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Month: February 2025

Red Flag over Berlinale 2025: An Embarrassing Festival of Self-Censorship

Feel bad about going to Berlinale this year? Maybe reading how terrible it was will help.


28/02/2025

Last year’s Berlinale film festival was marked by scandal. After two co-directors of the documentary No Other Land, one Palestinian and one Israeli, gave short speeches calling for equality, they were denounced by German politicians for antisemitism. A Bundestag resolution called it one of the “big antisemitism scandals” in recent years (Elon Musk’s “Roman salute,” in contrast, barely got a peep).

I do not envy Tricia Tuttle, the new head of the Berlinale, who must try to navigate between the German state’s fanatical support for Israel’s far-right government and the international art scene’s generally liberal views. There were contradictory signs like an Instagram post, nine months too late, defending No Other Land, and an FAQ informing people that the so-called antisemitism resolution was mistaken and not legally binding.

Anodyne

The resulting festival was an embarrassing mess. Germany’s public broadcaster offered a slideshow of “stars speaking out politically” that looks like a competition for anodyne messages. “HUMANITY! LOVE! VOTE!” Why did no one think to bring a sign about “DEMOCRACY”?

The only person to make an actual political statement from the stage was Tilda Swinton, who defended boycotts of Israel at a press conference. The festival leadership, in contrast, highlighted a documentary about David Cunio, who had starred in a Berlinale film in 2013 and is currently a hostage in Gaza.

In other words, they know there is a war going on, and they have chosen to focus exclusively on the side backed by German imperialism. The only film from Palestine was about parkour in Gaza City. I heard one official on stage musing about a “place that no longer exists,” as if talking about Atlantis swallowed up by the sea.

Racism and Calling the Cops

It was up to a handful of brave artists to talk about politics. Jun Li, director of Queerpanorama, read out a statement by Erfan Shkarriz, who was boycotting the festival. Berlin cops opened a criminal investigation because of the phrase “From the River to the Sea,” which multiple German courts have declared to be legal.

That is Berlinale 2025: Inviting international artists and then sticking the cops on them.

At the premiere of a documentary about the dictatorship in Paraguay, editor Manuel Embalse, who is Jewish, gave a similar speech while wearing a keffiyeh. He ended with the same slogan, used around the world as a call for equality — it has never been, despite what German prosecutors think, a unique marker of one particular Palestinian faction. 

Dirk Stettner, chair of the CDU in the Berlin parliament, called for cancelling the whole festival. This would be the next logical step: banning international artists from Germany.

While the films in competition seem to have been mostly forgettable, two spectacular documentaries allowed victims of German racism to tell their stories. Das Deutsche Volk portrays the families of the nine people murdered in Hanau five years ago. They are currently being attacked by local politicians for criticizing the state. 

Die Müllner Briefe features a much older mass murder: the arson attacks that killed three people in Mölln in 1992. Thousands of letters were sent to the survivors, but shockingly, the city of Mölln locked these messages of solidarity away for 27 years. They are now being presented to the public.

Yet my favorite film at the festival, Hysteria, was a satire of the German anti-racist film genre. In a film-in-the-film, a Turkish-German director is trying to commemorate yet another racist murder — the 1993 arson attack in Solingen that took five immigrants’ lives. The filmmakers want to do everything right — but one of the refugees they hire as extras is upset to see a Quran was burned for a shoot. As everyone tries to act in a principled way, the situation gets increasingly tense and absurd. Different characters who are affected by German racism — the intern with a Turkish father, the wealthy director, the different refugees — argue about who benefits from white privilege and who is making art that assuages European guilt. A morally ambivalent, hilarious  masterpiece!

Under the Radar

The closest thing to an impactful statement about Germany’s complicity in genocide might have come from Radu Jude, who won a silver bear for the screenplay of Kontinental ’25. A bailiff in Cluj, a city with Romanian, Hungarian, and German traditions, evicts a poor man from the cellar where he is just barely surviving. He kills himself, and she spends the rest of the film searching for relief from the overwhelming guilt, consulting her boss, husband, priest, former student, and many other weirdos.

