NEWS ARCHIVE 1: Germany, Italy, Austria…
NEWS ARCHIVE 2: Well, basically European voters have pulled the parliament to the farthest right it’s ever been… [fade under]
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: In EU elections earlier this summer, right wing parties made major gains across the continent. That includes a far right German party called the AFD, Alternative for Germany.
NEWS ARCHIVE 3: …the eastern state of Thuringia, one voter in three now backs the AfD.
NEWS ARCHIVE 4: The party expects substantial gains in state elections next year.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: Over the past several years, correspondent Evan Williams has been reporting for us on the rise of the far right in Germany and a wave of violence there targeting Jews, Muslims, and migrants.
EVAN WILLIAMS: What we noticed over the past few years was the increasing power and strength and popularity of the organized far right in politics.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: His latest film with us is called Germany’s Enemy Within. He joins me today to talk about his reporting. I’m Raney Aronson-Rath, editor in chief and executive producer of Frontline, and this is the Frontline Dispatch.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: Evan Williams, thank you so much for joining me on the Dispatch.
EVAN WILLIAMS: Great to be here, Raney. Thanks for your time and all the support on this.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: Absolutely. So, of course, you’ve been reporting stories from all around the globe during your career. And in recent years, you’ve been looking into the far right in Germany. In your 2021 film, you reported on the aftermath of two brutal attacks, the 2019 attack on a synagogue in the German city of Halle and a 2020 massacre in Hanau targeting Muslims and people with a migrant background. Let’s talk about why you returned to Germany this year.
EVAN WILLIAMS: Well, last time, you’re quite right. Last time we reported the film for Frontline in 2021, it was really looking at the far right political violence against immigrants, Jews, Muslims, politicians. But what we noticed over the past few years was the increasing power and strength and popularity of the organized far right, what’s called the ‘new right’ in Germany, in politics and particularly in state politics in Germany, which the states have a lot of power and they are organized and they are doing really well. And when I started to notice that their polling was going over 30 n some Eastern German states, I thought we should really start to look at this because that meant they were in a position where they could at least be in a coalition or at least assert influence, if not potentially take power at some point. So, this became something I thought was worth pursuing.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: Right. I know we’ve talked at length about the rise of the far right. I want to talk about what’s been going on in the U. K in recent days. We’re speaking on Tuesday, August 6th. There have been riots for several days now. We don’t know what will develop in the coming days before our listeners hear this, but give me your perspective based on your reporting on the far right in Europe.
EVAN WILLIAMS: Indeed. I mean, one of the most tragic things we’re seeing at the moment across Europe is what’s happening in Britain. I mean, uh, this was an incident that occurred more than a week ago. A young man very tragically killed three young girls at a dance party, injuring many, many more. Initially, social media messages went out that this was a Muslim immigrant who had committed this crime, and far right groups organized very quickly in that town and, and in neighboring areas, in and around Southport, in the northwest of the country and started attacking or threatening mosques and Muslims and went on a rampage. It had nothing to do with an immigrant, and the boy who was underage, was born in Britain. His parents were originally from Rwanda. And so it was one of those terribly tragic cases. But what’s happened since then? is that the anti immigrant, particularly anti migrant, but also anti-Black, anti any immigrant sort of sentiment has spread across the country in what I think seems to be quite an organized fashion. And this I think has taken Britain absolutely by surprise. It has horrified most of the community. But it is an outpouring of violence and anger and hate, the like of which hasn’t been seen for many years in Britain.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: And what do you think is driving this, Evan, as you look at that, and take me back to Germany as well and what you saw there?
