The Jewish community of East Berlin has protested against an anti-Israel newspaper cartoon which non-Jewish intellectuals there privately described as anti-Semitic. The cartoon — as well as the community’s protest, which came in the form of a letter to the editor — appeared in the Berliner Zeitung, the official organ of the East German Communist Party.
The cartoon, published last week, depicts a stereo-typically Jewish character dispatching an armored car filled with soldiers from Israel over south Lebanon to remote Arab lands. In private conversations, non-Jewish intellectuals in Berlin described the cartoon as taken directly from the Nazi Party newspaper “Der Stuermer.”
The letter to the editor of the Berliner Zeitung by Dr. Peter Kirchner, chairman of the Jewish community of East Berlin, represents the first official Jewish communal protest in East Germany against anti-Semitism in the German Democratic Republic. The GDR (East German) regime has consistently portrayed Israel as a source of evil and malfeasance in international relations. But it has taken pains to show that no anti-Semitic tendencies are involved in its anti-Israel policy, and that its tiny community of 700 Jews enjoys full religious liberties.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