Like in every Jude film, the focus is on the absurdity of everyday life. The constant and casual racism against the ethnic Hungarian protagonist from the Romanian majority is one example, matched by the casual racism of ethnic Hungarians, which is funny for viewers totally unfamiliar with the stereotypes. In reminding herself that she followed the rules, she does not absolve herself, and only highlights the cheap excuses people use to do inhumane things — “I was just doing what I was told!” — German officials should watch this.

As always, Berlinale was also full of bland Hollywood slop and failed projects that will rightly never see release. The political messages were still there, but they were much harder to find than in previous years.  If you boycotted the festival, you didn’t miss much.

Red Flag is a weekly column on Berlin politics that Nathaniel Flakin has been writing since 2020. After moving through different homes, it now appears every Friday at The Left Berlin.

The German Greens: From Pacifist Roots to Militarism, Neoliberalism, and Greenwashing

A Party Transformed


26/02/2025

Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, founded in 1980 as a fusion of environmentalists, pacifists, and anti-nuclear activists, has long shed its radical origins. Once synonymous with grassroots democracy and peace, the Greens now embody a paradox: a party still branded as “center-left” and “green” by the German mainstream while blatantly championing militarism, neoliberal austerity, and policies starkly at odds with its founding principles.

Below are a few helpful reminders of past controversies and betrayals of principles

  • Militarism’s Early Roots: The Greens’ 1998 entry into federal government under Chancellor Gerhard Schröder (SPD) marked their first betrayal of pacifism. Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer justified NATO’s 1999 bombing of Yugoslavia as “humanitarian intervention,” setting a precedent for future pro-war stances. The party later backed the Afghanistan War, cementing its alignment with US-led militarism.
  • Neoliberalism and the Hartz IV Legacy: Partnering with the SPD, the Greens co-authored the Hartz IV reforms (Agenda 2010), which slashed welfare protections, imposed punitive sanctions on the unemployed, and normalized precarious labor. These policies exacerbated poverty and psychological distress, disproportionately harming marginalized groups, forcing them into working conditions that barely covered, if at all, basic human needs.
  • Scandals and Suppression: The Greens’ had early ties to pedophilia apologists (resurfacing in 2013) having members proposing the decriminalization of pedosexuality back then. And in a much more recent incident in 2023, they purged member Miriam Block, a Hamburg politician stripped of her roles for demanding an inquiry (introduced by Die Linke) into the unsolved NSU-linked murder of Süleyman Taşköprü, a request rejected by their coalition partner, the SPD — this highlights a pattern of prioritizing power over accountability and justice.

A review on recent events

The Greens have Unconditionally supported Israel’s War in Gaza. “No weapons and military equipment to warzones” was a heavily exhibited phrase printed largely on countless Green election posters displayed nationwide, which included an image of a white dove during their 2021 Bundestag election campaign.

After October 7, 2023, Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock and Vice Chancellor and Economic Affairs Minister Robert Habeck rejected calls for a humanitarian ceasefire ( Gaza-Krieg: Bundesregierung weiterhin gegen Waffenstillstand) despite the fact that other fellow European foreign ministers (e.g. France and Ireland) and UN general secretary António Guterres called for one. 

It was only after Palestinian deaths surpassed 32,000 in March 2024 that Baerbock first suggested the idea of a possible humanitarian pause to the fire. Germany remains meanwhile Israel’s second-largest arms supplier (€323 million in 2023), with the Greens, in possession of 2 key ministeries for the approval of arms exports (Habeck’s and Baerbock’s), authorizing exports despite overwhelming evidence of war crimes. 

All of this unfolds as German exports account for 30% of Israel’s arms imports. This places it just behind the United States, which dominates with 69% of Israel’s military supplies — a staggering 99% combined total that underscores the West’s complicity in Israel’s military aggression.

Baerbock’s shameless and outrageous declaration at a Bundestag session on the 10th October 2024 announcing that “civilian sites lose protected status if abused” directly violates the Geneva Conventions. Habeck echoed debunked Israeli claims about Hamas using “human shields”, despite UN reports from March and November 2024 finding no evidence by reporting that “Israel does not provide substantial evidence nor could they independently verify those allegations”. 