EVAN WILLIAMS: Of course. I mean, Britain, there’s no, there’s no secret [that] Britain has been going through many years of, I’d say, economic instability. Particularly after Brexit, there’s been sort of a, a nationalism that’s been, that’s been fanned by certain elements of the political classes as they support sort of support for Brexit. But there’s also tapping into sort of a disquiet. People are feeling like life is getting harder. People aren’t getting anywhere economically, and we’re seeing that across Europe as well, and particularly this plays into the people we spoke to in East Germany. When I say to them — these are just normal mums and dads and retirees and they’re supporting the far right Alternative für Deutschland for the first time. And I’m asking why, you know, um, and there’s like, ‘well, nobody’s listening to us. They feel like the cost of living is getting more expensive. They don’t see a way out of their socio economic situation. And I think when you get the far right messaging to them, that the problem is the migrants, the problem is the Muslims, they’re taking your jobs, they’re doing the usual tropes that we hear from the far right, they are latching onto this in surprisingly large numbers, uh, and that’s what’s happening in Germany at the moment. And that’s why the AfD is in a position where they may do very well in these upcoming state elections on September 1st.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: Well, okay. So now let’s talk more specifically about the AfD and their platform. What are they proposing to the German public?
EVAN WILLIAMS: Yeah, it’s a really interesting question. And there’s two parts to this question
actually, Raney. So, um, they propose everything you would imagine from a far-right group. So they’re saying, okay, first of all, we’re going to get rid of all the illegal migrants who are immigrants who are here. We’re going to deport them. We’re going to set up a deportation airport. Uh, the leader of the AfD in Thuringia, Björn Höcke says to me in the interview in the film, uh, we will create a, a deportation airport here and, um, we’ll get rid of all the illegal immigrants. But also then saying, well, actually, and then after that, all those immigrants that haven’t really fully assimilated, um, that aren’t really German, that are maybe on benefits of some sort. Well, we think you can probably encourage them to leave as well. Um, and when I asked what, how do you do that? He’s saying, well, um, that would be a financial encouragement, obviously, you know, they’re, they’re not going to be happy here. So we’ll, we’ll encourage them to leave. And this is, this has the echoes of Nazi Germany for many Germans. Now they also talk about economic policies and other things. But, you know, really this is the thing that they’re pushing forward. And of course, other politicians have said to us and observers, well, that’s all very well to say that in opposition. What happens when they actually get in power? What will they really do? And that’s why it’s such a good question because many in Germany think if the far right win power, uh, and if they were in government in the state, in say one of the Eastern states for five years, uh, people may see, see them as being unable to address the problems that they all feel at the moment, but let’s wait and see.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: I mean, right, let’s wait and see and also just give me a sense of the timeline.
EVAN WILLIAMS: Well, the timeline is on September 1st, there are two states in East Germany — that’s Thuringia and Saxony— are having state elections. Uh, in those elections, the AFD at the moment are polling 30 percent. In recent EU elections, they won 30%, uh, the biggest party, uh, in those, in those states to return members of parliament for the European Union, European Parliament. Uh, if they win that sort of number, um, they could, if that’s the biggest number of votes, they would then have the first choice to try and form a government. Um, we’re told that the other parties in, in sort of Europe’s bizarre coalition politics, which is slightly unusual for, for most people in the States, but, um, you have these coalition parties and often you might have three or four or even five parties joining together to form government. So they might all, all the other parties might get together and prevent the AFD from actually taking power. After that, after that, there is a federal election in Germany next year in 2025. They are now the second biggest, second most popular party by block in the country. So they are going to be a significant force either in opposition or in some sort of. potential power, um, in Germany, generally.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: So you spoke to a very influential figure in the AfD as he campaigned in the German state of Thuringia. His name is Björn Höcke, and he’s someone who you say in the film has really pushed the boundaries of political speech.
