Rashad: More people can still come in.

Stella: Yes, yes. Feel free to come in if you want. The title of the tent is "Come As You Are", it's really the invitation to come in and sit with us. There is enough space, I hope. It is a nice sign that you have come in such numbers. Next time I might do a bigger tent. Are you ready?
So, welcome again. I am very happy that so many of you have come today and are here in the tent "Come As You Are" for the happening "Let the Rainbow Rain". Here "rain" is to be understood in the sense of "to rain" and not "to reign, to rule", an important little distinction. First of all, I think it would be nice, Rashad and Udi, if you briefly introduced yourselves again.

Udi: Yes with pleasure. Thank you from my side as well. It's nice to see so many new faces in this context. My name is Udi Raz, I am a board member of the association "Jewish Voice for a Just Peace in the Middle East". I come from Haifa. Who knows where Haifa is? On the Mediterranean Sea, that's right, in Israel. Some also say Palestine, because in this whole region of Israel-Palestine there are more or less 50/50 Palestinian people and Jewish people. And Haifa is known for having Jewish and Palestinian people living together. To what extent they actually live together and mix with each other, that's another issue. But I was lucky enough to get to know other perspectives as a small child. That has shaped me a lot. I can also tell you a little story about what connects us all. Stella told me earlier that on the big, huge picture that you see when you go out of the tent, on the left-hand side, in the middle, is the name "Haifa". You can't see the text anymore, though, because Stella kept painting on it. Perhaps in this sense we are connected by a little story and our connection to this place. We can perhaps discuss this further in a moment. But first, Rashad, would you like to introduce yourself?

Yes, good evening, first of all, everyone. My name is Rasha Alhindi. I am a German-Palestinian journalist and filmmaker. I was born and raised in Kuwait as a Palestinian refugee. My father was expelled from Tirat Al-Karmel Haifa when he was eight. My mother was still a baby, she was a few months old, also from Tirat Al-Karmel Haifa. Accordingly, we, Udi and I, would have come from the same town. Just like Stella, they will tell you in a moment. So that's what connects us together. And I'll say this, if the story had gone differently, the three of us would be somewhere on the beach tonight, at Carmel Beach, having a relaxed drink. But unfortunately we have to sit here together today and talk a bit about this conflict, about our backgrounds and such. That's my part now about Haifa and my background. I have been in Germany since 1998, almost 26 years. In between, I also lived in Syria for 9 years, in the Palestinian refugee camp Yarmuk, if that's a term for some people here. Unfortunately, that was totally destroyed in 2018. My family was displaced again, this time by the Assad regime, but that's another story.

I am Stella, I was born and grew up in Basel. But I have always had a very close relationship with the so-called "Holy Land" because of my religious upbringing and my family history. My grandfather was born in Haifa in 1915 and as a child I was often there and visited family. My father was a Biblical tour-guide, which means we travelled all over the country. So I was very familiar with it from my childhood. However, as a child I didn't really know how it all came about. Actually, my grandfather is Swiss, why was he there and so on? These questions only came up later, when I was in Berlin. I moved to Berlin in my early 20s after leaving the religious community, when I actually wanted to build and find a new identity. So after five years I asked myself this question, what is actually my relation to Israel. At that time, I didn't know the term "Palestine" at all. I didn't grow up at all with an awareness of Palestinian history and identity, and then I just travelled there in my early 20s. There had been this desire in my subconscious for a long time to simply return as an adult and also to search for traces of my family history.

Then I actually studied in Jerusalem at the Bezalel Academy from 2016 to 2017. I was able to spend a year abroad, which was very, very exciting, and during this time I got to know the Palestinian side intensively, travelled a lot in the West Bank and really had experiences that completely turned my world view upside down. Because I had actually already started the process by leaving the religious community, and I thought I knew how things worked now. But then it was a total change of perspective, so to speak. And that is also a theme, I think, that connects us all apart from the geographical location of Haifa. The experience, a narrative with which one grows up or a certain world view, an idea and then a process through various things such as encounters, travelling, reading, watching films, listening to music, whatever, we will also go into that. How does it come about that you start asking these questions, that you actually start asking, something is not right here, what is it and why?

Exactly... as well as perhaps also to give up the claim to truth of one's own perspective and to be prepared to question oneself, and in the best case, in dialogue with people who have a different experience. And yes, maybe we can ask Udi again. What was your perspective, how did you grow up? You grew up in Haifa... what was your image, what has actually changed to your current image?

Where I come from, a certain way of thinking prevails, which can perhaps be summarised under Zionism. What it means exactly, everyone can explain more precisely for themselves, but I can say what it means to me. For me, from my own experience, Zionism means a constant, permanent situation where one population group quite deliberately oppresses another population group in order to be able to explain to themselves again and again why. Why everything, why they are actually superior and how to justify it again and again. How can you justify the occupation, how can you justify killing people, how can you justify destroying houses, how can you justify displacing people?
For me, this is all part of it, it is a discourse that is absolutely logical in itself. Accordingly, I find the term “change of perspective” very appropriate, because actually for me it was a very shaky process, because I suddenly had to question all that I understood as neutral. And that was a long process and still is a long process for me. Whenever I hear new stories about the catastrophe, about the Nakba.
The word "Nakba" means catastrophe in Arabic, and that is also the term from the Palestinian perspective for everything I listed earlier, a situation that is permanent, that has not yet come to an end. And new stories keep emerging that not only challenge my original perception of neutrality, but have made me aware of how much responsibility my community has, my country of course. All the people I love and cherish are part of such a system of oppression, not because they are bad people, that's not the point, it's just a system that is inherently logical in itself, and people are trapped in it. I hope it answers the question a bit. Rashad would you say something else about this?

About my story?

About change of perspective.

