A Berlin court has convicted a pro-Palestinian activist of condoning a crime for leading a chant of the slogan “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” at a rally in the German capital four days after the Hamas attacks on Israel, in what her defence team called a defeat for free speech.
The presiding judge, Birgit Balzer, ordered 22-year-old German-Iranian national Ava Moayeri to pay a €600 (£515) fine on Tuesday, rejecting her argument that she meant only to express support for “peace and justice” in the Middle East by calling out the phrase on a busy street.
Balzer said she “could not comprehend” the logic of previous German court rulings that determined the saying was “ambiguous”, saying to her it was clear it “denied the right of the state of Israel to exist”.
Thank you for explaining your rationale.
I think you are dangerously wrong. How do you suggest to prevent violence? some of the issues you are facing are historically Jewish neighborhoods in east Jerusalem launching terror attacks against settlers living there who purchased the land their grandparents were forced from (the actual situation is even more complicated than this one sentence explanation). Now imagine needing to solve that, but on a very large scale.
If you suddenly grant Palestinians full rights and movement, there is nothing preventing them from launching a genocidal campaign against Jewish Israelis. Hamas, PIJ, and other Palestinian groups have declared they will not stop until all Jews within Israel are dead.
Your rationale for wanting a one state solution is idealistic, but ultimately naive. It fails to capture the complexity of the conflict and serves to further violent interests while screaming their slogan.