EVAN WILLIAMS: So Björn Höcke is a former history teacher who for many, many years now, uh, had joined or started around 2013, 14, joined the AFD, the Alternative for Deutschland, Alternative for Germany, which began as an, as a sort of a Euro skeptic party. And that was at the time when Germany was largely bailing out Greece, if we remember that, um, when Greece was going bankrupt and the, uh, the Europe, uh, the EU were bailing out these Southern European countries. So this, this small grouping of largely sort of middle class professors got together and we’re like, no, we don’t really like this. And very quickly inside the party, Björn Höcke, um, analysts and academics I’ve spoken to tell me started to drive a much more far-right agenda within the party itself and very quickly it turned from concentrating on the EU, although it’s still basically-anti EU, by the way, but it turned to, um, to much more anti immigrant, anti-Muslim policies. And this really heightened in 2015 when Angela Merkel opened the doors for roughly 800,000, close to a million, largely Syrians during the big refugee crisis. And she did that as a way of trying to change the image of Germany as being this rather grumpy, you know, white country to say, we can afford to bring these people in. We can afford to give them sanctuary. Um, it’ll help us longer term anyway. And so she did that, and the AFD started using this very anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant rhetoric that people in the film tell us, um, they believe, has actually encouraged certain acts of violence against Muslims and immigrants in Germany because once politicians start saying this sort of thing, people, some people think it’s okay to then go and do things.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: Höcke rarely speaks to the foreign media, but you spoke with him and you asked him about his use of Nazi slogans. Tell us about that interview and let’s first hear a few seconds from that interview.
EVAN WILLIAMS: You’ve been charged with issuing a Nazi comment, “Everything for Germany.” You’ve been charged with a criminal offense, because that’s a crime. It’s a Nazi saying.
BJÖRN HÖCKE: [Speaking German] You are absolutely right [fade under]…
EVAN WILLIAMS: Yes, indeed. And, and, and exactly right. So part of his pattern of politics has been to, as you say, correctly, to test the boundaries of acceptable political speech. And we must remember that in Germany, because Germany went through World War II and the Nazis, they’ve got certain laws in place which ban certain phrases and symbols. So Nazi phrases, the swastika, uh, Nazi sayings, uh, certain symbols and other things, um, are actually a criminal offense, uh, which is quite unique. And so Björn Höcke used a phrase — basically everything for Germany, ‘Alles fur Deutschland’ at his public speech, which is a criminal offense because it was used by the Nazi SA, the original brown shirt militia, uh, it was even on their honor daggers. It was an engraving in their daggers. So it was very much a Nazi saying at the time when they were starting to, you know, beat up and kill leftists and anybody that opposed the Nazis. And then they’d go on to start the pogroms against the Jews, of course. So then he says this at a public meeting and then is charged, and then said it again after he was charged, as we’re told in the film by one of the domestic intelligence chiefs. And then he’s charged again, and then says, ‘well, I know I didn’t really understand that. I didn’t know the meaning.’ And so when I interviewed him, I said, well, you’ve been charged with a criminal offense of using a Nazi slogan. This is effectively, um, dog whistling, this is sort of messaging. This is far-right messaging to the population. They go, no, no, no. This is just the same as what Trump said when he said America first. We’re just patriots. We’re, we’re not, that’s not a Nazi thing. There’s no criminal offense in that. Anyway, he was found guilty in a criminal court and fined about 30, 000 dollars. That’s how serious that sort of phraseology is taken in Germany. And there’s one other really interesting episode of the way he uses his speech. He, a few years ago, uh, back in 2017, I think it was, he said that the Holocaust memorial in Berlin was a memorial of shame and that Germans, Germans were the only people that had planted a memorial of shame in their capital, and that we needed to, we need, that the country needed, a 180 degree turn in the way that it remembered the Holocaust. Now, he was saying this because he believes that German history should be remembered for all its greatness and all its contributions to society, etc. And that this was just a small episode, you know, the Holocaust was a small episode along the way. Well later, when he got criticized and almost thrown out of the AFD for these comments. He then said, well, I look, I made a mistake. I’ve learned my lessons. But the issue is the comment has already been said. And those who analyze and monitor Björn Höcke, particularly domestic intelligence in Germany, say that he knows exactly what he’s doing. And this messaging goes out that it’s okay to sort of revisit and rethink the way that we remember the Holocaust and the Nazis.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: So, AFD chapters in a few of the states are now classified as extremists. Tell us about that.
