A public high school in Berlin has come under fire for allegedly requiring its pupils to attend a Muslim celebration on the occasion of Ramadan.
Students of the Carl Zuckmayer school have received an “invitation to Iftar” on March 28 from 5:30pm to 8pm. Iftar is the evening meal with which Muslims break their fast during Ramadan, the Muslim month of daytime fasting and nighttime feasting.
This year Iftar runs from the evening February 28 to March 30.
The invitation was sent out to the students in a seventh-year class, typically attended 13 to 14-year-olds. The students’ parents were informed that the gathering was mandatory as it replaced other lessons cancelled for the Iftar celebration.
Students were also informed that they should bring something to eat according to a list published by the school.
Entsetzlich, was diese Berliner Schule da veranstaltet. Weihnachten, St. Martin, Ostern, all das wird nicht gefeiert und man beruft sich auf die Neutralität der Schule, obwohl auch im Grundgesetz (Präambel) der christliche Gott erwähnt wird. Als Liberaler wünsche ich mir weniger… pic.twitter.com/5DPBvghR3H
— Tobias Huch (@TobiasHuch) March 13, 2025
The celebration call was made public by the father of one of the students of the class who passed the letter on to German tabloid Bild.
The man, who did not want to be identified, told journalists: “Christmas is not celebrated at the school, neither is Easter. There are no mandatory celebrations of any German Christian holiday. But for Ramadan our children have to step up. Where do we live?”
The district of Neukölln where the school is located has a strong Muslim population, predominantly of Turkish and Arab backgrounds.
As of June 2024, almost 60,000 out of the area’s 160,000 inhabitants were non-Germans. According to some estimates, Muslims made up around 25 per cent of the population.
A spokesperson for the Berlin City Government said State-run schools there had to respect neutrality requirements including not forcing students to attend any religious event.
“After talking to school supervisors and the school itself it has clarified that attendance of the [Iftar] event was explicitly voluntary,” the spokesperson said.
Ahmad Mansour, a German-Israeli psychologist of Arab descent and prominent critic of radical Islam, wrote on X on March 13 that, while it was understandable that a school with many Muslim students would organise a Ramadan celebration, it was important that participation was voluntary.
He claimed that in such schools there was often social pressure put on non-Muslim and non-fasting pupils to adhere to Islamic rules.
Muslim fasting practices during Ramadan have been increasingly affecting public education in Germany and Austria.
In Vienna, a teachers’ union recently sounded the alarm over what more and ever younger children forced to deprive themselves of food or drink, with some children almost fainting during the school day.