Yes, for me it's the other side, I'm on the other side, so to speak. I can still remember a very memorable story from my childhood. I was eight years old in Kuwait. I went to a Christian nun's school and there were many children of migrant workers in this school, in Kuwait, just like my parents. I was eight then, so I was in the second or third grade, so I can't remember exactly. Then I came to my mum again and I asked her: "Tell me, we are Palestinians, aren't we?" And she laughed and said, "Yes, of course, why do you ask?"
I said, "We go to Syria every year during the summer holidays, not to Palestine. How does that work? The other children, the Iraqi children, they go to Iraq, the Jordanian children, they go to Jordan, the Egyptians go to Egypt..." And then she told me about the Nakba, about the expulsion and that we are refugees, that we are not allowed to go back. With Israel, the occupation and so on and so forth. That was the first time I knew, okay, I'm different, so there's something wrong here. And that's what I grew up with, of course.
One of my best friends was my grandmother, who was displaced when she was 21 and she always liked to tell stories. She visited us in Kuwait at that time, then later, when we were in the Palestinian refugee camp Yarmuk, we were neighbours. She died in France at the beginning of this year at the age of 94. She always wanted to return there, she told me. But she also told me many things about this place. For me it was a kind of paradise, what she told me. And yes, this longing made a difference. I thought to myself at the time, because I know this too, or we Palestinians know this, that the older ones, the refugees, they long for it, they make the place even more beautiful than it is. But in 2016 I was lucky enough to be able to visit Haifa and Carmel for the first time in my life, so also in the summer holidays, so to speak, the dream came true at the age of 39. And it really is so beautiful, just as my mother described it to me, just as my grandmother described it to me. It really is a paradise, anyone who has been there knows what I am talking about. And it was mixed feelings for me, sure, so I returned, the first time I was there. I am no longer a refugee or a guest or a Kanakke, here in Germany, I would say. But even by Jewish Israelis, people who really... by Palestinians anyway, I was so accepted, I am one of them, I am Palestinian. But I was also welcomed by some Jewish Israelis who were in Haifa and who, just like Udi, are involved and stand for Palestinian rights and for a just and common peace. Even, I would say, even among Zionists, even among those on the extreme right. I think they know inside that I come from there. So that was this feeling, the first time, I have an identity, so to speak, I am no longer a refugee. And of course I got to know many Israelis here in Germany before that, but in the country itself it was even more intense. And that also changed my perspective. On the one hand, I knew exactly, I always knew what we Palestinians have to go through, but I also experienced it there on the ground and I saw it, so this polarity, this settler colonialism, this expulsion, this anti-Palestinian racism of discrimination and also persecution and so on and immediately. It's an apartheid, so you can't say anything else. But on the other hand, there are also Jewish Israelis who stand for a common peace. And I personally think it's great that we can create such a space here in Germany, especially in Berlin, so I'm envious of Berlin. Udi comes from Berlin, I've known Udi for two years now. There is a movement in this direction and we are calling for more and more, also in view of the political situation in Israel at the moment. You can see that this extreme right-wing Zionism, this religious Zionism, is not good for anyone. And I'm a bit optimistic about that, that's my perspective for example, I've talked too much now, yes. But I'll pass it on to you.

So you see, there is an unpainted canvas here and I thought that in order to capture this conversation artistically today and to be able to continue working with it, I would like to see your participation in it, whoever would like to. You are welcome to choose a pencil or a colour. The idea is because I also often work with outlines in my work, so I sometimes put myself on a canvas and outline my body and document physical processes that way. I often work with my painting on the basis of meditations or consciousness exercises and try to capture the cognitive things that we are all thinking about in our heads right now with our bodies and to bring them together in painting. So that's also what Udi mentioned earlier with Haifa in the picture there, with the word, there was a mind-map underneath that, underneath the colour, and exactly that here today could actually become the starting point for a new work. You are welcome to participate if you like. Maybe you should also note down questions or terms that somehow strike you during the conversation, everything intuitively, so don't think about it too much, just do it. That's how I do it in the studio. I'm curious to see what this will look like at the end of the talk.

Yes, exactly, about me, my perspective. I already mentioned a little bit that I grew up religiously. For me, this decision or this process to simply no longer be part of it and to simply leave my community was a slow process in a way. It wasn't a conscious, rational decision, but rather that I realised that I had no room in this belief system as the person I am, and that my queerness and such non-heteronomous questions of identity meant that I couldn't really develop further. I probably wouldn't have been able to make art in that framework, I would probably have been married early on and I didn't want that somehow. Yes, exactly, that's why I think it was such an intuitive decision. I simply realised that somehow there must be something else. And it must somehow be possible for me to have friends outside my religion or my faith, which at that time was almost impossible because the world was divided into "us" and "them". And yes, I simply had problems with that the more I got to know people outside and realised that I also wanted to be friends with them. I think these are phenomena that we know from different contexts, that this division into "us" and "them", this separating and not thinking together, not coming to the same table or somehow getting to know each other, being interested in each other and also being able to see different opinions and perspectives as correct, is parallel. So it's not that when you think differently, it immediately means "you're right, I'm wrong" or vice versa, "you're wrong, I'm right", but rather that you simply learn not to get stuck in these absolute thoughts of truth. And in the end it restricts you extremely, you lose a lot of freedom to go through the world openly and of course it can also have a negative effect on the "others", so to speak. You can see that in history.

How does it feel to have the Germans or the German government, I don't know how to define it, be so incredibly pro-Israel and to question them so little, at least publicly, with their expansion, settlement policy... How does it feel to live in such a country? Well, when I imagine it, muah, but maybe I feel it wrong or? So that's my very personal impression and I think it would be exciting if you could answer that honestly.

