Twee verdachten zijn geïdentificeerd na een brandstichting in de woning van de commissaris tegen antisemitisme in Brandenburg in januari. Dit heeft het Openbaar Ministerie bekendgemaakt. De krant "Tagesspiegel" berichtte als eerste over het incident. De verdachten komen uit de persoonlijke kring van commissaris tegen antisemitisme Andreas Büttner. Zoals hij bevestigde aan het Duitse persbureau dpa, gaat het om twee kennissen.
Een woordvoerder van het Openbaar Ministerie van de deelstaat Brandenburg heeft vanmiddag in reactie op een vraag laten weten dat er twee verdachten zijn geïdentificeerd in het onderzoek naar de gezamenlijke brandstichting. "Gisteren en vandaag zijn er onder andere handhavingsmaatregelen genomen in twee andere deelstaten." Het Openbaar Ministerie weigerde op dit moment verdere details te verstrekken.
Meer over dit onderwerp
Aanval op Commissaris voor Antisemitisme: Leiding van de Linkse Partij veroordeelt antisemitisch geweld tegen partijleden
Door Marc Röhlig
Aanval op student Lahav Shapira: "Misschien zou de rechter het als antisemitisch beschouwen als de aanvaller tijdens de aanval uit 'Mein Kampf' had geciteerd" Een interview door Hannes Schrader:
"Misschien zou de rechter het als antisemitisch beschouwen als de aanvaller tijdens de aanval uit 'Mein Kampf' had geciteerd."
Büttner vertelde het Duitse persbureau dpa dat de verdachten kennissen waren met wie hij in 2023 een bedrijf had opgericht. Hij werd ook door de politie als getuige ondervraagd. "Als deze twee inderdaad de daders zijn, dan heeft het naar mijn mening niets met antisemitisme te maken," zei Büttner. Hij zei dat er geen verklaring voor was.
"Ik ben geschokt," zei Büttner. Hij hoopt dat de politie snel het motief zal achterhalen. Het bedrijf, dat in de zonne-energiesector wilde werken, was inderdaad samen opgericht, maar heeft nooit projecten uitgevoerd. "Er is daar niets gebeurd; het is een opgeheven bedrijf," verklaarde Büttner. Hij is sinds 2024 anti-semitisme-commissaris voor de deelstaat Brandenburg.
Hamas-symbool op de deur, brand gesticht
In januari van dit jaar staken daders een gebouw op zijn privéterrein in Templin in brand. Het stond naast het huis waar Büttner met zijn gezin woont. Niemand raakte gewond. Op de voordeur van het huis was een rode driehoek geschilderd. Volgens het Openbaar Ministerie leek het symbool op dat van de Palestijnse terreurorganisatie Hamas. Bovendien ontving het deelstaat-parlement in Potsdam een dreigbrief gericht aan Büttner.
Het Openbaar Ministerie omschreef het incident als een aanslag en kondigde in januari aan het onderzoek over te nemen "gezien het duidelijk politiek gemotiveerde karakter van de daad en de bijzondere positie van het slachtoffer". Vervolgens werden er veiligheidsmaatregelen getroffen rondom het terrein van Büttner.
Nog meer spektakel, al dan niet antisemitisch:
Andreas Büttner (politicus) Lid van de FDP
Na zijn verhuizing naar Brandenburg werd hij in 2001 lid van de FDP en vanaf 2007 leidde hij de afdeling Uckermark. In hetzelfde jaar werd Büttner lid van het uitvoerend comité van de FDP Brandenburg. Büttner was voorzitter van de lokale afdeling Templin,[13] die na interne partijconflicten op een gegeven moment nog maar uit vijf leden bestond, waaronder verschillende familieleden van Büttner; een groot deel van de leden, waaronder de drie gemeenteraadsleden, verliet de partij in november 2012.[14][15]
Büttner werd in 2008 verkozen tot lid van het presidium van de FDP Brandenburg. Van 2008 tot 2011 was hij tevens voorzitter van de deelstaatcommissie voor onderwijs en scholen. Op 5 december 2009 werd hij benoemd tot waarnemend secretaris-generaal van de FDP Brandenburg.
