A short time after the last election in Israel I attended a birthday party of a close friend in Berlin. We sat in a nice café, drank coffee and lemonade. Someone asked me about the election. I am moving here in certain circles, very leftist and liberal, from very certain neighborhoods in Berlin. Sometimes I feel like they like to hear me talking about Israel, that it reinforces their views.
But not this time. This time I told them that I think that the strong showing of Liberman is great. People there stopped drinking their coffee, the lemonade became really sour. In ten minutes I was sitting alone. I have a point here. It is the same point that lead me to say that Thilo Sarrazin is Germany’s man of the year.
**
Other then gender I don’t think that I share anything with Liberman and Sarrazin. But I do think that Libernan forced the Israeli public to expose itself to something that we don’t like to admit: that many of us don’t like Arabs, that many of us had enough of all the small steps. Liberman skipped the pleasantries. He forced the Israeli public (and its counterparts on the Palestinian side) to talk about the last step, the Jerusalem question and the solution for the refugees. The support for Liberman means one thing, and one thing only: the situation is hopeless. You can meet, talk and discuss as much as you want about the peace process, the Israeli public just don’t care anymore.
Thilo Sarrazin had done the same service for Germany. It used to be, when I was talking about racism, integration and minorities with German friends that they would always respond that the racism exist only on the fringes of German society, in the former East where unemployment run high and it is easy to convince the youngsters to despise anything that is not pure German.
Sarrazin broke this excuse to the smallest pieces. Not only his status on Germany’s mainstream, but the fact that millions had bought his book and bought into his ideas and xenophobia. I doubt that unemployed people living in the former East are the people who buy books.
It is one thing to live in Berlin and read the taz, and involve yourself with integration matters and live among the immigrants, but it is a bubble, a minority bubble. The most-read paper in Germany is Bild.
**
Germany should be thankful for Sarrazin. Not only had he exposed its true face about immigration and integration (as was evident by politicians’ statements following his book, but it forced the German society to start a true discussion about the nature of Germany and its relation to its new citizens.
If German citizens will look around them they could witness what a lack of this public discussion created in Europe. One after one, almost every European country that failed to have this discussion, resorted to voice its discontent with the new immigrants in the election booths. Not only former Eastern block countries with economic uncertainties like Hungary and Slovakia, but also Holland, Denmark and even Sweden, the pillars of European liberalism.
Western Europe who brought to the world the enlightenment, the education and the liberalism is having now the fight of its life. If it will fight its millions of new immigrants it will betray its core values, but, according to Sarazzin and millions of other Europeans, if Europe will fail from curbing the immigration, it will cease to exist as it is today as a western civilization.
It’s a horrible situation: if the continent will keep its holy values, it will disappear, but Sarazzin claims that its existence depend upon betraying its liberal values. It raises a question: are the values the foundation of the existence or do you have to sacrifice existence for the value. It’s an existential question that no one likes to talk about or make decisions. Sarazzin controversial views had opened the window for discussion.
The statistics itself should have raised this discussion a long time ago. The number of Muslim immigration is estimated between 17-23 million people, and Europe need almost each and everyone of them to support its generous pension plan. In Spain, over a span of one decade, the percentage of immigrants, mostly Muslims, jumped from 3.2% to 13.4%. in 2009 the seven leading names for new boys born in Brussels were of Arabic origin, demographic predictions estimate that at the half point of this century there will be a Muslim majority in France and maybe other European countries, Austria was 90% catholic in the 20th century but in 2050 the under-15 population will have Muslim majority, in Marseille (the oldest city in France) and Rotterdam Muslim are more then a quarter of the population, over 20% of Malmo’s population are Muslims, 15% in Brussels and Birmingham, 10% in Paris, London and Copenhagen.
These numbers should have raised the integration discussion a long time ago and put it in the middle of the daily agenda in Europe and in Germany, so why did we have to wait for Sarrazin?
**
I think that the first reason that this discussion was eliminated has to do with the fact that in order for Germans to talk about integration, they had to define the standards of this integration. In other words, what one needs in order to become integrated in the German society and who decide what are those standards.
I understand that for many years it was a taboo to discuss this issue in Germany, and yet: What does it mean to be German? We can agree on the language. But what about religion? Is Germany a Christian or secular country? Maybe it is a secular country with Christian values of helping the other, being compassionate, and tolerant, but you can make this case only if you ignore any history over 60 years in Germany.
Maybe the guidelines should be around human rights, but how much can you force Germans to respect the others? And where is the line between that and hurting their self definition and cultural autonomy? If a woman can speak fluent German, can discuss the writing of Gothe and enjoy a play by Brecht or Ballack but wants to wear a Burka, is she integrated or not?
Germans, it seems to me, made the easy solution in order to avoid any conflicts, and decided not to decide. The immigrants definitely can’t decide on these matters. This is exactly where somnambulant people like Sarrazin are getting into the pictures, and still Germans like to discuss the messenger instead of the message he carries.
Sarrazin took off the comfortable blanket of the German public and forced it to face this issue. Forced it to define itself (and also the immigrants to define themselves) so both sides will have an idea of what concessions they must make in order to reach a common ground.
**
I also would like to write a few words from a Jewish point of view. It strikes me to see the similarities between few of Sarrazin arguments and what was said about Jews in Germany about 80 years ago, and yet I am afraid to take the discussion into this area as I think that it will only strengths the taboo around this discussion. (shouldn’t racism be
taboo?
But I am asking myself what I am supposed to do as a Jew when I am witnessing such similarities? I don’t really know, but there is one thought that keeps popping into my mind.
Most of the German population believes that immigrants should integrate to some degree and adopt the German lifestyle. But a new immigrant can look at the past and ask: wasn’t it the majority of the German population that executed a whole religion that defined itself first as German and then as Jewish?
Maybe Sarrazin is right after all. Maybe it is a discussion about Genes. The German genes.