EVAN WILLIAMS: It’s a very unique situation in Germany. After World War II, they established a domestic intelligence agency, sort of similar to the FBI in some ways, but with a remit to basically monitor and to try to prevent the return of extremism, particularly after the experience with the Nazis. And this domestic intelligence agency can basically monitor political parties or operatives among many other things to prevent extremism. So, the agency declared a faction of the AFD that was run by Björn Höcke as an extremist threat to democracy. That organization within the party was then disbanded. Björn Höcke remained a very powerful figure in the party. And then the domestic intelligence agency then declared the entire party in Thuringia under Björn Höcke an extremist, an extremist threat to democracy, which meant that then it was officially and publicly put under surveillance. So they monitor their phones, they monitor their communications. They are monitoring this party, and this is quite extraordinary, isn’t it, Raney, that to think that a political party, which is polling 30 percent in a state, is under surveillance as an extremist threat to democracy. And I think most of us outside Germany find that quite hard to sort of understand, because if it’s a threat to democracy, well, then shouldn’t it just be banned? And there are many people in Germany that think that should be the case. However, um, when you, when you look at that issue, um, it’s problematic because then, I mean, very fundamentally, you might have 30 percent of the population who believes in this party, supports the party and what they say and what they do. And then if you ban that party, you would then disenfranchise 30 percent of the population. So then the party generally across the country has now also been declared a suspected threat to democracy, which is one step below being declared a full threat to democracy. And so the entire party is now being surveilled by domestic intelligence because, um, because it could be seen as an extremist threat. And that’s based upon basically it’s it’s rhetoric against migrants and Muslims and minorities. and that’s why they’re now under surveillance in these states and under suspicion in the country.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: Evan, what does the AFD say about being labeled as extremist?
EVAN WILLIAMS: Now the AFD say, Well, hang on a second. The, uh, domestic intelligence agency is a, an organ of control by the central government. They are trying to suppress legitimate opposition, as in us, the AFD. Um, all of these things are terrible and it’s just the way the government is trying to suppress, um, opposition because we’re against them. That is their official response and that’s exactly what Björn Höcke said to me when I asked him exactly the same question Raney.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: One of the most extraordinary parts of the film, and this is the documentary itself, but also the last reporting you did, are your conversations with Stefan Kramer, the domestic intelligence chief in Thuringia. In your 2021 film, Kramer warned that the violence in Halle and Hanau were just the tip of the iceberg.
EVAN WILLIAMS: You’re absolutely right. When you remember those, those warnings he made in that 2021 film, when he was like, well, this is just the beginning. This is just the tip of the iceberg. As we include in the film, there are plots, uh, violent plots by the far right to overthrow government, to attack MPs. We include the, the Reichsburger plot as the most recent iteration of that where they were going to storm the federal parliament and try and, uh, potentially arrest and maybe even assassinate, according to domestic intelligence, some of the MPs. So they’re, they’re monitoring these sort of things, but at the same time, Stefan Kramer really surprised me when we talked about what might happen in Thuringia, which is the state he’s, uh, he’s running the agency. And he said if the AFD gets into a governmental role into a position of power, that he will now at this point in time leave Germany.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: It was really, it was really a poignant moment in that interview with Kramer. Let’s hear that moment from the documentary.
STEPHAN KRAMER [in film]: If the AfD gets into a governmental responsibility, if they are the ones being in charge, I’m leaving the country, and I’m not saying that easily. I’ve been living all my life in Germany. I’m raised in Germany. I’m a reserve officer in Germany. I’m fighting for this democracy. This is my home. But once this first step takes place, that’s my red line.
EVAN WILLIAMS [in film]: Why not just move to another part of Germany if they’re in Thuringia?
STEPHAN KRAMER [in film]: Because I’m saying if it starts in one state, it will go on in others. We Germans seem to have a cultural problem with reading, understanding and listening what dictators are saying, writing and doing. When Hitler wrote Mein Kampf, people said, “Oh, come on.” For God’s sake, read! Listen! Understand! Take it for real what they say, because most of the time they do what they say.
