German Justice Minister : “Anyone who doesn´t believe in miracles isn´t a realist.”

Mass reminded the famous words of founding father of Israel David Ben Gurion; “Anyone who doesn't believe in miracles isn't a realist.” to describe the rising Jewish life in today’s Germany.

“It is also tremendously significant that Jewish life is once again flourishing in Germany. Since the fall of the Iron Curtain, the number of Jewish people living in Germany has more than quadrupled. This summer, the “European Maccabi Games” will be held in Berlin – the first time ever in Germany” Maas has said.

The fallowing is full text of the Heiko Maas’s speech:

“Exactly fifty years ago to this very day, the State of Israel and the Federal Republic of Germany officially took up diplomatic relations. To mark the occasion, State President Rivlin is in Berlin today. These diplomatic relations are not something that can be taken for granted. For me, even the fact that I am speaking here now is not something that can be taken for granted.

The end of the second world war seventy years ago was commemorated last week by people in Germany and all over the world. The end of the war and the collapse of the Nazi regime also meant the end of Auschwitz, and the end of the genocide against the Jews. The Shoah was the most atrocious crime of anti-Semitism ever committed – and it was committed by us Germans. With this in mind, it means a tremendous amount to be invited to this conference, and I'm deeply grateful for the invitation. I consider it a great honour to be here.

It is also tremendously significant that Jewish life is once again flourishing in Germany. Since the fall of the Iron Curtain, the number of Jewish people living in Germany has more than quadrupled. This summer, the “European Maccabi Games” will be held in Berlin – the first time ever in Germany. None of this can be taken for granted. In fact I consider it to be a stroke of great and undeserved fortune for Germany – and nothing less than a minor miracle. But as David Ben Gurion once said: “Anyone who doesn't believe in miracles isn't a realist.”

Ladies and gentlemen,

when we fight anti-Semitism in Germany, we are dealing with both the present and the past. Hitler was defeated a long time ago, but his ideas unfortunately live on. Today, racism and anti-Semitism continue to cause a great deal of harm to people all over the world – including, unfortunately, in Germany.

The Friedrich Ebert Foundation is the think-tank of the German Social Democratic Party. It regularly carries out academic research into anti-Semitic attitudes within German society. The most recent findings will be presented here on Thursday in one of the working groups. Unfortunately, prejudices and false stereotypes about Jewish people are not merely attitudes that continue to exist in certain people's minds. Far too often, incidences of hate crime are still being committed against Jewish people.

According to our police statistics: forty-five people in Germany were the victims of anti-Semitic violence in 2014, and there were twenty-seven cases of Jewish cemeteries being desecrated. Overall, more than one thousand five hundred anti-Semitic criminal offences were committed, most of which were so-called propaganda offences – such as shouting Nazi slogans or daubing swastikas onto synagogue walls. Given our history, the fact that this sort of thing happens in Germany is a disgrace for my country – and it is why the fight against anti-Semitism is one of the most important political challenges facing the German government and German society as a whole.

Ladies and gentlemen,

What are we in Germany doing to combat anti-Semitism?

First of all: there is a broad consensus throughout German society that there has to be zero tolerance for anti-Semitism. Criminal offences such as the ones I have just mentioned are vigorously prosecuted. This is not just about punishing the perpetrators – it is about showing people that we as a society are not willing to tolerate anti-Semitism.

In Germany, we have many immigrants from the Islamic world. As they have no German ancestors, they obviously have no family connections to Germany's Nazi past. But regardless of where a person comes from: everyone who lives in Germany is expected to understand and accept that there is no place for anti-Semitism in our country!

Secondly: I'm convinced that the more often that Jewish and non-Jewish people meet and talk to one another, the sooner prejudices and false stereotypes will disappear from people's minds. We welcome it when Jewish people decide to live in Germany. This is why my government is doing all it can to promote Jewish life and to reconstruct the infrastructure necessary to enable Jewish life to flourish once again in Germany.

Today, there are around one-hundred-and-thirty-thousand Jewish people living in Germany. We now have ninety-five synagogues, many of which have been newly built over the past few years – in cities such as Munich and Dresden, for example. Once again, it is possible to train as a rabbi in Germany, and since last year it has again been possible to study “Jewish theology” at a State university. These are important signals, making it clear that Judaism is a valuable part of religious and cultural life in Germany.

Thirdly: We constantly work to ensure that the anti-Semitic crimes committed in Nazi Germany are not forgotten. Only by knowing what human beings once did to other human beings, can we really understand how important it is to combat racism and anti-Semitism. This is why we have erected a large Holocaust memorial in the heart of Berlin, and why all pupils are taught in school about the genocide committed by the Germans against the Jews.

But if we really want to address our own history, we also need to face up to our so-called “second guilt”, namely the failings that occurred in Germany after the end of the Nazi regime.

For far too long, the justice system failed to ensure that Nazi criminals were brought to trial. In the nineteen-fifties and sixties, the system allowed numerous perpetrators to escape punishment, while ignoring the suffering of the victims. It's no coincidence that the chief organiser of the Holocaust, SS officer Adolf Eichmann, was tried not in Berlin, but here in Jerusalem.

There are some failings of the past for which amends cannot be made. But I still believe it is never too late for justice to be done. This is why it is right that the German judicial system is doing everything it can to track down the last remaining perpetrators who are still alive and bring them to justice. The trial is currently underway of a ninety-three-year-old former member of the SS, who the media have dubbed the “accountant of Auschwitz”. This man should not be allowed to go to his grave without his guilt having been determined by a German court. This is important for the victims and their descendants.

But the courts are not alone in making efforts to reappraise the mistakes of the past – our Justice Ministry is doing the same.

We have set up an independent academic commission tasked with investigating how the Justice Ministry dealt with the Nazi past in the nineteen-fifties and sixties. Among other things, the purpose of this commission will be to find out why Germany's justice system allowed so many Nazi criminals to go free. In order to facilitate this investigation, my Ministry has given the researchers full access to all the files, including personnel records and secret documents. Even though we realise that the results won't be flattering for the German justice system, we want the historical truth to finally come to light. Because if we genuinely want to tackle anti-Semitism in the present, it is vital that we take a self-critical look at the failings of our past.

Incidentally, one of these failings is the fact that present-day Germany still has laws in force that were drafted by Nazi jurists. The criminal offence of “murder” is a case in point. Absurdly, the very crime that involves the highest degree of guilt and incurs the severest penalties is still defined in wording that was formulated by Nazi jurists in 1941. I find this absolutely unacceptable – which is why I have set up a commission to draw up new proposals for our criminal law, and I am hopeful that we will soon be able to root out the last remnants of Nazi law from our statute books once and for all.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Racism and anti-Semitism have many facets. But ultimately they always involve excluding other people and denigrating them because of their race or religion. It's always about saying: you're not worth as much as me because you believe in a certain god, come from a certain country, have a certain skin colour, or belong to a particular people.

I believe that we must all join together in countering these tendencies with strength and resolve. We cannot allow racism or anti-Semitism to divide us. Because despite all our differences, we are all human beings; and as human beings, we have to live together – in peace, in tolerance and in mutual respect.”

21 February

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German Justice Minister : “Anyone who doesn´t believe in miracles isn´t a realist.”

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