Last year, for several months, there were exchanges between German officials and Kurve Wustrow. The German aid organization is making a desperate attempt to salvage its ongoing projects with Zochrot and New Profile, two Israeli human rights organizations focused on antimilitarization and Palestinian rights.
The organization made phone calls and held non-public meetings with officials. They sent emails answering questions. They even sent statements from Israeli organizations explaining their positions.
But nothing has dissuaded the German government from cutting all official investments in the organization. In mid-December, the resolution confirmed it. The futile fight has left Kurve Wustrow’s interim director, John Preuss, feeling “tired and frustrated. “
Kurve Wustrow has partners in several countries, adding Sudan and Myanmar. But, Preuss said, this was the first time the German government had funded one of its ongoing projects.
Preuss, who for days agonized by the resolution to speak publicly, and its Israeli partners had to guess against what they should protect.
The German government never gave the organization an official explanation as to why they had to suddenly cancel investment in projects they had approved or renewed last year.
DW’s investigative unit reviewed emails and submitted documents, and spoke to dozens of progression resources in Germany, Israel and the occupied West Bank. The organizations that have criticized the Israeli government’s policies and the ongoing war in Gaza.
Since the attacks led until October 7, 2023 opposite to Israel, Germany has also stopped financing at least six Palestinian organizations. DW’s resources have spoken with all things have agreed that this political resolution, an attempt to silence critical voices in the environment of the area of narrowing for civil society in Israel. They also said that Germany’s resolution had been taken under Israeli pressure.
In A DW, the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs rejected the accusation as “inaccurate”, saying that it continues to financing “many NGOs in Israel and the Palestinian territories that criticize Israeli professional policies. “
The paintings made through a new profile and Zochrot are debatable in Israel, especially a government that is politically further to the right than any other in the country’s history.
Germany’s investment cut took off ongoing projects that teams had eliminated until the end of 2023.
Zochrot, which means “remember” in Hebrew, advocates that the nakba is responsible, a term that many use to refer to the expulsion and displacement of the Palestinians before and the Arab-Israeli war of 1948. The organization also campaates for the Right returns from the Palestinian refugees and their descendants, to which the existing Israeli government firmly opposes.
Its director, Rachel Beitarie, told DW that she met with German officials before the defunding was made final. “The German past, the Nazi regime was brought up again and again in these conversations,” she said. German officials, she added, told her it was important for Germany to support Israel because of Germany’s history.
That’s why Zochrot wrote A to the German government, in which he addressed the query of whether he had called for “Israel’s lifestyles,” saying he categorically did not.
Bearie said Zochrot lost about 100,000 euros (about $103,000), about a quarter of his budget. The investment “definitely hurts us, but it won’t possibly stop us from doing this work,” he said.
New Profile, a volunteer-based movement, offers support to conscientious objectors who risk imprisonment in Israel, where military service is mandatory both for men and women. The organization said it has lost about half of its total funding.
In a lengthy communication to the German government, New Profile explained that its dealings with those who refused to serve in the Israeli army were “strictly in accordance with Israeli law. “
Sergeiy Sandler, the organization’s treasurer, said the defunding was timed “to deliver the most possible damage to our work.” It left the organization scrambling to find alternative funding at a time when Israeli soldiers were being sent to fight in Gaza and, until recently, Lebanon.
Both organizations had been receiving progression help through various German partners for around two decades. Until now, resources told DW, his paintings had never raised any considerations among German authorities.
Sources that tense the Israeli government would have possibly led to the resolution of the German government to suspend its financing, as well as that of other groups.
Germany reviews federal budget coverage for development cooperation and humanitarian aid, especially in regions immersed in armed clashes and political unrest. But when it comes to Israel and the Palestinian territories, the complexity is even greater.
The German parliament approved a solution in November drafted behind closed doors, linking state subsidies to the club with a debatable definition of anti-Semitism. such as “making comparisons between cool Israeli politics and that of the Nazis” or “claiming that the lifestyles of a state of Israel are a racist attitude. ” effort” as examples of anti-Semitism.
This is materialized in what the German Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development called in a statement in December 2023 nor make anti -Semitic comments. statements or movements that make them “undesirable. ” This means that organizations do not deserve to participate in the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, nor incite violence against Israel or deny Israel’s right to exist.
