“We soon realised that 
the GDR wasn’t hostile at all”

Avi Primor – Israeli diplomat and journalist

“On the one hand people were glad about the fall of the Wall, but on the other they were wondering what sort of Germany they would get now. Some even talked about the threat of a “Fourth Reich“. From 1952 onwards, we very tentatively, very grad­ually – and, to begin with, reluctantly – established 
relations with the Federal Republic, and contrary to all expectations they developed surprisingly well. Now another part of Germany was to be added to the equation, one that was particularly hostile towards Israel. That all proved unimportant because we soon realised that the GDR wasn’t hostile 
at all. That was just official policy, it in no way 
applied to people generally.”

Excerpt from an interview with the Tagesspiegel newspaper