Right to return

We report this week on a loophole which denies German citizenship to some Jewish descendants of refugees from the Nazis if their qualifying ancestor was female. Under the law, which stems from the 1930s, no one born before 1953 can have their German citizenship returned unless their father was a German citizen. We use the word “returned” advisedly because it was the Nazis who took away their families’ citizenship. Those who now wish to become German citizens are asking for nothing more than this most basic of reparations. Successive German governments have done much in this sphere. Until recently, there have been very few applicants and this loophole went almost unnoticed. But with Brexit, and fears over a possible Corbyn government, the numbers applying have risen sharply; there are now thought to be more than a hundred British Jews affected. It is not so much ironic as obscene that the descendants of the victims of the Nazis are themselves now being denied citizenship by the very same law that was in place when their ancestors were forced to forgo their German citizenship. The German government must right this wrong.