“Intifada” Over Berlin: Hamas Mob Turn Holocaust Memorial into Anti-Israel Stage

In a grotesque display of antisemitic provocation, pro-Hamas activists scaled Berlin’s historic Brandenburg Gate on Thursday, draping a massive banner accusing Israel of “genocide” and waving Palestinian flags while chanting “Yalla, yalla, intifada”, a call for global violence against Jews, just days after Germany solemnly marked the 87th anniversary of Kristallnacht, the 1938 Nazi pogrom that heralded the Holocaust. Using a stolen crane, six demonstrators hoisted banners proclaiming “Never again genocide, Freedom for Palestine,” weaponizing the sacred phrase “Never again” against the world’s only Jewish state. Berlin police mobilized 75 officers and specialist climbers to remove the intruders, smashing the crane’s windows to arrest two who refused to descend. All six were detained for trespassing and vandalism of the 18th-century monument.

Germany’s Central Council of Jews condemned the desecration in the strongest terms: “The banner on the Brandenburg Gate, shortly after the commemoration day for Pogrom Night, abuses the phrase ‘Never again’ and directs it against the only Jewish state. This action was accompanied by ‘intifada’ calls, which call for worldwide violence against Jews.” The timing and location could not be more cynical, the Gate, once the backdrop for Nazi parades, now stands as a symbol of German atonement and unity, yet was hijacked to invert Holocaust memory and smear Israel’s defensive war against Hamas terrorists who slaughtered 1,200 civilians on October 7, 2023.

The stunt reflects a broader chilling trend in Germany. A recent ARD poll revealed 63% of Germans reject Israel’s campaign to eradicate Hamas, while a YouGov survey found 62% label Israel’s actions “genocide”, a term once reserved exclusively for the Nazi extermination of six million Jews. Meanwhile, at Mainz University, pro-Palestinian students are organizing protests against an upcoming visit by University of Haifa President Prof. Gur Alroey, branding his invitation “legitimization of genocide, apartheid, and ethnic cleansing.” In Berlin itself, Jewish and non-Jewish students have barricaded themselves inside the Technical University for days, demanding protection from Hamas-supporting, antisemitic factions that dominate the student union ASTA and openly justify the October 7 massacre. The besieged students insist on structural reforms to guarantee safety and representation for Jewish and Israeli students and to ban events that glorify Hamas terrorism.

As flares lit the night sky above the Gate and “intifada” chants echoed through Pariser Platz, the message was unmistakable: the same hatred that fueled Kristallnacht has found new packaging, cloaked in Palestinian flags and twisted Holocaust rhetoric, aimed squarely at the Jewish state and Jews worldwide. For Germany, a nation that swore “Never again” on the ashes of Auschwitz, Thursday’s spectacle was a painful reminder that the poison of antisemitism never truly vanished, it simply learned new slogans.