When i checked again the statement by the group has been updated, now using the term freezing in the bold part of the statement:

Berliner Sparkasse freezes Jewish Voice account

You are right that there could be a legal confusion around the term confiscation and the statement was updated probably to reflect the point you made about the legal meaning.

In the common usage both in English and German the term is broader what i argued for.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confiscation

Confiscation (from the Latin confiscatio “to consign to the fiscus, i.e. transfer to the treasury”) is a legal form of seizure by a government or other public authority. The word is also used, popularly, of spoliation under legal forms, or of any seizure of property as punishment or in enforcement of the law.

EDIT: The following is only referring to the usage in common used language. The legal distinction is as pointed out by @geissi@feddit.de and freezing in legal terms is different from confiscation.

The factual control over that property is taken away from the owner. That is confiscation (in the common used language not in legal terms). For any physical property that term is used directly in that sense. The term “freezing” for bank accounts has established in that sector but it remains valid to speak of confiscation as the factual control over that asset is seized from the owner.(in the common used language not in legal terms) For that is is irrespective of whether the recognized ownership has changed. I.e. if a police officer takes all the money out of your wallet and puts it in a safe at the police station it still has been confiscated from you, even if he gives you a letter stating it is still your money. You are denied access to it, until some decision has been reached by someone.

The only legal distinction here is that the bank is a regulated private or in this case public entity that is legally seperate from the executive, whereas the police is a direct executive organ.

At the time there was no news article available.

EDIT: the following only applies to the usage of the term in common language. It is not accurate in the legal sense, where the term has a distinctly different meaning from the term freezing A bank account being frozen can be referred to as confiscation though. It means that you loose the factual control over your property. When a teacher confiscates the phones of students to give them back at the end of the school day. Or when police confiscates all your electronics in a criminal investigation, only to give them back month later.

It is true that there currently is not the level of permanence that the term can also include. However it means that the organization is unable to operate and there is strong reason to believe their stance that this is done for politican reasons just shortly before they want to hold a conference.

For context, the Berliner Sparkasse is a subsidiary bank of the Landesbank Berlin. It used to be owned by the state of Berlin but has been sold to the group of Sparkassen in 2007 to deal with the states debt. It is therefore owned by a few hundred state and muncipality banks.

The bank is in full public ownership. The government of the state of Berlin can remove members of the executive board at any time if it sees the banks actions in violation of any law. There is also an advisory board that is appointed by the state government and members can be removed from the advisory board at any time, without any specified reasons in the law.

The bank is publicly owned and subject to possible direct intereference by the state government of Berlin, which has been particularly strongly cracking down on peace activists including arrests of jewish activists for peace and bans of demonstrations by jewish peace organizations such as the Jewish Voice for Peace in the first month after Hamas attacked Israel on 07. October.

Considering not even the openly neonazi AfD are classified as extremist

except in many cases they are, and except the fact that this should be ringing alarm bells when left leaning organizations are targeted by the government. Taking their tax exempt status, like it was done with the VVN is a death sentence to non profit organizations.

Also how do you want to get peer reviewed studies about something that is happening right now and in that extent and with that attention since six months?

They can and will lose their tax exempt status or have it threatened if the government argues them to believe “extremist” for which false allegations would be an indication.

Losing the tax exempt status based on broad allegations have happened to the VVN-BdA the Association of people persecuted by the nazi regime, federation of antifascists. Based on it being mentioned in the “constitution protection report” of the interior intelligence in Bavaria the finance office of Berlin has revoked its tax exempt status in 2019. The organization was targeted as “leftist extremists” as they have a decisive anti-fascist stance, given that the organization has been founded by Holocaust survivors and their descendants are organized in it.

https://taz.de/Aberkennung-der-VVN-Gemeinnuetzigkeit/!5645383/

https://taz.de/VVN-BdA-wieder-voll-gemeinnuetzig/!5768978/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrest

An arrest is the act of apprehending and taking a person into custody (legal protection or control), usually because the person has been suspected of or observed committing a crime. After being taken into custody, the person can be questioned further and/or charged. An arrest is a procedure in a criminal justice system, sometimes it is also done after a court warrant for the arrest.

I think you might confuse it with detention, where the police would keep you in jail for a limited time.

As for who and what, from the article:

The officer who briefly removed Kalinowska from the protest told Al Jazeera that there was no formal list or any particular guidelines to follow.

“Really, I just use my intuition,” he said. “If I see something I think is bad, we go and get it.”

And this is indivative of the wider problem here. Police can harass and attack protests without having to uphold a legal standard. So even if there is no legal basis to what they do, just storming into the protest and dragging someone out is used as an intimidation and punishment without crime tactic. It is always a violent act where not only the person apprehended, but also the protestors around them are physically attacked.

https://twitter.com/derJamesJackson/status/1741488229201658142

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/10/germany-gaza-protests-crackdown

The problem is that German mainstream media is not covering these topics and had a ridicilous pro Israel bias until the last few weeks since it becomes impossible to ignore the deliberate starvation of people in Gaza and the continued genocidal rethoric of the Israeli government in regards to invading Rafah.

So you think the pictures and videos that show the speaking activist being detained by the Police have been staged with the police? You think that recognised organizations who rely on their tax exemption would make false allegations against the government that could deny their tax exempt status and practically kill their work through that?

There will be no two state solution, waiting for Israel to come back to the negotiation table. Israel has jeopardized any process towards a peaceful solution since Yitzak Rabin was murdered by a Likud fanatic.

This is the only way we can move forward. The world needs to recognise Palestine without waiting for the US and Israel. This is the only way to bring peace and safety to Palestinians and Israelis alike.

