A report of the demonstrations in Germany in protest against Israel’s attacks on Gaza.
In Berlin 10,000 demonstrated against the Israeli attacks on Gaza on 3rd January. This came on top of two mobilisations in the preceding the week with 4,000 and 7,000 people on them. On Saturday large scale demos also took place in many other towns such as Frankfurt/Main (10,000), D?sseldorf (4000), Stuttgart (3000 to 4000) and Hamburg (4000).
The main organiser of the demonstrations are the Pal?stinenische Gemeinde (the umbrella alliance of various Palestinian organisations in Germany), along with a number of Arab and Islamic organisations. The demonstrations mobilised a large part of the Palestinian community from all political backgrounds and traditions, even though the actual composition and slogans varied considerably.
For example the main slogans on the first two demonstrations in Berlin were directed against the Zionist aggression, calling for a new intifada, but also attacking imperialist support of Israel?s war with slogans like ?Deutschland finanziert ? Israel bombardier? (Germany finances ? Israel bombards). The Berlin demonstration on Saturday, on the other hand, was much less political with a dominance of religious slogans.
However, there was one common feature at all demos: A very low turnout of the German far left and an almost complete absence of the labour movement. In particular, Die Linke, the Left Party, which claims to be an alternative to the openly social-imperialist SPD, was hardly visible.
So it was only small organisations like Gruppe Arbeitermacht and REVOLUTION who distributed leaflets and who, together with some other internationalist and anti-imperialist forces expressed their solidarity with the Palestinian people and their struggle.