Germany and the Middle East

From Kaiser Wilhelm II to Angela Merkel

Rolf Steininger

• Publisher: Berghahn Books
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781789200393
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: German History
• Index: History

For over a century, the Middle East has weathered seemingly endless conflicts, ensnaring political players from around the world. And perhaps no nation has displayed a greater range of policies toward, and experiences in, the region than Germany, as this short and accessible volume demonstrates. Beginning with Kaiser Wilhelm's intermittent support for Zionism, it follows the course of German-Mideast relations through two world wars and the rise of Adolf Hitler. As Steininger shows, the crimes of the Third Reich have inevitably shaped postwar German Mideast policy, with Germany emerging as one of Israel's staunchest supporters while continuing to navigate the region's complex international, religious, and energy politics.

Chapter One

BEFORE THE FIRST WORLD WAR, 1898–1914

Kaiser Wilhelm II and Theodor Herzl’s “National Home” in Palestine

It all began in the nineteenth century with a phenomenon in Europe and a man from Vienna. The phenomenon was anti-Semitism; the man was Theodor Herzl.

Herzl, an assimilated Austrian Jew born in 1860, was convinced that the answer to the growing anti-Semitism in Europe was to create an independent Jewish state. In 1896, he summarized these thoughts in his programmatic, comprehensive 71-page text The Jewish State: Proposal of a Modern Solution for the Jewish Question (Der Judenstaat: Versuch einer modernen Lösung der Judenfrage). A year later, the World Zionist Congress in Basel, organized by Herzl, demanded that this Jewish state be in Palestine. As Palestine was part of the Ottoman Empire, the Zionists needed help and support to build a state there, as well as an advocate to represent their cause before Sultan Abdul Hamid II. Herzl counted on the German Reich, and particularly on Emperor Wilhelm II.¹

From the moment he embraced Zionism, Herzl had intended to petition Wilhelm II. In June 1895, shortly before he wrote the draft for his Judenstaat, he asserted: ‘I will go to the German Kaiser; and he will understand me because he was raised to evaluate great matters. I will tell the German Kaiser: Let us go’. Even though it was clear to Herzl that a Jewish state established with Germany’s help would have to pay ‘the most usurious interest’, he still preferred the German path to realization of his far-reaching plans, including the founding of an aristocratic Jewish Republic in Palestine, modelled after Bismarck’s Reich.

In his diary on 8 October 1898, Herzl wrote: ‘To stand under the protectorate of this strong, great, moral, splendidly managed, tightly organized Germany could only have the most wholesome effects on the Jewish national character. With a single stroke’, he continued, ‘we would come to a perfectly ordered internal and external legal situation’. The Germans would likewise win with this alliance, because ‘through Zionism it would be possible for the Jews to love this Germany again, which, in spite of it all, is still dear to our hearts!’

A year before, Wilhelm II had read a report about the first World Zionist Congress and written in the margin: ‘I am very much in favour that the Jews [die Mauschels] go to Palestine; the sooner they move out there, the better. I will place no obstacles in their way’. On 1 December 1897, Herzl sent the Kaiser his brochure Der Basler Kongress. Wilhelm, who still liked the idea of a Jewish state in Palestine, wrote to his uncle Frederick I, Grand Duke of Baden, through whom the connection with Herzl had come about: ‘I am convinced that settling the Holy Land with the well-funded and hardworking people of Israel will soon lead the former to unimagined prosperity and blessing’. This would lead in turn, the Kaiser reasoned, to a significant revival of Turkey’s economy, which was in the best interest of the German Reich. Berlin was hopeful that the sultan would grant a concession for the construction of the Baghdad Railway. Wilhelm continued:

Then the Turk is healthy again, meaning he gets money the natural way, without borrowing, then he is no longer ill, builds his avenues and railways himself without foreign companies and then he cannot be so easily divided. Q.e.d! Moreover, the energy, creativity and capability of the tribe Sem would be deflected onto worthier goals than draining the Christians. And many a Semite stirring up the opposition as a Social Democrat by conviction will move eastward, where more rewarding work presents itself . . . Now, I know for sure that nine-tenths of all Germans will turn away from me in horror if they should learn later on that I sympathized with the Zionists or even possibly that I would – if I was called on by them – put them under my protection!

