Minister Belarra’s fellow protesters: banned in Germany for celebrating the attacks

After reiterating before Parliament that for Germany Defending Israel is “reason of state”The chancellor Olaf Scholz announced last week a battery of measures that included the ban of the Samidoun association, a support network for Palestinian prisoners with branches in North America and several European countries and that on the same day of the Hamas attacks celebrated what happened in the streets of Berlin. even distributing sweets among the attendees.

In the midst of episodes like the burning of israeli flags in several German cities, Scholz justified the measure in which the country was not going to allow anti-Semitism on its streets: “We have to act against all this in general and be very firm,” he reiterated this Tuesday from Jordan while the ban on demonstrations against continues. Israel.

Samidoun, meanwhile, responded with a statement stating that they would take the ban to court amid attacks, in addition to “fascist” Israel, on Western powers for their support of a “genocidal” state. He also justified the Palestinian “resistance,” the “shield to defend the people and their country from the war crimes of the occupation regime” days after Saturday’s terrifying attacks. As for the German government, he accused it of “criminalizing” the right of Palestinians “to express and organize.”

The group, with branches in the United Kingdom, France, Sweden, the United States and Spain, among other countries, emerged in 2011 in Canada to demand the freedom of all Palestinian prisoners in Israel and years later was classified by Israel as a terrorist group for its links with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and with Iran. The Ministry of Defense then accused the group of raising money and activists for the “terrorist and armed struggle against Israel.” Now, from Germany, its embassy in Berlin has warned that Associations like these act as a “Trojan horse” in Europe and abuse Western democracies: if measures are not taken, what happens in Gaza “will be seen in Germany.” The German Interior Ministry has warned that they have more pro-Palestinian associations in their sights for their support of Hamas and that they will pursue the “anti-Semitism” of networks supporting Palestine.

The measures announced by Germany and supported there by all parties, including the leftists of The Greens or Die Linke, contrast sharply with the statements of a sector of the Spanish Government, with Ione Belarra at the head, which even has no qualms about coming out. the street called by a group in the spotlight for terrorism. This happened last Sunday, when the minister, accompanied among others by Lilith Verstrynge and Isa Serra, and by leaders of Sumar and Más Madrid such as Íñigo Errejón and Mónica García, attended the demonstration called in Madrid by Samidoun together with other associations such as Alkarama , Al-yudur, Masar Badil and Palestine Youth launching Long live the “struggle of the Palestinian people” and accusing Israel of genocide.

None of the aforementioned politicians had a problem attending a rally in which the “legitimate resistance of the Palestinian people towards liberation and return” was defended and in which it was stated from the stage that “Palestine has the right to self-defense and armed resistance“. “This demonstration is to support the Palestinian resistance,” was stated by the organizers, who have also held similar demonstrations in other Spanish cities such as Barcelona in which they have also heard justifying the attacks: “The Palestinian people have decided make use of an internationally recognized right: the right of occupied peoples to defend themselves by all means at their disposal.” Proclamations and persecuted songs were also heard in other European countries, including Germany, such as “From the river to the sea , Palestine will win”, alluding to the desire to erase Israel from the map.

From the hand of IU and Sumar

The presence of Sumar or Podemos in the march is not surprising if we remember some episodes that prove the closeness of the Spanish subsidiary of Samidoun with the extreme left since its creation, in 2020.

The group, which among other things was behind a call to boycott a talk by the Israeli ambassador at the Complutense University this year, was invited by MEP Manuel Pineda to Brussels in July 2019.

Their presence is also common at local Izquierda Unida parties (in towns such as Rivas or Arganda) and the Communist Party party, where deputy Enrique Santiago was photographed at the group’s stand.