World
From anti-Zionist to warrior against hate: Meeting Germany’s only Jewish antisemitism commissioner
How an East German Jew was won over by Israel
July 24, 2024 07:46
How an East German Jew was won over by Israel
July 24, 2024 07:46I’ve known Stefan Hensel for several years. When I first met him, he told me he wasn’t Jewish. Yet today he is Germany’s only Jewish antisemitism commissioner, for the city of Hamburg. His story is remarkable.
Born in 1979 in the sombre landscape of former East Germany, Hensel’s early life was marked by economic hardship and political struggle. His father spent five years in prison for his attempts to escape the German Democratic Republic (GDR) and political activism. On his release, he met Hensel’s mother, whose own roots were shrouded in mystery, with a birth certificate issued two decades late in the GDR stating she was born in 1946 in Poland.
Sitting now in his stylish Hamburg home, Hensel reflects on his journey, occasionally glancing at his young daughter playing nearby. The home is a testament to his transformation – a blend of modernity and tradition, much like his own life. “I was a wild teenager,” Hensel tells me with a wry smile. “I rebelled a lot against my family and the state’s expectations. My mother died of cancer when I was 19 and a few months later I moved to Israel.”
His move was driven by a scholarship from Action Reconciliation and Service for Peace. Hensel initially considered Northern Ireland but found himself drawn to Israel. “Why Israel? I cannot pinpoint it,” he says. Despite his radical left-wing and anti-Zionist beliefs, Israel’s complex reality intrigued him. He worked in a women’s shelter and assisted a Holocaust survivor, experiences that subtly began to reshape his worldview.
Hensel’s initial ignorance about Jewish life and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was profound. “I had no clue,” he admits. Yet working in the shelter exposed him to the multifaceted layers of Israeli society. “There were Arabs, new immigrants, Jewish women — it was very diverse.” His time in Israel during the Second Intifada further complicated his perceptions. “I was a guest of a normalisation program in Gaza City, run by the then Fatah government. There were a lot of international kids. All were convinced that the settlements were a real obstacle to peace. I was like, OK, these people do farming, gardening, it looks fine. And then we went to see refugee houses, and they really lived in bad conditions. At the same time, we also visited people from the Fatah party, and they lived in mansions. So for me, it was very clear, this has nothing to do with Jewish people settling; it’s a case of corruption.”
He returned to Gaza City alone. “I went on a private trip. I stayed for a week as a tourist. I went surfing with them, it was all nice. And I think I did understand that they basically want to have an ordinary life, like everybody. Things were more relaxed.” However, the brutal reality of the conflict soon shattered this sense of tranquility. “The Intifada showed me a different phase. People took three boys who took the wrong turn into Ramallah. They were tortured and murdered. And they showed the bloody hands. I was shocked.”
Returning to Germany, Hensel struggled to reconnect with his past. “My former friends didn’t understand what was happening in Israel; it was all very biased.” This disconnect led him to engage deeply with pro-Israel organisations. He became the president of the German-Israeli Association’s northern region, advocating for Israel and expanding his connections within the Jewish community.
Hensel still saw himself as an outsider – until a DNA test in his late 30s changed everything. The revelation was startling: 30 per cent Ashkenazi Jewish: “I was stunned”. Years of further investigation confirmed his maternal Jewish lineage. This however, did not immediately resolve his internal conflict. He decided to undergo a full conversion so his children could fully integrate into the Jewish community.
The conversion process deepened his connection to Judaism. “I learned a lot and eventually I did become religious,” he says. Today, his family celebrate Shabbat and Jewish holidays and he actively participates in the local Jewish community. His journey is mirrored in his voluntary role as Hamburg’s antisemitism commissioner, a position that consumes much of his time, despite his day job running his own education business and his outreach work with people in China, Taiwan and Rwanda.
Recent events following October 7, have heightened the urgency of his work. “The numbers [of antisemitic incidents] are skyrocketing in Germany,” he says. “If we look at what happened after October 7, there was a wave of solidarity in Germany with the State of Israel and its representatives. It’s fading.” He points out that German citizens are being held in Gaza. “But overall, this kind of notion, the responsibility does not really appear to a certain kind of population, because especially a migrant population would say, ‘We have nothing to do with it.’”
Hensel’s unique background provides him with a specific understanding of the issues faced by Jewish communities, especially those of former Soviet Union Jews living in Germany. Many of these immigrants live in poverty and face ongoing discrimination. “Their life and reality are very different from the one that you may have or I may have,” he observes. This understanding fuels his commitment to improving conditions for all Jews in Germany.