuals and politicians. Jews who spoke out in protest were almost on their own. Four years later in 2002, for 8 May - the day marking the liberation in 1945 - Walser was invited for a discussion with Chancellor Gerhard Schröder on "Nation and Patriotism." Their dialogue focused on the question of whether the Allies of WW I were really the ones responsible for Hitler’s coming to power. Walser maintained that patriotism must be based on emotions and deeply rooted in history, and the German chancellor asserted: "The way we as Germans deal with our history shall be decided by each and every generation anew." The decision seems to have been made.

Since the second Palestinian uprising began in the fall of 2000, many consider that Israel is losing the media battle. The Israeli government is frequently blamed for not making its viewpoints known effectively. Pro-Israeli media watchers are an important source of information for their readers. But above all, they are private actors in the Arab-Israeli public relations war.

On 9 November 2002, the memorial day for Kristallnacht in 1938, German public television for the first time in years did not screen the usual quantity of movies and documentaries on this topic. The main news programs devoted about ten seconds to a historical review. Two documentaries were shown at around 11 p.m., one on Hitler’s secretary and the other, not broadcast on either of the two national channels but on three of the sixteen federal stations, on the Sonderkommando (Jews forced to work in the crematoria) in Auschwitz. However, this time the first national channel, ARD, presented the first episode of a three-part series on the German general Erwin Rommel and also the first episode of a six-part series on the SS, and although the SS was portrayed as a brutal organization its victims were absent.

On 17 November 2002, the Day of National Mourning, which is dedicated to soldiers and civilians who died in WW I and WW II, parliament held a four-hour ceremony. Tall black crosses were emplaced in the parliament despite the supposed separation of church and state. Between some classical music pieces, a young woman read from letters written in 1942 by German soldiers based in Stalingrad. During the whole ceremony there was not one word about war crimes, or about the army units that slaughtered Jews. ¨

Peter Sloterdijk, a German philosopher born in 1947, has stepped out of academia and become a star of German television. Since 2002 he has had his own show, Philosophical Quartet,17 in which he and his regular comrade Rüdiger Safranski, a philosopher and writer, host two other guests to discuss the latest issues. Sloterdijk is known for an elitist and anti-American attitude that goes hand in hand with a conservative view of the German past, a synthesis of leftist and rightist positions. His latest book, Airquake: At the Source of Terror18 recounts catastrophic events that for Sloterdijk are all similar: the Holocaust, the Allied bombings of Germany, the atomic bombing of Japan, and September 11 are the strange pearls on Sloterdijk’s string. He maintains that the source of all these catastrophes was the first attack with poison gas in WW I, which, he emphasizes, was primarily made possible by the German chemist Fritz Haber. With a cynical undertone Sloterdijk stresses the fact that Haber was Jewish, and then alleges a continuity between Haber’s experiments and the gas chambers during the Shoah. Although Sloterdijk does not make the connection explicitly, he implies a horrible conclusion: that without a Jewish chemist there would have been no Holocaust.

In November 2002 Sloterdijk invited to his show Luc Bondy, a theatrical director, to discuss the topic of anti-Semitism. Bondy told the audience: "After WW II, as small children, we were confronted with guilt. It was so massive. We as children in postwar times were under fire nearly nonstop and saw those pictures everywhere. My thesis is: the only possible way to get rid of anti-Semitism is therefore to be anti-Semitic again."19

These and many other popularized historical reinterpretations reflect the fact that Germany is on a path toward self-reconciliation. It is a reconciliation between the generations, as the gap that opened between the 1960s leftist movement and the parent generation, who were accused as participants in the war, is closed; and it is also a reconciliation between Left and Right. No longer do historical debates drive a wedge between Germans.

As Anne Applebaum has written:

The country’s collective conscience was enlightened by the TV-Series "Holocaust" to an extent that could never have been achieved by historical science and all its publications. What imperative message, fuelled by emotionalism, is carried by today’s self-reconciliation trend? The discussion on victimhood has now been extended to include the perpetrators. In the dispute over the planned "Centre against Expulsion," for example.20
The gates are wide open to a new cult of victimhood that minimizes - even without malicious intention - Germany’s guilt for the outbreak of war, its crimes against humanity (including those committed by German army units), as well as the uniqueness of the Holocaust.



Misusing the Shoah
The decreasing interest in the Holocaust does not prevent Germans from invoking it in political debates. The "lesson" that Germans now draw from WW II and the Holocaust is one of opposition to the United States and Israel.

It is often claimed that the German public has been sensitized to realities such as the 2003 war in Iraq or the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by decades of education on German war crimes and the Shoah as a unique genocide. The Shoah is misused to oppose military conflicts, particularly if they are carried out by the United States or Israel against terror regimes, terror movements, and Islamic fundamentalism. Once a domain of the Left, anti-Americanism and anti-Zionism are now embraced by ordinary Germans, reinforced by the books on the Allied bombings and the like. The extreme Right, which normally is identified with xenophobic attitudes, has discovered its solidarity with Islamic and Palestinian "freedom fighters." Pro-Palestinian, anti-American, and anti-Semitic themes were common in the 2003 demonstrations against the war in Iraq.

