Schlaglicht Israel Nr. 06/12 Aktuelles aus israelischen Tageszeitungen 26. März – 15. April 2012 1. Kontroverse um das Gedicht von Günter Grass Das am 4. April in der Süddeutschen Zeitung veröf­fentlichte Gedicht„Was gesagt werden muss“ von Günter Grass hat in Israel heftige Reaktionen aus­gelöst. In dem Text warnt der deutsche Literaturno­belpreisträger u.a. davor, dass Israel in der Ausei­nandersetzung mit dem Iran und dessen Atompro­gramm eine Bedrohung des Weltfriedens darstelle, da Israel über Atomwaffen verfüge, die keiner inter­nationalen Kontrollen unterworfen seien. Israel hat den Besitz von Atomwaffen nie dementiert oder bestätigt. Eine Folge des Gedichts: Der israelische Innenminister Eli Yishai erklärte Grass in Israel zur „persona non grata“. Israelis can be angry with Gunter Grass, but they must listen to him „Grass'"What Must Be Said" does contain things that must be said.(...) But Grass exaggerated, un­necessarily and in a way that damaged his own po­sition. Perhaps it is his advanced age and his ambi­tion to attract a last round of attention, and perhaps the words came forth all at once like a cascade, after decades during which it was almost impossible to criticize Israel in Germany. That's the way it is when all criticism of Israel is considered illegitimate and improper and is stopped up inside for years. In the end it erupts in an extreme form. Israel has many friends in Germany, more than in most Euro­pean countries. Some of them support us blindly, some have justified guilt feelings and some are true, critical friends of Israel. There are, of course, anti­Semites in Germany and the demand that Germany never forget is also justified. But a situation in which any German who dares criticize Israel is instantly accused of anti- Semitism is intolerable.“ HAA, Gideon Levy, 8.4.2012 Shame on Grass „Günter Grass(...) displayed a disappointing moral bankruptcy. Grass’s poem and the attempts by him­self and other of his countrymen to defend it raise the question whether Germans – at least those sup­porting Grass – have learned anything from history. (...) Does he really think that he, an 84-year-old German who was a member of the Waffen SS as a teenager, should be the one recommending that Israel compromise its deterrence capability and, in the process, expose itself to existential threats?(...) the controversy surrounding Grass’s poem has brought to the fore a modern manifestation of anti­Semitism, which is actually a form of mental pathol­ogy. Germans such as Grass are filled with Holo­caust-era guilt. To alleviate their dissonance, some Germans project their feelings of guilt onto Israel. But regardless of the psychological mechanics be­hind his despicable poem, Grass, at the end of his life, has now been“exposed.” We hope he regains his moral bearings and issues a complete retraction. Anything less will cast a shadow on Grass’s reputa­tion as a moral voice for Germans who came of age in the generation after the Shoah.“ JPO, Editorial, 8.4.2012 Grass: Let's Be Brave Poets, Not Fearful Puri­tans „Martin Luther once may have proved Germany as the mother nation of humanistic thinking, and earth­shattering theological reform(Germany was this, of course, for the Jews of the enlightenment). Howev­er, Luther, like Grass, turned to Jew-bashing and by doing so, spoiled his talent on hatred.(...) I, as a critic of poetry(...) can at least say this: aside from the fact that the poet is clearly anti-Semitic, his di­dactic lyric is extremely uncreative.(...) The poem is naught but a rant.(...) Why throw stones at this poet? Why not laugh at his unimpressive verse? If we are a cradle of culture and ingenuity, let us act 1