Germany’s Bundesrat, the upper house of parliament, backed a bill to criminalize the denial of Israel’s right to exist on Friday, a motion that constitutional experts said could jeopardize freedom of expression.
According to the bill, anyone denying Israel’s right to exist or calling for its abolition would be punished with a prison sentence of up to five years under the regulation. The bill will be examined by the Bundestag, the lower house of parliament, after its summer recess.
The Germans really love genocide.
Our government sure does. Their enablers probably don’t actively love it, they just can’t be arsed to actually think about the implications of just voting CxU. The reasons range from “I’ve always voted for them” (that just makes it worse) and “they’re Christians” (the fuck they are) over various forms of “I like the status quo” (which they’re making worse for everyone not already rich) to “the evil bad green / left parties are gonna take away my house, my car, make me eat tofu and whatever other propaganda bullshit my favourite sensationalist rag has told me that I believe uncritically”.
They don’t love genocide, they just love not having to care about politics and the cunts they elect abuse that merrily. Of course, there are also genuine genocide fans, but for the most part, it’s more a habitual complacency with a chunk of domestic fearmongering.
As a democratic body, we’ve been slacking off for decades. Now the bill is coming due and the youth get to foot it. We get thrown in with the misguided, the lazy and the assholes. And the worst part is how many of us fall into the “domestic misery -> xenophobia” trap and prove you right.
I can’t even argue with your conclusion. The difference between actively supporting and passively permitting is academic when the results are these pieces of shit in our government.
What does genocide have to do with this bill?
The modern state of Israel is a settler-colonial state, inherently built on genocide. Saying that it should be dismantled and replaced with something better shouldn’t be a crime, and making it one is ignoring nearly a century of context. Nearly a century of context inextricably linked to Germany, no less.
Challenging a state’s right to exist should be covered by freedom of expression. It’s not the same as saying the people shouldn’t exist, which I could see a human rights argument against, but the state is an organisation and as such should always be open to challenge, regardless of context. They’re spitting on basic human rights.
Most of us aren’t responsible for most of that century of context, but we are responsible for what happens today. To ignore it is to ignore genocide. To ban criticism is to protect it. Merz and his accomplices should be charged with aiding genocide and this law should be entered as evidence.