I’m applying for German renationalisation. Like other British Jews, Brexit has put my safety in danger

We won’t even be close to becoming German by 29 March, but what’s driving me is the same reason my family became British in the 1930s: survival

It was during the 2016 referendum campaign that my family first realised we could restore our German citizenship, thus retaining our freedom of movement in Europe. The application seemed a bit of a faff, and not many people knew of our family’s refugee history. Adopting a new nationality had seemed ridiculous; we didn’t speak German, hadn’t lived in Germany for generations, and our family had fled in terror from the Nazis.

Fleeing to the UK in 1936, my great-grandparents Wolfgang and Lotte Krebs and their young son Peter were stateless for over a decade. First applying for British nationalisation in 1941 they were denied citizenship for 11 years, instead relying on short-term promises by the government and their employer to be able to stay living in Ipswich, where Wolf was an electrical engineer.

White privilege and the model minority trope meant Wolf and Lotte could more easily assimilate to British culture than refugees and migrant people of colour. Lotte would tell friends that she picked up her Germanic accent whilst travelling the continent. Both Lotte and Wolf, who practised liberal Judaism in Germany, became secular on British soil.