But Wilhelm already had his retort to those nine-tenths:

That the Jews murdered the Saviour, God knows even better than us, and he punished them accordingly. But neither the anti-Semites nor others nor I are commissioned and authorized to bully these people to adopt our manner in Majorem Dei Gloriam!

Wilhelm then recalled that one should love one’s enemies, and besides:

From the secular, realpolitik viewpoint, it must not be disregarded that the enormous power that the international Jewish capital now represents with all its danger would be an incredible achievement for Germany if the Hebrew world would look with thanks to them?! Everywhere, Hydra raises her horrid head with the rudest, nastiest anti-Semitism, and fearfully Jews – ready to leave the countries in which they could face danger – look for a protector! Now then, those who are able to return to the Holy Land should enjoy protection and safety, and I will vouch for them with the Sultan.

Wilhelm would meet with Herzl on his trip to the Holy Land between 11 October and 26 November 1898, with stops in Constantinople, Jerusalem and Damascus; the main event was to be the Dedication of the Church of the Redeemer in Jerusalem.

Figure 1.1 Kaiser Wilhelm II with his entourage in front of a tent outside Damascus. Photo by Eric Matzon. Courtesy of Israel Government Press Office, Jerusalem.

On 13 October 1898 in Vienna, five Zionists – Theodor Herzl, Josef Seidener, Tobias Schnirer, David Wolffsohn and Max Bodenheimer – boarded the Orient Express to Constantinople. Herzl led the group. After three years, his efforts had been rewarded: he would be granted an audience with the German Kaiser, Wilhelm II, who had begun his journey to the Orient two days earlier.

Upon receiving the Zionists on 18 October in Constantinople, Wilhelm asked Herzl: ‘Tell me in one word: what should I demand from the Sultan?’ Herzl replied: ‘A chartered company under German protection’. The Sultan had no intention of ceding or selling land to the Jews. When asked by Wilhelm, he stated: ‘I cannot sell a foot of land because it is not mine but that of my people. The Jews can save their millions. Once my empire is divided, they might get Palestine for free. But only our body can be dissected. I will never agree to a vivisection.”² For Wilhelm, that was the red card. There would not be a German protectorate over a Jewish state in Palestine.

The Kaiser and his entourage arrived in Haifa on 24 October 1898 for the final leg of their journey, described by the English historian John Röhl.³ As stated in the travel report, when Wilhelm II went ashore that afternoon he became the first German Kaiser since Frederick II of Hohenstaufen in 1228 to set foot on the soil of the Holy Land. As the retinue proceeded along the dusty road to Jaffa, they were joined by numerous clergy and more than five hundred additional people arriving on four steamers. The procession required no fewer than 230 tents, 120 carriages, 1,300 horses and mules, 12 cooks and 60 waiters. This huge caravan was protected by a Turkish army regiment, along with German warships that accompanied the travellers by sea, firing thunderous fusillades whenever the Kaiser’s banner could be seen on the horizon.

Figure 1.2 1903: The Jaffa Gate of the Old City of Jerusalem with Turkish flags. People wave flags as a sign of adoration for the sultan. Photo by Eric Matzon. Courtesy of Israel Government Press Office, Jerusalem.

