The debate over the limits of freedom of expression in relation to the conflict between Hamas and Israel has been revived in Germany, a country that considers the defence of the Jewish state as a “reason of state” as a consequence of its responsibility in the Holocaust. A Berlin court on Tuesday sentenced a demonstrator at a pro-Palestinian protest to pay a fine of 600 euros for using the slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free“(From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free).”
German media are highlighting that this is the first conviction for using a politically charged phrase that has been causing controversy for months and sparking debate about its meaning. The court in the Tiergarten district of the German capital considers that the moment in which the protester, a 22-year-old student identified as Ava M., uttered it is key. The sentence highlights that the protest, which took place on October 11 last year, occurred just four days after the attacks by the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas against Israel on October 7.
The court “was concerned about the close temporal connection with the attack,” a court spokeswoman told Morning Express. “In this specific context, the sentence can only be understood as a denial of Israel’s right to exist and an endorsement of the attack, according to the president in her motivation for the ruling,” she added. The verdict was read out in public in a packed courtroom, with around 30 people, some of whom chanted slogans in support of Palestine. One person had to be removed. In addition, while Ava M. was listening to the verdict inside, several dozen demonstrators were protesting in the street.
A similar case was heard a few weeks ago in a court in Mannheim, western Germany, but the result was exactly the opposite. The judges ruled that the slogan does not constitute a crime because the phrase can be interpreted in different ways. In the Berlin case, the student is charged with an article of the German Penal Code (section 140) which makes her guilty of the crime of apologising for criminal acts. She must pay a daily fine of 15 euros for 60 days.
The event, which Ava M. attended, took place in the multicultural Neukölln neighbourhood in the east of the capital, near Sonnenallee, the street lined with Arab restaurants that has been the epicentre of pro-Palestinian protests since the 7 October attacks. Around 60 protesters gathered near the Ernst Abbe Institute and chanted the slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”. Police have identified Ava M., a German-Iranian with no criminal record who declares herself “in favour of ending the war, occupation and violence” and against “all sexism, racism and anti-Semitism”, according to her lawyers in the German press.
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The defendant argued in her appeal that the theme of the protest was violence in schools, because two days earlier there had been a confrontation between a teacher and a student at the school over a Palestinian flag. The slogan she chanted reflects “the desire for peace,” her legal defense argued in the appeal, which also states that the slogan is ambiguous and, therefore, should be protected by freedom of expression. The defense asked for her acquittal arguing that the slogan has a long and complex history, which is much older than Hamas and that its meaning depends on what is wanted to be expressed in each situation.
The court, however, ignored Ava M.’s arguments and gave more credence to two police officers who testified that they heard no reference to the issue of violence in classrooms. “The Palestinian issue predominated,” one of them said, according to the local newspaper. Berliner ZeitungThe prosecutor argued that the slogan condoned Hamas’s murderous attack on the Israeli population and that the intention behind chanting it was to support it. The judge’s final words, which she described as a “pretext” for violence in schools, “were drowned out by the howls of protest from the packed auditorium,” the report said.
The phrase, which refers to the Jordan River in the east and the Mediterranean Sea in the west and includes Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, is highly controversial in Germany, where authorities interpret it as a desire for Israel to disappear. Israel’s security is considered a “reason of state” in the country, where criticism of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has virtually disappeared from public debate.
In November last year, the German Interior Ministry urged police to prosecute the slogan at pro-Palestinian protests, considering it a slogan of Hamas, a terrorist organisation. Since the October 7 attacks, German authorities have banned numerous protests against the Israeli offensive against Gaza and police have arrested demonstrators for using this and other slogans.
Ava M.’s lawyers are considering appealing the Berlin court’s ruling and taking the matter to a higher court. The ruling has been a “blow to freedom of expression,” one of them told the left-wing daily. The Young World.
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