The German government is concerned about the recent rise of right-wing extremist groups and is addressing the problem, the German foreign minister told a group of American Jewish leaders late last month.
“It is something that the Germans are very angry and annoyed about,” Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel said through an interpreter in a meeting here Friday sponsored by the American Jewish Committee.
The increase in extremist activity in countries including Germany and Russia, where rightwing candidate Vladimir Zhirinovsky did stunningly well in parliamentary elections last fall, has Jewish groups from around the world worried.
Kinkel acknowledged that German fascist groups, which have staged several violent demonstrations in recent years against minority groups including Jews, are believed to have ties with similar movements in Russia and Canada.
Kinkel fielded questions from the audience about topics ranging from the Middle East peace process to Germany’s role in the world arena.
“It is very much in our interest to see the peace process” succeed, Kinkel said. The German government plans to help the process along by contributing economic assistance to the Palestinian authority in charge of implementing the self-rule accord in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank town of Jericho, he added.
Economic and technological assistance should be made available to the Palestinian authority, he said, “to take the (financial) pressure off Israeli shoulders.”
But political assistance should be left to the United States, which is the only country that can really exert influence over the parties in the Middle East, Kinkel said.
Kinkel said Germany, now the biggest country in Europe after its historic re-unification, has assumed a larger role in global politics.
Emphasis is being placed on the younger generation, he said, which is being taught about German history and about its responsibility as a major political and economic power.
Of the film “Schindler’s List,” Steven Spielberg’s award-winning movie about the Holocaust, Kinkel said it “hit Germany like a bomb, but in the positive sense. “The film struck at the heart of the German people.”
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
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.
