The new coalition ability of anti-Semitism in German parties

As an exoneration, it is often cited that the federal party conference acknowledged Israel's right to exist and its special importance as a safe space for Jews. But it is precisely the emergence of this decision that turns what was supposedly positive into the next scandal. The outgoing party leader Jan van Aken had negotiated with various currents until the end in order to reach a compromise. According to him, 126 amendments were included in the text. Part of this negotiated compromise was, of all things, the recognition of Israel's right to exist.

One must be aware of the absurdity of this process: in a German party there was a debate about the formulations under which the only Jewish state's right to exist was still capable of reaching a consensus. Such a right to exist is not a bargaining chip or a concession to a moderate wing of the party. The fact that this confession appears at the end of the text does not prove the left's unity against anti-Semitism. It shows how deep the conflict goes when even a democratic matter of course becomes the subject of a laboriously negotiated compromise.

At the same time, the same party conference officially declared the Israeli actions in Gaza to be “genocide”. The Central Council of Jews subsequently assessed the declarations of protection as unbelievable lip service and described the left as unelectable for Jews. Anyone who nevertheless presents the resolution as a successful demarcation from anti-Semitism is confusing the existence of a sentence with the existence of an attitude.

A promise of protection does not prove its value in a resolution. It proves him in conflict with his own people.

Six eyes and no one wanted to see it

However, the blind spot is not limited to the left. In June 2025, the then federal spokeswoman for the Green Youth, Jette Nietzard, published a video on the organization's official Instagram channel. In it, she described the terrorist attack on October 7, 2023 as a “military operation”.

On that day, Hamas and other attackers murdered around 1,200 people, mostly civilians. Entire families were wiped out, people were raped and mutilated, and 251 people were taken hostage to the Gaza Strip. To linguistically turn this anti-Semitic massacre into a military operation is not a trivial inaccuracy. It shifts perpetrators and victims and covers terror with the vocabulary of regular warfare.

The video was deleted after public criticism and republished in an altered form. In a later episode of the podcast “Based,” Nietzard said that other people had watched the video before it was published. She spoke of “six eyes”.

Six eyes had examined the text. But no one seemed to recognize the trivialization.

This turned a personal misstep into an institutional problem. If such a formulation passes through several control bodies and is then published on an official channel, it is not just a single politician who lacks sensitivity. Then an entire editorial and political environment failed.

The Jewish Student Union demanded Nietzard's resignation. Hanna Veiler, former president of the Jewish Student Union of Germany, left the Green Youth and spoke of a long-standing blind spot in anti-Semitism and Jewish life. She remained a member of the Green Party.

The question of credibility for the Greens

The Greens not only have to explain how deep the blind spot extends in their political youth. They must also answer why, despite its development, a loud-voiced coalition continues to be treated as a normal democratic option.

The Green Party co-chair Felix Banaszak stated in the summer of 2026 that he was not ruling out any discussions or coalitions in the democratic spectrum. From a Jewish perspective, this sounds like a hasty democratic clearance certificate.

This contradiction became even clearer on January 15, 2026 with “Markus Lanz”. Franziska Brantner, co-chair of the Green Party, spoke in detail about her party's opposition to anti-Semitism. However, when she was specifically asked whether she could rule out a coalition with this party given the anti-Semitic tendencies in the Berlin Left, she did not draw this line. She did not rule out such collaboration.

Anyone who declares anti-Semitism to be a red line in theory, but then draws this line in pencil at the moment of a concrete question of power, devalues ​​their own confession. There is no reason to accuse Brantner himself of anti-Semitic positions. The question is what political price the Greens derive from their words. If even the party leader keeps the coalition door open while problematizing the possible partner's anti-Semitism, the impression is created that the protection of Jews ends where parliamentary majorities begin.

Antifascism is not a linguistic license. Anyone who only recognizes anti-Semitism when it comes from the right has not fought anti-Semitism. He simply examined its political packaging.

The SPD's silent alarm system

Today's lack of clarity is particularly serious for the SPD. Your solidarity with Israel is part of the history of the Federal Republic. When ratifying the Luxembourg Agreement in 1953, which regulated material services between the Federal Republic and Israel, the SPD's unanimous consent was crucial. For decades, Social Democratic politicians saw the relationship with Israel not as ordinary foreign policy, but as part of the credibility of German democracy.

However, the former chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee Michael Roth wrote in 2026 that his party's “internal alarm system” on the issue of Israel appeared to be switched off in some places. He criticized linguistic contortions about October 7th and the silence regarding statements from his own ranks.

There are also open questions about how Berlin Social Democrats deal with actors from the Islamist spectrum. Research by WELT AM SONNTAG documented contacts of the Berlin SPD parliamentary group leader Raed Saleh with events and people who were attributed by security authorities, at least in the past, to the IGMG or the Muslim Brotherhood environment. Saleh rejects any political proximity to Islamist organizations. It would therefore be wrong to call him an Islamist even without evidence. But democratic representatives must explain where dialogue ends and political appreciation begins.

If the SPD is nevertheless considering a coalition with a left whose anti-Semitism problem can no longer be overlooked, it is not just about political tactics. The question is whether the historic alarm system still works or will be muted as soon as its sound disrupts coalition negotiations.

Anti-Semitism is not a special Jewish issue

Anti-Semitism is undemocratic not only because of German history and the Shoah. It is already this because of the elementary promise of every liberal democracy: No person may be devalued, threatened or pushed out of the public space because of their origin, descent or religion.

The Basic Law protects human dignity, equality and religious freedom. If Jews hide their kippah or Star of David or can only enter Jewish institutions behind armed police, these rights remain on paper. In reality, however, they are becoming smaller and smaller.

Germany's historical responsibility strengthens this promise of protection, but does not alone justify it. Even a country without German history would have to protect its Jewish citizens from anti-Semitism. However, the German state emerged as an alternative to National Socialist barbarism. If he fails to protect Jewish life, he damages part of his own founding narrative.

Anti-Semitism is a seismograph. That doesn't cause the earthquake. It simply indicates earlier than others that something is shifting beneath the surface. Where anti-Semitism rises, the recognition of facts, the protection of minorities and the ability to distinguish between the individual and the collective also come under pressure. This is precisely why it connects right-wing extremists, left-wing extremists and Islamists, even though they otherwise see each other as opponents.

What such a coalition would mean

There are individual members in the SPD, the Greens and also in the Left who are credibly committed to Jewish life and contradict the developments in their parties. This does not change the responsibility of the organizations. If these very voices are ignored, marginalized or forced to leave, they cannot serve as a fig leaf for a party that does not effectively combat its anti-Semitism.

If such a coalition were to come into being without the left first drawing clear personal and political consequences, its message would be devastating. It would signal to Jews that even repeated anti-Semitic incidents do not represent a fundamental obstacle to access to power. That after every scandal, distancing yourself is enough. That confessions about Jewish life are spoken solemnly, but become quiet as soon as majorities are calculated.

For a young Jew who has decided to live visibly in Germany and work against anti-Semitism, this would be more than the usual formation of a government. It would be a further breach of trust in those political forces that claim to want to protect minorities. It would be the bitter realization that the very parties that have made diversity and safe spaces central to their politics could be willing to compromise when it comes to Jewish safe spaces.