Saad Shahriar
Mondoweiss / September 28, 2024
While the German left passionately supports many international causes but remains conspicuously silent on the ongoing genocide of Palestinians, conveniently overlooking its own complicity in Germany’s military-industrial ties to Israel.
This is not just an abstract critique. As someone deeply embedded in these spaces, it is impossible to ignore the glaring contradictions within Germany’s so-called progressive movement. What once appeared as a beacon of international solidarity and human rights has become a façade—a hollow theatre of selective outrage and performative activism. The ongoing genocide in Palestine, as bombs reduce Gaza to rubble and kill innocent people, is met with shocking silence. The German Left, which claims to stand for the oppressed, is nowhere to be found. Where are the protests? Where are the statements of outrage? They only appear when it’s geopolitically convenient, while the bodies of Palestinians continue to pile up, apparently too inconvenient for their agenda.
To provide context on whom I am critiquing within the German leftist scene: In Germany, the current cabinet is dominated by the German Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the Green Party, both of which claim to be center-left. These parties, however, are vocally pro-Israel and, by extension, pro-Zionist. Their government continues to arm Israel, fuelling the ongoing genocide of Palestinians—Germany is the second-largest arms supplier to Israel. By default, these parties, along with their student wings occupying university governments across the country, support the apartheid state and settler colonialism. From the top government structures to the grassroots student bodies, this system is complicit in sustaining genocide.
What’s particularly galling is that these same political forces promote “refugee welcome” campaigns and peace initiatives, presenting themselves as humanitarians while actively backing apartheid and ethnic cleansing. The contradiction is blatant, yet somehow, it goes unnoticed or unchallenged in their rhetoric. The most troubling aspect of this is the silence of the broader left. There are hundreds of leftist activist groups in Germany—anti-fascists, anti-fascist feminists, anarcho-syndicalists, and other radical or progressive left groups that fight for refugee rights or social injustice—who are supposedly fighting against these power structures. Yet, after October 7, 2023, when Israeli violence against Palestinians escalated even further, these groups fell silent. It is worth mentioning that in Germany, the radical left faction ‘Anti-Deutsch’ (Anti-German), whose position is to oppose German nationalism and criticize the mainstream political culture of Germany, is also pro-Zionist.
I personally confronted this hypocrisy when debating with an anarchist activist after October 7 last year. I asked him not to focus on the larger Palestine-Israel conflict but simply on the police brutality faced by Arabs and other minorities during pro-Palestinian demonstrations. His response was chilling—he claimed neutrality, refusing to take a stand. This is a common refrain from the so-called “radical” left. These activists, who are otherwise so vocal about refugees’ rights, anti-police brutality, and opposition to the state, have been paralyzed by confusion or, worse, indifference in the face of an 11-month-long genocide—armed, in part, by their own government.
I witnessed them marching for Mohammed, the young man killed by German police, and posting statements against police brutality. Yet, when it comes to the state-sanctioned violence against Palestinians, they are silent. One particularly striking instance of hypocrisy came when a German leftist activist, who advocates for Iranian women’s rights, messaged me after I posted, “Stop Genocide” on social media. He immediately responded, “Still not a genocide.” This is the level of cognitive dissonance and double standards that pervades the German Left. The same Left that erupted in indignation over Mahsa Amini’s tragic death in Iran now remains silent as Palestinian women and children are blown to pieces, many by bombs funded directly through Germany’s military-industrial complicity.
The struggles of Iranians, Kurds, and Ukrainians have been appropriated and turned into symbols of their supposed solidarity, while Palestinians, whose existence disrupts the European colonial legacy, are abandoned.
This is not solidarity. It’s a farce, tokenism repackaged as progressive politics. The German Left has become a willing participant in a neo-colonial dynamic where they get to choose which struggles matter based on what is palatable for Western audiences. The struggles of Iranians, Kurds, and Ukrainians have been appropriated and turned into symbols of their supposed solidarity, while Palestinians, whose existence disrupts the European colonial legacy, are abandoned. This is not solidarity—it’s colonialism by another name, a moral hierarchy that places certain struggles above others because they are less likely to ruffle feathers in Berlin’s corridors of power.