Bij de deelstaatverkiezingen van 2009 in Brandenburg werd Büttner voor het eerst in het deelstaat-parlement gekozen.
Op het partijcongres van de FDP in Brandenburg op 27 maart 2010 werd Büttner met bijna 84% van de stemmen herkozen als secretaris-generaal. Hij trad op 31 augustus 2010 af als secretaris-generaal, nadat hij Hans-Peter Goetz was opgevolgd als voorzitter van de FDP-fractie in het deelstaatparlement van Brandenburg. Büttner was vicevoorzitter van de commissie Onderwijs, Jeugd en Sport en lid van de commissie Arbeid, Sociale Zaken, Vrouwen en Gezin.[16] In 2010 orkestreerde hij in het geheim de verwijdering van de toenmalige fractievoorzitter, Hans-Peter Goetz; er gingen geruchten dat hij zelf ambities had voor die positie. De pers beschreef de gebeurtenis als een "coup".[17][18]
In maart 2013 stelde Büttner zich kandidaat voor een zetel in het federale uitvoerende comité van de FDP. Met respectievelijk 23,56% en 20,52% van de stemmen in twee stemrondes wist hij geen zetel in het comité te bemachtigen.[19]
Op 6 april 2013 werd Büttner verkozen tot vicevoorzitter van de FDP Brandenburg. De zittende vicevoorzitter, Linda Teuteberg, trok zich verrassend genoeg terug ten gunste van hem, waarmee een sluimerend leiderschapsconflict binnen de partij met voorzitter Gregor Beyer ten einde kwam.[20]
Op 30 november 2013 werd Büttner gekozen als lijsttrekker voor de FDP Brandenburg bij de deelstaatverkiezingen op 14 september 2014.[21] Nadat de FDP de deelstaatverkiezingen had verloren en uit het deelstaatparlement was verdwenen, nam Büttner ontslag als vicevoorzitter.[22]
Aanvallen en dreigbrief
In augustus 2014 werd Büttners privéauto in Templin aangevallen. De lak werd bekrast en beschadigd, onder andere met hakenkruizen en een Davidster met een streep erdoor.[31][32]
In de nacht van 3 op 4 januari 2026 werd er brandstichting gepleegd op Büttners privéterrein in Templin. Een schuur werd in brand gestoken en een rode driehoek, een symbool van de Palestijnse terreurorganisatie Hamas, werd op Büttners voordeur geplakt. Volgens hem waren Büttner en zijn gezin op dat moment in huis. De brandweer wist de brand te blussen en er vielen geen gewonden. De Staatsveiligheidsdienst startte een onderzoek naar de brandstichting.
Op 5 januari 2026 ontving het deelstaatparlement van Brandenburg een brief met doodsbedreigingen en beledigingen aan het adres van Büttner. De brief bevatte ook een witte substantie, die later onschadelijk bleek te zijn, en een getekende driehoek, een symbool van Hamas.[33][34]
De minister-president van Brandenburg, Dietmar Woidke, veroordeelde het incident "in de sterkst mogelijke bewoordingen." Minister van Binnenlandse Zaken René Wilke verklaarde dat Büttner, als commissaris voor antisemitisme, een bijzondere dienst bewees aan de staat en zijn bevolking. Dat zijn inzet tegen extremisme en haat hem tot doelwit van geweld maakt, is verachtelijk.[35][36][37]
In april 2026 identificeerde het Openbaar Ministerie van Brandenburg twee zakenpartners en vrienden van Büttner als verdachten van de brandstichting en de dreigbrief. In de nacht van de aanslag ontdekte en bluste een politiepatrouille een vuur langs de weg, 20 kilometer van de plaats delict, met daarin wegwerphandschoenen, een schildersoverall en een fles aanmaakvloeistof voor de barbecue. Deze spullen waren gekocht bij een bouwmarkt in Nedersaksen met de bankpas van een van de verdachten. Het DNA van een van de verdachten werd naar verluidt aangetroffen op de dreigbrieven die het deelstaatparlement had ontvangen. Volgens persberichten wordt een antisemitisch motief onwaarschijnlijk geacht.[38] De verdachten waren actief op het gebied van politieke educatie en zouden in chatberichten hebben gespeculeerd over wat het zou betekenen als Büttner bekender zou worden.[39]
Büttner had samen met de twee verdachten een bedrijf opgericht. Tweeënhalve week voor de brandstichting zou Büttner een nacht met de twee verdachten hebben doorgebracht in een romantisch hotel in het Harzgebergte. De aandeelhoudersvergadering van het bedrijf zou daar hebben plaatsgevonden. Volgens het handelsregister is het doel van het bedrijf "bedrijfsadvisering," maar volgens Büttner werd het opgericht als een bedrijf voor zonneenergie-systemen.
