Controversy Erupts at Jerusalem Protestant Service as Jewish Leader Exits Over ‘Genocide’ Remarks

A Reformation service at Jerusalem’s Old City became the center of controversy Tuesday when Abraham Lehrer, Vice President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, abruptly left after the presiding bishop accused Israel of genocide against Palestinians.

Lehrer, part of a high-profile delegation from North Rhine-Westphalia visiting Israel to advocate for a Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial in their state, departed the service at the Redeemer’s Church after Bishop Ibrahim Azar’s controversial sermon delivered in Arabic with translation services provided.

“The translation said in English ‘genocide,’ in German ‘genocide’ – when I read that, I couldn’t stay,” Lehrer explained to German media outlets following the incident. Lehrer, whose mother survived the Auschwitz concentration camp, immediately took a taxi back to his hotel and skipped the congregation’s reception afterward.

Bishop Azar, who leads the Evangelical Church in Jordan and the Holy Land, made several pointed statements in his sermon, including references to “two years of genocide” against Palestinians. He also criticized Israeli checkpoints in Judea and Samaria and spoke of “falsely imprisoned people,” while notably omitting any mention of the October 7 Hamas attack, Israeli hostages, or recent reports of Gaza civilians killed by Hamas.

“When the international community ignores Palestinian suffering, that is a call for reformation,” Azar said in his sermon. “When the dominant global narrative dehumanizes the Palestinians and ignores the Palestinian Christians’ existence, that is a call for reformation.”

The incident has sparked significant media coverage in Germany, with widespread criticism directed at the Protestant Church. Other members of the North Rhine-Westphalia delegation, including State Parliament President André Kuper, Antisemitism Commissioner Sylvia Löhrmann, and Westphalian Evangelical Lutheran Church President Adelheid Ruck-Schröder, remained for the service but departed the reception early.

The controversy extended beyond Azar’s sermon. During the service, prayers were also offered in French for the release of “all prisoners in Israeli prisons,” which reportedly included imprisoned Hamas terrorists, according to a worshipper who spoke with the prayer leader afterward.

Bishop Azar’s church, founded by German missionaries in the 19th century, continues to receive substantial financial support from Germany. He has a history of strong criticism toward Israel, including a July statement accusing the Israeli government of using starvation as a “weapon of ethnic cleansing” against Palestinians. Azar is also reportedly a leader of the EAPPI program, which sends international activists to Judea and Samaria where confrontations with Israeli soldiers are common.

Danny Orbach, a military historian and associate professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, strongly contested Azar’s characterization of the situation in Gaza as genocide. “The situation in Gaza is as far away from genocide as possible,” Orbach stated. He argued that in historical cases of genocide, perpetrators aim to maximize civilian casualties, whereas Israel has “sacrificed important military advantage in order to spare civilians.”

Orbach pointed to Israeli bombing patterns as evidence, noting that the military conducted numerous small, focused attacks rather than large-scale bombardments that would have caused far more civilian casualties. He also cited Gaza Health Ministry data showing disproportionate casualties among fighting-age men compared to their share of the general population.

“This is not true morality. This is perverse morality that incentivizes the likes of Hamas to hide even more behind civilians,” Orbach stated, while acknowledging the “enormous human toll” and suffering in Gaza.

The controversy extends to Bishop Azar’s daughter, Sally Azar, also employed by the Protestant Church. She recently faced criticism for leading a workshop at the German Protestant Church Assembly where a map reportedly showed Israeli cities listed only by their Arabic names, with Tel Aviv missing entirely. On October 7, 2023, the day of the Hamas attack, she posted “Gaza just broke out of prison” on Instagram, which many interpreted as endorsing the attack.

The incident highlights ongoing tensions surrounding the Israel-Gaza conflict and its representation within religious institutions that maintain connections to both communities.