So first of all, thank you very much for the question, I think it's very, very important, yes, how does it feel, shit everything. Not only shit. Let me put it this way, in the liberal mainstream, in the German liberal mainstream, all forms of racism are fought, expect anti-Palestinian racism. This is already very acceptable in Germany, the whole European anti-Semitism is blamed on us. Because of our own historical background here in Germany, many, not the majority, but many, are now blaming the Palestinians. And we already have a, yes, yes, it's like that, yes, we are, yes, so with me it comes, I'll say so. That's often how I meet some Germans. The first question they ask when they know I'm Palestinian is, "Oh, what's your position on Israel?" Well, that is, although the question is very provocative, but that is still, then later it comes, "What is your attitude to Jews?" Yes, and that for example, only Palestinians are asked these questions, yes, yes. But the thing is, Israelis are not the Jews, the majority of Israelis are, yes, but there is, I say... I quote the great Israeli thinker, Moshe Zuckermann, who says: "Not all Zionists are Jews, not all Israelis are Jews and not all Jews are Israelis." Yes, so that is important, the most important thing! You also have to know that only 46 per cent of the world's Jews live in Israel. So not even the majority of Jews live in Israel. And there we are as Palestinians. Of course we speak of Jews because of the situation in the country, because they are Jews and Arabs, yes. But our way of thinking is not about Jews, as it is in Germany. In Germany, you immediately associate Israel with Jews, immediately.
And I have the feeling that here in Germany people want to come to terms with their own history. Now Jews have a "safe place", yes, that is Israel. And we have to protect that at all costs, so that we have paid off our debt, something like that, yes. And that is projected onto us, Palestinians, in other words, we are dehumanised. So they don't even speak for us, simple human rights, that is, to live and not to be expelled and not to be killed. So that's where we are. I laugh about it now because I experience it so much, but it's not a laughing matter at all, it's really shitty, I say.
On the other hand, it's exciting what Udi tells. I'll give you the word.

I agree, this feels like shit, as you said. Most of all, it feels very bizarre to hear from people that I am anti-Semitic just because I perceive Palestinian rights as legitimate as a Jew. Of course, sometimes I am called anti-Semitic by Germans who cannot understand how a Jewish person would want the Jewish state to also be a democratic state. That feels very unpleasant. And you usually feel isolated and alone, especially when you're fresh to Germany, there's no network yet, no backup. But in the meantime, that is also something wonderful that is happening here in Germany, that more and more people understand the paradox, the tragic paradox, which actually affects us all. Because the responsibility does not only lie with Israelis or those who have Israeli citizenship, but the German government supports Israeli policy without questioning what Israel is doing at all. I understand, I don't justify it, but I understand that for many Germans it is very easy to have an object that can be called "Jewish" and to maintain this object, no matter what this object does at all or how it even lives or how it also breathes and so on and so forth. But Germany brought the Jewish state into being, so to speak. That was a direct consequence of the Holocaust, that Jewish people came up with the idea that we need an independent country. It is only tragic that this independence only became possible when Palestinian people, the indigenous people of Palestine, could first be considered inhuman. And that is this recurring mindset that was exported from the racist continent of Europe.

I just want to add something. It is significant that until 1939 Zionism was unpopular among Jews in Europe. In Palestine, in historical Palestine, less than 100,000 immigrants were Jewish. After that, after 1939, and we all know what happened in Europe in 1939, that increased rapidly. And there are hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees who also want a shelter, they just fled to Palestine. In 1948, the State of Israel was founded, and as a result, the Nakba happened. My parents, my grandparents and more than 850,000 Palestinians, who made up about 80 percent of the Palestinian population at that time, were expelled. And that is a consequence of National Socialism here. If you put one and one together, there is a German responsibility for Palestinians as well. That is a fact.

I am Ute Klemann. You said earlier that you are an Israeli Jew. Is there actually also the term, I am an Israeli Palestinian?

Thank you for the question. We are also in the world we are born into, we are actually given certain categories already. And I think this analogy perhaps to gender or gender role is very true. When you think of gender and gender roles, you can talk about masculinity and femininity. But in fact, also in the way one lives out these categories, they are so stretchable and outside of these terms. From that point of view, I think it's very nice that you invented the term through the conversation, in Israeli Palestinian, so to speak. I think it's brilliant. I know some people who are very fond of playing with categories like that. And I think the most important thing is that no matter what we call ourselves in the end, we are all human beings and we all want to live respectfully with each other. So I think Palestinian Israeli is brilliant. Why not? With pleasure.

I would like to come back to the question before with the reference to Germany, because that is also connected to the event today, because the actual trigger for this was that I thought it would be good to do such an event and also to invite the Jewish Voice and Palestine Speaks, because the Nakba commemoration event was banned in Berlin. I think that was one thing where everyone here in Germany should simply cry out.
It is not acceptable that Palestinians and Jews who want to commemorate the Nakba together are banned from doing so, and with such violence, including police violence. Udi, maybe it's better if you tell us. I arrived in Berlin that day in the evening and only saw it on social media and was completely shocked that something like this was happening in Germany. Not surprised, sadly, but also shocked by the extent and the pictures I saw.

I am very happy to talk about the Nakba ban, this year and last year. In Germany, practically Palestinian people are not allowed to consider their own history in public. In a democratic country. That's... I'm mostly at a loss for words on how to describe and summarise that. But I think it's so terrible. And Jewish Voice has invited people to a public event this year for the Nakba demonstration, for Nakba Day. But other organisations have done the same. Surprisingly or not, all the other organisations are run by Palestinian people. These are Palestinian organisations. All Palestinian organisations have been banned from demonstrating by the Berlin police.

Among others, there was a women's peace group, i.e. of Jewish and Palestinian women working for peace, of women artists in Berlin. The event was also not allowed because of the ban by the Berlin police.

The rules come from the Senate, of course. This is not a spontaneous decision by the police. I'll pass on the microphone.