Gaza as a Line of TruthHow Media, Civil Society, and the Political Left Became Complicit in Repressing Palestine Solidarity in Germany
Regions
The final part in the Solidarity under Siege series, this longread examines how Germany’s media, NGOs, and political left responded to Gaza; not with resistance, but complicity. Through repression, silence, and smear campaigns, Palestine solidarity became a defining fault line exposing the contradictions of Germany’s progressive institutions.
Longread by
Credit: Faisal Yassin
We are not welcome in the German spaces. We’ve seen that when there was the largest anti-racist demo, and there was a block against AfD, and there was supposed to be a bloc for Palestine, we were kicked out. And we were also kicked out from the queer demos years ago. Just to speak as queers against the Pinkwashing of Palestine, or speak about Palestine with the environmental movement against greenwashing of settler colonialism in Palestine, this was not allowed.
The moment you bring Israel into any topic, you’re out. The moment you start to become anti-Israeli policies – and anti-genocide, anti-colonial regimes and anti-apartheid – or speak about it, you’re out. This tells a lot about how Palestine became kind of the line between right and wrong, the line between: are you human or are you evil? Are you part of the orientalist, or are you part of those who are decolonising? Yeah, it is Palestine that became not only the line of truth, but a litmus test of our shared humanity and our individual and collective commitment to the ongoing struggle for liberation.
Majed
In the aftermath of 7 October, institutions typically associated with liberal democratic values, such as university leaders, certain sections of the press, the left-leaning political establishment and even the climate justice and other civil society movements, have been largely silent on Israel’s genocide in Gaza and failed to resist Germany’s authoritarian shift. Worse, in many cases they have actively enabled it. This longread is based on research conducted up to the autumn of 2025, with minor updates integrated around the date of publication.
Credit: Faisal Yassin
The role of the Media: Manufacturing Consent for genocide abroad and repression at home
- Start Portrait: Hebh Jamal, Palestinian journalist and activist -
On 7 October, there was this video that I made basically trying to counter a lot of the German narrative and specifically also state that I think military resistance against Israeli military infrastructure is protected by international law. I said decolonization is necessary. They attempted to criminalize me over these statements and because I said, ‘From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.’
I, of course, fought back and I actually won. So, the prosecutor completely dropped the charges. But that also doesn't matter because even though what I said was completely legal, the political elite in every single newspaper, like the BILD, thinks that they could call me a Jew hater, Israel hater, which they did just the other day.
And even the Anti-Semitism Commissioner of the German state of Hessen has this whole campaign against me, basically comparing me to a Nazi on his social media. There's absolutely no political nuance. It just doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if what you say is legal, it doesn't matter if what you say can be contextualised.
German broadcasters that are writing in English have a very different terminology than German broadcasters that are writing in German. If you look at Deutsche Welle English and Deutsche Welle in German – it's almost a completely different department, completely different news organization. And I think that's intentional. It's almost as if people don't really know, want people to know what's going on inside this country and what people are telling each other.
