Hi.
In the past few days, discontent regarding mod decisions in this community has been brewing, particularly when it comes to comments on Palestine, Israel, and Israeli politics and actions. There are also misunderstandings regarding mod intention and German law. We hope to clear that up with this post.
While the servers of feddit.org are in Austria, most of the mods of this community as well as admins of this server live in Germany. Speaking of, our server admins have also posted a write-up on the same topic.
And with that, let’s go:
In Germany, antisemitism is specifically sanctioned in German criminal law, both for speech and as a motivation for other criminal behavior. In addition, Germany seeks to protect the Jewish state of Israel (the so-called “Reason of State” introduced in 2008) and thus verges toward protecting Zionism as well. Certain criticism of Israel/Israelis is also categorized as “Israel-related antisemitism”.
Since criminal law is involved, enforcement can mean things like police raids and device confiscations. After such police action, it does not really matter if it was appropriate or if cases are dropped or never charged: The damage is done. All told, it’s not that fun.
There is also no point in engaging in discussions about the veracity of statements that could get us into legal trouble. In addition, we believe that you can express most opinions without breaking rules.
If your comment contains the following, it will be removed from this community:
- Calling for the dissolution of Israel, or calling for a one-state solution without specifying equal rights for all people; Jewish in particular.
- Calling for a destruction, annihilation, an end of all Zionism or the like.
- Equating Israeli actions and (historical) Nazism.
- The slogan “from the river…”
- Endorsement of or justifications for Hamas or Hezbollah, or slogans or graphics positively referring to these organizations. These are considered terrorist organizations in Germany.
- … and obviously: Any of the common antisemitic tropes or calls to violence against Jews or Israelis
Comments will not be removed for the following:
- Denouncing genocide.
- Denouncing Israeli war crimes.
- Criticizing Zionism as an ideology or political movement.
- Referring to the current Israeli government as “criminal,” “expansionist,” or “far-right”.
If your comment is removed nonetheless, these are not the reason. I’d also like to stress that this community was never a free-speech-absolutist zone: It is a (usually lightly) moderated community. There may also be times when bans go too far. In such cases, please DM the @[email protected] account (which all mods have access to).
To help you understand why, I'll leave an assortment of sources here (translations via DeepL).
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Berlin in mid-May [2024] around 6 o’clock in the morning. A loud, continuous “banging” against the apartment door wakes student Alina T. from her sleep. […] When her husband opens the door, several LKA officers, two employees of the district office and the SEK “storm” past him into the apartment. Puzzled, he looks at the search warrant. […] The background to this was a Facebook entry in the student’s profile: "From the river […]
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In November 2023, the Federal Ministry of the Interior and for Home Affairs also issued a prohibition order against Hamas.[60] According to the order, “the slogan ‘From the River to the Sea’ (in German or other languages)” is a distinguishing mark of Hamas[61]. […] the current legal situation [regarding “Denial of Israel’s right to exist”] is - contrary to what the statements of the Federal Ministry of Justice suggest[63] - anything but clear. Whether incitements to eliminate the State of Israel are prosecuted depends on the respective legal opinion and the prosecution will of the respective public prosecutor’s office.
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Press release from the previous government:
In this context, Section 111 StGB, which covers public incitement to commit crimes, may also be relevant. Incitement to extinguish Israel’s existence by force may be punishable under this provision. The same applies to calls to publicly display the Hamas flag. If Hamas attacks are publicly cheered and celebrated, this may also be punishable. This means that people who cheer on Hamas’s actions or publicly express their sympathy with the attacks may constitute the criminal offence of “approval of criminal acts” under Section 140 of the German Criminal Code (StGB).
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In connection with the controversial Palestine Congress in Berlin, the German authorities have also imposed an entry ban on former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis. “In order to prevent antisemitic and anti-Israel propaganda at the event”, several entry bans have been issued, the news agency AFP learned from security sources on Sunday. One of these concerned Varoufakis. (Notably, Varoufakis would have spoken about one-state solutions …)
federal reverse (on behalf of the mods of !europe)
Where did I say posts about the middle-east are not allowed here if they are in relation to Europe? They are allowed and we do not remove them as off-topic.
But this topic is only a very minor topic for this community which is primarily about EU domestic news and such topics, so when creating this community there was absolutly no reason to avoid feddit.org as the hosting instance over legal concerns specifically related to the state of Israel.
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Literally this whole discussion is happening under the premise that discussion on Palestine is restricted.
Yes, and I’ve stated, if legal concerns are so troubling there needs to be censorship on the topic, moving to a different instance outside of Germany would make more sense, assuming the moderation and administration team cared about the censorship about an ongoing genocide of which multiple European countries’ governments are partaking in. Other large communities have changed instances as well successfully.
I, and I imagine many others, would have also understood if such restrictions were in place until such a move could occur. Instead, it’s clear the decision was made to defer to an unjust and unethical law.
Restricted, as in “please don’t voice certain opinions here (some of them at closer inspection trollish/unsavory anyway)” but not restricted as in “don’t mention this particular topic”.
It’s not hard to start a community here. There are several !europe communities with non-German mods on non-German servers already, too.
But there’s no point in me, as a German, modding the kind of community you want.
I see no reason to move instances as it is absolutely allowed to discuss what is happening in Gaza and Israel here (in so far as there is a direct relation to Europe). The restrictions are basically that two wrongs don’t make a right (or many more wrongs in this case), and it is a bit sad that we were forced to explicitly spell it out to make people aware that any genocide is wrong, not only the one that is currently happening.
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If we can’t say our opinion because the mods have to remove content or face the threat of being raided by some gestapo squads for saying what’s perfectly normal to say outside of Germany I think we should honestly just move. Then we could speak our minds and the mods / server hosts can sleep at night. We don’t need to have the same opinion, but no one should get anyone in trouble for saying theirs. I think this is a huge advantage of the fediverse and we could just use that to make everyone’s life easier.
I find the restrictions relatively reasonable, and in my circle of radical leftists outside of Germany (I don’t live in Germany), it is really rare that anyone would run into issues with those rules. Of course I am highly against the police raiding homes in reaction to such kind of speech, but this is the reality in Germany that I can’t change.
If it is normal in your personal circle to advocate for the expulsion of an entire group of people from a territory they have lived on all their life or to make comments relativising the holocaust, I strongly recommend you look for less shitty friends. And if you don’t see how that relates to the rules in question you need to seriously educate yourself about the fucked up situation in the middle-east.
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Couldn’t have said it better.
We’re talking about a very hypothetical scenario of what Palestinians allegedly would like to do if they had the chance vs the forced expulsion, mass starvation, and mass annihilation of Palestinians that is currently happening in reality, but somehow we should care more about the genociders feeling unsafe because of our opinions and alleged intentions?