Interreligious association accuses Western politicians and NGOs of financing terrorism in Gaza

“Typical Western reaction”

A lot of money for humanitarian projects comes to the Gaza Strip from the West. Jürgen Wilhelm from the Cologne Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation criticizes that the money ends up indirectly with the Hamas terrorists.

DOMRADIO.DE: You write in your statement: "We hope and pray that our many friends and relatives in Israel are safe." Have you received any messages from people?

Prof. Dr. Jürgen Wilhelm (Chairman of the Cologne Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation): Yes, thank God I haven't received any terrible news from Tel Aviv yet. This is because only relatively few rockets have been able to reach Tel Aviv so far. The main targets were all in the area around Gaza and the villages and towns there.

On the positive side, I have to say that everyone is still alive. And although a good friend, especially one of my children, was immediately drafted into reserve service, nothing has happened there yet. But unfortunately that's different for many families.

DOMRADIO.DE: The Foreign Office advises against traveling to Israel. However, there are currently some visitors from Germany who were just as surprised by the attacks as the people in Israel themselves. Do you think it is currently possible to leave safely?

Wilhelm: It's hard to judge from here. But it seems to be the case, as the Foreign Office is in constant contact with the German embassy in Tel Aviv. And Mr. Seibert is a very experienced ambassador who comes from the Chancellery, a former journalist, as we know. They say that the scheduled flights for the excursion are still ready. There is another service to get away from Tel Aviv. But that has to be decided locally and the decision will probably change every hour.

A few months ago I was also in Jerusalem and also in Bethlehem on the Palestinian side. Everything was peaceful there. It's easy to get to Tel Aviv airport in this relatively small country. But you will have to find out very carefully on site what is possible, how, when and where.

DOMRADIO.DE: We hear a lot about solidarity these days. It is above all a moral attitude. Is there anything else we can do to help from Germany?

Prof. Dr. Jürgen Wilhelm

"We are experiencing [...] that anti-Semitism has unfortunately returned to the centre of society."

Wilhelm: Yes, of course. For example, you can show political solidarity in spontaneous rallies, in public calls, and also in discussions. We from the Christian-Jewish society and our Jewish friends experience it even more naturally and much more directly that anti-Semitism has unfortunately returned to the center of society. He was certainly promoted by right-wing radical forces like the AfD and others. But it's not just that, it goes far beyond that.

Yesterday there was a very impressive spontaneous rally in other large cities, but also in Cologne. Today I will be speaking in Bergisch Gladbach, a city with over 100,000 inhabitants. There will probably be a few hundred people there. Yes, you can do that.

In my opinion, sending concrete humanitarian aid to Israel is, firstly, logistically hardly possible at the moment and perhaps - as far as we can judge from here - not yet necessary.

DOMRADIO.DE: In Germany, however, you don't just see solidarity with Israel. Over the weekend we saw pictures from Berlin of Hamas sympathizers taking to the streets and literally celebrating the attacks. How did these images affect you?

Prof. Dr. Jürgen Wilhelm"These guys, especially in Berlin-Neukölln, should be prosecuted legally if they can be"

Wilhelm: That's shocking and basically unbearable. You may have sympathy for one or the other. But calling at public rallies in Germany and cheering that Israeli people have been killed and taken hostage is not possible.

The hostages also include women and children and elderly people. Horrifyingly, we have even seen some videos of how Hamas treated innocent civilians. It's a disgusting terror and these guys, especially there in Berlin-Neukölln, should be prosecuted legally if at all possible. And if they don't want to live here, then they should go to Palestine and fight there.

DOMRADIO.DE: The European Union is funding the Gaza Strip with millions of dollars to improve the poor living conditions there. Given the current situation, have the funds been invested there correctly?

Wilhelm: Everyone who is involved with the country knows that a large part of this money ends up indirectly with Hamas. This is the typical reaction of the West, which is to ignore findings with a wink, to suppress them or not to question them for supposedly overarching political reasons.

This is common in the larger international context and to some extent even understandable here and there. However, transfers to the Gaza Strip have been miserable for years because humanitarian aid only reaches very, very little.

Prof. Dr. Jürgen Wilhelm

"We ultimately finance the terrorists, who we then label as such and then despise again."

If you want to put it in an evil or critical way, you could say: We ultimately finance the terrorists, who we then label as such and then despise again. There is also a certain dishonesty in international cooperation with the Palestinian territories.

DOMRADIO.DE: Israel is currently experiencing a severe domestic political crisis. Society is divided and the Netanyahu government is criticized. How will the current armed conflict affect the political situation in Israel?

Wilhelm: At the moment, of course, the people will unite in defending themselves against this terrorist attack. That's what all the news and all the people who speak out and who have responsibility say that.

You don't have to be a friend of the Netanyahu government and you don't have to like his policies and his strange right-wing coalition. But in the face of danger, Hamas has now of course brought the Israeli people and the entire population together.

If you like, this is a positive aspect, but of course it does not legitimize this attack in any way. But he is welding the state together from the outside, as far as I can tell from the reporting.

DOMRADIO.DE: Will Netanyahu's government emerge stronger from this?

Wilhelm: I don't know whether she can emerge stronger from this. Because the security authorities obviously had huge gaps. It was not just the infamous Mossad as the secret service that was apparently not properly informed or did not correctly evaluate the information it received or did not pass it on. Or Netanyahu's political cabinet didn't react decisively enough and didn't listen.

The big question mark that hangs over everything at the moment: How could such a massive attack by thousands of Palestinian terrorists who invaded the land of Israel and also overcome fences happen? Whether this falls on the Netanyahu government's feet at the end of the day remains to be seen.

Source

EU Commission freezes payments to Palestinians

In view of the attack on Israel by the Islamist terrorist organization Hamas, the EU is initially freezing all development aid payments to the Palestinians. The responsible EU Commissioner Oliver Varhelyi announced this on Monday in Brussels via the short message service X. A spokesman for the authority confirmed the decision.