I say first of all, I know all the terrible things that happened before and after 1939 with regard to Jews, so with everything I say, we know that there is a very traditional, anti-Semitic tradition in Germany, also in other European countries. And I would like to mention two aspects to this. The first is an ultimately, I think, unfair development. The traditional anti-Semitism of many Germans has been shaken, in a positive sense, by the Six-Day War in particular. Suddenly a lot of Germans (and I know what I'm talking about, because I'm talking about family members), they said, that's great. They are incredible soldiers. And that resulted in a considerable reevaluation in the assessment of Israel. And there was a new victim. These capable people are now apparently being endangered by the Palestinians. That is, a shifting from one negative image to another category. I am telling you that now and, of course, I am not judging it, and I am not endorsing it. That is very clear. That is one thing. A second aspect that seems to me to be important is that at the moment, I think, as Germans with certain values that are guided by our Basic Law, we have a very difficult attitude towards current Israeli policy. And I think we are relatively united on that, and it makes me personally angry that it is being said from Israel, not by those who are sitting here now, that anyone who criticizes Israel and the current policy, possibly evaluates domestic things, is an anti-Semite. That makes, yes, we know. I, I, I say it. It's a, it's exploiting the highly justified, bad conscience that German people traditionally have. I personally didn't deserve it because I didn't act, but I inherited it. And I accept that, too.
The last thing that is saddening, I think there is a very sad conflict partnership to keep their own troops together, on the Palestinian Arab side and on the Israeli side. And the two sides are playing ball with each other, each securing their grip on a significant portion of their population. And there, too, of course, you are the very ones who are disrupting that, which is good, is friendly. But a Berlin Senate, of course, says: "We don't want to get involved in this, we with our guilty conscience can't give lessons to Israelis." I personally am ready to teach lessons to the current political majority, in Israel. If they tell me, you're a German and your father did this and that, yes, then I say, "For that, unfortunately, I can't do anything, and I think it's terrible, but it doesn't justify what's happening with you." And at this point, I would also say that the Israeli tendencies that you represent, in this sense, should be happy to aggressively demand support from Germans for the democratic values that we find and that we find here.

Now from my side to close the topic. This is exactly what we need, that is, from Germans, from courageous Germans. So that they say, "Okay, we inherited this, we have a responsibility, and Palestinians deserve their rights. And there has to be a joint peace, so a realistic one above all." Because these two-state solutions were nonsense from the beginning, I say, so unrealistic. But now again. We have here in Germany an anti-Semitism commissioner of the German government, Mr. Klein, Felix Klein. He claims, and this is one, one, one represented opinion, so in the German mainstream, whoever accuses Israel of apartheid is practicing anti-Semitism. And he has said that several times, and the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz got upset about it. How can it be? Because many Israelis speak, that is organizations, people, meanwhile many Zionists, so now a few days ago, the former head of Moussad, that is a Zionist through and through and he has already said, in the West Bank there is already an apartheid. That also diplomats, so Israeli diplomats, as ambassadors, and and, which represent already the opinion Israel operates. It is, we have an apartheid state, yes?
That's absurd, so this German, from the mainstream, I say, yes, so it's just, I still represent or I'm of the opinion, the majority of Germans see it differently. But either they don't want to have anything to do with the subject or the reluctance is because of the consequences, which you also told us about. So then also when you point the finger also and say here, hello, your story and so on, yes? That is something else. We have this treatment of Palestinians and also of Germans. We have now this anti-Semitic pamphlet by Aiwanger recently, yes? It has been an issue and zero consequences. On the other hand, I conducted an investigation with a colleague for over a year as a journalist at Deutsche Welle. Deutsche Welle with workers from the Arab Deutsche Welle, predominantly Palestinians, beautiful employees, there was also an investigation at Deutsche Welle. Predominantly, there were also anti-Semitic statements from a few of them, but predominantly 90 percent of them, they only expressed criticism of Israel. And because of that, they were slandered, persecuted, witch hunted, and yes, anti-Semitism, as already goes. That's just for comparison, how it becomes in Germany. So, we are really silenced consistently here in Germany. We are also partially witch-hunted as journalists. You always have to fight with it. Thank God there are also brave producers here in Germany. With whom I like to work, but many, many... really as an example, as a small example. That was a topic with Udi, where I met Udi. I wanted to produce a documentary about Israelis, Jewish Israelis who are critical of Israel. So people like Udi, that's where I met Udi at that time. And I tried to sell this film here in Germany to the producers. Even the brave ones among them say, "Oh Rashad, this is a very dangerous subject." And there you can see how this topic is dealt with, even here in Germany. I think that's it from me now.

I would now suggest that we do something a bit more here. I think it would be nice to place them differently, the ceramics, in order to swap the balance of power a bit. Because you see, they also have different sizes. And that we might manage that the small one ends up here and the big one there. And beautiful, very beautiful, I can see, I think it's beautiful how much paint has already been put on the canvas. Otherwise I would say, we can also open the buffet. And I also know that there are people sitting here who also have their own stories. So maybe you just want to tell them.

