BERLIN—Germany‘s ruling parties are preparing a legislation that makes it easier to deport migrants who make anti-Semitic statements or question the right of Israel to exist, German daily newspaper Die Welt reported.
Leaders of the party of Chancellor Angela Merkel, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), leaders reportedly hope that the legislation will be passed before International Holocaust Memorial Day, on January 27, which recalls the liberation of the Auschwitz extermination camp by Red Army troops in 1945.
CDU legislator Stephan Harbarth told Die Welt that the move was intended to crack down on anti-Semitism among “migrants with Arab background and from African countries.”
‘’While education and other preventive work are important, the state must be able to wield the ultimate threat of deportation, he said. “Anyone who incites anti-Semitic hate and rejects Jewish life in Germany cannot stay in our country,” he said.
The draft bill being proposed by CDU-CSU calls for the “absolute acceptance of Jewish life” to be considered a “benchmark” for migrants integrating into society.
It also stipulates that “those who refuse Jewish life in Germany or question the right of existence of Israel cannot have a place in our country”, according to Die Welt.
German officials have reacted with outrage in December when protesters -mainly migrants – burned Israeli flags in Berlin to protest the US’s decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere has suggested that Germany appoint an anti-Semitism commissioner to counter growing hate speech against Israel and the country’s own Jewish community.
In December, a study commissioned by the American Jewish Committee’s Ramer Institute for German-Jewish Relations in Berlin found that antisemitic among Muslim refugeeswas “rampant” and required urgent attention.
Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Conservative Alliance, will entered talks this week with the Social Democratic Party (SPD) of Martin Schulz, in a last-ditch effort to form a coalition government after months of political uncertainty and deadlock.
They are set to discuss whether they can renew a governing coalition that has been in operation in recent years.