The hypocrisy does not end with global struggles. The German Left, ever eager to proclaim its support for Kurdish and Iranian activists, suddenly loses its voice when it comes to the racial profiling, police brutality, and state repression faced by Palestinians and Arabs in Germany.
But the hypocrisy does not end with global struggles. The German Left, ever eager to proclaim its support for Kurdish and Iranian activists, suddenly loses its voice when it comes to the racial profiling, police brutality, and state repression faced by Palestinians and Arabs in Germany. Under the guise of “combating antisemitism,” Germany systematically crushes Palestinian activism, surveilling and harassing pro-Palestinian voices. And where is the Left? Silent. What kind of progressive movement ignores the oppression happening in its own backyard while boasting about international solidarity?
This isn’t solidarity. It’s complicity. The German Left, hamstrung by historical guilt over the Holocaust and burdened by political convenience, refuses to challenge its own nation’s deep complicity in Israeli apartheid. The Left talks a big game about resisting authoritarianism and injustice, but when it comes to Palestine, they fall silent, too afraid to speak out against a state they are deeply entangled with economically and militarily. Germany’s arms deals with Israel go unchallenged. The growing police state in Germany itself, one that targets migrants, particularly Palestinians, is ignored. The Left remains content with symbolic gestures and hollow rhetoric while the machinery of imperialism continues to grind down the very people they claim to support.
The German Left today has been hijacked by neoliberal complicity. Instead of resisting the state’s deepening authoritarianism, they have been absorbed into it, adopting the language of public safety and stability while enabling state repression. Far from critiquing the military-industrial complex or Israel’s sattler colony and apartheid system, they hide behind Germany’s historical guilt. What once was a commitment to standing with the oppressed has been replaced by a tepid adherence to respectability politics. They have let the state muzzle their criticism of Israeli apartheid under the guise of historical responsibility, allowing genocide to be rebranded as “self-defense.”
This pattern of silence is tragically familiar. During the Holocaust, the German Left did not resist en masse—fractured, divided, and more concerned with ideological purity than taking a stand against Nazism’s genocidal machine. Today, the Left again fails to mount any significant opposition to the genocide in Palestine, caught in the same cycle of moral paralysis. But this isn’t where the betrayal ends. The German Left has also failed to resist the creeping militarization of their own state, the erosion of civil liberties, and the expansion of police powers. The same “law and order” rhetoric once wielded by the far-right is now mainstream, embraced by the center-left under the guise of social stability. Germany, haunted by its fascist past, now allows authoritarianism to grow unchecked, with the Left standing by, a passive observer to the state’s aggression.
Even the German Left’s much-touted “refugee welcome” campaign is little more than a hollow PR stunt. While Germany proudly projects an image of humanitarianism, refugees are corralled into detention centers, denied basic rights, and subjected to inhumane bureaucratic scrutiny. The moral authority the Left claims to hold crumbles when confronted with this blatant hypocrisy.
This is the German Left’s greatest failure. It has failed the Palestinians. It has failed migrant communities in Germany. It has failed to effectively resist the rise of the AfD, a party rooted in far-right nationalism and echoes of the Nazi past. It has failed to live up to the ideals of justice, equity, and internationalism that it so loudly proclaims. It has turned solidarity into a performance, a convenient mask to wear when the cameras are on, but discarded when the struggle becomes too uncomfortable, too politically charged, or too threatening to Germany’s economic interests. The Left’s fetishization of Iranian, Kurdish, and Ukrainian causes while abandoning Palestine is a betrayal, not just of the Palestinians, but of every principle they claim to stand for.
In the past 11 months, I have seen how the German left didn’t raise their voices against state police brutality when women were being punched by the police, and minors were taken into custody during pro-Palestinian demonstrations. In so-called leftist alternative spaces, discussions or concerts in support of Palestinians were canceled. In university student politics, it’s even uglier. University administrators, professors, student government, and student parliament are working to silence voices of Palestinian solidarity. Even academic discussions about Palestine were framed as antisemitic. I know an editor of a left-wing newspaper who, several times, referenced unverified claims about Hamas beheading babies, misleading people with that narrative. This is a deeply unethical and immoral situation that I have been witnessing within the German leftist scene in real-time. They are actively complicit.