Dozens of appeals from civil society organizations told DW that the German government had been increasingly restrictive on investment since Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas and other Palestinian activists introduced a series of brutal attacks, killing some 1,200 Israeli women and taking 254 hostages. In response, the Israeli government introduced attacks on First Gaza and then Lebanon. Tens of thousands of Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli offensive, according to local authorities.
Aid workers have compiled a list of at least 15 organizations, including Zochrot and New Profile, that have lost their German government funding in recent months. Most are Palestinian, and many had long-standing partnerships with German development organizations.
While the Foreign Ministry did not confirm that 15 had been defunded, DW was able to verify at least eight groups whose funds were recently cut.
One resolution, according to many NGO resources, is namely symptomatic of Germany’s restrictive position: the Berlin resolution quietly reduces funding for six Palestinian organizations after the Hamas attacks at the end of 2023.
Israel had deemed them connected with terrorists already back in 2021, even though many countries, including France and originally Germany, said those claims were baseless.
One of the organizations, Al-Haq, gained prominence in 2014 for providing testimony against Israel to the International Criminal Court, which in November 2024 issued an arrest warrant for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, citing allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Many civil society sources said it was likely due to this 2014 testimony that Al-Haq made Israel’s terror list.
The Israeli government’s resolution to designate the six Palestinian NGOs as terrorists in 2021 is a “100 percent” political resolution, the European Union’s representative in the West Bank and Gaza, Sven Kühn von Burgsdorff, told DW.
“None of the audits and financial controls came to the conclusion that any of these six NGOs have contravened or violated our financing agreements or contractual obligations,” he said.
Nine European foreign ministries reached a similar conclusion. They wrote in a joint statement in July 2022 that “no substantial information was received from Israel that would justify reviewing our policy towards the six Palestinian NGOs.” One of the signatories was Germany.
The investment continued, but in December 2023, the German government quietly carried out a total policy shift and ruled out any federal investment. Christmas is just a few days away, one source said, while most humanitarian staff were already on vacation.
DW has a copy of an internal, classified report by the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, which states that no new cooperation with the six agencies were to be authorized. Here, too, no reasons were given. The decision has still never been publicly communicated.
When asked what prompted the sudden shift, a Foreign Office spokesperson told DW in a written statement that the government reviewed and continues to review any information concerning the six NGOs.
Overall, the investment of 8 Israeli and Palestinian organizations appears to involve Germany’s resolution with the existing Israeli government, progression resources agreed upon.
It comes at a time when the space for critical civil society and media in Israel is shrinking, said Israeli lawyer Michael Sfard, who defends and advises Palestinian and Israeli NGOs, including Al-Haq. He believes that restricting funding for human rights organizations is part of a deliberate strategy of the Israeli government to stifle dissent.
“It’s a trend that began a decade and a half ago, but came to its peak with the current government, and especially after October 7,” he said. It was, he explained, “unbelievable how difficult it is in today’s Israel to criticize the policy of the government.”
The Israeli Embassy in Berlin answered questions about the broader crackdown on civil society in Israel.
Germans “participate in oppression,” said Beitarie, director of Zochrot.
Sergeiy Sandler once again agrees. He lives in Beersheba, a city in southern Israel between two army airports. The soundtrack of the war in Gaza, which is unfolding just 40 kilometers from his home, is the incessant roar of planes heading to or from the Gaza Strip.
It is a constant reminder that war is so close to home. “And the [new profile] paintings are helping at least other people who do not participate in atrocities,” he said, adding that the new profile is receiving more and more applications from other people to get out of the service. military.
“I can see why the Israeli government would suppress us,” he said.
But what, he asked, angrily, “is the German government’s business imposing the ideological demands of the Israeli government on Israeli citizens?”
What, he added: “Are the affairs of the German government to silence dissent?”
In a letter to DW, the Foreign Ministry rejected all accusations through Germany that followed Israel’s example in silencing voices critical of the Netanyahu government, calling them “inaccurate. “
Additional reporting via Tania Krämer in Be’er Sheva and Tel Aviv
Posted by: Mathias Bölinger, Carolyn Thompson, Sarah Hofmann
Fact verification: Carolyn Thompson
Legal advice: Florian Wagenknecht