- End PORTRAIT -
Language has power. Much has been written about how German outlets have played a direct role in manufacturing consent for a genocidal war by consistently minimising the genocide and the violence inflicted upon Palestinians. Israeli state narratives are treated as default truths, while Palestinian testimonies are doubted, framed as extremist, or simply ignored. The deaths of Palestinian children are buried beneath euphemisms, the killing of 250 Palestinian journalists and media workers (as of January 2026)1 is met with little solidarity from their German counterparts.
This double standard extends deeply into domestic politics. Antisemitism accusations are used as a rhetorical weapon to discipline public discourse, silence Palestinian voices, and stifle solidarity. While this tendency was clear in the media long before 7 October 2023, it was not always this pronounced. As traced by Samantha Carmel,2 until the 1980s, it was still possible in West Germany to support Palestinian self-determination and present that support as a moral lesson drawn from the Holocaust. Politicians like former Chancellor Helmut Schmidt and journalists like Spiegel founder Rudolf Augstein openly criticised Israel’s policies without repercussions for their career.3 Augstein, for example, warned against unconditional support for Israel and insisted that past Jewish suffering could not justify present-day Israeli violence against Palestinians.4 Today, such statements would be unthinkable in mainstream German media. It has become nearly impossible to apply universal moral lessons from Nazi crimes to Israel, since the Holocaust is framed as an exceptional crime that – by definition – can never be repeated.
The first two and a half years of the genocide have shown that Germany’s media are systematically eroding journalistic standards. This is the case not only for right-wing outlets but also for those perceived as mainstream or even left-leaning. They have engaged in doxxing and smear campaigns, racialisation and ‘othering’ of Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims, casting Palestinians and their allies as the threat, and the state that bombs, occupies, and kills as the victim. In so doing, they justify and sustain the political repression against genocide opponents, and fuel anti-Palestinian and anti-Muslim racism.
Axel Springer
The Axel Springer media empire, owner of outlets like the widely read right-wing tabloid Bild as well as WELT, Politico Europe, and Berliner Morgenpost, plays a central role in normalising anti-Palestinian repression and criminalising dissent in Germany. Springer’s commitment to the Israeli state is structurally embedded in the company. One of its five mission statements, further sharpened following 7 October, explicitly supports ‘Israel’s right to exist’ (while other countries are not mentioned),5 and its CEO Mathias Döpfner has gone even further. In a now-infamous leaked quote published by Die Zeit, Döpfner summarised his political worldview with the phrase ‘Zionismus über alles’ (Zionism above everything else). This echoes the banned Nazi slogan ‘Deutschland über alles’ (Germany above everything else).6
The Green MP Jürgen Trittin even praised Springer’s rigid stance, calling for similar alignment across all publishing houses and political parties. His declaration blurred the line between media independence and state propaganda, which prompted Germany’s journalists’ union (DJV) to issue a warning against political interference in press freedom.7
The racist portrayal of the Barbakh family in the media
The impact of Springer’s ideology can be felt across German media, particularly in the case of the Barbakh family, a group of Palestinian refugees from Gaza living in Berlin who in 2024 and 2025 were the target of an extended smear campaign because of their political activism.8 For months, major German outlets – including WELT, Bild, Focus, and the Berliner Zeitung – routinely depicted the family as a dangerous ‘Gaza clan’,9 using racialised language and othering to paint them as violent, foreign, and inherently criminal. Rather than focusing on verified facts, articles made sweeping claims, suggesting links to Hamas or portraying the family as a threat to Berlin, with little or no substantiation.10 This dehumanising coverage included the publication of a video showing the arrest of a 16-year-old family member, with WELT claiming that the family ‘makes no secret of their hate for Israel’.11 The reports drew serious concern from media watchdogs and human rights groups. Berliner Zeitung journalist Carola Tunk was accused of repeatedly contacting a minor from the Barbakh family via social media, without parental permission and despite the child clearly stating that he did not wish to speak with her.12 She reportedly stalked him digitally and physically, sent him personal questions and tried to locate his whereabouts. This violates both the German Press Code (Pressekodex) and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.13 Despite this, Berliner Zeitung published content identifying the minor by name and associating him with the sensationalised label ‘Gaza Mohammed’, referring to him as the ‘star of the Pali scene of Neukölln’,14 language that reinforces racialised stereotypes and strips him of individual dignity. On 18 March 2025, the German Press Council found that a BILD article violated the German Press Code by publicly identifying some of the family members.15
This media harassment feeds directly into a wider system of state repression and deportation threats. Several members of the Barbakh family, including minors, have reportedly been issued with deportation notices by German immigration authorities.
