Jewish worries as German support for Israel is challenged on streets
He was speaking at an event to mark the anniversary of the November pogroms of 1938, sometimes known as "Kristallnacht."
Berlin's staunch diplomatic support for Israel is often described as a matter of historic responsibility.
But, as fighting continues between Israel and Hamas, social discord is emerging in Germany.
I meet a woman called Noa at a Berlin synagogue where she tells me how she has family who survived the Holocaust by hiding in Poland.
Some Jewish people in today's Germany, she says, are now hiding their identity.
"It's scary. Why should I live and be afraid of who I am?"
Aaron doesn't feel comfortable showing items traditionally worn by Jewish men in public, either his kippah or his tzitzit, the tassels of his prayer shawl.
Having fled the war in Ukraine, he believes Berlin is unsafe because "a lot of people support terrorist organisations".
Fears about a rise in antisemitism, since the outbreak of hostilities between Hamas and Israel, are widespread across Europe.
For Germany, incidents such as two petrol bombs being thrown towards a Berlin synagogue in October spark acute anxiety due to the nation's Nazi past.
Cases of antisemitism were, according to preliminary police figures, already on the rise this year before the Hamas attacks - the majority committed by the far right.
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