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Berlin’s Social Democrats have decided to open coalition talks with the Left Party and the Greens, a step that has set off an unusually sharp national argument. On Monday 19 October the SPD’s state executive voted to begin negotiations, ignoring criticism from parts of the federal party. The same evening the Berlin Greens agreed to negotiate a “red-green-red” alliance. The Left Party is due to vote on the matter at the end of October. Formally the issue is who will govern a city-state after the election of 20 September. Politically it has become a test of how the German centre-left handles the Left, how the conservatives use the memory of the Holocaust in party competition, and what it means for the coalition in Berlin’s federal government.
The campaign was shaped by the Left Party’s strong result. Its lead candidate, Elif Eralp, has explicitly committed to protecting Jewish life in the capital, and the party’s electoral success has made the idea of a left-led city government a realistic prospect, raising the prospect that Berlin could have a Left mayor. That possibility has produced a strong reaction in parts of the SPD and, particularly, in the conservative Union parties.
The slogan at the centre of the debate is “Nie wieder ist jetzt” (“Never again is now”), a phrase against antisemitism and for the protection of Jewish life. In recent days it has been used by members of both the Union and the SPD, and for some federal coalition lawmakers it has also become an argument against a Left-led Berlin government. That creates a charged contest, in which the same words are used to oppose and to defend the coalition.
The objections concentrate on antisemitism. Twenty prominent SPD members of the Bundestag, among them former Interior Minister Nancy Faeser, wrote a letter before the state party’s decision, urging it not to start coalition talks with the Left. A main point of criticism is the recurring accusations of antisemitism against the Berlin Left. Their statement says: “For us, the protection of Jewish life is non-negotiable. ‘Never again is now’ must not be a Sunday speech.”
One of the initiators, SPD domestic policy spokesman Sebastian Fiedler, indicated on ZDF that he favours a coalition with the CDU instead. He said that as long as the issues of structural antisemitism are not off the table, the SPD cannot enter a coalition.
The immediate focus is a Left politician, Vanessa Emde. She was elected directly to the Berlin parliament about a month ago with 46.2% of the vote in her constituency. During the campaign she expressed “full solidarity” with a rapper who had wished death on Israeli soldiers at a Left Party event. The SPD and the Greens demanded that she should not be part of the Left’s parliamentary group, but she was admitted, and she described this as a “small gain of ground against the reason of state,” an allusion to former Chancellor Angela Merkel’s statement that Israel’s security is a special responsibility for Germany. According to media reports, the Berlin Left’s leadership has since reconsidered and no longer wants to work with her. Talks are expected this week. The Berlin Left has also distanced itself from her, saying she does not cooperate with the party, after criticism of controversial statements about Israel that she shared online.
Criticism from the conservatives has been the sharpest. CSU leader Markus Söder wants to raise a “firewall against the left,” and CDU parliamentarian Christoph Ploß called a coalition with the Berlin Left an “absolute breach of the dam.” The Junge Union demanded “social ostracism of this cultural rupture” by the SPD and the Greens, while the slogan “Never again is now” lit up on an LED wall behind them.
The rhetoric borrows the vocabulary used about the far right, the “firewall” that mainstream parties maintain against the AfD, and applies it to the left. That is itself a political move: it seeks to equate the two ends of the spectrum and to present cooperation with the Left as a taboo of the same kind. Critics of the move say that the comparison is misleading and that it trivialises the original firewall.
The debate touches a factual question: where does antisemitic crime come from? According to the police crime statistics cited in the report, most antisemitic offences are committed by perpetrators with a right-wing ideology (47%). A good third (35%) are attributed to “foreign ideology,” and left-wing perpetrators account for about 2%.
to be continued
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