Springer outlets have also targeted political activists and public servants. Elisa Baş, a young climate justice activist and spokesperson of Fridays for Future, was vilified by Bild and other Springer outlets for sharing someone else’s criticism of Josef Schuster, the head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, in her Instagram story.16 Schuster, in a guest commentary for Bild, had described Palestine supporters as ‘barbarians among us’ and said that ‘something must happen’.17 Unlike hundreds of Palestine supporters, he was never charged with incitement.
Springer media has also contributed to the public shaming and professional downfall of Melanie Schweizer, a former civil servant and advisor in the German Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, as well as former parliamentary candidate for MERA25.18 She was dismissed after Bild ran a smear campaign against her, accusing her of ‘hatred of Israel’ based on social media posts criticising Israel’s military actions in Gaza. She was never contacted for comment, and her posts, many of which were not even public, did not breach any laws.19
ARD
In October 2023, a leaked internal memo from Germany’s largest public broadcaster ARD, whose nightly news programme Tagesschau reaches almost 10 million viewers or 12% of the German population, revealed detailed instructions for reporting on Israel’s war on Gaza.20 Journalists were advised to avoid phrases like ‘escalation’ or ‘spiral of violence’ that might contextualise Hamas’ attacks, and instead adopt terminology aligned with Israeli state framing. An internal ARD glossary dated 18 October 2023 instructs journalists to avoid terms like ‘Hamas fighters’, mandating instead the use of ‘terrorists’.21 The document goes further by categorising any comparison between Israel’s actions in Gaza and the Holocaust, or even referring to Israel as a colonial power, as antisemitic.22Furthermore, ARD stated that the chant ‘From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free’ is a criminal offence, incorrectly claiming it calls for the ‘annihilation of Israel’.23
In November 2024, after a football match between Dutch Ajax and Israel’s Maccabi club in Amsterdam, Maccabi supporters rioted in the city, chanted anti-Arab slogans, attacked a taxi driver, tore down Palestinian flags, and thus provoked violent clashes with local residents.24 International media coverage framed the incident primarily as an antisemitic attack or even ‘pogrom’ against Israeli football fans, ignoring eyewitness reports and video evidence that revealed a very different picture.25 The Dutch photographer Annet de Graaf, who filmed Maccabi supporters attacking a Dutch person, later discovered that Tagesschau was one among many news channels that had used her video out of context, misrepresenting the sequence of events to portray Maccabi fans as the victims rather than the aggressors.26 Following public pressure, Tagesschau issued a rare public apology to de Graaf, acknowledging the misuse of her footage but never explaining to its audience what it actually showed. It instead replaced the video with a different one without changing the biased reporting.27
Other media outlets
Der Spiegel, a popular weekly with a long tradition of shaping political opinion, has likewise contributed to the smearing of Palestinian solidarity.28 A 2024 protest by 85 students at Berlin’s FU was surrounded by an equal number of journalists. Among the deluge of inflammatory coverage, a Spiegel TV segment stood out for its misleading and dangerous rhetoric. It falsely framed the protest as ‘against Jews’,29 while ignoring the fact that several Jewish students had co-organised and spoken at the event against genocide. The video zoomed in on one queer student’s personal Instagram, showing a swimsuit photo and publishing his account name, an act that led to right-wing harassment and threats. The student's Jewish identity was omitted from the reporting.30
In December 2024, internal whistle-blowers at Deutsche Welle (DW) exposed a culture of pro-Israel bias and open hostility to Palestinian perspectives.31 At least 13 staff members and freelancers reported being targeted for their political views.32 Internal documents reportedly include ‘comebacks’ for anchors to use during live interviews with ‘pro-Palestinian voices’, including instructions on how to deflect or challenge any mention of Israeli war crimes. A spokesperson from Deutsche Welle, responding to this research, said “We emphasize that our programs meet journalistic standards of plurality, impartiality and unbiased reporting. In accordance with our law, our programs as a whole must enable viewers to form their own opinions independently and must not show any bias in favor of any party or other political association, religious community, professional group or interest group. We regularly review our programs against these standards and correct our content if necessary.”
