Six weeks ago, a little-known politician in Germany made a little-noticed speech. This morning, the same politician is likely to be expelled from the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) for the same speech which has been headline news for the last two weeks, writes Derek Scally
With the expulsion of Mr Martin Hohmann, CDU leaders hope to draw a line under an extraordinary scandal but are unlikely to succeed: the Hohmann affair touches on fundamental issues in post-war German society and raises serious questions about Germany's conservatives.
Mr Hohmann argued in his speech that the logic that has branded Germans "perpetrators" of mass murder because of the Holocaust could be used to brand Jews "perpetrators" of mass murder because of the participation of Trotsky and other Jews in the Russian Revolution. Mr Hohmann then argued that both Jews and Germans were innocent and that the real perpetrators were, in both cases, minorities who had turned their backs on their religion.
His argument mirrored a favoured Nazi justification for the Holocaust: revenge for the "Jewish-Bolshevik world conspiracy". And so, a German politician echoed the words of Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, and none of the 120 people listening batted an eyelid. The speech only came to light a month later when a woman in the US found it on the Internet and sent it to a German television station.
The first reaction of CDU leaders when the scandal broke was merely to slap Mr Hohmann's wrists, give him one last chance, and issue a statement saying they distanced themselves totally from his remarks.
But the CDU made a serious error of judgment in hoping it would all blow over. It miscalculated badly the anger of ordinary Germans, the Jewish community, the Israeli ambassador, not to mention the enthusiasm of the government to get the boot in, thrilled that the spotlight was off it for the first time in months.
CDU sources say the party leader, Ms Angela Merkel, was prepared to expel Mr Hohmann a week ago, but was persuaded to hold off by senior party officials. They were concerned an expulsion vote would divide the party, give oxygen to Hohmann sympathisers, and perhaps even result in the leadership failing to get the two thirds majority needed, a disastrous political scenario.
On Monday, 11 days after the scandal broke, the CDU leadership began expulsion proceedings. But by waiting so long the CDU has gambled away its credibility and party leaders have left themselves open to the valid criticism that they reacted to the public reaction and not to the dangerous remarks themselves.
Jewish leaders in Germany say today's expulsion vote is "late but not too late". It is a belated chance for CDU MPs to show they can distinguish between conservatism and right-wing extremism.
Mr Hohmann wasn't able to distinguish between the two in his groundless claims that there was a Jewish domination of post-Tsarist Russia. Indeed casting Jews and Bolsheviks into the same pot as he did is classic Goebbels. As one historian pointed out earlier this week, calling Jews a "people of perpetrators" because of the role of Trotsky and others in the Russian Revolution makes as much sense as calling all Georgians perpetrators because of Josef Stalin and the countrymen he appointed around him.
Mr Hohmann was called a "right-wing extremist", "deluded" and a "religious fundamentalist" by CDU members around the Reichstag this week, but few wanted to admit that party leaders had overlooked similar remarks from him in the past.
His October speech was an attempt to pull the moral ground out from under Jews by pointing out that they were once not always victims and that the Jewish people were also once perpetrators. Because today's descendants of Holocaust survivors are living monuments to German guilt, Mr Hohmann tried to tar the victims as perpetrators so that Germans aren't quite so alone in the history books.
It is not just a German phenomenon, but one which can be seen all over the world in the oft-heard criticism that the Israeli government is "no better than the Nazis".
Mr Hohmann's parting shot, that he "spoke for many Germans", is as off the mark as the amateur history lesson.
No other country in the world has done as much to atone for its past as Germany, a fact alluded to by Jewish leaders here even during the height of the Hohmann affair. No other country in the world does as much to combat extreme right groups and propaganda. Sadly, there are still isolated attacks with anti-Semitic overtones and swastikas are still occasionally sprayed onto walls and gravestones. But fears of a creeping "latent anti-Semitism" in German society are unfounded.
That was the suggestion of a survey by the American Jewish Committee a year ago. Yet when asked if they thought Jews had too much influence in German life, more than half of Germans disagreed, more than a fifth didn't know, and 20 per cent agreed.
Only 17 per cent of those surveyed said they would rather not have Jewish neighbours, while nearly 70 per cent said they would have a problem with African or Arab neighbours. Mr Hohmann's remarks were a low point in an otherwise useful debate about the suffering of some Germans in the second World War.
The taboo-breaking discussion about Germans who died during the mass expulsions from the east or the firebomb attack on Dresden is important, timely and right. The danger lies when someone like Mr Hohmann tries to relativise German responsibility or to say all forms of suffering were the same.
Germany remains a country with a clear understanding of its collective responsibility never to forget. Mr Hohmann's remarks have no place in this country. Today's vote is a chance for the CDU to atone for its mistake of putting political consequences above moral responsibility.
A clear vote to expel Mr Hohmann from the party will show German voters and the wider world that anti-Semitism has no place in German public life. Anything less than a decisive vote will raise more questions than it answers.