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Month: February 2024

Four Years since the Hanau Massacre

As the anniversary of the racist terror attack approaches, serious questions remain unanswered and the far-right continues to surge


14/02/2024

On February 19, 2020 nine people were shot and killed by a neo-Nazi in the German city of Hanau: Ferhat Unvar, Hamza Kurtović, Said Nesar Hashemi, Vili-Viorel Păun, Mercedes Kierpacz, Kaloyan Velkov, Fatih Saraçoğlu, Sedat Gürbüz and Gökhan Gülteki.

The perpetrator had expressed extreme hatred of foreigners, women, muslims, and jews in posts online. He carefully chose the locations, a shisha bar and a betting shop, to target people with a migration background, who he believed should be ‘completely exterminated’ from Germany.

Deadly Failings

In the four years since the attack a series of investigations has uncovered major failings in the authorities’ response. Initiative 19. Februar Hanau, a group representing survivors and victims’ families, has questioned why after identifying the perpetrator, it took the police five hours to arrive at his nearby home. And why, after they finally did arrive outside the house, they claimed not to hear gunshots when the perpetrator shot his mother and then himself.

There are many more serious questions. The perpetrator was known to the police but never had his gun licences revoked. Emergency calls on the night went unanswered. Families were not properly informed of their relatives’ deaths, and autopsies were performed without their permission. They have subsequently faced countless indignities including delays in financial support and continued racist harassment from the perpetrator’s father.

A year later it was revealed that 13 of the police officers working in Hanau that night had been subsequently suspended for being part of racist, far-right group chats.

We can never know to what extent far-right sympathies combined with institutional discrimination, incompetence and apathy determined the course of what happened that night, and the response that followed but as Dimitra Andritsou from research collective Forensis, summarised: “Much like the shots around the perpetrator’s house, the state’s refusal to hear — on the night of the crime, and for many years afterwards — is a political choice, and indicative of deeply entrenched racist structures within the German state.”

Dangerous Rhetoric

Despite the shock and outrage expressed by German politicians and media outlets at the time, there has been a continual normalisation of extreme right-wing views in the years since the attack. Mainstream parties, including the governing Social Democrats, have increasingly taken on xenophobic talking points. In October chancellor Olaf Scholz appeared on the front cover of magazine Der Spiegel alongside a quote from his interview: “We must finally deport people on a large scale”. As austerity policies begin to take hold, and the German economy dips into recession, the ground is ripe for scapegoating immigrants and other minority groups.

The far-right, anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD), some of whose leading members have called for an end to commemoration of the holocaust, has been comfortably polling as the second most popular party, at around 20% for months now. The opposition CDU has also begun to break the long held taboo of cooperation with the AfD, voting with them on both a local and state level.

The past decades have seen dozens of neo-Nazi attacks and murders in Germany, and these incidents are on the rise. There have also been numerous revelations of far-right networks made up of police and members of the military. Like the families of Hanau, many of the targets of these terror attacks have experienced a serious mishandling of their cases by authorities.

The recent revelations of a meeting between senior AfD members, business leaders and neo-Nazi groups to plan large-scale deportations of immigrants have been met with huge protests across Germany. There has also been widespread condemnation from mainstream parties. But these statements feel hollow when politicians readily take on anti-immigration talking points and have made few serious attempts to tackle structural racism. Lip service is paid but policies and language often tell a different story.

Memorial Events

There are many events planned in the coming days across Germany to commemorate the nine who lost their lives in Hanau and to call for serious action on structural racism and extremist groups. A statement from Initiative 19. Februar has called for people to come together, support each other, and to demand proper investigations into right-wing murders and violence.

In Hanau a memorial demonstration will take place on Saturday 17th February at 14:00.

In Berlin there are two events planned on Monday 19th February:

oplatz4hanau

17:00 – 19:00 at Oranienplatz, Kreuzberg. More information here.

Vier Jahre Hanau – Die Konsequenz ist Widerstand

Memorial at 17:30 and march at 19:00 starting at S-Bahn Sonnenalle, Neukölln. More information here.

