“The Hamas slogan is treated no differently under criminal law than the Hitler salute" (Gates of Vienna)

 

by Frederik Schindler
November 29, 2024

The first two court decisions that classify the slogan “From the river to the sea” as a symbol of the Hamas terrorists are legally binding. The judiciary in Bavaria declares that their “clear position” on this issue is having an effect. The criminal liability of the slogan is controversial.

It is the most well-known slogan, one that has been used for decades by anti-Israel activists. “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.” In this slogan there is no more room for the state of Israel, which, in addition to the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, extends over 78% of the territory between Jordan and the Mediterranean. Now the first two court decisions are legally in force, in which the use of the slogan is punishable.

This concerns two criminal rulings from district courts in Sonthofen and Fuerstenfeldbruck. Both have been made available to Welt am Sonntag. It regards postings on the X platform from November of last year. A few weeks after the terror attacks by Hamas on Israel, an X user used this slogan on November 3. Ten days later, another posted: “No, never recognition of a genocidal state like Israel. From the river to the sea, no Israel territory!”

The State Prosecutor’s offices in Kempten and Munich see this as the use of symbols of anti-Constitution and terrorist organizations, punishable under Paragraph 86a of the Criminal Code — and applied to the district court to issue an order of punishment (sentence). In the first case, it was €4,200 to be paid — €60 a day for 70 days. In the second case, it was €5,400 euros, equivalent to €60 a day for 90 days. Since no objection was filed, these became legally binding in mid-July and the beginning of October. Otherwise, the penalty order would have been in an indictment in a principal court hearing.

“They knew, or at least accepted, that it was the expression of a Hamas slogan,” the District Court of Sonthofen found in its decision in the penalty order. In Fuerstenfeldbruck, the document reads: “The expression symbolizes in a catchy phrase the proclaimed goal in the Hamas Charter that Israel should be fully incorporated into a Palestinian state. This goal logically assumes the destruction of the state of Israel.”

The Commissioner for Anti-Semitism in the Bavarian judiciary, senior public prosecutor Andreas Franck, assesses the sentences positively: “Our clear position on this issue is showing an effect. There have hardly been any cases in public space in Bavaria where the Hamas slogan has been reported.”

Criminal penalty for the slogan is controversial

On November 2, 2023, the Federal Interior Ministry banned Hamas. A portion of the decree is the ban on using their symbols publicly. The slogan “From the river to the sea” is also named. Since 2017 it has stood in the charter of the Islamist terror organization, where it states: “Hamas rejects any alternative to the complete and unrestricted liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea.” However, it was already used by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in the 1960s, so it is clearly older than the 1987-founded Hamas. On the contrary, the 1977 election platform of the current Premier, Benjamin Netanyahu, states: “Between the (Mediterranean) sea and the Jordan (river), there will only be Israeli sovereignty.”

The criminal liability of the slogan is controversial. Some activists point out its ambiguity and stress that they are demanding not the eradication of Israel or Jewish life, rather the “liberation of Palestine from Israeli occupation”— or a secular and democratic state, in which Jews and Palestinians could live equally. Other courts have interpreted the expression as covered under freedom of expression.

In March of this year, the Hessian Administrative Court threw out the demonstration requirements of the city of Frankfurt, with which it wanted to ban the slogan. The court stated that criminal liability was “extremely doubtful”. The main principle says nothing about how the goal of “a free Palestine, including the territory of Israel,” should be reached— for example, either through armed struggle or treaties under international law. There are no visible concrete indications that the use of the slogan must be understood as a mandatory call to violence and terror. The Bavarian Administrative Court decided in June that the city of Munich could not ban the slogan from demonstrations across the board if there was no “recognizable reference to Hamas”.

(Continue)