Magnus Hirschfeld – a Jewish, gay doctor – is at the heart of two of my four tours in Berlin. These tours dive deeply into the horrors of Nazi Germany and the fate of Hirschfeld and his work under the Nazis’ destructive hands. Beyond the fact that I come from a country invaded by Nazi Germany, and from a community systematically exterminated in the concentration camps, I also carry the responsibility to educate about the Holocaust during my tours. This is my personal contribution to Germany’s commitment to “Never again.”
This commitment began very early in my life. I must have been around 9 or 10 years old when I saw my first documentary about the Holocaust. While I don’t remember my exact age, that moment remains one of my most vivid memories from childhood. I can still recall exactly where I was sitting, how I was sitting, and what I was feeling as I stared at the screen with my mother next to me. I was so confused, so overwhelmed, and I was craving answers! I wanted to understand how this was possible. How could human beings commit such cruelty—so far beyond anything I could imagine?
Of course, my parents couldn’t give me satisfying answers. Nobody could! To this day, it remains one of the most discussed, yet least answered questions in human history. But it laid the first cornerstone for my later activism and my decision to become a sociologist. It also led to my deepest fear: the lack of empathy within human nature. I have learned so much about the reasons why people might lack empathy. But to this day, it still remains the thing I fear most and struggle with the most to truly understand.
As a teenager, I began reading Hannah Arendt. Her concept of the Banality of Evil was one of the first ideas that came close to providing me with an answer. In high school, when my history teacher noticed my eagerness to understand Nazi Germany and the Holocaust, he recommended Crowds and Power by Elias Canetti, a book I promptly bought. Later, I started studying sociology and became deeply interested in social and personality psychology. My studies focused, among other things, on oppression and discrimination.
At the age of 20, I co-founded the Vegan Society Luxembourg and served as its spokesperson until I moved to Berlin five years later. But in 2020, when the organization’s then-president spread antisemitic COVID conspiracies, I made the painful decision to publicly distance myself from the very organization I had founded. It was especially difficult because I had to explain repeatedly why these conspiracies were antisemitic at their core, even though they didn’t directly mention Jewish people.
I was happy when I moved to Berlin, partly because I was fascinated by its history. And because I believed that Germany—unlike many other Western countries with horrific pasts (colonialism, slavery, fascism, genocides)—had done a lot to atone for its past and keep the memory alive. No other country I know of has planted such a massive memorial to its past in its political heart—as Germany has done with the Holocaust memorial and other monuments right next to the German parliament. Even when I saw things to criticize, I believed it when Germany said, “Never again.”
Since October 7, 2023, when the Hamas terrorists attacked Israel and killed over 1,000 people—most of them Jewish—I have been profoundly shaken by the horrors. It took me months of reading, listening, and sleepless nights to begin to understand what had happened, what was unfolding after the attacks, and what was happening here in Germany. Antisemitic and anti-Muslim violence is on the rise, and a lot of Jewish and Muslim people feel increasingly unsafe in Germany.
Yes, I have seen many instances of antisemitism among people who claim to stand up for Palestine. Antisemitism is alive and well in various groups: Neo-Nazis, Christians, Muslims, Atheists, right-wingers, left-wingers, conservatives, progressives, conspiracists, and the “regular German.” And I understand that antisemitism, like any other form of hate and bigotry, is something that needs to continuously be unlearned. That’s why you will never hear me claim that I have never said or done anything antisemitic, or that I never will.
But what I have also seen – and continue to see a lot – is Germans accusing pro-Palestine people of antisemitism, even when that claim is completely untrue according to my own and other researchers’ and activists’ understanding of antisemitism. In fact, I see many non-Jewish Germans accusing Jewish people of antisemitism. I see the descendants of Nazis not only explaining to the descendants of Holocaust victims what antisemitism is, but also accusing those Holocaust victims’ descendants of being antisemitic.
One example is the Israeli filmmaker Yuval Abraham, who has been accused by countless Germans – including politicians and media outlets – of antisemitism after he spoke up for Palestine at the Berlinale in 2024.
Of course, you can accuse Jewish people of antisemitism if you have a good reason for it. I can accuse both the gay Nazi Ernst Röhm, as well as the current Nazi party AfD’s lesbian leader Alice Weidel, of anti-queer bigotry. And I can properly justify that. But in most cases, proper justification is not happening when Germans accuse Jewish people of antisemitism.
Not all of these cases can be linked to Germans who have no understanding of antisemitism. Some can be traced to a profound difference in the applied definitions of antisemitism. Germany largely bases itself on the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism. However, many researchers and activists, including myself, use the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism (JDA)’s definition.
IHRA defines antisemitism as “a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews.” It includes manifestations directed toward Jewish individuals, their property, community institutions, or religious facilities. Critics argue that the IHRA definition conflates criticism of Israel with antisemitism, potentially limiting free speech and academic discourse.
The JDA defines antisemitism as “discrimination, prejudice, hostility or violence against Jews as Jews (or Jewish institutions as Jewish).” While IHRA’s definition includes examples related to Israel, the JDA focuses on behaviors directly targeting Jews or Jewish institutions. This distinction aims to protect legitimate criticism of Israel without conflating it with antisemitism.
Unfortunately, whether Germans use the IHRA definition or no definition at all, we are seeing more and more people who stand up for Palestine being accused of antisemitism, even when their actions do not classify as antisemitic under the JDA definition (or, in many cases, even under the IHRA definition). As the most gruesome, bloody, deadly, and incomprehensibly horrific crimes against the Palestinian population unfold before our very eyes, it is becoming increasingly difficult to show solidarity with Palestinians in Germany, as shown in the fact that four Palestinian activists are being deported without any convictions (three of which are EU-citizens) and that “German politicians interpret the slogan ‘From the river to the sea’ as expressing a call for the destruction of Israel, whereas courts have repeatedly ruled it a peaceful expression of solidarity and the desire for equal rights for everyone in the region.”
Beyond that difficulty, and beyond the denial of Palestinian suffering, I even see Germans who mock innocent Palestinian civilians, who downplay the horrors they are suffering, or who justify the atrocities committed against them. And that goes to the core of my disillusionment with Germany’s commitment to “Never again” since October 7, 2023, and shakes the very heart of my biggest fear: the lack of empathy within human nature. When I committed to “Never again,” I committed to “Never again for everyone!” And it pains me to see that this is not what Germany stands for.
“Never again” must mean “never again”.
For everyone.