Hanau demo call 2024 – The consequence is resistance. Migrantifa now!

Don’t Forgive, Don’t Forget


Monday, 19th February 2024 – 4 Years Hanau. 5,30pm Commemoration, 7pm Demonstration- S-Bahn Sonnenallee

4 years ago, a right-wing extremist known to the police shot 9 young people in Hanau out of racist fantasies of extermination. Gökhan Gültekin, Sedat Gürbüz, Said Nesar Hashemi, Mercedes Kierpacz, Hamza Kurtović, Vili Viorel Păun, Fatih Saraçoğlu, Ferhat Unvar and Kaloyan Velkov. The German state and this society did not stop him. On the contrary: German society, the inflammatory media and the openly inhumane asylum policy and German Leitkultur of recent decades have created the breeding ground for an act that was brutal and shocking – but could and will happen again at any time. Dignity, equality, the fight against the right?

Not a chance. Scapegoats, projection surfaces, targets. Foreigners out, foreigners in, depending on what suits the market – and in between: Foreigners dead. The so-called failure of the authorities is not a failure – everything works exactly as it should. Just not for us, but against us. We know that. Racism is a reason of state. The consequence is resistance. Migrantifa now!

Racist normality

„Clan criminality“, tightening of asylum laws, raids on shisha bars, „kebab murders“, NSU – files closed, deportations, murder by police, Islamophobia – part of good manners in Germany, all bourgeois parties are moving to the right, migration as „the mother of all problems“, „Germany is abolishing itself“, more money for repression in the form of the police, military and judiciary. All so-called individual cases, such as Hanau, Solingen, Halle, NSU, are not cases, because Germany is as it lives and breathes: racist, exploitative and violent.

Exploitation needs racism

Racism against Muslims, Arabs, Kurds, Black people, Sinti*zze, Rom*nja and many Others – is necessary when it comes to the exploitation and over-exploitation of workers. Germans have a better position on the backs of migrant workers and those in the global South who manufacture products for our consumption at extremely low wages. German construction sites, German slaughterhouses, German fields, the low-wage sector, the inhumane camps, shitty working conditions and shitty equipment all send their regards. Working illegally for 5 euros an hour and being grateful for it, while customs destroy not the employers but the employees – you have to dehumanize people beforehand, how else can you justify it? Racism here is both an ideological glue and a fire accelerant that keeps German workers blindly loyal to a state that acts against their own interests. It’s so easy when you can step down while you have to bend upwards! The neoliberal lie of “you can make it, if you work hard enough” or “from rags to riches” is becoming increasingly implausible: one more worker foaming at the mouth with hatred of foreigners is one less worker foaming at the mouth with hatred of the system.

Consequences yok

Dozens of exhibitions, panels, demos, commemorations, political lip service, interviews, documentaries later, one thing stands above all: no justice, no consequences. It is not enough to kill 9 people for racist motives to be classified as right-wing extremist by the BKA. Right-wing terror should be shelved along with the myth of the denazification of Germany, or the NSU trio. The survivors and relatives from Hanau have approached the German state with 4 demands and charges: Remembrance, clarification, justice, consequences. This is the minimum that the brutal loss of a loved one for such barbaric motives should entail. It is not surprising that appealing to a „constitutional state“, which above all brings us injustice, will not bring justice. Where we cried out and mourned, the minister of the interior, Peter Beuth, made statements such as: the police did a „good job“ on the night of the crime in Hanau and the crime could not have been prevented. How they make a good job, we can see everywhere in Germany, e.g. Christy Schwundeck in Frankfurt, Oury Jalloh in Dessau, Bilel in Herford und Ibrahima Barry in Mühlheim. Consequences, yok.

We must organize against this!