Habeck stated “…Hamas uses the (Gaza) population as hostages, even as human shields and hides behind them, kind of producing the images (of dead children) and civilian casualties themselves”. When questioned about the possibility of an ongoing genocide in Gaza perpetrated with German weapons and unconditional support Habeck said: “the naming of a genocide in Gaza is a complete contortion of victim and perpetrator…”. (l )

Never in its history has Germany exported so many weapons as during the current legislative period. In 2023 they increased the amount of arms exports to Israel tenfold compared to the year 2022. (Deutsche Rüstungsexporte nach Israel fast verzehnfacht | tagesschau.de) These 2023 exports were authorized as “urgent procedures”.

Fuelling the Ukraine-Russia War

The Greens spearheaded Germany’s U-turn on pacifist arms exports, flooding Ukraine with heavy weapons and backing a €100 billion military upgrade fund. Sven Giegold, a top Green official in Habeck’s ministry, even advocated arming “democratic” nations in conflicts — a far cry from their anti-war roots.

Germany and the EU’s failure to impose an early oil embargo on Russia, coupled with ineffective diplomacy and poorly timed sanctions, allowed the Ukraine war to escalate. This inaction marked one of two key breaches of the Greens’ campaign pledge to avoid arming conflict zones. Even within the SPD, critics warned that heavy weapons deliveries risked dangerous escalation. Yet under pressure from Kyiv and internal Green Party figures like Annalena Baerbock — who declared “We see terrible horrors every day” and insisted “now is not the time for excuses, but for creativity and pragmatism” — Germany pivoted to militarism.

Unlike the fierce internal dissent during the Greens’ 1999 support for NATO’s Yugoslavia bombing, the party’s pro-war consensus on Ukraine faced minimal to no resistance. Strikingly, Anton Hofreiter — once seen as the leader of the Greens’ anti-militarist “Fundi” faction — now echoed the “Realos” wing (led by Baerbock and Habeck), declaring “we have no other choice” to justify arming Ukraine. Hofreiter even invoked fear of a Russian invasion sparking World War III, a rhetoric diametrically opposed to the Greens’ pacifist roots. This shift underscores the party’s abandonment of its anti-war principles in favor of militarized Realpolitik and lobbying for the military industry. This can also be highlighted by the approval of a 100 billion Euro fund to swiftly upgrade the national military in June 2022.

Climate Protection Farce: Greenwashing

Their slogan “climate protection is human protection” during their electoral campaign is exposed as perhaps the biggest and worst lie and contradiction.

The 2023 eviction of Lützerath —a small village destroyed for RWE’s coal mine expansion in Green co-governed (with CDU) North Rhine-Westphalia exposed their environmental hypocrisy. While preaching for environment protection and renewable energies the Greens approved record fossil fuel projects alongside military exports, two of Germany’s and the world’s largest CO₂ sources.

Germany has committed to reducing national emissions by 65% below 1990 levels by 2030 and achieving climate neutrality by 2045, as outlined in its 2021 Climate Protection Act. As a signatory to the Paris Agreement since April 22, 2016, these pledges are not only central to its international reputation but also to the Greens’ electoral promises. Yet the party’s actions starkly contradict these goals. The violent eviction of the village of Lützerath in 2023 — aided by police using pepper spray and bulldozers — to expand RWE’s Garzweiler coal mine exemplifies this blatant hypocrisy. For a party ostensibly dedicated to environmentalism, facilitating fossil fuel extraction while partnering with one of Germany’s largest energy corporations represents a profound betrayal of its foundational principles.

The environmental devastation wrought by Israel’s assault on Gaza — partially financed by German arms exports — includes the destruction of 40% of cultivable farmland over 1 million olive trees razed, and widespread contamination of water, soil, and air from CO₂-intensive military strikes and illegal white phosphorus use. These actions have left 97% of Gaza’s water unfit for human consumption, with only 5% of water needs met by groundwater.

“Feminist Foreign Policy”

Baerbock’s self-proclaimed “feminist” branding collapsed amid Gaza’s humanitarian catastrophe: 67% of casualties are women and children, 50,000 pregnant women endure unsafe births under deplorable human conditions, and 690,000 lack hygiene access. It is important to remind people of Baerbock’s dismissed ceasefire calls despite UN pleas, reducing her “feminism” to empty rhetoric.