The role of the Left on campus
In May 2024, at the University of Münster, a storm was brewing in the student body, one that exposed the deep-seated issues of racism and institutional power abuse. It is worth mentioning that the current student government at the University of Münster is primarily composed of Campus Green and Juso-HSG, the student wings of the Green Party and SPD. It all began when an autonomous department in the student body called fikuS (department for financially and culturally disadvantaged students), a student group composed largely of racial minorities and representatives of financially disadvantaged students, won its rightful place within the student body as an autonomous department. I was among those elected by my peers, and it was seen as a clear sign that the marginalized voices on campus were finally getting the representation they deserved.
But as soon as we took office, an anonymous challenge was filed, casting doubt on the legitimacy of the election. It seemed to us that the election was challenged because we all hold pro-Palestine stances at the university, and one of the individuals in our group is half Palestinian and half Lebanese. Before a scheduled presentation by the person even took place, the university’s Commissioner of Antisemitism accused it of being antisemitic. Additionally, the finance department halted this person’s wage payments, assuming the event might be antisemitic. Later, the payments were further stopped due to an unreasonable concern raised by the finance department regarding a discrepancy between this person’s birthplace and nationality.
The other two elected representatives were myself and another woman from a minority background. Since the university actively suppresses Palestine solidarity, the official basis for the challenge was filed on the basis of an unclear legal issue.
Still, it didn’t take long for the representatives of the fikuS to see it for what it truly was: an attack on racial minorities daring to assert their democratic rights. This wasn’t just about procedure or policy; it was an assault on Black and minority students who had placed their trust in that autonomous student body to advocate for them. After the election challenge, the finance department of the student government stopped paying the newly elected representatives.
The system, both at the university and beyond, is designed to protect the privileged while exploiting the marginalized. It is a system that thrives on bureaucratic loopholes, empowering those who wish to maintain the status quo. The challenge to the election wasn’t just an isolated act—it was emblematic of a larger problem, one where power dynamics rooted in racial discrimination are allowed to thrive under the guise of democracy. This was more than just an electoral challenge—it was about standing up to the entrenched systems of power that sought to silence them.
And there are countless examples. In June of this year, sociology students at the University of Münster organized an event to discuss antisemitism, racism, and settler colonialism. Instead of encouraging open dialogue, university representatives from Campus Green—the student wing of the Green Party—and others in positions of power within the student body actively surveilled the event. Their purpose? To monitor and take notes on whether any part of the discussion could be deemed antisemitic.
The irony here is staggering. These students, representing a party that openly supports Israel and its colonial violence, took it upon themselves to judge a conversation on antisemitism, led by none other than the chair of Jüdische Stimme (Jewish voice for just peace in the Middle East), who is Jewish. Despite this, the event was initially banned. It was only allowed to proceed after behind-the-scenes negotiations between the students—who are involved in left politics and the university rector.
This is a perfect example of how the so-called self-proclaimed “progressive” or “radical” left in Germany silences critical discourse, especially when it threatens to expose their own complicity in supporting Israeli apartheid and settler colonialism. They claim to fight for justice and human rights, yet they actively suppress any discussion that challenges the narrative they are invested in protecting. On the other hand, those who oppose this are negotiating with the same power structure they claim to resist by not actively opposing it.
True solidarity demands more than convenience—it demands courage. It demands an unflinching commitment to justice, even when that justice comes at the cost of challenging one’s own government, one’s own history, and one’s own complicity. Until the German Left is willing to confront the truth about its own role in perpetuating Israeli apartheid and its own growing police state, it will remain nothing more than an empty vessel, afraid of the truth and unwilling to fight for real justice.
Saad Shahriar is an anti-racist activist, filmmaker and writer with a focus on truth-telling and social justice
