Reflections of a Post-War German

Growing up in post-war Germany was a strange experience. When I was 6 or 7 years old, I remember gazing at bullet holes lodged in the walls of the small chapel around the corner. The ruins from the war remained, a good 20 years later. We kids were cautioned not to go into abandoned buildings because mines might still be hidden under dilapidated structures. We were told, “You could lose an arm or a leg.” My family had come from the “East,” those places which were now, after the war, Russia, Poland, or the DDR. We felt a lingering sense of being refugees, “not from here.” In muffled tones, memories of painful war experiences and loss were exchanged between family members and neighbors. So often I felt like hiding under a table so that I could escape the lingering sense of gloom.

In the beginning of the ‘70s, Willie Brand’s new social-democratic government swiftly and firmly tore the scabs off from the barely crusted-over wounds. As teens, we learned that we Germans had killed 6,000,000 Jews, and another million gypsies, homosexuals, and mentally ill people. Before that “end-solution,” as Nazis called it, there were years where Jews lived cooped up in designated areas, without sufficient food, medication, and sanitary conditions. Most had to abandon their homes and were forced to leave at a moment’s notice, just to be herded away. This dreadful information, shared by our teachers, was accompanied by movie presentations of concentration camps, and of brutal persecution.

Many of us as teens had not heard much about these terrible atrocities before. We all knew something horrible had happened, but we did not know exactly what it was. But there was this pervasive and terrible feeling of secrets, shame, and wrongness. As teens, we were even more confused when we went home to talk to our parents, and they often reacted with silence, frustration, and defensiveness. So many questions occupied our minds. Were we Germans basically bad and cruel people? Was something wrong with our genetic makeup? Was this a condition we would pass on to our children?

When we were older teens, many of us traveled by train cheaply around Europe. However, I remember arriving in the Netherlands, Belgium, and France and discovering that people did not want to speak to us. Soon we learned that it was our “German-ness” that was unwanted. I remember how my girlfriend and I would keep our mouths shut with the hopes that other Europeans would think we were Danish or Norwegian. Then we would be off the hook.

When I came to America to go to university, I realized that being German was not easy. In psychology class, I often received the role (during roleplay exercises) of the prototype villain because of my German accent. I again felt that awful shame that stuck to me like tar. I understood that people did not trust Germans and felt I had to be extra nice to be accepted. In a way, I surrendered to this condition, but it made it hard to feel good enough about myself.

You might ask, why am I telling this story? Is it that I want pity, or that I am pitying myself? No, there is something else. This is a cautionary tale. Right now, it is Israel, ironically, that takes our German seat of being seen by so many as the bad guys, callous to helpless civilians.

Even though Israel’s retribution cannot be compared to the Holocaust in its magnitude, and Israelis feel understandably vengeful towards the atrocities Hamas has committed toward 1,200 of their own, the world’s moral sentiment is shifting. People from many countries are becoming increasingly upset about the 35,000 civilians killed in Gaza, most of whom were women and children. Images that remind us of the Jewish tragedy in and before WWII, are now displaced Palestinian people in a huge ghetto called Gaza, now without adequate food, sanitation, and medical help. A famine is looming, even though Israelis, who have plenty of resources, are just living 100 kilometers away from the place of great misery. Like Germans in WWII, who felt detached from the misery of the Jews, that same coldness can be detected in official Israeli voices, unempathetic toward Palestinian civilians who are in great travail. Despite the alarm voiced by state leaders of other countries and the UN, the government and military of Israel press on with a merciless offense.

I want to warn of the long-term consequences of this kind of behavior. To be a “Nazi” has become an archetypal image for someone who cold-bloodedly negated the rights of others, especially the very vulnerable. Archetypes live long. Judging voices of the world don’t understand the effects of trans-generational and current trauma, and they can’t grasp complicated political backstories. The long shadow of reproach can last 70-plus years! I am aware that many Jewish people all over the world feel compassion for Gazans; some even let themselves be arrested on political marches protesting on behalf of the helpless. However, having been on the morally right side of history does not protect from later condemnation.

I am aware how complicated history is. The massacre of 1,200 Israelis on October 7 and the fanatical Islamist view of Hamas reopened the wounds of the Holocaust. Parents of current Israeli military leaders were often those who escaped the Nazis by the skin of their teeth. My heart goes out to all of them, and being a post-war German makes this feel very raw. My grandfather, a historian, was incarcerated by the Nazis, and my mother, a Red Cross nurse on WWII’s Eastern front, witnessed the liberation of Auschwitz and took care of its survivors. I feel deeply triggered. How much more must the children of holocaust survivors be affected, as well as the children of Palestinians all over the world? I wish we could all grieve and feel deeply with each other, from a place of heartfelt empathy and compassion. Only then something might shift.

Reflecting on my experience, I am grateful for these hard lessons of being a post-war German. I learned that only understanding and feeling with all those who suffer can ultimately bring change.  I learned how dangerous it is to think that you are better or more worthy than somebody else. The German identity as an “Übermensch” (superior being) was self-defeating. No human is more worthy than another and no group of people is more extraordinary or special than another.

I also learned that collective punishment, meaning to admonish a whole group of people for the sins of a few, is deeply wrong. Being a post-war German required me to keep looking at myself carefully and to work on my foibles relentlessly. I am grateful for that, as it helped me to overcome my natural human languor. The shame I inherited brought out in me the fierce desire to be my best self. Not just for others, but for my own sense of integrity.

Concentration camp survivor Elie Wiesel said, “Good Germans may not be guilty but responsible.” I came to understand that I, as post-war German, do not carry guilt, but that I am responsible to help make this world a place in which atrocities never happen again.

My greatest wish is that Germans, Jews, and Palestinians, including all those who protest against injustice, will find in themselves the responsibility that Elie Wiesel talked about.  Let us remember what is truly important: to create an environment that allows all of us to thrive together while caring for this planet that sustains us all.