Members of the Jewish community in Germany are starting to feel the need to hide their Jewish identities in public, German news outlet Bild reported on Friday.
Fearing antisemitic attacks, Berlin's Jewish community now feels the need to take extra security measures, one being that they won't be submitting the full names of children who are celebrating their upcoming bar or bat mitzvahs in the local paper, a tradition that has been passed down for decades.
"Dear community members, due to the current anti-Israel and anti-Jewish incidents, we are currently only printing the names of our birthday and Bar/Bat Mitzvah children with abbreviated surnames in order not to potentially put anyone in danger," the local paper wrote on its congratulations page.
The spokesman for the Jewish community in Berlin, Ilan Kiesling, told Bild that the decision to not submit the full names was made in November 2023, shortly after Hamas's attack on Israel.
"This threat to Jewish life seems to have reached a new dimension, not only in Berlin, which has led to great uncertainty among our community members," Kiesling said.
Rise in antisemitism in Berlin
The number of antisemitic incidents in Berlin in the first half of 2024 was higher than the whole total for 2023, according to a report published by Germany's Federal Association of Departments for Research and Information on Antisemitism (RIAS).
From January to June, RIAS recorded 1,383 incidents of antisemitism in Berlin (about eight a day), which is a significant increase from 1,270 in 2023.
Among the 1,383 incidents, two were listed as cases of extreme violence and 23 as attacks (six of which were against children).
Thirty-seven were recorded as property damage, 28 as threats, and 1,240 as abusive behavior.
Seventy-four of the incidents took place in academic institutions.
Seventy-one incidents contained threats of annihilation.
In both cases of extreme violence and attacks, Jews living in Berlin were inflicted with serious bodily harm.
Mathilda Heller contributed to this article.