But in that complexity it is also not yet clear, if the attack was an actual hate crime, with the goal to harm the victim because he is jewish.

They can’t expel people for things they do off campus. That is true. However it also shouldn’t be the case, as we had our wave of “red scare” persecutions of people in the 70s, destroying peoples lives based on often farbicated charges against people who were considered “too left”.

Denying people access to education based on criminal charges is a slippery slope and in the current environment it is likely, that these will solely be used for political persecution.

Also it should be noted that the claim, that the attack was bigotry related is made by the victim and his supporters, with the victim having a history of violently engaging pro palestinian protestors on campus, ripping off posters that remembered killed palestinian women and children and repeatedly demanded all pro palestinian voices to be banned from campus.

The police didnt classify it as a hate crime so far and the claims of it being a hate crime are made on the allegation that jewishness and pro-israel and pro-zionism stances are identical. (Which is in itself antisemtic and used to repress jewish people in Germany who are critical of zionism)

For repression in Berlin in general:

https://jewishcurrents.org/an-anti-palestinian-crackdown-across-europe

Open letter of Jewish people condemning the supression by the German government, German and English Version:

https://taz.de/Offener-Brief-juedischer-Intellektueller/!5965154/

https://www.nplusonemag.com/online-only/online-only/freedom-for-the-one-who-thinks-differently/

Recent arrest of jewish activists for peace, German and English version:

https://www.juedische-stimme.de/stellungnahme-einer-jüdischen-stimme-aktivistin-nach-ihrer-verhaftung-bei-einer-demo

https://www.theleftberlin.com/police-brutality-at-palestine-solidarity-sit-in/

The victim in that assault case has been shoving and grabbing students at the university before. That is of course much less severe than how he was beaten up, but in that discussion about throwing out students for violent behaviour that was conveniently ignored.

The whole discussion only started when he was attacked and it was about denying education to pro Palestinian and in particular Arab and other migrant sudents. It was headed among others by the racist major of Berlin (major in this case is also the head of the state government) who just a year ago won an election on the grounds of demanding police to release the names of suspect teenagers. This demand was made so the public could decide based on the names, if those suspects were “real Germans” instead of maybe “foreigners with a German passport”. This is far-right nationalist ideology and primitive racism.

So it is clear what goals are aimed at with the demand to throw students out of universities if they are suspect of a crime. If it would be put in place it would be used to remove “foreigners” from universities, not to remove “good kids who have made a mistake”.

Who wants peace needs to bring justice. This result, while unfortunate was entirely predictable.

And by illegaly cracking down on demonstrations and other forms of democratic discourse, western governments knowingly galvanise further.

The UK thought it was getting a poor deal, when it had the most exceptions in the EU. It will still need another generation or two for the UK to realise that it is not the old empire anymore.

This is wrong. Germany is not calling for a ceasefire since december. Germany is calling for “humanitarian fire pauses”. When asked by journalists in the governmental press conference about three times a week the goverment keeps speaking about a “humantarian fire pause” “humanitäre Feuerpause” and is explicitly rejecting the word “ceasefire” “Waffenstillstand”. The goal of the German government remains set on Israel being able to continueing attacking Gaza militarily.

Dont let some english analysis tell you otherwise when the primary source, the german government itself is openly rejecting the word ceasefire. Even after the massacre on the 29th February, the German government remains to reject the word ceasefire.

Government Press conference 01.03.24

In the press conference on 12.03.2024 the German government again repeated that they believe Israel to be fully abiding by international law. Only in this press conference they are not talking about a “Feuerpause” but “Waffenpause” which could be understood as a ceasefire, but leaves wiggle room continue fighting after the “pause”. This is distinctly different from a “Waffenstillstand”, where “stillstand” translates more to a full halt.

Meanwhile the German economy needs a migration of an extra 400.000 working age people to maintain its workforce and not have the economy shrink because of lacking workers. The effect is even more severe for the health insurance and pension insurance as their costs grow while income shrinks from people retiring.

EDIT: The 400.000 extra immigrants need to be there every year. So 4.000.000 people over the next decade.

Germany is not drawing a line. Germany continues to provide military aid to Israel as well as allow for weapons exports to Israel.

German shells are being used to kill civillians in Gaza. This is so far the same lip-service to the humanitarian situation that the German government is giving since months, while aiding Israel in its genocide against the Palestinians.

This probably now comes as the German government sees itself at risk to face consequences at the ICJ. Germany continues to refuse taking any tangible actions to pressure Israel into not commiting further crimes against humanity.

This is not true. Germany remains reluctant to call for a ceasefire. At least until past week they have demanded “humanitarian fire pauses”, so a continuation of Israeli attacks as long as some food is distributed.

Germany has immediately attacked South Africas charge at the ICJ, discredeting South Africas position minutes after the first hearing ended. So at a time where it was impossible to actually have worked through it.

The government is asked since at least three months, if Israel isnt going to far. The German government repeatedly rejected that repeating time and time again, that Israel has the right to defend itself and that Hamas is solely responsible for the situation of the people in Gaza.

What we see now is nothing but a continuation of that same lip service. Because also since months the government is asked, if the strategy of providing further military aid and allow for more weapons exports while just telling Israel to “do more” for the humanitarian situation, is apparently ineffective. This also kept being rejected by the government.

Finally the German government is complicit in attacking UNRWA based on the claims Israel brought the day of the ICJ preliminary ruling. Despite there being no evidence brought forth by Israel to this day, the German government was eager to be Israels lap-dog immediately cancelling all future funding of UNRWA