Global Courant
We, a diverse group of employees of the Max Planck Society (MPS), Germany’s premier research institute, are writing this letter to express our disapproval of the position our employer has taken regarding Israel-Palestine and to call for a serious change in the discourse, both within the MPS and in Germany as a whole, about Israel-Palestine.
On October 11, MPS published a “statement on the terrorist attacks against Israel,” which began by condemning “Hamas’ heinous attacks on Israel in the strongest possible terms.”
It went on to express solidarity with Israel, grief for Israeli and other lives lost, and sympathy for affected families, friends and loved ones. It regretted that students, young academics and other employees of universities and research institutions would be “called up as reservists” and reaffirmed its commitment to maintain “close scientific and personal ties” with research institutions in Israel, and to use these connections to “support the where possible.”
In February, an article appeared in the German newspaper Die Welt attacking leading Lebanese-Australian scholar Ghassan Hage, who works at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, which is part of the MPS. Within days, the MP announced it would dismiss him for “expressing views that are incompatible with the core values of the Max Planck Society.” Hage was critical of Israel in his online posts.
A open letter of Max Planck researchers was distributed in protest against Hage’s dismissal, calling for this decision to be reversed. We support the letter and also support an earlier letter rack published by colleagues on December 17, criticizing the MP’s position on Israel-Palestine and asking him to reconsider his position of unconditional support for Israel and its academic institutions as a whole.
The events of recent months have fully confirmed that such a reconsideration is absolutely necessary. In particular, we as members of the MPS must not support arbitrary killings of civilians, massive destruction of civilian infrastructure and a near-comprehensive denial of humanitarian conditions for Palestinians in Gaza.