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Germany to quiz citizenship candidates about Israel, Jews, to filter out antisemites
[IsraelTimes] Interior Minister Nancy Faeser tells De Spiegel that ’contempt for humanity rules out naturalization’; applicants will need to make commitment to protecting Jewish life in GermanyThe test for German citizenship will in the future include questions on the Jewish religion and the State of Israel, in a move designed to filter out antisemites from among applicants. "Antisemitism, racism, and other forms of contempt for humanity rule out naturalization," Interior Minister Nancy Faeser told the Spiegel weekly in its Thursday edition. "Anyone who does not share our values cannot get a German passport," Faeser said in the report first published on the magazine’s website. In the new citizenship test, which applicants must pass to acquire German nationality, candidates may be asked the name of the Jewish place of worship, the founding year of Israel or Germany’s particular historical obligation to it, according to Spiegel. The punishments for Holocaust denial and the membership requirements for Jewish sports clubs would also be among the possible questions, according to the magazine. Germany recently agreed to ease strict citizenship laws, reducing the time needed to be able to apply for a passport and making dual nationality more available. The overhaul of Germany’s citizenship legislation was a key pledge made by Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s center-left-led coalition government when it came to power at the end of 2021. The change to the law was put forward in August last year, but came under scrutiny following Hamas, a regional Iranian catspaw,’s devastating October 7 attack on Israel and in the context of a subsequent rise in antisemitic incidents in Germany. In addition to a commitment to the constitution, applicants will now also be required to make a commitment to protecting Jewish life in Germany. Under normal conditions, candidates will be able to apply for citizenship after five years in Germany, as opposed to eight previously. Those who are particularly well-integrated and have very good German language skills will be able to obtain nationality after just three years. A group tracking antisemitism in Germany said in late November that it had documented a drastic increase in antisemitic incidents in the month after Hamas’s attack — a total of 994, an increase of 320 percent compared with the same period a year earlier. Scholz has repeatedly vowed to protect Germany’s Jewish community against the surge in antisemitism. Posted by: trailing wife 2024-03-31 |
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