Why I wear 🍉

My decision to wear a watermelon sticker on the Spiel des Jahres (SdJ) stage on Sunday was to show solidarity with Palestinian civilians.

The watermelon is a symbol of Palestinian resilience in the face of decades of oppression. I bought the sticker from Wear The Peace, an organisation that donates 100% of their profits to humanitarian aid.

I acknowledge the current and historical context that has led to SdJ as a German institution to respond with heightened sensitivity to allegations of antisemitism. I take those allegations very seriously.

However, debating the shape of the sticker and pushing for an antisemitic interpretation is a distraction. Instead, I want to draw attention to the reality of thousands of Palestinian people who are being wiped off the map, and are in dire need of humanitarian and medical services.

No human being or group of people should be erased because of their ethnicity, religion or nationality. I hope we can all agree on that.

All humans deserve peace and justice. I believe this won’t be possible until the end of what the International Court of Justice has recently defined as unlawful occupation. What we can do as citizens of Western nations is to put pressure on our governments to take responsibility for their historical role in this injustice, and end our complicity with their funding and enabling of war crimes.

These actions and views are entirely my own, and do not necessarily reflect those of anyone else involved with Daybreak / e-Mission.