Israel is condemned, but terrorist movements in Spain, Ireland, or Israel itself are not. The German public does not organize demonstrations after a bus bombing in Israel, but it does after a Hamas leader is killed. Israel, and hence "the Jews," are accused of horrendous behavior that is alleged to be even worse because they are "former victims." In other words, Israel and the Jews have not learned their lessons from the Shoah, whereas Germans have learned them thoroughly.

To clear themselves of the suspicion of being anti-Semitic, Germans accompany every castigation of Israel with the mantra that it is "only criticism" motivated by a just, democratic preference for peaceful solutions. The other side of this coin is their claim that because of the Holocaust, Germans have to side with today’s victims, namely, the Palestinians. Undoubtedly the best tactic, however, is to quote leftist Jews or Israelis to buttress their own views. Jewish witnesses are taken to court against Israel.21



Anti-Semitism and Anti-Zionism Go Hand in Hand
This anti-Israeli attitude is state-of-the-art in parts of the German media.22 Photos and illustrated reports present the Israeli Goliath against the Palestinian David, Palestinian children against heavily armed Israeli soldiers. We see ruins of Palestinian buildings with distressed women and children standing in front of them, juxtaposed with settlers who live in green, opulent surroundings and act aggressively toward Palestinians.

A 2002 study showed that German media coverage of the Middle East is often characterized by a lack of context and hostile undertones against Israel. Not uncommonly, the Holocaust is minimized by comparing Israel with the Third Reich, blood libels are invoked regarding Palestinian children, and Zionist conspiracy theories are mentioned. The study concluded: "German media coverage of the conflict contributed to an anti-Semitic view of Israel among the German population."23

At the end of 2002, the Federal Centre for Civic Education in Bonn followed up with its own study, which concluded that "an important effect in media is to present Israel and its military power only to convey the impression that Israel is the aggressor."24 During the official presentation of this study, however, the results were distorted and played down. The opening lecture was by Werner Stüber of the University of Düsseldorf, who had lived many years in East Jerusalem and taught at Bir Zeit University. He did not say a sentence about Palestinian terror, but did speak of the "powerful Jewish lobby in the United States." An attempt to dispute this lecture was stifled with the words that the lecture backed the position of the Centre for Civic Education - which, seemingly, did not consider the results of its own study, and, incidentally, is directly connected to the German state. As the conference continued, the focus was not on anti-Semitic tendencies in German media but rather on Israel’s "aggression," "inhuman" behavior, and so on.

After the Jenin operation in April 2002, Süddeutsche Zeitung published a cartoon showing Sharon in front of an Israeli tank that was identified as Jewish-Israeli with a Star of David. To the left of the tank was a bulldozer carrying away dozens of dead, emaciated bodies. UN staff were trying to approach, but Sharon shouted at them, "Go away, this is war!" The bulldozer with the dead bodies is a clear association with images from the liberated extermination camps, in which thousands of dead bodies were carried by bulldozers into mass graves. The simple message of the cartoon is that "the Jews" are Nazis. As Deidre Berger, head of the American Jewish Committee in Germany, noted succinctly, "Israel is under fire in the German media."25



Conclusion
There are various facets of anti-Semitism in Germany today:

Pre-Auschwitz anti-Semitism, found above all in neo-Nazi circles
Neo-Nazi anti-Semitism, typically combining Islamism and anti-Zionism
Neoliberal anti-Semitism, combining massive anti-Israeli attitudes and resistance to both financial and moral responsibility for the Holocaust
Leftist anti-Semitism, hand in hand with anti-imperialist and antiglobalization attitudes
Anti-Semitism disguised by general, reflexive “criticism” of Israeli policies
Anti-Semitism and, hence, anti-Zionism as part of the new German claim of having been victims in WW II
There are no effective, large-scale activities against anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism, and the majority of Germans would not support them. Although certain individuals and organizations try to put the problem on the agenda, this is much more cosmetics than a successful strategy.

As the historian Julius Schöps of Potsdam University put it in the newspaper Tageszeitung:

Protests against anti-Semitism, organized by small groups, do not get extensive attention in Germany. Resolutions by the German parliament to reject anti-Semitism are drivel of the worst kind....But all those ineffective actions are presented to the world as a strong defense against the charge of anti-Semitism. The truth is: no one is really interested in these matters. No one really cares.26

http://www.jcpa.org/phas/phas-urban-f04.htm

I can't translate this neither as my german is limited to "hande hoh" or "hitler kaput" learned in childhood, but I found this article which corespond to your threads.