There’s something quietly revolutionary about paperwork. It rarely makes headlines or history books. But every so often, a bureaucratic act reveals a moral frontier. Because citizenship isn’t just about where you live. It’s about what you’re willing to live for — and what you’re prepared to stand against. That’s what happened last week in Berlin, when the German government revoked the citizenship of a man named Abdallah A., a naturalized Palestinian-German who used his new German identity to glorify Hamas’s October 7 atrocities , the deadliest mass killing of Jews since the Holocaust. His Instagram stories praised the attacks as heroic, sanctified the gunmen as martyrs, and circulated celebratory footage of the carnage. The message was clear: if you celebrate the slaughter of civilians in the name of jihad, you don’t get to carry our passport.. This wasn’t theater. It wasn’t symbolic. It was a line in the sand, drawn not in outrage, but in moral resolution. And it’s exactly the kind of line the United States still refuses to draw, at least not yet. Nine months into Donald Trump’s second term, the administration has moved aggressively on border enforcement, visa scrutiny, and immigration controls. Visa-holders who glorify terror have been deported. Foreign students caught amplifying Hamas propaganda have had their status revoked. No complaints here , it’s overdue. But when it comes to naturalized citizens like Abdallah A., we haven’t yet taken the next step: revoking citizenship from those who use it to shield allegiance to the enemies of democracy. Germany just did. And we should pay attention. Abdallah’s Instagram posts weren’t vague. They weren’t about policy or solidarity. They were straight-up odes to mass murder. He called the killings of Israeli civilians “resistance,” praised the Hamas gunmen as “martyrs,” and wrapped it all in the familiar aesthetic of radical chic — keffiyehs, slogans, and martyr memes masquerading as activism. Germany didn’t blink. The government — led by a center-left coalition, no less — moved to strip him of citizenship and deport him. Their reasoning? You can’t glorify terror and call yourself part of a constitutional democracy. At some point, the moral contract dissolves, and the passport no longer applies. And here’s the kicker: they’re right. Because citizenship is not a participation trophy. It’s not an identity badge you get to flash no matter what you say or do. It’s a contract — reciprocal, binding, and real. And when that contract is broken in public, with intent and clarity, the state has a right to walk away. Germany has had good reason to start drawing these lines. In the year following Hamas’s October 7 pogrom, the country experienced a dramatic rise in antisemitic incidents and threats to Jewish institutions. Jewish homes, schools and synagogues faced bomb threats, vandalism, and even firebombings. In Berlin, two Arab men hurled Molotov cocktails at a synagogue within days of the massacre. By 2025, German authorities had arrested multiple Hamas-linked suspects, including three men in Berlin in October accused of plotting attacks on Jewish institutions. Police recovered weapons, including an AK-47 and explosives, suggesting an imminent plan for mass violence. That was only the latest in a string of plots. In early 2024, four Hamas operatives were caught planning operations tied to arms caches in Poland. According to Der Spiegel, German authorities believe Hamas has been laying the groundwork for its first European attacks. Faced with mounting threats, Germany responded with unprecedented force. It banned Hamas and the activist group Samidoun outright in November 2023. It passed new laws criminalizing support for terror organizations and barred public use of the slogan “From the river to the sea,” now officially deemed incitement. It didn’t stop there. Germany rewrote parts of its immigration and naturalization rules. In 2024, two states began requiring that applicants for citizenship affirm Israel’s right to exist, in handwriting. The message is unambiguous: you can’t reject the principles of the German state and expect its full embrace. And that’s the paradigm shift Abdallah A. now embodies. He’s not just a case study. He’s a signal — the first in what may become a larger turning of the tide, a recalibration of Western liberalism’s boundaries. Germany has decided that celebrating the murder of civilians , especially Jews — is incompatible with citizenship. America should take note. Yes, we have stronger free-speech protections than Germany. And no, we should not start punishing people for chants alone. But there’s a difference between dissent and betrayal. Between protest and open allegiance to a group like Hamas. Germany sees it. So should we. Because citizenship isn’t just about where you live. It’s about what you’re willing to live for — and what you’re prepared to stand against. That’s the line. Abdallah crossed it. Germany responded. And now, the United States must decide whether its moral compass still points true. READ MORE from Kevin Cohen: Poland’s Fusion of Hard Borders and Human Duty The Business of Borders: The Economy of Virtue The Geography of Defiance