Yes, first of all I am glad to be here. My name is Hardy. Yes, Hardy Nabulsi, my last name, I say my last name because I can explain something with it. I was born here in Germany. And I actually have no real connection to Palestine myself, although my family comes from Palestine. And even my parents have no real connection to Palestine, because they were not even born there, but my parents were born in Lebanon. Yes, and that is something, because I was born in Germany, I realized only late that I come from Palestine at all, and that has many reasons. You don't have to know that first, I can tell you a little bit about my family history first. My grandparents were expelled at a very young age. So on my father's side, my father came from Nablus, hence my last name. And on my mother's side, my family is from Jaffa, which is a port city. Exactly, and then my grandparents fled to Lebanon, where my parents were born. But the problem is that when you live in Lebanon as a Palestinian refugee, you keep your Palestinian refugee status and then you always inherit it, simply because the Lebanese government has said: "Okay. Palestine will eventually exist again, which means we will not naturalize you and we will just wait for the state to exist again and for you to return." But that never happened. And so my parents then passed this refugee status on and on until even the grandchildren of my grandparents, who have since passed away, they're still Palestinian refugees. You can't really build a life as a Palestinian refugee in Lebanon. You can't learn a higher profession, you don't have equal rights in that sense. And without the help of the organization, like UNRWA, my family would not have been able to live there properly. Yes, and so my parents decided to dare to flee to Europe. So Germany was not really the goal, it came about through events that my parents "landed" in Germany then in quotation marks and I was then also born here. And yes, as I said, for the first few years of my life it didn't play any role at all for me. I have to say that my parents here also fought for a long time for German citizenship. So almost two decades, I only lost my statelessness at the age of 13. So I was stateless until 13 and only then I got my German citizenship. But the reason why I realized like that or asked myself the question, "where do I actually come from?" was because even though I was born here, I never really get this feeling that I am 100% part of society. Because you always have the feeling that you still have to justify yourself to some people. Or other people deny you the right to be German, even though you were born here, simply because we see you don't look German.
So, that's a problem that I think a lot of people have, which I don't think you'll ever really be able to solve 100%. And that made me ask the question, "What is actually really my homeland?" When you talk about home, because everyone is now looking for their roots, and I also asked myself that question. Yes, that's how I came across the fact that Palestine is my homeland. Of course, I knew that somehow before, but then I got more and more involved with it and exactly. And that was also a very painful experience for me, because it's different than when I know, okay, I come from Egypt and I can return to Egypt at any time. But when you know, okay, I'm from a place where I can't, where I can go as a tourist at most. Yes, that's... Well, I can go there with the German passport, but of course I can't just, of course I can't say, I can say now, I want to live there. That's not possible. I can go there as a tourist, I can travel there.
That's possible, but the feeling of being a tourist in your own homeland is not really a nice feeling. And even there, of course, I know that I could possibly be confronted with something like discrimination, etc., because there are also people who simply don't appreciate us as people with Arab origin. So just like we can meet some Germans here who say, "Oh, you're not German." Will we meet people there who say, "Oh, you're not a Jew, you're not an Israeli." That means, basically, for me there is no place in the world where I can say, here I am at home, here I can stay. And here I am accepted by all people. So what many people take for granted. And if you also feel that way through these refugee movement, that my family was scattered all over the world, you can say that I have no uncles, no aunts, no grandparents here in Germany, where my parents are. So back then, when kids told me my grandparents were picking me up from school, it was a little bit like, "Yeah, what's that?" for me. Exactly, that's something that weighs on me quite a bit too. But I think it's something that you can only learn to deal with, and in the end, it's nobody's fault. So even people who were born in Israel in later generations can't help what happened there. In the end, we just have to try to make the best of it. But it also weighs on me, it cost me a lot of effort to come here and talk about my story. Because you are quickly stigmatized, especially when you talk about it with Arab origins, you are quickly pigeonholed. Yes, but it's still important for me to emphasize that I don't have an anti-Semitic attitude. At school, I studied a lot about the Holocaust, a lot about Jewish history. I read Anne Frank's diary, I watched many documentaries on the subject. And I can very well differentiate between anti-Semitism and the crimes that were committed against the Jews and Israeli politics. I see it as a moral problem that the Israelis justify their crimes with, I say, and I say it exaggeratedly now, with the Holocaust. They say, "Here, the Holocaust happened. If you criticize our policy, then you are again cutting this wound." And I think that's especially unfair to the victims of the Holocaust. Because I'm sure that many people who had the Holocaust at that time and also died of it, the victims of the Holocaust, if they could look at what's happening today, that many of them would say, you can't do it like that and not in our name. Don't hide behind it, don't hide these deeds behind it and don't justify your deeds with it. Yes, and exactly. Yes, so most of my relatives live in Lebanon, but unfortunately life is still very difficult there as a Palestinian refugee. Especially just because of the crises that are going on at the moment, which, so if you're already talking about price increases here, you have to imagine it 30 times more there. So, yes, so thank you very much for listening to me. And I'm looking forward to more stories.

I just remembered when you mentioned the Holocaust survivors, Esther Bejarano, who herself has always insisted on the rights of the Palestinians and has fought against the policies of the Israeli government. She was a woman from Hamburg who herself had this experience of the Holocaust and nevertheless, or perhaps because of it, always took the side of the Palestinians when it came to rights. I just remembered that. She has also always resisted being called an anti-Semite. She was called that again and again by Germans, totally absurd, especially with the history that she had gone through, also because of German society. And then to have to hear again somehow decades later from German society "You are anti-Semitic!". I think that hits twice as hard. She survived two concentration camps, yes, Dachau and Auschwitz. Thanks again for the addition. Exactly, that was just important to me because she came to mind. She is always remembered, she is also commemorated, and I think she passed away two years ago. And they talk about her again and again. And in the daily news you also see a picture of her and so, but how she talks about Palestine is always left out. So it is totally exciting how selectively about people also, how such a commemoration about people takes place, always with the exclusion, always with the exclusion of the Palestine solidarity that they had.

