fbpx

Violent neo-Nazism rising in Germany, report says

Violent neo-Nazism is on the rise in Germany, according to an annual report by the German government. The annual report on extremism by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution released this week also said that the proponents of violent neo-Nazism are rejecting organized political parties.
[additional-authors]
April 21, 2011

Violent neo-Nazism is on the rise in Germany, according to an annual report by the German government.

The annual report on extremism by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution released this week also said that the proponents of violent neo-Nazism are rejecting organized political parties.

According to the report, the number of neo-Nazis with violent tendencies rose by 10 percent last year, to 5,600.

Heinz Fromm, head of the agency that produces the report, told the Neuen Osnabrucker Zeitung newspaper that the increase should be seen as a warning, though membership in the far-right National Democratic Party (NPD) of Germany has dropped to 6,600 and the total number of those identifying as right-wing extremists dropped from 31,000 in 2009 to 25,000 in 2010.

Fromm said that while NPD membership has fallen gradually since 2007, the violence prone, anti-election Autonomous Nationalists gained 200 members in 2010, for a total of 1,000.

In recent elections, right-wing extremist parties with racist and anti-Semitic platforms have cooperated in order to avoid stealing each others’ votes. But Fromm noted that the parties do have differences, including in the degree to which they are willing to relativize the Holocaust and use anti-Semitic propaganda.

Though Holocaust denial is illegal in Germany, some neo-Nazi groups doubt the facts of the genocide and insist that German civilians endured the greatest suffering.

In recent elections in the former East German state of Saxony-Anhalt, the NPD failed to earn the required 5 percent of the vote to reach the parliament. But the NPD still has legislators in two former East German states, and Fromm said it may reach the 5 percent mark in September elections in one of them, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.

In other news, a court in Koblenz this week jailed nine neo-Nazis for broadcasting racist and anti-Semitic propaganda via Radio Resistance, the French news agency AFP reported. The station was shut down last November.

The sentences ranged from 21 months to three years. Nine others were given suspended sentences.

Did you enjoy this article?
You'll love our roundtable.

Editor's Picks

Latest Articles

The Joy Within

Sukkot asks us to receive the harvest that has actually come in—not the one we imagined or wished for.

A Bisl Sukkot ~ Don’t Be Afraid, Go Outside

The sukkah reminds us to go out into the world, especially when the comforts of insularity beckon us closer—to explore paths we have yet to take and seek journeys ready for wandering.

A Harira Hug in the Sukkah

I love making soup for this holiday because even if the days are still warm, the cooler evenings make you start craving something warm and comforting.

The Beat Goes On

While so much of the world seems obsessed with and consumed by its hatred of Israel and Jews, Israelis continue to build, create, work, celebrate, argue, raise families, and plan for the future.

Viral AI Video Targets Jewish Comedian

“The biggest concern is that people now have a pathway to shut down Jewish voices through complete falsities that people will believe. … For the future of Jewish entertainment, it’s very scary.”

Yiddish Historians: Writing in Their Own Language for Their Own People

Mark Smith has compiled an important anthology of Jewish history using 49 works by Yiddish historians to recreate or at least open the door to a world of Jewish thought that was once almost mainstream, but which no longer exists, except in the minds of too few specialists.

The Everlasting Melody

Most Jews who have sung “Eitz Chaim” over the past half-century probably never knew Portnoy. They did not know when he wrote the melody or how young he was when he composed it. They simply knew the song.

More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.