“Those who fight against Nazis cannot rely on the state” – as the anti-fascist, anti-Zionist and German-Jewish survivor of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp Esther Bejarano said. She was commenting on the NSU and summarizing the constant „failure“ of the investigating authorities. What we need is resistance and our own solutions. Building common strength in our neighbourhoods, communities and movements – beyond the state, which will always be an oppressor to keep us down. The power lies with us and in our connections, where lives are sacred and we don’t sell each other out for profits or careers. What can Germany offer us? Migration and arms deals with Turkey, Israel and other authoritarian regimes, a few Black, lesbian or refugee party members who serve us the same plonk every year? They steal and alienate revolutionary slogans like “Jin Jiyan Azadî”, babble about a “feminist foreign policy” while they are taking part in the bleeding to death of the people in Palestine, Kurdistan, Sudan and Congo. Opportunistic showcase “Kanacks” blather on about the danger of Islamism. At the same time, left-wing forces are silenced and defamed to the maximum as soon as we stand up, organize, demonstrate and strike. Meanwhile, right-wing extremist groups, such as the Grey Wolves, are operating openly in the middle of Germany and right-wing groups are gathering ideologically and armed throughout Europe. Fascists wherever you look. No thanks, we are hungry for freedom, not for integration or nationalism.

What next?

Let’s demonstrate together on February 19th against the German racist status quo! Let’s fight for a society in which such a crime is not repeated and make February 19th a nationwide anti-racist day of struggle. Good Germans forget, they never see themselves as responsible, they always point the finger at others, they denounce their neighbours and then draw the curtains. They have collective amnesia and delusions of grandeur. We are not good Germans, we are class warriors. We put our finger in the wounds that this society denies. We are anti-racists, anti-fascists and internationalists. We say enough is enough, we no longer bend down, but stand firm, side by side with each other beyond identity and origin against a state that is always lurking with one knee in our necks.
February 19, 2020. The consequence is resistance, Migrantifa now!

Fighting Fascists in the Workplace

German Trade Unionist Addresses British Anti-Racist Conference about the Nazi Threat


German trade unionist Olaf Klenke  from the Gewerkschaft Nahrung-Genuss-Gaststätten, the NGG food trade union in Germany was a guest speaker at this year’s Stand Up To Racism Trade Union Conference in London on Sunday 11 February.

Focusing on building anti-racism in the workplace, the one day conference was addressed by a number of trade union General Secretaries and other leading trade unionists form across England, Scotland and Wales. A good deal of the work took place in a series of workshops, where activists from trade unions across the country were able to relate and discuss their local experience and look at ways of building the anti-racist and anti-fascist movement.

This comes at a time when the forces of the far right are growing across Europe. Fascist Meloni is already Prime Minister in Italy and the challenge by Le Pen for the French presidency looks a strong one.

In the UK, the main right wing and fascist parties and movements such as the BNP and the EDL have disintegrated in the face of determined organisation and opposition by anti-racists. Nonetheless, the rhetoric against refugees and asylum seekers from mainstream politicians means that there is still a serious threat.

The attacks on refugees from the British government is unceasing. Their ‘Stop The Boats’ slogan referring to migrants crossing the English Channel in small boats, alongside their determination to offshore refugees to Rwanda sometimes seem to be the Tory government’s only policies. Their government is in serious trouble, and is drifting directionless with only racism to rally their followers. The Israeli attacks on Gaza also mean that Islamophobia is being ramped up with Muslims once again being singled out as terrorists.

It had seemed until a few weeks ago that the situation was similar in Germany, but the massive mobilisations against the AfD have shown that there is the potential for things to shift very rapidly.

Olaf Klenke, who is an eastern regional organiser for his union, reported his experience of the huge marches against the AfD. They had been relatively spontaneous, he said, with various organisations calling protests. These protests have taken place in both big and smaller cities and towns, and have received a huge response. Significantly, the response has been good in Eastern Germany. This is especially important  because of the high number of AFD voters in the East. In fact it is probable that the relative size of mobilisations in the East are greater than in the West. 

Olaf said that at first it took courage for ordinary people in the East to go to the street to oppose the AFD but once it happened people began to lose their sense of isolation and realise that they were not alone. In some places in the East, the AfD has been getting 20-30% of the vote. Activists are hoping that this push back will eat into that figure. Although the AfD has been getting good percentages these are often on low turnouts.

