In Germany, questioning Israel's existence could carry a prison term

Does Israel have a right to exist?

If you live in Germany, if you answer no, that might land you in prison. Well, not yet, anyway.

Earlier this month, the German states and the German Federal Council voted in favour of a proposal brought forward by the state of Hessen to criminalise the denial of Israel's right to exist. The federal parliament, the German Bundestag, is now going to consider the draft law in the near future.

The draft law states that anyone who denies Israel's right to exist can be punished by up to five years in prison or an incredibly hefty fine. Christian Heinz, Hessen's justice minister, claimed that the draft law was intentionally put together in narrowly defined terms to address calls glorifying the destruction of the state of Israel.

Heinz references the protests that have erupted across Germany since the start of the genocide in 2023. Heinz claims that the masses are once again demonstrating, openly shouting slogans against the Jews.

For years, even prior to the start of the genocide, Germany has deliberately criminalised nearly everything that is pro-Palestinian. From stifling Nakba commemoration events, to banning the Palestinian keffiyeh, to consistently deploying police brutality on German streets. This country's condemnation of a free and liberated Palestine is a threat to the German Staatsräson, or the reason of state.

The German Staatsräson is a political doctrine that former Prime Minister Angela Merkel announced in the Israeli Knesset in 2008, claiming that Germany has a commitment to Israel's national security.

Anti-Semitism accusations have been instrumentalised inside the courtroom by judges and prosecutors. State authorities flood the pro-Palestine movement with fines, trial dates, and legal proceedings. They're financially exhausting regular people and creating a climate where political expression itself, regular chants and slogans that have defined the pro-Palestine movement, are treated akin to announcing a terror connection.

Even protesters who are involved in non-violent direct action, such as the Elm Five, have faced deteriorating conditions in pretrial detention for 10 months now.

The current draft law, on top of these measures, after all that Palestinians have been through in Gaza for the last three years, only demonstrates the extent of German complicity in this genocide. They are announcing to the international world that, regardless of what crimes Israel has committed against the Palestinian people, them demanding their own liberation is much worse.

Germany's persistence in debating the consequences of denying Israel's right to exist is not meant to create more nuance and force the pro-Palestine movement to make its stances, chants, and slogans clearer. It is simply meant to incite fear in regular people who fundamentally believe that it is humans who have the right to exist free from occupation, from apartheid, and from genocidal state actors and their funders.

And while it is uncertain whether this draft law will be passed in the Bundestag, Germany's message is loud and clear.