US-Russian journalist Masha Gessen won Germany’s Hannah Arendt prize for political thought

A German foundation has said it will no longer be awarding a prize for political thinking to a leading Russian-American journalist after criticizing as “unacceptable” a recent essay by the writer in which they made a comparison between Gaza and a Jewish ghetto in Nazi-occupied Europe.

  • SilverserenOP
    34•11 months ago

    The hypocrisy of the Heinrich Böll Foundation (and the German government in general) is incredible.

    Here you have a Jewish person who is a journalist and a renowned political thinker who was being given the award for being someone who “reports on power games and totalitarian tendencies as well as civil disobedience and the love of freedom”.

    They 100% have the position, right, and accuracy to be comparing the state of Gaza currently to the WWII ghettos.

    Edit: Something else to note. The Foundation made this statement "“But Masha Gessen’s views should not be honored with a prize intended to commemorate the Jewish philosopher Hannah Arendt”.

    And I can’t help but laugh. Do they not know Arendt’s past stance on Israel? She was literally one of the first world-renowned Jewish anti-Zionists.

    She literally compared the Likud party to the Nazis!

  • @Therealgoodjanet
    9•11 months ago

    I get it; Germany has a lot of guilt and are vehemently on Israel’s side to “make up for their mistakes”, but the only thing that’s unacceptable here is the situation in Gaza, not calling out the situation. They should be careful to not end up on the wrong side of history again.

  • Unaware7013
    1•11 months ago

    Ironic that Germany is on the side of the genocide perpetrators again.