In comparison with Israel’s security borders, “the Berlin Wall is a toy” said the Bavarian politician in a nearly four minute video posted on YouTube.
BERLIN — Israeli organizations slammed Uwe Kekeritz, a German Green Party MP, on Thursday for claiming that Israel’s security fence and border system to stop Palestinian terrorism is worse than the Berlin Wall.
In comparison with Israel’s security borders, “the Berlin Wall is a toy” said the Bavarian politician in a nearly four minute video posted on YouTube in August. He spoke at a reportedly anti-Israel June event sponsored by the German Protestant Church.
Efraim Zuroff, the chief Nazi hunter of the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the director of its Jerusalem office, told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday, “It is obvious that Green MP Uwe Kekeritz learned nothing about the larger picture about Middle East politics and history during his visit to Israel.”
"To the best of my knowledge, the Berlin Wall was not built to stop terrorists from committing suicide attacks against West Berlin civilians, (it was) rather to prevent East Germans from fleeing to freedom in the West. And the number of people shot by communist authorities far outnumbers any casualties at Israel’s security fence," said Zuroff.
He questioned whether Kekeritz made the comparison “out of genuine ignorance or anti-Semitism.”
Kekeritz said “it must be made clear to the Israelis that they cannot continue with their policies without consequences.“ He added that it is “taboo” to criticize Israel in Germany. Zuroff added, "There is no shortage of criticism of Israel in Germany today and no one is preventing him from voicing criticism of Israel, justified or unjustified.”