Okay, I will speak in English. Sorry because I newly live here in Germany. For me it’s weird to be a Palestinian as a Palestinian, because you have to explain every time about yourself to every single person and people from outside, about how you live your life and how you arrive to this moment of your life, where you are. Because for me I see, more Paletinians are from outside, than living inside Palestine. The childhood, how we grow up as Palestinians, every single moment in our life is related as a refugee, related to there. That place. Every single thing, to speak with your grandfather, your grandmother, to speak with you parents, the people around you. It was like always related to that place. Which is for me, as a child, mystery. What’s that place? How they lived in that place? And how they came from that place? And when they tell me stories, when my grandfather was telling me stories, and when my father was born in Palestine, and their village is totally destroyed and there is Israeli who live in that village, which is Al-Fallouge close to Hebron, when every time we were, my grandfather, we visit him, we ask my father to go to Huja mountain, which is the highest mountain in Jordan, and this mountain is in front of Palestine. And he was always sitting besides the cemetery and just looking to Palestine. And always when I’m asking why are you staring there? He said, you see there? That’s our village, that’s our home thee. I came from there. And he came from there, walking from Palestine to Jordan, as a refugee. And besides the cementary and he told my father and us, I want to burry here. Even if it’s far away from Baka camp, which is refugee camp for Palestinians. Then my father was like, but it’s far away, to take your bagage. But he said, no he want to burry here. Because he believe when one day he will wake up, he will walk from this place to Palestine, to his home back and he said to my father, I don’t want to walk for long time. It’s here is the nearest place to Palestine. And as a child I was like, what is the relation between that person and the land? And what is this related to me, as a grandchild? And this burden as a Palestinian you carry it on your shoulder, all your life. Because for most of the people which is controlled by white countries. You don’t exist. I don’t exist. For Germans, for others, I don’t exist. As a… if I want to present myself, who I am. And every time, even I married from German, when I speak with her relatives with her family, when I say that I am from Palestine, they say: “Ah, I was in Israel!” Okay, and they always talk about Israel. My presence is not existing at all. Even when I speak about Palestine, kay, okay, maybe they don't understand, maybe just they understand Westbank as a Palestine. Ah, he said, ah, he went to Israel in Hebron. Hebron, okay, it is even for your law or your country, it is Palestinian territory. And this is, make you feel always like, you ask question about how do you feel as a Palestinian in Germany? Also, we were talking about like, okay, she asked me, like if you want the nationality, because we want to travel, and my Jordan nationality, it's not something that I can, I mean as a passport, they can travel. And I was like, I was thinking, I want to do all the time, I was like, why? Like, I, the German, they don't see me. I don't exist for the German. And you want me to take, I mean, not, want me, I mean, do, like, if I want to take their nationality, I mean, I don't belong to this people, which is refusing me as an existence human. Can I ask, no, I'm not taking the nationality. I will continue my life as I lived it before, I will live it as front. And even like this is built, many things inside of me. For me, I now refuse totally to go to USA, to go to Australia or New Zealand. For me, because this is occupied territory, it's not belonging to the people who live there. They occupied it, they kicked out the people or killed them, massacred them, and now, will anyone speak about them our think about USA, think about white people there. For me, I'm not taking permission from white people who occupied that territory to go to visit that place. If the Indian indigenous allowed to me to go to USA, I will go. If the indigenous in Australia allowed me to go to Australia, I will go. I had a chance, my parents, they were from the resistance, and they are still resistance people. I am also, I am a resistance person. They are, they are forbidden to enter Palestine. Even my half family lives now in Hebron and half Jordan. And one, I am a theatre actor, and I was practising theatre in Italy with two theatre groups.
And we had a chance to go to make a theatre show in Freedom Theater in Jenin.
All of them, they were happy to go, and I was like the only one, I was afraid. I was like, I was the only Palestinian there. Imagine I am a Palestinian, and this is the only chance in my life, maybe I will go to visit Palestine. And then when I was like, okay, I want to visit Palestine, I want to visit my area, but I don't want to take permission from the Israeli to go to Palestine. Then I went to the Palestinian embassy, they said “oh, it's okay, we will give you permission to enter without going to the Israeli border.”
I was like, okay, this is great, and I was like, “but from where you will take this permission?” He said: “From the Israeli.” And I said: “No, I'm not going. I'm not going to take permission from Israeli to enter Palestine. Even I will live and die outside, but I will stay, live and resist for Palestine, and for me and my children and the generation after, for me, they will live and remember always they are from Palestine.”
This is just from the heart.

That brings me to my grandmother, whom I told you about. Her last five years were in France, she lived, and I talked and talked to her a lot like that the last years of her life. So she told me, "I would like to apply for French citizenship." I immediately thought, what do you actually want from a French passport? Then she said to me, "I want to go to my homeland, I want to be buried there." She told me that and then she started like that about the house, the family and the area and stuff. She asked me since 2016, I am now the only one from the family, the extended family, who has been there after the Nakba, so at that time, later also many cousins and so, she asked, so a cousin of mine and the other cousin were rejected because they have Palestinian names. So that also happens a lot, despite German passports, or French or whatever. And she looked at me like I was a time traveler. She never made it, so the place where she had lived was ethnically cleansed, so only Jews live there, so no more Palestinians. Even the Palestinians who were expelled from the country were not allowed to return to the place. Although they already have documents, that they already have possessions and houses, but that was not approved. And in her mind she looked at me as a time traveler from that time. I told her: "The house is no longer there." She gets it, but then later she asks about the house again. "Have you seen the house? Do you know where that corner is? Where the bakery is..." And that's how she looked at me. Also the same thing happened with Stella. I introduced Stella to my grandma at that time, there they were sitting, because exactly. My grandma grew up next to a German settlement and so she has a lot to do with German Templars. Quasi the community of your grandfather. And she also knew a few German words, so as an anecdote, she always told, the German settlement, the Germans lived in Nahatov. The Germans lived in Nahatov. And Nahatov sounds very Arabic.
Naha is a river and Tov is a flood. And they didn't think anything more of it. It wasn't until Stella came, and we both did a little research together about the place and so on, that the German settlement in Tirat Al-Karmel, where my family comes from, was called Neuhardthof at that time. And she spoke Arabic, Nahatov, and yes. And this place for example in Tirat Al-Karmel has three names. So, Neuhardthof is called in German, in Hebrew Kwar Zamir and in Arabic, Palestinian it is called Barben Nachher. And the place is still there. So there is, so I was also there, there is also, there is a soap factory of the Germans still, so also with German writings, also the buildings. So you notice that so these Bauhäuser, they are still there. But at that time I didn't even know what the place was called, so Neuhardthof. Just as a transition to you guys.

