German-Israeli Society

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German-Israeli Society
logo
legal form registered association
founding 1966
Seat Berlin , Germany
precursor German-Israeli study groups
main emphasis Promotion of relations between the people of Israel and Germany
Chair Uwe Becker
Members about 5,400 (2015)
Website deutsch-israelische-gesellschaft.de

The German-Israeli Society (abbreviation DIG; also: ʾGudat-ha-Yadidut-Germaniah-Yiśraʾel ) is an organization in Germany in which, according to its guiding principles, “Friends of Israel come together in non-partisan cooperation in order to show solidarity with the State of Israel and its Affect the population. "

history

The society emerged from the German-Israeli study groups (DIS), which existed since 1957 at the Free University and the Church University in West Berlin as well as at eight universities in the Federal Republic of Germany. The DIS at the Church University was strongly influenced by its rector, theology professor Rolf Rendtorff . In the summer of 1963, together with like-minded people, he began to convince various members of the Bundestag in Bonn of the need to establish diplomatic relations with the State of Israel. The idea of ​​founding a 'German-Israeli Society' (DIG) emerged from these politicians' meetings. The official establishment took place in Bonn on March 21, 1966 , about a year after the establishment of diplomatic relations between the Federal Republic of Germany and Israel.

The DIG became known nationwide through calls for humanitarian aid during the Six Day War . Between 1967 and 1973 the establishment of working groups supplemented the work focused on central tasks with regional activities.

In 1990 the members of the GDR-Israel Society, which was founded in that year, decided to join the association with effect from January 31, 1991.

In 2020 Michaela Engelmeier was appointed to the newly created office of Secretary General.

With around 4,600 members (2013) and 52 regional working groups, DIG is represented throughout Germany. They organize events such as lectures, seminars, exhibitions, concerts, study trips and special youth events on their own responsibility.

aims

“The task of society is to deepen the relations between Germany and Israel in all questions of public and cultural life. The society serves to promote international solidarity, tolerance and understanding among peoples, especially in the Middle East. "

- Articles of Association, § 2

Bureau

Uwe Becker has been president since 2019 , and Gerhard Jahn was the founding president .

The following have been Vice-Presidents since 2019:

Phillipp J. Butler Ransohoff, Michaela Engelmeier ( SPD ), Marcus Faber Member of the Bundestag ( FDP ), Kirsten Kappert-Gonther Member of the Bundestag ( Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen ), Claudia Korenke (Frankfurt am Main) and Maya Zehden (Berlin).

Treasurer has been Hermann Kuhn ( Bündnis90 / Die Grünen ) since 2015 .

Other members of the Executive Committee since 2019: Yoram Ehrlich, Helge Gilberg, Matheus Hagedorny, Aras-Nathan Keul, Daniel Killy and Vincent Wolff.

Awards given by the DIG

Ernst Cramer Medal

The medal named after the Jewish journalist Ernst Cramer has been honoring personalities in Israel and Germany who have made a special contribution to the bilateral relations between the two countries since 2013 .

Peace prize

Since 2001, the society has awarded the German-Israeli Society's Peace Prize, endowed with 5,000 euros . The previous winners are:

  • 2010 The Jewish Amakim Tavor School in Kibbutz Mizra and the Arab Iksal School
  • 2005 The Hand in Hand School Jerusalem
  • 2003 The Peace School of Neve Shalom / Wahat al Salam
  • 2001 "Arab Jewish Cultural Center Beit Hagefen" in Haifa for the project "Young Leadership"

Badge of honor

Members and personalities who are deserved for the work of the association receive the badge of honor of the German-Israeli Society upon proposal. The award winners include Marianne Karmon, former chairwoman of the Israeli-German Society in Jerusalem and the Action Reconciliation for Peace Services in Israel .

Young forum

The Junge Forum DIG (JuFo) is the platform for members aged 14 to 35. Federal chairmen were or are:

  • since 2019: Aras-Nathan Keul
  • 2015–2019: Tibor Luckenbach
  • 2009–2015: Lukas Welz
  • 2005–2009: Stefan Hensel

In nationwide activities, the Young Forum promotes the exchange between young people in Israel and Germany. In particular, those who have lived in the other country and want to contribute their experience to German-Israeli relations should be included.

An annual German-Israeli summer camp takes place as part of the summer camp program of the Action Reconciliation Service for Peace . Young Israelis and Germans work together for several weeks, learning and experiencing history on a topic that changes every year:

  • 2014: ... because of this war. 100 years of the First World War
  • 2013: Fragments - Jewish-Russian Identities in Germany and Israel
  • 2012: Cross and Queer - Religion and Sexuality in Germany and Israel

"Israelpedia" is an annual JuFo seminar and annually grants young people a deeper insight into a topic that is related to Israel, German-Israeli relations or the Near and Middle East. In addition to political, historical and social workshops, excursions, cultural events and networking meetings are organized.

  • 2015: Zionism Today: Perspectives from Religion, Society, Economy and Politics
  • 2015: 1965 revisited - A critical appraisal of German-Israeli relations in the 50th year after their official admission (Cologne)
  • 2014: "Old Wound" Israel - On the Presence of Anti-Semitism and Anti-Zionism (Hamburg)
  • 2012: Upheavals in the Middle East - Perspectives for Israel (in Berlin)

The German-Israeli Future Workshop gives young people who have got to know Israel or Germany more intensively the opportunity to develop projects and get involved in German-Israeli relations. New paths for the present and the future should be tried out and taken. The last future workshop took place in Berlin in 2015.

