German Jewish community hits back at op-ed telling leader to ‘shut up’ about Iran strikes

Jewish organizations in Germany have slammed a prominent leftist daily after it published an op-ed telling the community’s top representative to “just shut up already” following his public statements on the joint Israeli-American military strikes on Iran.

The controversy began after Josef Schuster, president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, issued a statement on Tuesday in which he backed the military action, expressing hope for the fall of the Iranian regime.

On Wednesday, Susanne Knaul, an editor at the Berlin-based Die Tageszeitung, known as taz, published an opinion piece under the title “Just shut up already.”

In it, she criticized Schuster for his open support of the campaign. “Is this really necessary, many, especially those who are Jewish themselves, are now asking,” she wrote.

Knaul also expressed understanding for the desire to see an end to the Iranian regime, writing that, “No one denies Schuster the right to support the attacks. Whether publicly or privately, most people in Germany will hope that the terror regime in Tehran will soon come to an end.”

But she ultimately concluded that Schuster “should have shown restraint in his function and better left statements of this kind to the Israeli ambassador.”

Schuster had noted that Tehran is “behind numerous attacks on Jewish communities” and argued that without Iranian “terror agents,” Jews in Germany could finally move closer to a “visible life without a protective shield.”

Knaul, who served as the paper’s Middle East correspondent in Israel from 1999 to 2019, also criticized Schuster’s vocal support for Israeli warfare in Gaza, saying he had previously leaned “too far out of the window” with his criticism of the German government’s temporary arms embargo against Israel in August 2025.

Critics are calling the op-ed an attempt to muzzle Jewish voices. The newspaper’s editorial board has since come out in Knaul’s defense.

With an audience of approximately 330,000 readers, the taz is among Germany’s most influential left-wing newspapers. While the paper’s editorial line is often critical of Israel, it is known for also providing a platform for pro-Israel perspectives.

The Central Council, which represents some 90,000 members across 100 communities — roughly half of the Jewish population in Germany — issued a sharp rebuttal to Knaul’s article the same day of its publication.

“We have to disappoint you. Today, Jews will no longer be silenced,” the organization wrote on social media. “Fortunately, those days in Germany are over!” The Central Council added that the Iranian regime threatens the security of both Germany and Europe, telling Knaul she was living in a “dream world.”

The Central Council’s post drew support on Instagram from two members of parliament from the conservative CDU, the governing party of Chancellor Friedrich Merz. “What an unbelievable lapse,” wrote MP Franziska Hoppermann in the comments section. Fellow lawmaker Thomas Bareiss thanked the Council for its “clear stance,” writing: “It is good that you do not allow yourselves to be intimidated by such statements or commentaries.”

Other Jewish leaders joined the fray, accusing the newspaper of overstepping.

“Jewish voices in this country will never shut up again,” said Ron Dekel, president of the German Union of Jewish Students. Speaking to The Times of Israel, Dekel said the widespread solidarity among the country’s Jews triggered by the “unspeakable article” proved that most of the community stands firmly behind Schuster’s statements. He accused Knaul of attempting to “strip democratically legitimized Jewish voices of their right to speak.”

Benjamin Graumann, chairman of the Jewish Community of Frankfurt — one of the country’s largest and most significant — described the attempt to stifle Jewish representatives as “pure antisemitism” in a guest piece for the daily Die Welt. He called the op-ed a “new low” in German reporting, occurring “while the only Jewish state is being shelled daily with rockets aimed at the entire civilian population by a regime that has declared the destruction of Israel as its reason of state.”

The German chapter of the anti-Zionist group Jewish Voice for Peace applauded the op-ed, sharing a screenshot of the article on X, writing: “In case the taz changes this refreshingly honest headline following an intervention by the Central Council or the Israeli Embassy, we’d better capture it now.”

Jewish Voice for Peace is generally considered a fringe group in Germany, whose Jewish community is seen as overwhelmingly pro-Zionist.

The three editors-in-chief of the taz, Katrin Gottschalk, Barbara Junge, and Ulrike Winkelmann, defended Knaul against the criticism.

“In the many years that Susanne Knaul spent in Israel, she has always maintained her inner independence as a good journalist and continues to do so today,” the editors stated in response to an inquiry from The Times of Israel.

“We do not consider the commentary to be antisemitic at all,” they said, adding that the headline “Just Shut Up” was a reference to a 2007 quote that “has become a common idiom within the Berlin political establishment for a ‘tough-but-fair’ request among like-minded peers. It was in precisely this sense that Susanne Knaul intended her commentary.”

But Lorenz Beckhardt, an editor for the German public television broadcaster and co-chair of the Association of Jewish Journalists, labeled the text “blatantly antisemitic.”

“By telling Mr. Schuster to shut up, a large part of the Jewish community is being targeted,” Beckhardt told The Times of Israel, adding that the newspaper’s editorial board had failed in its duty by allowing the piece to be published.

“Someone should have told their colleague that she is striking a tone that has not been acceptable in Germany for 80 years,” Beckhardt said.