The head of the German state of Brandenburg condemned antisemitism on the 84th anniversary of Kristallnacht.
Brandenburg Minister President Dietmar Woidke related that he believes it is necessary for the state and civil society to clearly and decisively speak out against all forms of antisemitism, Brandenburg.de reported.
“Nowhere and never must there be tolerance for antisemitism,” he said, speaking in Potsdam.
“This is an important, central lesson from history: the planned disenfranchisement and persecution of the Jews during the National Socialist regime of terror began immediately with Hitler’s assumption of power in 1933 and reached another terrible climax on November 9, 1938, which was visible to all the world.”
“Synagogues burned, Jews were mistreated, hunted down and murdered. We are still ashamed today that all this could happen in front of the eyes and partly with the approval of the population,” he added.
Noting that “for the Nazis, the pogrom night was a further step on the way to the Holocaust, which killed almost six million European Jews,” he stressed that “we must never forget that!”
“Against this background, it is encouraging that a new synagogue center is now being built in Potsdam and that Jewish communities are developing in Brandenburg. Jewish life and the Jewish faith belong at the heart of our society,” he said.