Germany: Why are some Jews supporting a German right-wing movement?

Standing on an improvised stage and wrapped in the black, red and gold German flag, Rotem Ahituv stared out at thousands of protesters spread below him and offered the demonstrators a kind of absolution that only someone like him could give.  “I am Jewish,” he told the crowd. “My family has lived here in Germany for 700 years, and I can tell you that I see here no Nazis.”  In a short and passionate speech that quickly went viral on the Internet, Ahituv, an Israeli immigrant to Germany, spoke about the threat of a Muslim takeover of Europe and declared that Germany’s Jews stand with Pegida, the populist right-wing movement that had organized the January 26 demonstration in Frankfurt. 

[...] In taking his stand, Ahituv was not just opposing Germany’s leadership and all its mainstream parties; he was standing, too, against Germany’s Jewish establishment. Communal leaders have strongly backed Chancellor Angela Merkel’s description of Pegida as a group led by individuals whose hearts “are cold and often full of prejudice, and even hate.”

Josef Schuster, chairman of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, has condemned Pegida as an “immensely dangerous” movement that consists of neo-Nazis, parties from the far right and citizens who think that they can finally let out their racism and xenophobia.  “The Pegida-movement definitely doesn’t serve the interests of Germany’s Jewish community,” he wrote to the Forward in an email. “They want to exclude the Muslims and foreigners [from] German society. Somebody who roots against one minority is also able to root against other minorities”

[...] According to Rabbi Walter Rothschild, Pegida is raising important questions that mainstream politics has avoided. Rothschild, who is chief rabbi of Schleswig-Holstein, a federal state in northern Germany, said that there was a need in German society to discuss to what extent a minority should be allowed to maintain cultural norms that override core principles of Western civilization. Within the Muslim minority — which amounts to 5% of Germany’s population of 82 million — there are some communities, Rothschild said, that disregard Western values like women’s rights or freedom of speech and preach anti-Semitism.

“If you are going to have a mosque, then don’t teach hatred in it,” he said. “Yes, you can have a school, but don’t teach people to be terrorists. Yes, you can have your own political opinion about the Middle East, but don’t walk up and down [in street demonstrations] saying, ‘Kill the Jews!’ — which is what they did in Berlin.” Rothschild was referring to pro-Palestinian protests that took place in the German capital during Israel’s military offensive against Hamas in Gaza last summer.

”This is a cultural issue,” Rothschild concluded. “Jews in Europe are mostly on the side of modern Western values. There are some Muslims who are against modern Western values. Why should I support the right of Muslims to be against what I believe in?”

More: Jewish Forward