Last Saturday, a demonstration and a tribunal took place in the city of Duisburg to denounce the Federal Republic of Germany’s complicity in the ongoing genocide in Palestine. In May 2024, the organization Palästina Solidarität Duisburg (Palestine Solidarity Duisburg, PSDU), to which the author also belonged, was banned by the German authorities. Against this backdrop, the idea was born to publicly and symbolically denounce Germany for its massive repression of the Palestine solidarity movement; with Duisburg deliberately chosen as the venue.
After a militant demonstration where hundreds of participants marched through the working-class and migrant-dominated city, the tribunal took place on the crowded main pedestrian zone in the middle of Duisburg city center. The event was organized by regional Palestinian groups, including the Committee Against the Ban on PSDU, and supported by the Germany-wide Kufiya Network, the legal aid associations 3ezwa and Rote Hilfe (Red Aid), and the European Legal Support Center (ELSC). The Mera25 party hosted the online livestream and a member of parliament from Die Linke (the Left Party) and several lawyers participated in the demonstration and the tribunal. The unlawful dissolution of the Palestine Congress in Berlin in April 2024 was still fresh in everyone’s memory.
High-profile panels and furious accusations
The tribunal comprised a total of seven panels. The “witness” and “expert” hearings covered a range of topics including attacks on the right of assembly and on migration law, “professional disqualification”, bans on organizations, repression at universities, anti-Palestinian incitement in the media and proactive legal battles, such as lawsuits against German arms deliveries to Israel and charges against Israeli soldiers living in Germany who have committed war crimes. Activists, lawyers, experts and those affected by racism and repression had their say. The speakers included employees of the German Red Cross and the ELSC, a former activist of the Hind Rajab Foundation, a politician from Mera25 and former members of the organizations Samidoun and PSDU, which are banned in Germany. Palestinian journalist Hebh Jamal accused the German media of continuing its dehumanization of Palestinians and systematically spreading Israeli propaganda; and reported on her film project on the so-called German “Staatsräson“ (reason of state).
In the tribunal’s closing session, twelve people formulated symbolic accusations against the Federal Republic of Germany and its institutions. The charges included numerous violations of the constitutional, fundamental, and human rights – such as freedom of expression, assembly, association, and science – as well as international law, migration and asylum law, and civil rights, including the responsibility to protect German citizens who are threatened by states while abroad. The latter referred to the lack of action taken by the Federal Foreign Office when the Israeli army recently hijacked the Gaza Flotilla ship “Madleen” in the Mediterranean, and when the “March to Gaza” participants were subjected to repression in Egypt. This accusation was made by an activist who took part in the March to Gaza herself. Further accusations came from a Palestinian couple who have already lost over 100 relatives in the Gaza Strip to Israeli violence since October 8, 2023, and from an Iranian who accused Germany of actively aiding and abetting the war of aggression against Iran in violation of international law.
Israeli-born Ronnie Barkan, grandson of an Auschwitz survivor and member of the group Palestine Action – which was classified as a “terrorist organization” in the UK on July 3 due to its direct actions against arms companies – and an activist from the long-established Association of Persecutees of the Nazi Regime – Federation of Antifascists (VVN-BdA) also brought charges. The latter recalled the Buchenwald Oath. A quote from it was taken up in a final appeal, which called on the participants and spectators to move from symbolic accusation to real legal struggle: “We will only stop the fight when the last guilty party stands before the judges of the nations!”
Police arbitrariness and media harassment
In keeping with the theme, the Duisburg police came up with various reprisals: they banned the slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”, which is criminalized and highly controversial in Germany, allegedly because the demonstration had a connection to the banned group PSDU. The slogan “Yalla Intifada” was listed as banned at the onset of the demonstration – but was eventually allowed again after resistance from the participants. This phrase was also emblazoned on the stage of the tribunal. Towards the end of the tribunal, the police forced the event to end prematurely, such that the cultural program which was planned to follow the tribunal could no longer take place.
A vivid example of the German media’s anti-Palestinian obsession came from a team from the state broadcaster ARD, which reportedly traveled to Duisburg solely because of the participation of Zaid Abdulnasser, former German coordinator of the prisoner solidarity group Samidoun. Their mission was apparently to produce a report in which they would continue to agitate against Zaid, whose residence status in Germany is highly precarious and against whom a racist deportation campaign has been launched in the past. The broadcaster confirmed the tribunal’s accusation that the German mainstream media do not critically monitor prevailing politics, as is their ostensible task in a bourgeois democracy, but on the contrary serve as an extended organ of repression.
Leon Wystrychowski is a former member of the Palästina Solidarität Duisburg (Palestine Solidarity Duisburg, PSDU).
