Israel bars German author over poem critical of its nuclear arsenal [View all]

Source: McClatchy

JERUSALEM — Israel's interior minister declared the celebrated German author Gunter Grass "persona non grata" on Sunday, barring his entry to the country, in response to a new poem in which the Nobel laureate called Israel's undeclared nuclear arsenal a threat to world peace.

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Grass's poem, titled "What Must Be Said," was published in the German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung, provoking Israeli condemnations and criticism in Germany, where the memory of the Holocaust constrains public debate about Israel and infuses the complex relationship between the two countries.

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The Israeli Embassy in Berlin branded Grass's poem anti-Semitic, saying that its publication before the Jewish Passover holiday, "belongs to European tradition to accuse the Jews of ritual murder before the Passover celebration."

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle wrote in a commentary Sunday in the Bild am Sonntag newspaper that "putting Israel and Iran on the same moral level is...absurd," adding that Germany has an "historic responsibility" toward Israel.

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Read more: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/04/08/3542989/israel-bars-german-author-over.html