Yes, exactly, so again so to the background, of course, before I have not told that big. My ancestors were German Templars, a movement from Baden-Württemberg. It started in the 1850s and they came to Palestine in 1868 and built German colonies there. The first city was in Haifa, so that's where my great-great-great-great-... six generations before me, in 1868, a long time ago, over 150 years ago, they arrived there as German Templars. And the belief or the ideology of the German Templars was already, that was in any case also based on the Bible, that they go there. So that somehow they had the idea that the Messiah would come back. And I have made the experience that in Germany almost nobody knows this story, so it was also only a very small group of people. But in Israel it is relatively well known, because these buildings, these German colonies, are still standing compared to the Palestinian houses, which have often been destroyed. And not only that they are standing, they are even under monument protection. I find that very absurd when you think about history, so why are German buildings listed? And why, for example, as a descendant of colonists in Palestine, as a descendant of the National Socialist, am I allowed to enter Israel, Palestine, at any time? And I can go to the house of my great-great-great-great-grandparents and I am warmly welcomed. I was even allowed to spend the night in the house. So a very important experience for me. It was very, so yes, I would like that for all Palestinians to be able to do it. And that made me very... when I met Rashad, I realized, we have, so our families have the same documents that prove the ownership of the houses. They look exactly the same. And the story is very, very crazy. I just did a lot of research when I started to understand these connections. Okay, why was my grandpa born in Haifa in the first place and so on. Okay, he was a descendant of these German Templars. He was also third generation in Haifa. And what happened in 1948? The Nakba. The Germans, the German colonies were exiled, I think they say. So it wasn't as violent as it was towards the Palestinians, they were sort of kicked out by the British... so there was also the Haganah that was there. I don't want to say anything wrong about the details, but in any case they were taken to Cyprus and then from there they could choose whether to go to Germany, that is, in the post-war situation, or to Australia. With my family it was an exception because my great-grandfather had Swiss citizenship. And then they went to Switzerland for the first time, until 1950, and he got a visa through the Swiss embassy to be able to enter the newly founded state of Israel, and he also got permission to stay there. Also in comparison, when you hear the Palestinian stories, very absurd. Especially since not my great-grandfather, but also his son, my grandfather, was active as a Nazi, despite the fact that he was Swiss. You can see the complexity in my family history. But in any case, it even went so far that through a Jewish lawyer my family was compensated for the lost land and house in the German colony. They got compensation for that, that was acknowledged to them, they got lands from Israel as compensation. So I found all that out, from Israel, so from the state. And when I found that out, well I actually still don't understand it to this day. I am also in the process of researching this, how is this actually possible? So I must also say for me personally, I feel with it, so completely in the wrong. This history just on the one hand opposite also Palestine as colonists first to come. I have also heard stories, so I was in Haifa, I tried to learn the Palestinian perspective on this history. There are too few sources that I can read. So when, it's often in Arabic, but there's a lot of research about it from a Zionist Jewish perspective on these German colonies. But not so much I found, so you, Rashad, know much more probably. But I couldn't read much, if I found anything at all. But I simply talked to the people on site and learned that it was not necessarily an easy relationship, even between the indigenous population and these German colonists. Among other things, they had taken the water for themselves. So the mechanisms that are so typical, which one also knows otherwise. Yes and exactly, therefore this memory of history is important for me also from a personal concern, because how that is often treated so one-sidedly in Germany. Exactly, I myself only came across the fact that history is so much more complicated and also so unjust through my own initiative and encounters with people.

I'm impressed by the personal stories that we've heard here and how, in fact, above all, you don't really exist without citizenship and the authorities that grant citizenship are actually the old people who had the great influence before. I found original, by the way, the idea, I'm not going to the U.S. until they invite me in indigenous people,
that's very original. You have to say that to some Americans, difficult task that is.
I ask another question and maybe it is unseemly, but in any case it is meant openly and nicely first. The activities that he develops are also announced under the queer aspect. What is the significance of that in this circle? That is, I mean, we are today in a time, where one can ask this expression
and also to ask such questions. And if you're not, like I am, which is no merit, but I say again like we are in this sense, I think, also relaxed and can also talk there personally. Is that then an aspect that reinforces this suffering under circumstances, creates connections or is irrelevant?

Thank you for the very interesting question. I'm wondering, just to make this understandable, are we now talking about queer people or queerness as a way of thinking. What does it refer to...?

I don't know...

Thank you for the question. I'll answer the second aspect then. Queer theory, how can queerness make us understand the situation of Palestine, Israel, Palestinian people, Jewish people, in general for people who live in this area. Because I think if we think of queer as an idea, in itself, it tries to challenge the idea of binarity, so if we apply this theory to the situation in Palestine / Israel, we can't talk about two binary groups. So there are not THE Palestinians and Palestinian people and THE Jewish people. There are HUMANS there. The attribution of... There is this group and the other group, that always comes from the powerful. Not from the people who actually want to live in peace. They're reminded all the time, through a systematic... that's just socialization. That's just you learn, there's "us" and there's "them." And I think from that queer way of thinking might, is very, very helpful to be able to think outside of those categories. Does that answer your question?

Yes, absolutely.

