Reflections on the German state’s silencing of the Berlin Palestine Congress

I was inside the Palestine Congress in Berlin two weeks ago, and what took place can only be described as a travesty of justice and an example of the creeping resurgence of fascism in the German state. 

On Friday, April 12, I woke up nervous. For weeks, the German media had written about the Congress, or what they described as a gathering where “antisemites plan hate summit.” Weeks leading up to the Congress, Berlin politicians have said they will do everything in their power to stop the gathering from taking place. Senator for the Interior, Iris Spranger, stated that the authorities were monitoring the Palestine Congress, while the CDU faction leader Dirk Stettner demanded that everything must be done to prevent the “antisemitic event.”  

German media wrote hit pieces on multiple speakers, including myself and renowned surgeon Dr. Ghassan Abu Sitta, as evidence of the so-called hatefulness of our event. They cite my dedicated piece to the martyr, Ibrahim al-Nabulsi, which I published on Mondoweiss last year,  and my activities in Students for Justice in Palestine as examples of my radicalism. 

Of course, these are without merit, but in Germany being against the Zionist entity is consistently conflated with antisemitism and inciting violence against Jewish people. This conflation allows the German state to absolve themselves of their complicity in genocide, apartheid, and occupation of the Palestinian people by maliciously shifting the conversation away from Israeli crimes and onto the “criminal” pro-Palestinian activists.

The event looked and felt like a battle zone. 

There was a police checkpoint outside of the event venue, which was only announced 2 hours before the start of the Congress. Hundreds of people lined up and waited for hours just for the police to cap those who entered at 250 people. Part of that number was the 30 militarized police officers that were inside the event hall with us, as well as the dozens of German media channels that the police themselves let in without notice. 

As the first, and what turned out to be, the only speaker of the Palestine Congress, I knew I was about to face the consequences of speaking up for Palestinian liberation and an end to genocide. 

Prior to my arrival at the Congress venue, I received a message from a lawyer: “don’t be afraid, but I need you to look at this document about you.” My heart immediately sank. I was then forwarded a five-page document written about me by the police. It was a complete profile filled with my articles, work as a journalist, and social media posts to depict me as an antisemite and supporter of terrorism. 

One example the police used was my upcoming documentary, titled “The Reason of State.” An apparent issue to the Berlin authorities was my interview of Zaid Abdulnasser, who was criminalized, raided, and assaulted by German authorities for his ties to Samidoun, a now-banned pro-Palestinian organization in Germany. Apparently trying to even speak to subjects of anti-Palestinian repression can be considered an offense that needs to be closely monitored. 

“Even if no clear anti-semitic content can be identified on her public internet presences,” the police report says, “some publications could still be identified that, on the one hand, were seen as advocating the actions of the Palestinian resistance  and demonizing the state of Israel which should be evaluated.” 

They took issue with referencing the killed Palestinians by Israeli airstrikes on October 7 because I did not mention dead Israelis. The mourning of Israelis consistently takes precedence in the eyes of the West and it apparently isn’t enough that the whole international community has prioritized their suffering by putting names and faces to those killed. In Germany, Palestinians are antisemitic if they choose, instead, to focus on the victims of this war who have become nameless, faceless, and invisible. 

Then yesterday I received a letter from the police in my mailbox informing me a criminal investigation had been opened against me by the Mannheim police department: “You are being investigated for the use of symbols of unconstitutional and terrorist organizations.” 

I am fairly certain that this criminal investigation was opened after it was made public that I was to speak at the Palestine Congress. It now seems that Germany is punishing me as a result. 

This is the reality of the Palestinian solidarity movement in Germany: we are the ones who are labelled as supporting terrorism for advocating for an end to this bloodshed, not the German state as it actively gives Israel the material and political support it needs to carry out the genocide and complete destruction of Gaza and its people. 

And I am not the only one facing state repression. 

Zaid Abdulnasser, although not a part of the Congress program, received a notice in the mail from the State Immigration Office in Berlin.

“You are obliged not to contact the participants and organizers of the ‘Palestine Congress’ event, from April 12, 2024, 10 a.m. until the end of the event on April 14, 2024, in Berlin organized by ‘Jewish Voice for a Just Peace in the Middle East.’” 

The letter goes on: “you are not to deal with them, not to accommodate them, and not to use certain means of communication (email, Facebook, Instagram, Facetime, WhatsApp, Youtube, X, Telegram).”

Zaid was forbidden from publishing media articles related to the event and from participating in all events of the Jewish Voice for Just Peace, and events related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. 

In the reasoning, the German state says that Zaid has become an “extremist as an activist” for his support of the PFLP and involvement in the now-banned organization, Samidoun Palestinian Solidarity Network. 

Zaid is currently facing a revocation of his refugee status for his activism, which the state deems antisemitic and threatens Israel’s right to exist. This time, however, the state’s extreme response infringes directly upon Zaid’s civil rights and freedoms of speech, assembly, and protest. 

Organizers of the Congress are also facing extreme consequences. One organizer told me that the state closed his bank account, while another received a notice from her work threatening to fire her due to her political activity. Another organizer suspects that police are surveiling her after the letters inside her mailbox were opened and then wrapped in tinfoil. 

Others are not only getting fired and receiving notices that they are being investigated by the authorities, but are facing collective punishment by the German state. On Friday, April 19, a Berlin district office announced the closure of two girls’ centers in Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg by the youth welfare office. The sponsoring organization, Freida Frauen*zentrum e.V. were informed of the termination with immediate effect of the service contracts for both facilities.

The two social care girls’ facilities, Alia and Phantalisa, were shut down due to the activism of two social workers. Berlin authorities claim they have been participating in demonstrations against the ongoing genocide in Palestine and posted private Instagram content showing solidarity. 

“We find it worrying that our employees’ private social media profiles are being monitored and that the exercise of fundamental rights outside of their working hours is being profiled and apparently criminalized. This calls into question the very democratic values to which we are committed in our work as social workers,” the press release of the women’s group read. 

Regardless of the international coverage of what took place during the Congress, Germany is only cracking down harder on pro-Palestinian solidarity, and in fact, it seems like the German government is just getting started. 

This intimidation and fixation on activists trying to fight against genocide is meant to distract from the actual genocide taking place — with German support. It is meant to shift our focus so that we are so consumed with fear of the police and of getting into legal trouble that we simply stop fighting, stop protesting, and stop trying to end our complicity in the murder of the Palestinian people. 

Of course, it won’t work. As we see all over the world, and most recently, on college campuses across the U.S., the fight for liberation is alive, and we will not be silenced.