Gott und die Welt

"The Rothschild plague cannot be vaccinated" was written on a poster of lateral thinkers during a demonstration against the corona measures. Anti-Semitism is blossoming, and not just since the beginning of the COVID crisis. On the street and on the net, there is hate speech against Jews from various quarters. But since the attack in Halle, politics and civil society have awakened. The federal government spends 125 million euros annually on preventing extremism and promoting democracy. Who develops the programs and projects? What are the new strategies against hatred of Jews in Germany? Anti-Semitism is particularly difficult to deal with on the Internet. The anti-Semitism researcher Matthias Becker from the Technical University in Berlin is breaking new ground. Together with European partner universities, he is developing an AI, an artificial intelligence, which is supposed to research and decode anti-Semitism online, because there, hatred of Jews can often only be found hidden. According to Becker, "socially acceptable" anti-Semitism is dead and wearing new clothes in post-war Germany. Nobody wants to be considered an anti-Semite today. "The anti-Semites," says Michael Blume, the committed anti-Semitism commissioner for the state of Baden-Württemberg, "are always the others". Anti-Semitic tendencies are mostly denied, especially in the middle of society. But Blume does not give up and puts his finger in the wounds he sees - be it Muslim hatred of Jews in schools or Israel-related anti-Semitism, which today sees all the evil in the world in the Jewish state. "Meet a Jew" program against anti-Semitic prejudice The Central Council of Jews in Germany is breaking new ground with "Meet a Jew": The program sends Jews to schools and the public. Nothing breaks down anti-Semitic prejudices better than face-to-face encounters. So far, contemporary witnesses have kept the memory of the Holocaust alive. But soon the last contemporary witnesses will no longer be alive. In Israel, a photographer portrays Holocaust survivors from a very personal, life-affirming perspective. His pictures are examples of a new, emotional culture of remembrance. He believes that Jewish haters and Holocaust deniers cannot be dealt with with history lessons. In Berlin, "The Democracy Guides" are making films with Arab migrants - including films that target anti-Semitism, which is often deeply rooted in Muslim societies. Like "Meet a Jew", they are supported by the federal government. Churches are also going on the offensive. Christian Staffa is the anti-Semitism officer of the EKD, the Evangelical Church in Germany. He relies on education and the ruthless handling of the churches' own anti-Semitic history. In Neuruppin, Brandenburg, he organized a two-day focus on hatred of Jews with an entire school. Never again anti-Semitism? Given almost two millennia of institutionalized hatred of Jews, this slogan is wishful thinking. Everyone who has written the fight against anti-Semitism on their banner agrees on this. But there are new strategies - in education, politics and legislation - and they are bearing fruit.