I
will continue to describe
Israel as a war-mongering
state as long as Ariel Sharon,
the Prime Minister, violates
the Oslo peace
treaty.
—
Jürgen
Möllemann

[image
added by this website]

London, Thursday, September 19,
2002

Israel critic breaks national taboo

By Roger Boyes

GERMANY’S election campaign took a nasty twist yesterday when a senior politician from the Free Democratic Party attacked the Israeli Government and a leading member of the German Jewish community.

Jürgen Möllemann, deputy chairman of the Free Democrats, has already been in hot water for declaring that there should be no taboo on criticising Israel. His comments in May almost ripped apart his party, but also gave it a temporary boost in the opinion polls. Many German voters agree with Herr
Möllemann.

Now Herr Möllemann has returned to the fray. At an election rally in Aachen he was applauded when he said:

“I will
continue to describe Israel as a
war-mongering state as long as Ariel
Sharon, the Prime Minister,
violates the Oslo peace treaty.”

No one, he said, would stop him, not even “the Friedmanns of this world”.
Michel Friedmann, a Christian
Democrat who is also deputy leader of the
Jewish community, is one of Herr
Möllemann’s most outspoken critics.

[Schroeder, Spiegel, Friedmann etc]For the Free Democrats, the incident is profoundly embarrassing: the party regards itself as the kingmaker in a tight election, capable of a coalition with either the Social Democrats or the
Christian Democrats. Only last week
Gerhard Schröder
(left, with
Jewish community leaders) described Herr Möllemann as one of the sensible voices in the Free Democratic
Party.

Herr Möllemann hatched the Free
Democrat plan to declare 18 per cent support as its target. A liberal group appealing mainly to small businessmen and economic reformers, it rarely scores much more than 10 per cent. Both the phrasing and the timing – in the midst of a debate on whether Germany should fight Iraq —
have ensured that Herr Möllemann is being ostracised by the political establishment.

Paul Spiegel, the head of the
Central Council of German Jews, said:

“Anyone who
positions himself like this in the
final stretch of an election campaign
has disqualified himself from a
democratic election.”

Other Free Democrats, nervous that Herr
Möllemann would deny their chance of power, distanced themselves. “An unbelievable error,” Burkhard
Hirsch said. “Not very sensible,”
Guido Westerwelle, the party leader, said.

Herr Möllemann chairs the
German-Arab friendship society and has many contacts in the Middle East. He has visited Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader.

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