Former Social Democratic Party (SPD) member of the state parliament Michael Höntsch was attacked by a pro-Palestinian demonstrator in Hanover. The preliminary proceedings have now been dropped. The 68-year-old notes a “strange timidity” in the fight against Muslim anti-Semitism.
The attack is documented on a video. “Freedom for Palestine” is shouted from a crowd. Then a crowd forms around a man and a woman holding an Israel flag. The man is the former Social Democratic Party (SPD) member of the state parliament Michael Höntsch; he has a cane and an oxygen device with him.
A man wearing sunglasses and a Palestinian scarf approaches him aggressively. Then a fist hits Höntsch’s face, he goes down and briefly faints.
The incident happened on April 23 this year in the city centre of Hanover. The group “Palestine Speaks” had called their “comrades, brothers, sisters and freedom fighters” to a rally for “Solidarity with Palestine”. Now it is clear: the attack by the pro-Palestinian demonstrators on the politician, who calls himself a friend of Israel, will go unpunished.
The police had taken the personal details of a Palestinian on the spot and initiated a preliminary investigation on suspicion of bodily harm. However, a spokesperson for the public prosecutor’s office in Hanover told the newspaper WELT: “The proceedings against the stateless 55-year-old man were discontinued due to a lack of sufficient suspicion of a crime, because it was not possible to prove intentional bodily harm.</div>
Höntsch’s daughter-in-law Rebecca Seidler was present at the incident and was fined 128.50 euros at the beginning of September. She is accused of holding an open-air assembly that had not been reported and thus of committing an administrative offence.
Seidler is the executive director of the Liberal Jewish Community of Hanover. According to her, she had come to the rally with Höntsch in order to observe and document possible anti-Semitic incidents and violations of regulations.
Höntsch had not brought the Israel flag himself, but held it spontaneously in silent protest together with a woman who had it with her.
“It is hard to understand that the physical attack against me remains without consequences, while my daughter-in-law is punished for observing a demonstration,” says Höntsch. The former interior politician had decided against pressing charges himself at the time – out of concern that he would become even more the focus of those who behaved so aggressively at the rally.
“With consideration for my family, I had thoughtfully refrained from pressing charges. I was directly exposed to the demonstrators’ propensity for violence and was worried that I could be threatened again,” said the 68-year-old. Concern for personal data also played a role. “I don’t want to meet the men who attacked me again alone”.
Höntsch learned via WELT about the dismissal of the case against the suspect from the pro-Palestinian demonstration. “I am frustrated and would have liked the attack on me to have led to a conviction for assault,” he says. “The anti-Semitism from the right is recognised. But there is a strange timidity when it comes from the Arab or Turkish part of the population.”
The topics of willingness to report and discontinuation of preliminary proceedings play a recurring role in anti-Semitic attacks. The annual reports of Claudia Vanoni, the anti-Semitism officer of the Berlin Public Prosecutor’s Office, show that in 2019 and 2020, only 13 per cent of the hundreds of cases with an anti-Semitic background in the capital were prosecuted or criminal charges were issued in each case.
A spokesperson for the Lower Saxony Ministry of the Interior said that the state government regretted that “a former member of the state parliament apparently fell to the ground due to the influence of a Palestinian activist”. On the video posted on the net by WELT, the “strong verbal and in one case also physical aggressiveness on the part of the pro-Palestinian gathering was clearly visible”.
The initiation of administrative offence proceedings against Rebecca Seidler could be “regretted against the background of the overall events”, the spokesperson continued. The state police headquarters will now examine whether a fine can be waived.