When Wilhelm passed the Jewish settlement of Mikle Israel, he had a brief roadside encounter with Herzl before continuing to the journey’s main event, the dedication of the Church of the Redeemer in Jerusalem on 31 October. And on 2 November 1898, the Kaiser received Herzl in the tent camp outside Jerusalem. ‘He said neither yes nor no’, Herzl wrote in his diary after the meeting, comforting himself with the thought that his efforts were not in vain: ‘This brief reception will be recorded in the history of the Jews forever, and it is not impossible that it will also have historical consequences’. The official press release spoke of the Kaiser’s ‘benevolent interest’ in all efforts ‘aimed at enhancing Palestine’s agriculture to ensure the best welfare of the Turkish Empire, in full respect of the sovereignty of the Sultan’.⁴ Max Bodenheimer recorded his impressions:

At first, the speech of the Kaiser had the effect of a cold shower. After further consideration, however, we thought, with regard to the critical situation, the Kaiser could not say more. Indeed, the Kaiser had said nothing of a Protectorate, but Herzl was allowed to clearly and forthrightly bring our intentions forward, and was promised that the prospect of this issue would be examined further. At this place and from the mouth of the Kaiser, this meant something.⁵

From Jerusalem the Kaiser travelled to Damascus, where, on 8 November at the grave of the legendary Sultan Saladin, he astonished the world with the following promise: ‘May the Sultan and his 300 million Muslim subjects scattered across the earth, who venerate him as their Caliph, be assured that the German Kaiser will be their friend at all times (zu allen Zeiten)’. Despite styling himself in this way and being dubbed Haji Wilhelm, protector of Muslims, implying that he had made the pilgrimage to Mecca, Wilhelm made no secret of his disappointment with what he had seen in Palestine: it was ‘a desolate, parched heap of stones’, he wrote to his mother on the way home. Further:

The lack of shade and water is appalling . . . Jerusalem is entirely spoiled by the many, very modern suburbs . . . full of Jewish settlers. There were 60,000 of these people – greasy, miserable, sluggish and degenerate – who have nothing better to do than to become equally hated by Christians and Muslims by trying to get every hard-earned penny from these neighbours. Nothing but shylocks, all of them.⁶

Prussian minister for culture, Robert Bosse, a member of the Kaiser’s entourage, analysed the journey. Some fellow travellers seemed to be of the opinion that the German Reich would ‘be on firm footing’ in Palestine. To this end, Bosse said of the journey: ‘How carefully our Kaiser avoided everything presenting evidence of exaggerated political aspirations or of awaking the suspicion of other nations. To this day, thank God, the foreign policy of the German Reich continues its activity on the course set by Fürst Bismarck. Specifically, in the oriental question, it is markedly a policy of peace’.⁷

Figure 1.3 1910: At the Wailing Wall. Photo by Eric Matzon. Courtesy of Israel Government Press Office, Jerusalem.

Even if Wilhelm did not like Palestine or the Jews’ presence there, business with the Ottoman Empire was good. Within a few years, solid ties between Berlin and Constantinople had been forged. The German Reich received the concession for the construction of the Baghdad Railway, and German and Ottoman economic relations and military cooperation grew closer. Prussian officers had been responsible for training the Ottoman army since the early 1880s, and arms sales were an important factor in Turkish–German relations. Krupp delivered five hundred field guns in 1885, Mauser and Loewe all other sorts of weapons and ammunition, such as half a million rifles in 1886. Before becoming the Ottoman minister of war in January 1914, Enver Pasha had served three years (1909–1911) as a military attaché to Berlin and developed a close relationship with Wilhelm. In December 1913, a German mission arrived in Turkey with the task of reorganizing the Ottoman army. Officers of the German military mission assumed responsibility for the command of the Turkish army under Enver’s leadership.⁸

Notes

1. For Wilhelm II, his journey and his meeting with Theodor Herzl, I rely primarily on John C. G. Röhl, ‘Wilhelms seltsamer Kreuzzug’, DIE ZEIT, Nr. 42 (8 October 1998), 30–36, as well as Alex Carmel and Ejal J. Eisler, Der Kaiser reist ins Heilige Land. Die Palästinareise Wilhelms II. Eine illustrierte Dokumentation (Cologne: Kohlhammer, 1999); Klaus Jaschinski and Julius Waldschmidt (eds), Des Kaisers ...