On 1 March 2024, the day after Israeli soldiers opened fire on around 1,000 starving Palestinians attempting to get food for their families,33 the mainstream Berlin regional daily Tagesspiegel, which has been ranked as the highest quality regional paper in the country,34 published an article that smeared two Berlin-based pro-Palestinian activists. It falsely portrayed them as inciters of violence and antisemitism by quoting statements about Palestinian self-defence out of context.35 The article pits them against so-called ‘moderate’ activists and dangerously includes their full names, faces, and workplaces, exposing them to potential harassment. In response, activists launched the ‘Doxxing is not Journalism’ campaign, protesting outside Tagesspiegel’s Berlin.36
Even taz, a daily newspaper often associated with progressive politics, failed to uphold journalistic principles when covering Gaza. On 9 March 2025, when more than 48,000 Palestinians had been killed by Israeli attacks,37 it published an op-ed titled ‘The Power to Define Genocide,’ in which the author claimed that accusations of genocide against Israel were ‘baseless’ and driven by ‘anti-Israel sentiment’. The piece dismissed reports from Gaza as emotional manipulation, argued that the civilian death toll was Hamas's fault, and concluded that only Hamas could be accused of genocidal intent.38
Credit: Faisal Yassin
Credit: Faisal Yassin
Too little, too late: Die Linke and the Left political establishment
Just when a strong political force was most needed to oppose Germany’s complicity in genocide and the escalating repression of civil liberties, the party from which such a stance was most expected remained silent. For years, the main German left-wing party Die Linke and its affiliated Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung (RLS) have failed to uphold their claimed anti-imperialist, anti-racist, and internationalist principles whenever it comes to Palestine.52 Die Linke has often aligned itself with the broader state consensus on Israel, suppressing dissenting voices within its ranks, adopting ambiguous or conservative rhetoric, and distancing itself from Palestinian civil society demands. The RLS, a publicly funded foundation with the stated aim of supporting emancipatory politics, mirrored this silence and even contributed to marginalising Palestinian perspectives internally.53This failure has had serious consequences: young activists of colour, anti-racist movements, and long-standing supporters of Die Linke have become increasingly disillusioned.54 The party's credibility as a force for justice and international solidarity has been gravely damaged.
After the beginning of the genocide, Die Linke’s leadership issued a one-sided statement on 11 October solely blaming Hamas for the escalation.55 Rather than correcting course as Israel’s genocidal intentions became ever more obvious, party leaders continued to clamp down on internal dissent. Co-chair Martin Schirdewan proclaimed his solidarity with Israel in a rally on 22 October, even as the death toll in Gaza mounted.56 RLS’s failures echoed those of the party. On 19 October, the Foundation posted a statement by its Tel Aviv office director that completely omitted the escalating massacres in Gaza.57 In contrast, in a leaked letter from November 2023 Palestinian staff in RLS’s Palestine and Jordan office criticised the Foundation’s ‘systematic suppression of Palestinian voices and the perpetuation of the oppressor’s narrative’.58 Expressions of solidarity were discouraged or outright banned. Even as colleagues and family members of staff were killed or displaced in Gaza, the Foundation suppressed their ability to speak.59
Pressure from progressive streams in the party to adopt stronger language calling for a ceasefire was voted down at the party conference in November,60 and their programme for the 2024 EU parliamentary elections, while condemning Russia, failed to mention Israel and Gaza.61 Christine Buchholz, a long-time MP and member of the more radical initiative Socialism from Below criticised Die Linke’s inability to take a clear stance. In an interview in January 2024, she said that the party’s position was ‘absolutely inadequate, as it tries to maintain a balance between criticism of Israel and criticism of Hamas’.62 The party, she argued, had moved away from its internationalist tradition and was more concerned with coalition-building than with principle.