So I think it's also very interesting to just compare these processes. For example, when you talk about "coming out", I think having the courage to stand by your identity, or your opinion, or to stand up for something that corresponds to your own values, even though you know that it's not welcome, that it's not accepted by the majority society. Or you will be punished for it. Or whatever. Maybe, so... It's something completely different, whether that affects me now as a person, also as a white person, as a queer person. For me, it also had a lot to do with the fact that I'm in the public eye anyway, with my work. That is, it was a necessity also me, so a compulsion to "out" myself, because if I don't do that, then I'm... So, I'm non-binary, if I don't do that, I'm constantly misgendered, in the media or everywhere. So, why do people talk about "coming out"? Why don't they say "welcoming in?" Because actually, when I show someone my identity, and when I come out and say, yes, this is who I am, it's a show of confidence. Why do I have to come out, why can't it be understood the other way around? Actually, yes, I found that a very beautiful term. "Welcoming you in" So, that's...yeah, that has something for me so... change of perspective too. And, yes, for me in relation, so to... I think, if I wasn't queer myself, maybe I wouldn't be here now, maybe I wouldn't make art, maybe I wouldn't talk about Palestine and human rights in Palestine. Because maybe I wouldn't have taken this step out of my community, out of my religious community. I had everything I needed there. I was comfortable, I had a home, I had a community in which I identified myself. I was very religious until I was 17. I also have a spirituality that is closely related to Christianity. And so for me it was... a lot of things actually fit, but then somehow just didn't. And I think this experience of... ah yes, actually there is something else. And I have to maybe stand these things that I've always been taught, just also critically. And I can't just trust that I'm just going to be told the truth like that as I grow up. So maybe that also led to everything I arrived then, the Jerusalem studied. And I lived in a community that was between Jerusalem and Jericho, in the West Bank Area C. And there it was also mixed. So there were Israelis, Palestinians, and also internationals, including many Germans. Yes, there... I think that without this previous process of actually going out of it, I wouldn't have had the courage to actually get involved in these encounters. And that is also a process that lasts and lasts. I think, again and again, you realize, okay, it takes a lot of time, that is, to understand this own imprint. And to free yourself from it a little bit, yes. And yes, queerness also in relation to community and solidarity. I think that in the queer community in which I am, intersectionality, that is, solidarity with people who experience other forms of discrimination, also plays a very important role. And yes, for that reason alone, I think there is a big connection between queerness and solidarity with Palestine and human rights. So, if you yourself know that it also, no matter what form my experience has of discrimination, I think you also have more affinity perhaps. Even if of course they happen on a completely different scale, but still, maybe you have more empathy, I don't know...?

Yeah, well, I'll say this, I'm not queer myself, but I'm a big supporter. And I can speak from my experience. So we move in progressive circles. It's also like, so nowadays, the Israel-Palestine issue, if there were any really reasonable groups, so working together and for peace, so a just peace, it's in progressive circles. And there are many queer people and queer groups. And that's just what I experienced, from both sides. So especially, I think that's also, you can actually say, Udi, you know that much better, because you were in the country. From Palestinian queers and Israeli queers, that's where it actually started, so to speak, so that teams approached each other, yes? And I think that plays a big role. And that is, there is also, what you just mentioned, actually, so there is great empathy. So now if you grew up as a refugee, then you meet a queer person or a black person or others, then you already have empathy for that. You understand roughly, well not exactly, but you understand roughly what that person is going through. And there's a lot of common ground there. And that brings people together. And therefore I think that is a very important part, I think, so I experience this again and again, so many queer Israelis, they are Palestinian supporters. And there is also the "Queer for Palestine", for example, that is also a group in Berlin. They also do a lot. So, let's say, a lot of work. So you also have to write that in such a big way. Yes.

So I think that still brings... the thought came to me, why maybe this also happens in such a way, that just for this connections arise and also solidarity arises. Because I think, for example, for me, as a queer person, I ask myself about the structures, why is it like that, why am I discriminated against, what's behind it. So you already try to understand things not super only individually somehow and also the history. So, I then also dealt with, just because I have a religious background, also with queer theology. So, to find perspectives of history, of my language, which are queer, where I can identify myself. And I think, through this awareness of external structures, which can also be a disadvantage. These are also partly the same structures that also exercise this power. So, patriarchal structures, for example, are also a part of many problems in the world, I would say, also in relation to, yes, to history or to the present.

Which is also an important level for me, which is also connected with queerness, with also, just, my non-binariness has also a lot to do with it, with spirituality. So, with what is spirituality? So, you could ask each person here now, and with gets for each person a different answer. I think there is a big connection between being allowed to be authentic, being able to take space and also spirituality. So, for example, when I left this religious community, I never questioned my faith or my relationship to God or anything like that. So, I may not have that concept now as strongly as I used to. But I know that everything is right and that I'm good, incredibly beautiful things happen to me, where I keep thinking, yeah, maybe, whether I call it God or not, but that I actually feel so already spiritually somewhere good or carried, I haven't lost that. So, this, I think, what I just had to give up, was this kind of close community, where just only in either-or is thought, where is discriminated against homosexuality, bi-sexuality, transpersons have no room there. So, people who don't fit into these gender roles are not welcome there at all and this whole connection between own identity and also awareness not only of oneself, but also for others. That's why we join together, because we know we're not the only ones. When I checked that, "I'm not the only one affected by this," it made me feel incredibly relieved. Because at the beginning, of course, you also feel totally isolated. And in my whole family history I don't know a single queer person. But I'm sure that there were.

So that's also a gain in knowledge for me, precisely because of my questioning of a narrow image of queer. That's what I said, I hinted at it a bit. And in this respect I thank you for the expansion.

I would just like to conclude by saying and all those present, so first of all thank you to those present also who came and showed interest in the topic, in our stories also, in general. But also I have a request, so just support these groups, this movement for a just and real peace. So, now it's actually great, is that very. I think that's important. So this support from you guys we need to keep going and also believe in it. Yes, thank you very much.

Enjoy the evening, I was very happy to see you all. Thank you very much.