A hostile wave of “open and aggressive” antisemitism is swamping Germany with government officials cautioning it has been rising steadily since Hamas terrorists attacked Israel on October 7 last year.
“We have experienced a tsunami of antisemitism since October 7th,” Federal Government Commissioner for Anti-Semitism, Felix Klein, said in an interview with the AFP news agency, as reported by Welt.
The deadly Hamas attack “further broke the existing dams regarding antisemitism in our society,” he added.
This is reflected in the police crime statistics for 2023 with around 5,000 antisemitic crimes, half of which were committed after October 7th, and all in the wake of growing numbers of migrants still pouring into the country, the report notes.
Klein went on to make an historical comparison with Germany today and as it was at the end of World War II as Adolf Hitler’s powers began to wane but much of his Nazi ideology remained.
Open and aggressive antisemitism in all its forms in Germany and worldwide is “stronger than ever since 1945,” Klein noted.
According to Klein, this “all-time high” reflects a worrying absurdity: on October 7th, “more Jews were murdered than at any time since the Shoah” yet the hate is building even as Jews work to defend themselves and their faith from attacks.
This is not the first time reports have emerged of Germany’s Jewish residents feeling threatened.
As Breitbart News reported, just on 12 months ago segments of the Jewish population in Berlin were being forced to consider a question many once thought unthinkable in the wake of the atrocities committed by Adolf Hitler and his Nazi followers and the subsequent promises of “never again” — is it time to leave Germany?
The fear was apparent in testimonies from a host of Jews in the national capital worried about their futures and those of their families as a rising tide of antisemitism is seen once more to cast a shadow across the city.
Germany has the third-largest Jewish community in Europe, according to the interior ministry.
The Central Council of Jews in Germany puts the number of practising Jews in the country at around 100,000 and the number of synagogues at around 100.