A History of Jews in Germany Since 1945 by Brenner Michael; Kronenberg Kenneth;

Author:Brenner, Michael; Kronenberg, Kenneth; [Brenner, Michael; Kronenberg, Kenneth;]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780253029294
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Published: 2018-01-15T07:00:00+00:00

“JEWS OUT”

In Cologne during the night of December 24, 1959, someone desecrated a memorial to the victims of National Socialism and then the façade of the Roonstrasse synagogue.28 The two perpetrators, both members of the right-wing radical German Reich Party, were caught less than twenty-four hours later as a result of the tip from the local party chair. Arnold Strunk and Paul Josef Schönen, both in their mid-twenties and both from Cologne, had been school friends, and both had previously been sentenced for theft and fraud. Despite or perhaps because Christmas Day was otherwise a slow news day, news of what they did quickly spread around the globe. In retrospect, it can probably be said that no swastika painted in Germany after 1945 triggered as much media attention or had greater political consequences than the one that they smeared at the entry to that Cologne synagogue.

The directorate of the Central Council of Jews in Germany immediately sent a declaration to the press: “The synagogue community of Cologne and the secretariat of the Central Council have received numerous messages of sympathy and protest from the public against this latest self-defilement of the German name, not only from statesmen but from a Nobel laureate as well.”29 It continued, stating that the “repugnant act” was apparently aimed “against all Jews, but to a much greater extent against Christian teachings, and especially against the reputation of the German people.” Although the Jewish representatives were “disturbed that inadequate police measures had been taken after the desecration of the synagogue in Düsseldorf the previous year,” they nonetheless suggested an interpretation that the Federal Republic would come to embrace after an initial phase of disarray: opposing antisemitism as a sign of commitment to the Federal Republic and as a battle for respect in the world.30

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