Anniversary of October 7th: Applause at Bebelplatz, red hands at the checkpoint

October 7th was a genocide, says Ron Prosor. “A genocide of Jews and Israelis and not the other way around.” The Israeli ambassador received thunderous applause for this. Hundreds gathered on Bebelplatz in Berlin-Mitte on Wednesday afternoon to commemorate the victims of the massacre, the hostages, the survivors and their relatives three years after Hamas' terrorist attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. The motto: "Never forget. Never be silent."

Participants wave Israeli flags, wear Star of David necklaces and kippahs. A woman has “7.10.23” tattooed on her forearm, with a Star of David above it. A participant holds up a poster: “Thank you IDF” – a thank you to the Israeli army.

Bebelplatz, where activists have set up the “Square of the Hamas Hostages” as a memorial site several times since 2024, is largely cordoned off with bollards, bars and police tubs. Banners with pictures of hostages kidnapped by Hamas on October 7 hang on a grill in Hamburg.

“The fight to free the hostages is over, but the threat remains,” says the initiator of the event, Melody Sucharewicz. "And that's why our fight continues. We must speak out when anti-Semitic attitudes are tolerated in democratic parties."

This refers to the Left Party, which won the Berlin House of Representatives election in September and has since been confronted with accusations of anti-Semitism. Prosor takes up the allusion: “A firewall against anti-Semitism either stands against all sides or is a worthless backdrop,” says the Israeli ambassador, and demands: “Anti-Semites must never enter parliament again!”

Federal Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt (CSU), according to the initiator, “a long-time supporter of the State of Israel,” arrived half an hour late. He also warns: "We have to be alarmed when right-wing extremists lead a state parliament in Germany. We have to be alarmed when a party in Berlin talks about possible participation in the government that openly tolerates anti-Semites in its environment." The day before, Tobias Rausch, an AfD politician, was elected president of the state parliament for the first time in Saxony-Anhalt.

According to the Interior Minister, the slogans that one reads on building walls and at demonstrations in Berlin are not about liberating something. “It’s about something being destroyed: a Jewish people.” For him it is clear: “Israel has the right and the duty to defend itself.” And: “Germany stands firmly and unshakably on Israel’s side.”

Speakers repeatedly refer to the militant part of the pro-Palestinian movement that glorifies Hamas. “While the Hamas terrorists were still murdering, relatives were insulted and posters were torn down here on Bebelplatz, while baklava was being given away on Sonnenallee to celebrate Hamas’ bloodlust,” remembers Melody Sucharewicz. Those present don't want to let this get them down. “We will dance again, even if it is with burns and only one leg,” says Ron Prosor. “Nobody will stop us.”

A good kilometer away, near Checkpoint Charlie, the completely different camp demonstrated on the same afternoon. The “Three Years of Genocide” rally was apparently registered by PFLP-affiliated activist Ibrahim Ibrahim, who also appeared at the Left Party’s election party in Neukölln. However, hardly 50 people come. Women with keffiyehs wrapped around their headscarves hold blood-stained dolls meant to represent killed babies and raise red-colored hands.

An activist from the Trotskyist small group Spartakist holds up a sign that reads “Down with the Zionist agitation against leftists in the Left Party.” However, representatives of the Left Party cannot be identified.

The speeches say, for example, that October 7, 2023 “changed the world” because on that day the moral mask of the West was torn off. “We stand here today for the liberation of all of Palestine,” says a speaker who apparently belongs to the small group “Communist Organization,” emphasizing “entirely.”

Looking at the GDR flag that he was just holding up, he adds: This state was finally founded on October 7, 1949 - and the GDR always supported the PLO. Some small, left-wing groups have also called for a protest that evening to celebrate the Hamas massacre on October 7, 2023.