this post was submitted on 16 May 2025
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Europe

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Rules (2024-08-30)

  1. This is an English-language community. Comments should be in English. Posts can link to non-English news sources when providing a full-text translation in the post description. Automated translations are fine, as long as they don't overly distort the content.
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  4. No bigotry, sexism, racism, antisemitism, islamophobia, dehumanization of minorities, or glorification of National Socialism. We follow German law; don't question the statehood of Israel.
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  7. Light-hearted content, memes, and posts about your European everyday belong in !yurop@lemm.ee. (They're cool, you should subscribe there too!)
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(This list may get expanded as necessary.)

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We will use some leeway to decide whether to remove a comment.

If need be, there are also bans: 3 days for lighter offenses, 7 or 14 days for bigger offenses, and permanent bans for people who don't show any willingness to participate productively. If we think the ban reason is obvious, we may not specifically write to you.

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founded 10 months ago
MODERATORS
 

Hi.

In the past few days, discontent regarding mod decisions in this community has been brewing, particularly when it comes to comments on Palestine, Israel, and Israeli politics and actions. There are also misunderstandings regarding mod intention and German law. We hope to clear that up with this post.

While the servers of feddit.org are in Austria, most of the mods of this community as well as admins of this server live in Germany. Speaking of, our server admins have also posted a write-up on the same topic.

And with that, let's go:

In Germany, antisemitism is specifically sanctioned in German criminal law, both for speech and as a motivation for other criminal behavior. In addition, Germany seeks to protect the Jewish state of Israel (the so-called "Reason of State" introduced in 2008) and thus verges toward protecting Zionism as well. Certain criticism of Israel/Israelis is also categorized as "Israel-related antisemitism".

Since criminal law is involved, enforcement can mean things like police raids and device confiscations. After such police action, it does not really matter if it was appropriate or if cases are dropped or never charged: The damage is done. All told, it's not that fun.

There is also no point in engaging in discussions about the veracity of statements that could get us into legal trouble. In addition, we believe that you can express most opinions without breaking rules.

If your comment contains the following, it will be removed from this community:

  • Calling for the dissolution of Israel, or calling for a one-state solution without specifying equal rights for all people; Jewish in particular.
  • Calling for a destruction, annihilation, an end of all Zionism or the like.
  • Equating Israeli actions and (historical) Nazism.
  • The slogan "from the river..."
  • Endorsement of or justifications for Hamas or Hezbollah, or slogans or graphics positively referring to these organizations. These are considered terrorist organizations in Germany.
  • ... and obviously: Any of the common antisemitic tropes or calls to violence against Jews or Israelis

Comments will not be removed for the following:

  • Denouncing genocide.
  • Denouncing Israeli war crimes.
  • Criticizing Zionism as an ideology or political movement.
  • Referring to the current Israeli government as "criminal," "expansionist," or "far-right".

If your comment is removed nonetheless, these are not the reason. I'd also like to stress that this community was never a free-speech-absolutist zone: It is a (usually lightly) moderated community. There may also be times when bans go too far. In such cases, please DM the @EuroMod@feddit.org account (which all mods have access to).

To help you understand why, I'll leave an assortment of sources here (translations via DeepL).

  • A news report:

    Berlin in mid-May [2024] around 6 o'clock in the morning. A loud, continuous "banging" against the apartment door wakes student Alina T. from her sleep. [...] When her husband opens the door, several LKA officers, two employees of the district office and the SEK "storm" past him into the apartment. Puzzled, he looks at the search warrant. [...] The background to this was a Facebook entry in the student's profile: "From the river [...]

  • A legal treatise:

    In November 2023, the Federal Ministry of the Interior and for Home Affairs also issued a prohibition order against Hamas.[60] According to the order, "the slogan 'From the River to the Sea' (in German or other languages)" is a distinguishing mark of Hamas[61]. [...] the current legal situation [regarding "Denial of Israel's right to exist"] is - contrary to what the statements of the Federal Ministry of Justice suggest[63] - anything but clear. Whether incitements to eliminate the State of Israel are prosecuted depends on the respective legal opinion and the prosecution will of the respective public prosecutor's office.

  • Press release from the previous government:

    In this context, Section 111 StGB, which covers public incitement to commit crimes, may also be relevant. Incitement to extinguish Israel's existence by force may be punishable under this provision. The same applies to calls to publicly display the Hamas flag. If Hamas attacks are publicly cheered and celebrated, this may also be punishable. This means that people who cheer on Hamas's actions or publicly express their sympathy with the attacks may constitute the criminal offence of "approval of criminal acts" under Section 140 of the German Criminal Code (StGB).