Olaf explained that one of the reasons that the right have been doing well is the sense of resentment in the East, the massive restructuring of industry after reunification took a heavy toll on jobs there. There was also a failure by the unions to seriously confront the problem of lower wages in the East compared to the West. This feeds a sense of despair. 

According to Olaf, this combines with a racist discourse from mainstream politicians. In 2010 Thilo Sarrazin a former banker, Berlin finance minister, and member of the Social Democratic Party published Germany Abolishes Itself: How We’re Putting Our Country in Jeopardy. Sarrazin argued for restricting Muslim immigration to Germany on the grounds that Muslims who had immigrated to Germany from Turkey and other Muslim countries had failed to assimilate into German society, lived culturally separate lives in densely Muslim neighbourhoods, and that two thirds of Germany’s Muslim immigrants were on welfare. The book shot to the top of the best sellers list.

The AfD has only right wing social policies – for example,  they oppose the minimum wage. But they are making headway on a nationalistic basis. AfD membership has been growing lately, although in the past it was not high. It is therefore important to oppose them visibly in the street. To that end there will be a big protest outside their party conference in Essen at the end of June this year.

Important as the demonstrations are they have not finished off the right. It is also important that German trade unions mount a challenge to the social problems people face as well as making a political challenge to racism.

You can watch a video of Olaf’s speech here.

News from Berlin and Germany, 14th February 2024

Weekly news round-up from Berlin and Germany


NEWS FROM BERLIN

Berlinale management disinvites AfD politicians from opening gala

Following criticism for inviting AfD politicians to the Berlinale opening, the festival management has once again disinvited the party representatives. Particularly in view of the revelations of anti-democratic positions in recent weeks, it was considered important to take an unequivocal stand in favour of democracy, the Berlinale management announced. “We have therefore today disinvited all previously invited AfD politicians,” said the management duo Mariette Rissenbeek and Carlo Chatrian in a statement. In the last days, there have been numerous calls for the invitations’ withdrawal. Among others, around 200 filmmakers expressed their criticisms in an open letter. Source: rbb24

What’s going on at the BVG?

The new head of Berlin’s public transport company (BVG) faces a Herculean task. Henrik Falk must make sure that punctuality and reliability increase again. Passengers’ perception is now confirmed by objective data from the Senate: transport politician Tino Schopf (SPD) requested official data on delays and train cancellations for 2023, that the situation for the state-owned company and its passengers has declined. The proportion of delayed journeys rose to a record high in 2023, as did the number of cancelled kilometres. But there will be no strikes at BVG for the time being – at least not until next Thursday. Source: berliner zeitung

On Sonnenallee, unregistered pro-Palestine demo gathers to protest against Rafah bombing

On Monday evening, demonstrators came out onto the streets of Neukölln for an unregistered protest after the Israeli army launched an attack on the area of Rafah. Since the protest was unregistered, police came to break it up, which led to scuffles in which stones and bottles were reportedly thrown at officers. Among the various slogans chanted by protestors, there were some which have been subject to bans by the German state such as “Stop the Genocide.” However, two courts in Germany (Cologne and Munster) recently ruled that these slogans were not illegal and should be protected under the right to freedom of expression. Source: exberliner

Berlin repeat-election results: a slight defeat for Germany’s ruling coalition

Last Sunday saw Berlin repeat its 2021 federal election in a fifth of the city’s electoral districts, and while there were slight losses for Germany’s ruling coalition, there was no change in the twelve direct mandates. More worryingly, though, the far-right AfD party increased its vote share by one per cent. In fact, all the major parties of opposition saw some gains, with the CDU gaining 1.3% and Die Linke growing 0.1% compared to the 2021 outcomes. Those figures came at the expense of the ruling “traffic light” coalition of the SPD (-1.2%), the Greens (-0.3%), and the FDP (-0.9%). Source: exberliner

