Berlin cancels auto show for Iran rally to destroy Israel
The “Classic Days” auto show in Berlin’s main shopping district was cancelled because “the anti-Jewish Al-Quds day demonstration was permitted by the authorities at the same time.”
By BENJAMIN WEINTHALDemonstrators attend an 'al-Quds Day' protest rally in Berlin, Germany, July 11, 2015(photo credit: FABRIZIO BENSCH / REUTERS)
Berlin authorities pulled the plug on an old-timer auto show scheduled for May in favor of an Iranian regime rally that calls for the obliteration of the Jewish state.The Berlin-based B.Z. newspaper reported on Saturday that the Classic Days auto show in Berlin’s main shopping district was canceled because “the anti-Jewish Quds Day demonstration was permitted by the authorities at the same time.”Classic Days organizer Frank Peppel told the paper a hate demonstration will take place on May 16.“It’s a shame for Berlin,” he said, adding that “several hundred thousand visitors have to give way to radicals who protest against Jews.”Peppel told the paper he applied for a permit in May 2019 for Classic Days and heard nothing from the authorities for six months. In early January, the authorities told him Quds Day has priority.Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran, launched Quds Day in 1979, calling for the destruction of Israel. Al-Quds is the Arabic word for Jerusalem. The Berlin Quds Day demonstration has been held each year since 1996.German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Berlin Mayor Michael Müller have ignored appeals over the years from the Israeli and American governments, as well as Germany’s Jewish community, to ban the antisemitic rally.‘BDS not antisemitic’Meanwhile, the Austrian Press Council issued a decision on Friday declaring that labeling the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign targeting Israel as antisemitic is not a violation of the organization’s ethical code.It wrote: “Numerous institutions and state institutions classify the BDS movement as antisemitic. In view of this, the Senate seems to have justified the antisemitism allegation made by the news outlet” against the BDS group.
The press group also said freedom of the press protects the paper’s right to term BDS an antisemitic movement.A chapter of the BDS campaign in the Austrian state of Styria filed a complaint last year with the Austrian Press Council against the daily Kleine Zeitung, in which the anti-Israel group claimed the BDS movement is not antisemitic.According to the Press Council, the BDS entity said the international campaign to sanction Israel opposes Israeli policies via the “mass expulsion” of Palestinians but does not reject Jews.“It is irrelevant whether the BDS movement considers itself antisemitic or if other people contradict this classification,” the Press Council said. “The Senate [of the Press Council] also disagreed with the Styrian [Football] Association on the other complaints regarding the article.”Critics of the BDS campaign say its demand that all Palestinian “refugees” return to Israel would mean the abolition of the Jewish democratic state, and that meets the definition of contemporary antisemitism. Last May, the German Bundestag classified BDS as antisemitic.