Hypocrisy and Racism

Green Party co-chair Ricarda Lang targeted climate activist Greta Thunberg for her solidarity with Palestine, weaponizing the term “antisemitism” to accuse her of spreading “conspiracy tales” and exploiting climate activism to promote a “one-sided position on the Palestine-Israel conflict.” Lang even baselessly labeled Thunberg a “jew-hater”, a smear emblematic of the German political establishment’s conflation of anti-Zionism with antisemitism. 

This kind of hypocrisy was further exposed during the Berlinale 2024 scandal, where Green Minister of state for culture Claudia Roth faced criticism for applauding the critically-acclaimed documentary “No Other Land” by Palestinian director Basel Adra and Israeli journalist Yuval Abraham. When pressed by CDU politicians, especially by Berlin Mayor Kai Wagner, Lang defensively claimed, “I was only clapping for the Israeli moviemaker,” completely sidelining Adra’s contribution and epitomizing the Greens’ racist, selective and hollow performative allyship.

Erosion of Rights and International Law: Contempt for Accountability

Despite the ICJ’s provisional ruling on Israel’s “plausible genocide” and ICC arrest warrants for Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and now Israeli ex-Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, Baerbock initially ismissed these as “hypothetical.” This also despite the UN and the largest human rights organizations, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch having openly named and condemned apartheid, crimes against humanity and genocide perpetrated by Israel in Gaza. 

In 2024, the German government approved €160 million military exports to Israel, 31.2 of those additionally in December 2024 even as evidence of Israeli war crimes and mass civilian casualties in Gaza mounted. In a surreal twist, the Greens demanded a “written guarantee” from Israel that German weapons would not be used to violate international law—a performative gesture given Israel’s documented use of such arms in unlawful strikes. This attempt to “clean their conscience” (or rather wash their already crimson red bloody hands in advance) ignores overwhelming proof that German-supplied equipment has already facilitated repeated war crimes.

Katrin Göring-Eckardt (Green Bundestag Vice President) insisted Netanyahu should be “spoken to elsewhere,” mainly after 1:46:00) while ex-party chief Omid Nouripour and Cem Özdemir (Agriculture Minister) outright rejected the ICC’s legitimacy — a stark contrast to the latter’s pre-election claim in 2021 that “human rights aren’t tactical.”

Germany and the U.S. continue to supply 99% of Israel’s military imports. This unwavering support is enabled by the German Greens, who have endorsed arms exports to Israel without hesitation. 

Hard Right-Wing Drift

Habeck’s “10-point security plan” shamelessly mirrors far-right CDU rhetoric (CDU’s 5-point plan), emphasizing deportations, biometric surveillance, and targeting “Islamists” while ignoring far-right violence, which is statistically significantly higher. The firing of Marjam Samadzade (Schleswig-Holstein integration official) in mid 2024 over a pro-Palestine social media “like” exemplifies the Greens’ authoritarian turn.

A Party Unmasked

The Greens have long abandoned their pacifist, environmentalist, and social justice roots to become architects of militarism, neoliberalism, and right-wing normalization. Their “green” label now masks carbon-intensive policies, unconditional support for apartheid, and complicity in war crimes. A vote for today’s Greens is a vote for a rebranded hard-right agenda — xenophobic, profit-driven, and drenched in hypocrisy, mockery of international law and violent genocide.

Urban Fibers

Circularity in fashion? Local clothing donations to global pollution


The studio Urban Fibers investigates and implements new paradigms for the production of sustainable and regenerative textiles. In collaboration with regional producers, they have been remanufacturing local cotton from discarded t-shirts, a valuable raw material, to produce upcycled yarns. Designed for the use in locally existing textile infrastructure of digital weaving, knitting and braiding machines, these yarns can replace virgin cotton up to 100%. The results are vibrant and sophisticated textiles that can be recycled again.

Every week, 15 million second-hand garments from the global North arrive in Accra (Ghana) to be sold at Kantamanto, a vital hub for circularity, reuse and repair. Despite the local efforts to bring these clothes back to life, 40% of them remain unsellable and are directly landfilled, polluting the waterways and the complete coastal line of Accra. To top an already unjust situation, in January 2025 a devastating fire destroyed Kantamanto and left more than 8.000 market workers without a livelihood. Urban Fibers is hosting an event on March 1st to fundraise for Kantamanto and to bring attention to the problem of waste colonialism.