NEWS FROM GERMANY

Largest NATO exercise since the end of the Cold War

A massive manoeuvre threatens a continent-wide escalation of the conflict. According to reports, more than 90,000 soldiers, 50 warships and several squadrons of fighter jets from 31 member states and Sweden are taking part in Steadfast Defender 2024, which began on 22 January. The German government doubled its arms donations to Kiev this year to almost eight billion euros, while cuts are being made in the areas of education, health and pensions. The manoeuvre is scheduled to last until 31 May 2024. Under the banner of the NATO exercise, Germany also tries to increase its military presence in Scandinavia and Eastern Europe. Source: internationale friedensfabrik

“Millions of people we can’t do without”

According to the head of the Federal Employment Agency (BA), Andrea Nahles, the German labour market is in urgent need of workers. “We now have 5.3 million people working in Germany without a German passport, and we couldn’t do without them,” she said in an interview on SWR’s Interview of the Week. The German labour market cannot afford a policy that relies on so-called remigration. Right-wing extremists use the term “remigration” to trivialise expulsions and forced departures. According to BA figures, people from outside the European Union were the largest group who came into employment in Germany in 2023. Despite this, there are still almost 700,000 unfilled vacancies. Source: tagesschau

Willingness to donate declines in Germany

The German Donations Council “Balance of Help” is concerned about the declining number of donors. Last year shows the lowest level since the survey began in 2005. On average, each donation was around 40.30 euros. According to the survey, the most generous donors are in the over-60 age group. However, the proportion of donors aged between 30 and 39 has also increased. Donations for emergency and disaster relief summed up to 929 million euros. The “Balance of Help” researcher Bianca Corcoran-Schliemann spoke nevertheless of a “super result” when weighing up inflation and the increasing willingness of Germans to save money. Source: tagesschau

Commemoration and vigils on the anniversary of the attack in Hanau

On the next February 19, the fourth anniversary of the racist attack in Hanau that left nine people dead, the victims will be remembered with a memorial service at Hanau’s main cemetery. Hesse’s Deputy Prime Minister Kaweh Mansoori, Mayor Claus Kaminsky and Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser (all SPD) plan to lay wreaths at the memorial plaque in the cemetery. An imam will pray for the victims at the cemetery at 10.30 am. At 11:00 am, there will be a silent moment, at which there will reportedly be no political speeches “at the express wish of the victims’ relatives,” and which will be open to the public. Source: islamiq

Right-wing disinformation against trans people in Germany

“Under the current government, there is no money for pensioners, schools and the railway. But they now want to introduce nationwide counselling centres for everyone who doesn’t know whether they are male or female,” said Beatrix von Storch (AfD) in the German Bundestag last November. Such attacks are “deliberate strategic decisions” by the far right according to Sascha Krahnke, an expert on transphobia and the far right at the Amadeu Antonio Foundation in Berlin. The problem is also getting worse because hate speech and disinformation from social media are increasingly being taken up by the mainstream media. Source: dw

Letter from the Editors, 15th February 2024

Remember Hanau


Hello everyone,

The exhibition Kite of Four Colours has been running since Monday in Bardo Projektraum, Jessnerstraße 33. Kite of Four Colors is a photo exhibition with live-events that aims to counter the dehumanizing image of the Palestinian people spread by the Western media. The exhibition includes a selection of pictures that are part of a larger exhibition: GAZA HABIBTI*. During the week of the exhibition there will also be live events exploring different aspects of Palestinian culture. The events will be announced in the coming days. Stay tuned! The exhibition is open from 5pm every day until Sunday. The event is free, but a minimum donation of 5€ is strongly suggested. The photographs on display will also be available for sale. All proceeds will be donated.

This week’s demonstrations for Palestine are on Friday at 4pm at the Auswärtiges Amt under the motto Let Rafah Live, and on Saturday at 3pm at Hermannplatz under the motto Stop the War – Stop the Aggression.

Our latest Palestine Reading Group will be taking place at 7pm in our usual venue of Agit, Nansenstraße 2. This week we’ll be discussing the Violence of the Oppressed. Follow the link for suggested reading. The Palestine Reading Group takes place every week at 7pm in the Agit offices, Nansenstraße 2. This means that the following group (on The Israeli “Left”) will be on Sunday 25th February. Because the rooms are not always free, you may need to check the dates of some meetings. Future dates are posted on our Events page and will be posted in future Newsletters. You can also join our Telegram Group to keep up with the debate and suggest future subjects or readings.