  • Another news report

    In connection with the controversial Palestine Congress in Berlin, the German authorities have also imposed an entry ban on former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis. "In order to prevent antisemitic and anti-Israel propaganda at the event", several entry bans have been issued, the news agency AFP learned from security sources on Sunday. One of these concerned Varoufakis. (Notably, Varoufakis would have spoken about one-state solutions ...)

  • Overview Germany in 2024 by Amnesty International

  • Overview Germany in 2024 by Human Rights Watch

federal reverse (on behalf of the mods of !europe)

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[–] arifinhiding@feddit.org 1 points 6 hours ago

I'm in agreement with this decision. But I don't share the reasoning and context behind the conclusions regarding free speech. I'm non-europe, so the slogan "from the river to the sea" doesn't strike me as an impression that calls for Hamas. I suppose german lawmakers often make contextual decisions centered around their own experiences. That explains their legal stance, and I don't agree with it. I do agree with the decision to avoid the wrath of law enforcement agencies. As I understand it, i think it is reasonable enough since I've had members of my community vanishing without a trace until this day.

Throughout history, governments (WW2 and others) do commit atrocities and human rights violations. I think moderation teams allowing ample space for genocide documentation is good. As I understand it, other social medias such as Instagram don't allow genocide documentation at all. Granted, I think more should be done about it even in smaller communities like this. But that's besides the point, and I'm not an internet regular. And where real or digital spaces don't outright endorse "absolute free speech", I think spaces that allow specifics in their discourse is a good enough space to live in. After all, It is never ideal to let governments run fascist mode without accountability.

[–] MetalMachine@feddit.nl 19 points 21 hours ago

Pov: you assist in helping genocide

You should be ashamed

[–] shaserlark@sh.itjust.works 5 points 19 hours ago

Understandable that you don’t want any police raids and I sincerely hope that this is not representative of your personal opinion but rather a hint for us to maybe host this community somewhere else where free speech is possible without putting the server hosts in danger of being raided by some gestapo squad. It would be great if it’d be possible to migrate whole communities to another instance.

[–] MajesticElevator@lemmy.zip 22 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Insulting Israel isn’t discrimination or hate speech if motivated by facts, like them doing a genocide. It is when you do because of antisemitism.

It is also not wrong to think that the population of Israel should end up in a less benefiting situation like one state where they don’t get the superiority, because they were illegitimate to the lands and because they lived in this country.

German people were condemned with sanctions to the country after world wars. Didn’t make it racism or anything like that, just sanctions to what the country had done.


Fuck censorship

[–] 3abas@lemm.ee 32 points 1 day ago (7 children)

Israel is a religious ethno supremacist state, not calling to fix that IS UNJUST.

DEFENDERS OF fascism are fascists.

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[–] Lumiluz@slrpnk.net 12 points 1 day ago (15 children)

If you're going to act like a standard corporation in terms of what speech is allowed, why should users use this comm over say, reddit, which has the same rules but a MUCH larger community?

You've kinda defeated the purpose of Lemmy by doing this. Corporations forsake ethics for the convenience of law anyway, so from a logical perspective, people might as well use something else.

You could easily just get new mods who are NOT in Germany if you're this terrified of legal action, but instead you've chosen to follow unjust and unethical laws - no different than Reddit and whatever justification they make up as well.

By your own logic and stipulations, if Germany is taken over by the AfD in the future as well and they pass racist laws making it illegal to ban anyone using racist language for example, you'll also comply and allow racist language too. Either because ethics don't matter to you, or because they align with the law passed. Those are the only two logical conclusions.

And before you say "well it's a lot of resources to change things" - it was also a lot of resources to start this whole thing up and grow it in the first place too, yet that didn't stop you either, did it?

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[–] auraithx@lemmy.dbzer0.com 22 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (3 children)

When the rules demand silence in the face of atrocity, the mods become archivists of obedience, not arbiters of discourse.

You should transfer ownership of the server to someone with a set if you’re that worried.

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[–] anarchiddy@lemmy.dbzer0.com 35 points 1 day ago (2 children)

One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws

Why should it be necessary to specify Israelis as deserving of equal rights in historic Palestine when it is Israel who denies equal rights to Palestinians and not the other way around?

Go ahead and ban me now if that kind of acknowledgment can get you in legal trouble - I have no interest in participating in a community that is comfortable suppressing criticisms against an ethno-religious apartheid state committing genocide. Fuck Israel and fuck the German collaborators.

Free Palestine.

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[–] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 27 points 1 day ago (6 children)

Sad to see this. This effectively muzzles Israeli and Jewish anti-Zionist voices to make Germans feel good about themselves. This is antisemitic.

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