Last year Urban Fibers spent two months working in Accra, Ghana, processing market discards from the global north to make upcycled products. They worked with a young Ghanaian team of designers who are making a living by using the imported waste as their material and diverting it from the landfill. Back in Berlin, Urban Fibers wants to share the story of your clothes with you. Let’s give voice to the people processing our waste behind the scenes of the fast fashion industry, one of the most polluting on earth. But also to illustrate how we are all intertwined in our fight for a more just and safer future.

At our fundraising event on 1st March, there will be a discussion with Circular Berlin about the wasteful textile industry. We will also connect live with The Or Foundation, the charity behind the fire relief fund, that has been supporting the community of Kantamanto and providing remediation efforts since 2011. They will update us about the state of rebuild and about the current challenges of the workers. There will also be Urban Fibers’ goodies on sale, interactive activities, food and drinks and a clothing exchange corner. We will end the event with live guitar music and a DJ set to keep our spirits high.

All proceeds from the event will go directly to the fire relief fund of the Or Foundation.

Fundraising event for the workers at Kantamanto in Accra, Ghana
Date: Saturday, 1st of March
Time: 16:00-23:00 h
Location: C*Space Berlin – Langhansstrasse 86, 13086 Berlin

Entrance to the event is free, donations for the fundraising will be collected at the door

Accessibility: The space is unfortunately not accessible on wheelchair

For any accessibility requests please contact hello@urbanfibers.org

Palestine Solidarity Cut from “Uncuttable” Demonstration

The Palestine Exception in German Solidarity Strikes Again. Statement by Arts & Culture Alliance Berlin and Internationalist Antiracists Against Cuts


25/02/2025

We condemn the racist behaviour against culture and social workers in solidarity with Palestine by the organizers and police at the Unkürzbar protest on February 22nd in Berlin.

The protest “Berlin ist unkürzbar – Umverteilung jetzt!” (Berlin is Uncuttable – Redistribution now!) was organized by the union ver.di Berlin against the Berlin Senate’s massive budget cuts in social work, culture, universities, mobility and environmental protection.

At the protest, many demonstrators drew a clear connection between the right-wing agenda of budget cuts, censorship around the genocide in Palestine, and police violence in Berlin. Neoliberal austerity politics go hand in hand with increased law enforcement spending, the securitization of civil society, and the disenfranchisement of the cultural sector—all methods of social control. It is no coincidence that Berlin claims to have no money for homeless shelters or queer art projects while simultaneously pouring tens of millions of Euros more into the police budget, which it then uses to harass those very demographics.

Solidarity with Palestine, mostly from racialized people, was present from the beginning of the demonstration with signs such as “Anti-racists against budget cuts” and “Defund police, fund people.” They were both systematically and individually targeted by the march organizers and police.

Louna Sbou, director of Oyoun, the first initiative to be defunded under CDU rule in Berlin—based on false antisemitism allegations—was scheduled to hold a speech. At the protest, she was asked about the contents of her speech. The organizers forbade her from using any Arabic words, thus perpetuating and normalizing racist police language bans, then banned her from using the German word “Widerstand”, meaning resistance, and finally abruptly banned her from speaking altogether, claiming they “couldn’t trust that she wouldn’t use the word ‘Widerstand’.” Ironically, Sbou’s contribution is something that the organisers considered ‘cuttable’, raising wider questions for the movement against these cuts: is it only White art and White culture, spoken in German or English, which we cannot bear to lose? Are those forms of cultural expression which challenge the norms and assumptions of dominant mechanisms of power unwelcome in this movement? Do we imagine culture to be something inherently political, or do we only resort to politics as a means to preserve apolitical culture? 

