Cologne tolerates ‘anti-Semitic’ exhibit
A crude anti-Israel exhibit in Cologne’s Cathedral Square in the heart of the bustling pedestrian zone does not meet the criteria of inciting hate, Rainer Wolf, a spokesman for the public prosecutor in Cologne, told The Jerusalem Post on Monday.
Wolf said the public prosecutor plans to dismiss the complaint of Gerd Buurmann, a non-Jewish theater director, who filed a grievance in February, asserting a violation of Germany’s hate-crime law.
Buurmann told the Post that he was “horrified” by the decision and plans to now participate in a civil legal action against Walter Herrmann, the exhibitor of the anti-Israel exhibit.
Herrmann’s long-standing exhibit, “Cologne Wailing Wall,” has been deemed anti-Semitic by critics in the Cologne City Council and a commentator from the large daily Klner Stadt-Anzeiger.