By COLlive reporter
Germany’s newly elected President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, one of the country’s most popular politicians, is being called a “good friend” by more than one Chabad rabbi.
Chosen by the Federal Assembly meeting in parliament in Berlin, the post is largely ceremonial, but the president represents Germany abroad and is seen as carrying moral weight, the BBC reported.
Steinmeier, a Social Democrat who served as Germany’s foreign minister, has developed a close bond with rabbis and Jewish community officials at home and abroad.
Rabbi Shmuel Kaminetzky, Chief Rabbi of the Dnepr city in Ukraine, recalls how Steinmeier visited his community and was given a tour of the world-renowned Jewish community complex, the Menorah Centre.
It was in June 2015 and Steinmeier came to the Golden Rose Synagogue on Sholom Aleichem street. He was warmly greeted and then treated to a beautiful Shabbos lunch. He said he was deeply touched by the hospitality.
“We wish our dear friend Frank Steinmeier lots of success in his new position,” Rabbi Kaminetzky said this week. “We hope that with his wisdom and special talents, he can help not only Germany, but Ukraine as well, and to strengthen the European and Euro-Atlantic unity.”
A source in the Dnepr Jewish community said Steinmeier has worked together with Rabbi Kaminetzky many times, “aiding the Jewish community Dnepropetrovsk and Ukraine at large in various matters.”
At home, Steinmeier has participated “numerous times.. in Jewish events across the entire spectrum,” said Rabbi Yehuda Teichtal, Director of Chabad Berlin and a Rabbi of the Jewish community in Germany’s capital.
Speaking to the Jerusalem Post on Thursday, Teichtal described Steinmeier as a “uniter” and someone who “has always expressed a warm, positive approach, not just of reconciliation to the Jewish community, but also of a present and future active Jewish life.”
Steinmeier has spoken up for the Jewish and other religious communities in practical ways, pushing forward a law to permit religious circumcision when the issue was in the spotlight four years ago, the Post wrote.
“Remembering is one thing, it’s something else when a politician stands up for the present and future active Jewish community,” Teichtal commented. For Steinmeier, he said, “It’s not just official – like many politicians – but it’s real.”
