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Neo-Nazi demonstrations banned from synagogue opening

Updated: 31/Oct/2006 17:03

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MUNICH (EJP)--- A German court has upheld a ban on all neo-Nazi demonstrations that have been scheduled in Munich for November 9th – opening day of the city’s newly rebuilt synagogue.

Finishing touches are being applied to city’s newest house of worship which is being built on the Jakobsplatz where the city’s main synagogue once stood, prior to being destroyed by the Nazis in 1938.

The complex will stand once again stand in the shadows of the church towers of the city’s centre.

Koehler to attend

The opening ceremony will host hundreds of VIPs, including Germany’s federal president, Horst Koehler and his first lady.

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A speaker for the city’s central borough district, Wilfried Blume-Beyerle, welcomed the court’s decision, the DDP press agency reported. Blume-Beyerle said that the city is vehemently against any sort of Nazi demonstration but conceded that it was not always legally possible to stop such groups from exercising their right of free speech.

“A neo-Nazi demonstration during the synagogues opening service would amount to nothing more than an unbearable provocation. It would provoke unforeseeable reactions and could endanger public safety and order,” Blume-Beyerle said.

Blume-Beyerle was reacting to past dangers associated with the synagogue’s construction.

Plot uncovered

Just prior to the official groundbreaking, two years ago, police uncovered a plot by right wing extremists to attack the ceremony which was resided over by then President Joahnnes Rau. Today the neo-Nazi instigators of the plot are sitting behind bars.

However, Jewish institutions, throughout Germany, are still considered vulnerable to terrorist acts.

The new Ohel Jakob Synagogue will be opened 68 years after the destruction of its predecessor.

The complex will also house the city’s Jewish community’s offices and new Jewish museum – both of which are due to open within the first half of 2007.

Communal renaissance

Charlotte Knobloch, president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, who also heads the Bavarian city’s 9,000 strong Jewish community, said that the new synagogue was yet another confirmation of Germany’s Jewish renaissance and resiliance.

Several dozen synagogues have, thus far, been re-erected throughout Germany, since 1990, with new ones opening their doors on an almost on a yearly basis.

The rapid growth of Germany’s Jewish communities has been attributed to the heavy influx of Jews from the former Soviet Union who immigrated to Germany since the mid-1980s.

Funding of the Munich complex, which began in 2004, was paid for by the Jewish Community and private donations.

Each private contributor has been given the name “godfather of tolerance”. The programme was called to life by Germany’s publishing magnate, Hubert Burda who was recently awarded the Central Council of Jews in Germany’s Leo Baeck prize.

The structure will be smaller than its pre-war predecessor. Before the war, Munich counted 12,000 registered Jews.

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