From the beginning of the demonstration and even in negotiations beforehand, Palestinian solidarity activists tried to compromise with the ver.di leadership’s conditions for inclusion. These good-faith attempts were however met with persistent badgering by stewards imposing ever new, increasingly nonsensical and unjust demands. About midway through the march route, a large group of Palestine solidarity protesters, “Internationalist Antiracists Against Cuts,” was targeted by ver.di stewards, organizers, and police alike.  A representative of Bündnis Unkürzbar claimed the Palestine “bloc” was “lacking in solidarity,” being “divisive,” and “infiltrating the protest.” Protest stewards, under the direction of ver.di leadership, physically kettled the pro-Palestine group, stopping them from continuing. This kettle was then directly handed over to police, who completely surrounded and isolated the Palestine solidarity protesters. Demonstrators were also called “terrorists” by individual demo participants, shown the middle finger by one steward and subjected to slurs by another, while the group in its entirety was repeatedly called a “black bloc” by an apparently colorblind organizer. The organizers claimed that all participants connecting budget cuts to any issue associated with Palestine (censorship, genocide, police violence) were violating the “consensus of the protest”—a document that was forced through by a small group of demo organisers, despite co-organisers repeatedly voicing concerns about targeted marginalisation against Palestinian protesters and their allies. This “consensus” document devotes almost of third of its entire length to policing expressions around Palestine/Israel. 

Additional targeted infringements on speech, such as banning the word ‘Widerstand’, as it could be used interchangeably with ‘Intifada’, were made unilaterally during the protest by organizers. We strongly oppose both the suppression of Arabic and of the language of political resistance from this protest against attacks on culture. The repression of a language, the very medium through which much of living culture expresses itself, is a core feature of genocide. We therefore utterly reject the insinuation that speaking directly about genocide is irrelevant to a protest against attacks on culture from the state, especially when the very purpose of these repressive measures in Germany is to support the continuation of genocide in Palestine.

At the end, a group of around 100 pro-Palestine demonstrators was completely cordoned off by police and forbidden to join the final rally, with police claiming there was “no space” for them, despite this being an obvious lie. The police made up new restrictions specifically for these protesters, violently tried to confiscate a banner, and punched several people without warning directly in the face.

Two PoC were arrested while walking away at the end of the demonstration. One is an filmmaker visiting from Australia who received a prize at the Berlinale the night before, whom police falsely accused of a robbery that took place in December. The second person was arrested for allegedly chanting a chant that wasn’t even officially banned. He describes a traumatizing ordeal in the hands of the police: being denied medical care for hours, not being told where he was being taken, being told he would spend 48 hours in jail, and being locked in a bathroom at the detention center. He was furthermore refused information in English despite not speaking German, denied food for hours and the right to call a lawyer despite repeated requests, and treated disrespectfully and aggressively by medical staff in the detention center. Family members were wrongly told by the police that he had been brought to a hospital.

It seems many groups joining the protest recognized only THAT their funding is being cut, not WHY their funding is being cut. Drawing the explicit connections between the funding cuts and the draconian levels of censorship and repression amid increased police and weapons funding in Germany is not divisive, it is accurate. ver.di and Unkürzbar organizers enacted repressive politics against racialized people within their midst throughout the organizing process and finally handed the genocide-critical group over to the police, all while claiming themselves to be the victim. It was not those artists, cultural and social workers kettled by the police who were lacking solidarity, it was ver.di, Unkürzbar and all who stood by and watched as it happened!

We stand in solidarity with our colleagues and comrades who were mistreated and disrespected by ver.di, Bündnis Unkürzbar and the Berlin police. We thank those individuals, organisations, and rank-and-file members of ver.di who have stood in solidarity with us not just on Saturday but also beforehand. We call upon the main organisers of Unkürzbar and ver.di leadership to reflect on their stance and behaviour towards Palestinian solidarity groups within their ranks, to take accountability for these failings, and to engage in more constructive dialogue and practices moving forward. We remain resolute that we will not be silenced, cut, or excluded from this fight against the state’s attack on culture and social services in Berlin and beyond.