  • 2015: Collective and Global Transformations - 50 Years of German-Israeli Relations
  • 2014: Green Agenda in Germany and Israel - Environmental Policy, Renewable Energies and Climate Protection
  • 2009: 1st German-Israeli future workshop in Berlin

In 2019, the Junge Forum organized the first German-Israeli student conference in Frankfurt am Main. Representatives of the National Student Union of Israel also attended. A resolution condemning the BDS movement was passed with the RCDS , Juso university groups , green university groups and the fzs .

The Young Forum is active on site in regional and university groups that are present with their own events and activities. Regional and university groups currently exist in Augsburg , Bamberg , Berlin , Erlangen , Frankfurt am Main , Freiburg , Hamburg , Hanover , Leipzig , Nuremberg and Stuttgart (as of August 2015).

Controversy

Some local divisions of the DIG criticized the controversial exhibition “ Nakba - Flight and Expulsion of the Palestinians 1948”, which was shown in around a hundred cities . The organizers of the exhibition accused the DIG and other critics of not seeking discourse, but merely wanting to stop the exhibition. However, at the opening of the exhibition in Osnabrück, even the local DIG chairman Hans-Gert Pöttering (CDU) spoke a greeting. At the exhibition in Bremen, the local DIG chairman Hermann Kuhn told the taz that the unilateral assignment of guilt “did not promote the idea of ​​peaceful coexistence”. The organizers of the exhibition, including Detlef Griesche from the German-Palestinian Society, accused their critics of attempting to prevent behind the scenes. Griesche even claimed that the protest was "led and directed by Israel", but admitted that the exhibition was one-sided. Kuhn described Griesche's allegations as a “lie” and accused him of anti-Semitism, also referring to a demonstration organized by Griesche in 2014 with anti-Israeli slogans.

The Berlin DIG chairman Jochen Feilcke ( CDU ) was unable to assert himself in 2010 when DIG Vice President Dirk Niebel ( FDP ) resigned and then resigned himself. During a business trip to Israel, Niebel made a statement that he felt was undiplomatic and later withdrawn when he wanted to enter the Gaza Strip, which is controlled by the radical Islamic Hamas , to visit a sewage treatment plant. Israeli authorities prevented the unsettled excursion, justifying this by stating that Hamas would use such visits for propaganda. Niebel renounced a re-candidacy and asserted time reasons, but the criticism made it easier for him to leave. "

This article or the following section is not adequately provided with supporting documents ( e.g. individual evidence ). Information without sufficient evidence could be removed soon. Please help Wikipedia by researching the information and including good evidence.
The following paragraph

After DIG President Robbe was able to obtain the approval of EUR 300,000 federal grants in 2014, conflicts arose within the association, as the regional working groups, which shouldered the majority of DIG activities, were now dependent on the federal management for all financially effective decisions due to the associated verification requirements would be. There was also a conflict between Robbe and DIG treasurer Stephan J. Kramer . In addition, the long-standing DIG managing director took early retirement in the spring of 2015, so that the DIG member magazine did not appear in the anniversary year of 2015. In addition, among the local DIG representatives, “influential envious people” saw an anniversary exhibition financed by the federal government as a result of Robbe's mediation as an “expensive attempt to raise the profile” of their president, which missed the opportunity to “convey an empathic, differentiated image of Israel to the partially Israel-phobic German public”. In 2015 Robbe made his office available.

At the general meeting on November 15, 2015, the royal family was elected as his successor. Almost a year later, an autonomy of the working groups that is permissible under association law and acceptable for the working groups was anchored in the statutes.

Web links

Commons : German-Israeli Society  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ www.deutsch-israelische-gesellschaft.de Principles
  2. ^ So Gronauer, Gerhard: The State of Israel in West German Protestantism. Perceptions in church and journalism from 1948 to 1972 (AKIZ.B57). Göttingen 2013, pp. 181–183.
  3. ↑ Michael Thaidigsmann: Michaela Engelmeier becomes Secretary General. In: www.juedische-allgemeine.de. April 3, 2020, accessed April 13, 2020 .
  4. ↑ Cramer Medal for Peres
  5. ^ Catholic News Agency , December 14, 2016.
  6. ↑ helmholtz.de
  7. ↑ Niklas Zimmermann: Student Conference: “Opposition to your professors” . ISSN  0174-4909 ( faz.net [accessed July 31, 2019]).
  8. ↑ Frederik Schindler: Universities: Broad alliance against anti-Semitic BDS campaign . June 13, 2019 ( welt.de [accessed July 31, 2019]).
  9. ^ Daniel Bax: Controversial Middle East Exhibition: School under fire . In: the daily newspaper . ( taz.de [accessed on January 1, 2017]).
  10. ^ Gerd Kolbe: Systematic discrediting by Jewish-German interest groups: Unwanted Palestine exhibition . In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung . April 27, 2011, ISSN  0376-6829 ( nzz.ch [accessed January 1, 2017]).
  11. ^ Jan Paul Koopmann: Dispute over exhibition: New dispute on old fronts . In: the daily newspaper . ( taz.de [accessed on April 10, 2017]).
  12. ↑ Discussion on hostility towards Jews in Bremen - "That is anti-Semitic" , Weserkurier of July 9, 2015.
  13. ↑ Foreign Policy: Stake in the Flesh - Spiegel online , on February 21, 2011 (and in the print edition of DER SPIEGEL 8/2011)
  14. ↑ Ulrich W. Sahm : "Led astray"? Niebel backs down ntv from June 22, 2010.
  15. ↑ DIG President resigns: Reinhold Robbe resigns - Tagesspiegel , on September 15, 2015
  16. ↑ In all friendship: 50 years of the German-Israeli Society - haGalil. Retrieved April 10, 2017 .
  17. ↑ Articles of Association as amended on June 18, 2016