“Never again!” We agreed on that in the Federal Republic of Germany after the Nazis. But suddenly hatred of Jews and closeness to dictators seep into the heart of Germany. A wake up call!
“Never again!” was a federal German reason of state. Carried by a very broad middle that pushed seedy extremists to the fringes. Generations of students grew up with this belief to keep for life.
And now the world’s most famous art exhibition in Kassel, on German soil, is propagating hatred of Jews. And the most important foreign policy adviser to the chancellor is promoting clemency with Russia’s dictatorship. Are we just leaving the ground of those basic values that are supposed to make the reunited Germany – forever – immune to racial hatred and totalitarian excesses? It would be a spiritual crime of historical dimensions. Because the never never ends.
That was the plan: an artist collective from Indonesia is doing the most important art exhibition in the world. So that the “Global South”, victims of colonialism and globalization, can have a globally respected forum with its views. The result is a disaster.
Because an ugly reality grew out of the beautiful plan: images that were dripping with anti-Semitism. A Documenta boss who only wants to recognize a “misunderstanding”. A Minister of State for Culture assigned directly to the Federal Chancellor, who first protected artists and suddenly wants to be at the forefront of the anti-anti-Semitic movement. One doesn’t even know what to find worse: the artistic derailment or its embarrassing justification.
When asked about the anti-Jewish scandal triggered by the Indonesian artist collective Ruangrupa, Sabine Schormann, Director General of Documenta, replied: “Ruangrupa and the artists have assured us that there will be no anti-Semitism. The problem is that from their point of view it isn’t. And this is where the misunderstanding lies.”
Well – the misunderstanding lies with the artist group. But it is also up to the Documenta boss. And with Claudia Roth. Because there can be no doubt about one thing: anti-Semitism is location-independent, it exists in Germany, it obviously exists in Indonesia. There can be no cultural or postcolonial discount on anti-Semitism. Cultural relativism is a clumsy excuse that leftists like to use.
And Claudia Roth was also warned. It’s very simple: Anyone who calls the anti-Jewish enemies of Israel from the BDS movement (Boycott, Disinvest, Sanctions) will also get the anti-Jewish enemies of Israel into their home. Anti-Semitism was ordered, anti-Semitism has come. And he delivered reliably – repulsive as always.
Memories are awakened: A year and a half ago, the German Bundestag condemned the BDS campaign – with the votes of the Union, SPD, FDP and Greens. Green Claudia Roth was unable to agree (as was today’s Green family minister, Lisa Paus). It must not have been a coincidence. Roth is visually impaired in that eye, and she is so by choice. Which leads to the question of whether she is the right person to be Germany’s top cultural politician.
We stay in the Federal Chancellery. Jens Plötner is Olaf Scholz’s most important foreign policy adviser. He was Frank-Walter Steinmeier’s most important man at the time in the Foreign Ministry. Among other things, he said at the beginning of the week: “You can fill many newspaper pages with 20 martens. But I don’t think there’s enough discussion about how our relationship with Russia will actually be.” Regarding Ukraine, which is currently fighting for its survival against the Russians, Plötner said remarkably coolly: “Just because you were attacked doesn’t mean that you is better in terms of the rule of law.”
It’s not all harmless. It is part of the SPD’s long history of naïve Russia policy. As recently as 2014, former Chancellor Helmut Schmidt denied that Ukraine had its own identity. Schmidt, the SPD icon Willy Brandt, the legendary Herbert Wehner – the entire leadership of the SPD stabbed the Polish trade union Solidarnosc in the back in the early 1980s – and defended its violent suppression by the Polish Stone Age communists loyal to Moscow. Recently, it was not just anyone who documented this in Der Spiegel, but probably the most influential German historian of recent years: Heinrich August Winkler. The man is a member of the SPD. For 60 years.
In other words: the SPD narrative, the naive friend of Russia, that was only Gerhard Schröder, and this also for base, because capitalist motives, is a double legend. The motive for this was not only money, but also ideology. And makes. And Schröder was not a lonely man; when it came to Russia, he was rooted in the tradition of the SPD.
That’s one. The other: How can one, as the Chancellor’s most important adviser, publicly “think lovingly about Russia” (Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann) instead of helping Ukraine unreservedly?
And, more importantly, how can this be done after February 24, after Vladimir Putin and his troopers invaded Ukraine? This day should have opened the eyes of the last person who understood Putin.
And how can one talk like that after April 27th, after the day on which the Federal Chancellor proclaimed the “turn of the era”?
In general, Scholz, his quiet corrections of left delusions in the SPD. You are significant.
Unlike Federal President Steinmeier, the Federal Chancellor is demonstratively not going to this Documenta. He says that he finds the anti-Semitic works presented there disgusting.
For that, for confirming that German “Never Again!”, he deserves credit.
The Chancellor is also putting Russia, this social democratic place of longing, where it currently belongs under Putin: on the sidelines. This is at the same time the correction of another social-democratic error: that everything relevant in the East is exclusively called Russia. The new border no longer runs between East and West, but between authoritarian and free.
If he is consistent, Scholz is now seriously wondering how he wants to continue working with a man who publicly questions his politics. Who is already thinking of new deals with the butchers from Moscow, while they bring death and destruction to the neighboring country every day. It would be a decision about a comparatively small personnel matter with a big impact.