Police investigate after Berlin culture senator’s home attacked with red paint

Berlin police said they are investigating a paint attack on the home of the Berlin culture senator, Joe Chialo, that took place in the night of 22-23 September.

Photos on social media showed the house, in the Pankow district, covered with red paint and the words “genocide Joe Chialo”. The senator has come under fire from artists and pro-Palestinian factions because of his insistence last year that recipients of Berlin state arts funding sign an antisemitism clause in grant contracts. The clause was dropped a month later.

Chialo also raised ire among pro-Palestinian groups with his decision to withdraw funding for the cultural centre Oyoun. The senate has accused Oyoun of antisemitism; Oyoun has denied the allegations and is challenging the funding withdrawal in a lengthy court procedure.

Earlier this month, around 40 pro-Palestinian activists verbally insulted and tried to attack Chialo at the reopening of the Centre for Art and Urban Studies in central Berlin. After police intervention, he was able to leave unhurt, according to a report in the regional daily Tagesspiegel newspaper.

The attack on Chialo’s home has been met with widespread condemnation. “I am deeply shaken by the criminal verbal and physical abuse against the Berlin culture senator Joe Chialo for his courageous battle against antisemitism,” Felix Klein, the federal government official in charge of fighting antisemitism, told the RND news service. “The paint attack on his home oversteps another boundary and requires a firm response from the state.”

Chialo introduced the anti-discrimination clause into funding agreements last year, requiring recipients to declare they oppose “any form of antisemitism according to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism.”

The senate dropped the policy, however, just over a month after it was introduced, after fierce criticism from artists. Those artists said that the clause amounted to a restriction on the freedom of art.

In an interview with the daily Süddeutsche Zeitung yesterday, Chialo said the paint attack was “to me a symbol of how broken social discourse has become” and “a signal from a radicalised group that is trying to push through its causes with violence.” He said he is worried for his family and that the police have decided he needs personal protection to carry out his work.

Chialo told the Süddeutsche that he interpreted the text “Meet the demands” daubed on his home as a threat that the senate should provide renewed funding for Oyoun or “we will cause problems,” he said.

“Of course I am not going to cave in to blackmail,” he said.