This week is the fourth anniversary of the racist murders in Hanau, when 9 BIPoC people were murdered by a white racist. There will be a national memorial demonstration in Hanau on Saturday. Busses will be leaving Oranienplatz in Berlin at 5am. Please contact community@welcome-united.org to book your place on the bus. There will be also 2 memorial Events in Berlin on Monday, the day of the anniversary – a rally at Oranienplatz at 5pm, and a Commemoration (at 5.30pm) and Demonstration (at 7pm) at S-Bahn Sonnenallee. The Sonnenallee Event, organised by Migrantifa, is our Campaign of the Week.

On Saturday at 3pm, there will be a magazine Release : 8 years after the ‚March of Hope‘ offering stories of and perspectives on the ‚Balkan route‘.What events have shaped the ‚Balkan route‘ since 2015/16? How was the EU border regime expanded? What interventions and resistance have there been? Balkanbrücke have addressed these and many other questions, speaking to people on the move, activists and NGOs. The result is a series of artistic, activist and academic articles about the so-called Balkan route. The magazine launch takes place at Konserve at Haus der Statistik. There will be activities, a panel discussion, many exciting groups on the topic and a concert afterwards.

Also on Saturday, at 7.30pm, the Tech Workers Coalition is organising Part 2 of their online workshop Bringing Palestine Solidarity to Your Workplace. As the genocide in Gaza continues, more and more tech workers are looking for ways to bring Palestine solidarity to their workplaces. But what to do if your company isn’t actively doing business with the Israeli military? The ongoing Palestine liberation movement teaches us that war profiteering, imperialism, and militarism are the bedrock of occupation in Palestine and elsewhere. By bringing their Palestine solidarity to their workplaces, tech workers are engaging their leadership and co-workers to examine the tech industry’s complicity. Join tech workers throughout the world be registering here.

There is much more going on in Berlin. To find out what’s happening, go to our Events page. You can also see a shorter, but more detailed list of events in which we are directly involved in here.

If you are looking for Resources on Palestine, we have set up a page with useful links. We will be continually updating the page, so if you would like to recommend other links, please contact us on team@theleftberlin.com. You can also find all the reading from our Palestine Reading Groups here. And Berlin-based Palestinian photographer Rasha Al-Jundi is launching a limited print sale of images from occupied Palestine to support production costs of another project of mine related to Palestinians in exile. More information here.

In News from Berlin, the Berlinale invites, then disinvites AfD politicians, more delays and train cancellations from the BVG, police attack Palestine demo on Sonnenallee, and AfD gains votes at re-run elections while government parties record losses.

In News from Germany, Germany joins the largest NATO manoeuvre since the end of the Cold War, the head of German’s employment agency says that Germany needs migrant workers, donations to charity fall, commemorations planned for the victims of the Hanau massacre, and AfD transphobia is increasing.

Read all about it in this week’s News from Berlin and Germany.

New on theleftberlin, Palästina Spricht Hamburg call for more acceptance of racial minorities on demos against the far right, Nathaniel Flakin counters media disinformation about alleged antisemitism at the FU, the latest photo and cartoon from Rasha Al-Jundi and Michael Jabareen in their series It’s So Berlin!, Sophia Deeg looks at Germany’s lack of empathy for Palestinians, Christine Buchholz explains why she will stay in social movements and not take a seat in parliament, Dave Gilchrist reports from London on a German trade unionist’s speech at a conference against racism, and Alice Lambert remembers the Hanau massacre, which took place 4 years ago this week.

This week’s Video of the Week shows the demonstration for Palestine on Sonnenallee this week before it got attacked by the police.

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If you would like to contribute any articles or have any questions or criticisms about our work, please contact us at team@theleftberlin.com. And please do encourage your friends to subscribe to this Newsletter.

Keep on fighting,

The Left Berlin Editorial Board