In April 2024, the Linke Berlin party congress refused to pass a motion condemning the police storming of the Palestine Congress and the violent dismantling of the protest camp in front of the parliament.63 While some local Berlin branches supported the motion, the majority rejected it on procedural grounds. Prominent party figures such as former senators and parliamentary group members Klaus Lederer and Elke Breitenbach even signed the appeal of the so-called ‘Alliance against Antisemitic Terror,’ which accused the Palestine Conference of trivialising terror and of antisemitism.64 The response to these decisions was damning. Activists and party members across Germany accused Die Linke of siding with state repression, failing to defend basic civil rights, and remaining silent in the face of genocide. They argued that the party's credibility as a voice for justice and liberation had collapsed.
In October 2024, internal tensions within Die Linke’s Berlin branch reached breaking point. Prominent figures, including Lederer and Breitenbach, resigned from the party, citing irreconcilable differences over antisemitism and Israel/Palestine.65 This split followed repeated failures to resolve disagreements at the Berlin state party congress.
In December 2024, the party leadership initiated expulsion proceedings against Ramsis Kilani, a prominent Palestinian-German activist in Berlin, for allegedly bringing the party into disrepute – allegations of antisemitism based on ‘snippets from social media distorted by right-wing journalists’.66 In contrast, it took members of the party until May 2025 to formally demand the exclusion of Brandenburg’s antisemitism commissioner Andreas Büttner, a former CDU and FDP member who denied the genocide in Gaza and supported Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights.67 In January 2024, Die Linke did condemn the German cessation of payments to UNRWA, but did so claiming that this would only make Hamas more popular.68
While the election programme for the 2025 federal elections69 did condemn Israel’s ‘brutal war crimes’ and call for the ICC warrant against Netanyahu to be implemented, this was again in a context of equating oppressor and oppressed. The programme failed to use the term ‘genocide’, instead calling it a ‘war’, at a point when even mainstream NGOs like Amnesty were using the term genocide.70
A turning point?
After the relative success of the party in the February federal elections, things seemed to shift slightly. Despite leadership repression, dissent continued to grow within the party. In March 2025, MEP Carola Rackete, who had publicly distanced herself from Greta Thunberg’s pro-Palestinian stance in November 2023, now became the first major elected German politician to use the word ‘genocide’, calling out the EU’s (but not Germany’s) complicity.71
However, since then internal fractures seem to have only deepened. The party board member Ulrike Eifler was attacked for sharing an image with the slogan ‘All united for Free Palestine’.72 The leadership pressured her to delete the post, reportedly after in turn being pressured by Bild. Eifler refused to apologise, insisting that her intent was to draw attention to the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza.
On 10 May 2025, the national party congress adopted a motion replacing the IHRA definition of antisemitism with the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism (JDA) – a landmark decision. The motion also condemned the use of the IHRA definition to justify censorship, repression, and denial of funding. The Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung had criticised the IHRA definition in a 2019 report, yet it took the party until 2025 to act on this.73
Developments since have been equally schizophrenic and characterised by the ongoing struggle between a largely Zionist leadership and historic figures and progressive elements in the party’s lower ranks or local and state branches, as well as the many young activists that joined the party in recent years.74 Die Linke supported a pro-Gaza mass demonstration and finally calls the genocide what it is.75 This stands in stark contrast to the repeated revocation of critical resolutions by state branches or its youth wing76 and the expulsion of anti-colonial activists.77
Credit: Faisal Yassin
CREDITS
Authors
This is the fifth longread in a series of five based on the Transnational Institute’s report Solidarity under Siege: Germany’s Repression of the Palestine Movement. The first part can be found here. The report draws on the insights of interviews with seven activists from the Palestinian solidarity movement, including Palestinians and German, Muslim and Jewish people, among other (overlapping) identities, who shared their trust, stories and time with the author. At their request, pseudonyms have been used for some of these activists.
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