News from Berlin and Germany, 25th February 2025

Weekly news round-up from Berlin and Germany


NEWS FROM BERLIN

Election in Germany: the country shifts right, Berlin votes left

Germany’s most closely watched election in recent memory is over. Despite the conservative CDU winning the largest share of the vote nationwide and the far-right AfD coming in second, Berlin offered hope on an otherwise gloomy day for progressive politics. “Die Linke” politicians Ferat Kocak in Neukölln, Ines Schwerter in Lichtenberg, Pascal Meiser in Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg, and the veteran Gregor Gysi won direct mandates in Berlin. With this, “die Linke” is considered as the city’s strongest political force. This result is even more striking given that, ahead of the vote, Friedrich Merz (CDU) declared in his final major campaign speech, “The Left is over.” Not in Berlin. Source: the Berliner

Uproar over cancellation of Albanese at Berlin FU

Last week police were present in large numbers at the Free University of Berlin (FU). This was due to the cancellation of a lecture by Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories. The lecture was to be on topics including “Legaland forensic perspectives on the ongoing Gaza genocide”. However, this was cancelled following criticism. In response, the General Students’ Committee (Asta) announced resistance. The “Students for Palestine” group posted pictures and videos from the lecture hall. According to the footage, police officers were in the building. A short video shows officers asking a person to unlock a door. Source: berliner Zeitung

Berlin culture will probably have to make further savings

The austerity programme for Berlin’s culture continues. After the budget for 2025 has already been reduced by 130 million euros, another 15 million euros less will be available in 2026, according to figures from the cultural administration. In 2027, the Senate’s key figures provide for three million euros more – however, additional funds have been earmarked to compensate for possible pay rises. It is still unclear what the budget cuts will mean in detail for cultural institutions in the coming year. There is nonetheless the threat of higher ticket prices or fewer premieres. Source: rbb

 

NEWS FROM GERMANY

The AfD was strong in the east, but it won the election in the west

The crashing end of the traffic-light coalition caused a great deal of resentment across almost all parties and has resulted in electoral success for the AfD. It is the big winner in the east, with figures ranging from 32.5% in Brandenburg to 38.6% in Thuringia. It won in each of the eastern German states, only in Berlin did the extreme-right wing party come fourth. The rise of the AfD in the east is considerable, but it is crucial to have in sight that elections in Germany are won or lost in the West because of its much larger number of voters; the East cannot achieve such a result on its own. Source: berliner Zeitung

Immigration does not raise crime rate, according to German study

Immigrants or refugees do not have a higher tendency to commit crime and there is no correlation between the proportion of immigrants in a certain district and the local crime rate, according to new analysis of the latest German crime statistics carried out by the renowned ifo institute. The Munich-based institute correlated the latest national crime stats from 2018 to 2023 with location-specific data (a new aspect in this kind of study), to explain the overrepresentation of immigrants in crime statistics. This evidence goes against the current popular narrative. Source: dw

Rising rents can represent more support for AfD, study finds

According to a new study by the Centre for European Social Studies (MZES) at the University of Mannheim, low-income residents in German cities are more likely to support the AfD if they live in areas with fast-rising rents. The MZES found that rising average rents have the opposite effect on the political allegiances of high-income residents and landlords living in the same areas. “When rents rise, some people profit from the reevaluation processes. Others, however, perceive these developments as a socioeconomic threat. The latter are increasingly leaning towards the AfD,” study author Denis Cohen explains in a press release. Source: iamexpat

New donation scandal demands an explanation from the AfD

A few days before the general election, the AfD was apparently facing a new party donation scandal. “Der Spiegel” and the” Austrian Standard” reported on an advertising campaign worth around 2.35 million euros that former FPÖ functionary Gerhard Dingler is said to have donated to the party. It is suspected Dingler merely acted as a front man for the transaction. If the suspicion is confirmed, the AfD could face a fine for illegal party funding of three times the amount of the unauthorised donation. If this does turn out to be true, they will face a fine of around seven million euros. Source: t-online

100,000 demonstrate against the right

Over 100,000 gathered across Germany on the weekend of the general election. They demonstrated against right-wing extremism and the AfD. In Hamburg itself, up to 40,000 people gathered at two events. There were also rallies and demonstrations in Essen, Krefeld, Freiburgand Hanover, among other cities. In Berlin, around 100 neo-Nazis gathered on Friedrichstraße. Around 1,200 counter-demonstrators disrupted the march severaltimes, but the blockades were broken up by the police. According to “taz”, between 1.9 and 2.2 million people have taken to the streets in Germany in recent weeks out of concern about a shift to the right. Source: taz