EVAN WILLIAMS: It sort of shocked me actually. He basically sees this as a red line. If, he says, a section of the community is willing to vote in a far right group, a declared extremist threat to democracy into a position of power, then that’s his red line. And he said that as a domestic intelligence chief and as a Jew, as a Jewish German as well, where he just said, I’m not going to take that risk. And I said, you know, is it, do you, do you worry about your, your physical security actually? He said, yes. He’s got a family. He said, it’s not just that, but it’s the environment that is then created that also troubles him. The fact that these guys might be running it. And there’s one really interesting other aspect of this. If they got into a position of governmental power, they then, and Björn Höcke would then be in a position where they would have the power to, uh, sack Stefan Kramer, which Bjorn Hocke has publicly said he would do, and install their own person in that position. So you would then, Stefan Kramer says in the film, you might remember there, Raney, where he says, um, well, then we’ve got a situation where the far right has, has, has appointed the chief of, of the state domestic intelligence agency to monitor the far right. And how’s that going to work?
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: So in your reporting, you also spoke with Armin Kurtovic. It’s one of the most emotional interviews in the film and it must have been really powerful talking with him. His son was murdered in the attack in Hanau. What did he tell you about the threat of the far right in Germany?
EVAN WILLIAMS: Yeah, I mean, I’ve got to say, I mean, um, Armin is a really, um, an amazingly dignified and eloquent man. And, um, I, I, it sort of chokes me up whenever I think about him, actually. When we first interviewed him in 2021 for the first film, he was telling us about the, what he saw as the failure of the police action to stop this man, even though this man had posted a, an anti immigrant, uh, and, and, and really really, uh, sickening anti Muslim manifesto online weeks before the attack. Uh, and so at that point, that’s what he was focused on when I went back to see him for this film. I was interested in what he thought about the potential influence of what’s going on politically. And he revealed to us that he had finally got hold of the police report. And it was discovered that the, the killer, the far right gunman, the day before the shooting, he’d been watching videos of a far right event at which Björn Höcke was present and speaking And Armin, his family is originally from Bosnia. He was born in Germany and let’s remember many of these people came to Germany after the war to help rebuild the country, like in many European countries. He sees himself as German. He’s a German citizen. He’s got, he’s got three other children. And he said he squarely blames the anti migrant, anti Muslim rhetoric by politicians in Germany for the violence that is then perpetrated against the Muslims and the immigrants. He says, and this is his view, it’s not just Björn Höcke, he said, there are many Björn Höckes. It’s getting worse. Uh, he said, all I want is something to change. You know, it’s not just for me, it’s, it’s my son, nothing’s going to bring my son Armin back. But I’ve got three other kids. And what about the other kids? You know, that last line in the film where he says, you know, does this have to happen again? Has so many layers to it. It’s, it’s like, does he, he’s referring there to all of Germany’s history in some ways in one line, all of Germany’s history, his son’s tragic death, the killing of the other people, the continuing rhetoric and violence and threats against Muslims and migrants.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: Well, I mean, this is as you were leaving Boston, working on this film with us, of course, we’re talking about your next film, and you are going to be looking next at not just the rise of this type of hate inside Germany, but also across Europe. You’re looking at what just happened in the UK. What’s going through your mind as you’re thinking about embarking on your next endeavor for Frontline?
EVAN WILLIAMS: Yeah. I mean, I think we, we, we want to look at what’s going on politically in Europe. I think everybody was shocked and surprised by the far right, the National Rally in France doing so well in recent elections. They didn’t do so well in the second round, but the, but let’s not forget they had a record victory. They came very close to taking power, parliamentary power and the presidential spot in France. Um, we’ve got far-right parties looking at, uh, taking power in Austria. There’s a far-right party in control in, in Italy. There’s a far right group with very close connections to Moscow in Hungary. For example, um, similar things are happening all over Europe in many, many ways. So I think that’s one aspect to it is what’s going on. And maybe it’s looking at the similar social and political background to this, that people are, that are driving people towards the far right, this disenfranchisement with the center. Um, and in Britain, I think what we’re seeing is the, is the more extreme, violent expression of that that is, I think, tied up with many other issues, um, as well. And, uh, economic deprivation, a lack of social mobility, um, you know, a general anti immigrant sentiment that has been fanned and flagged by certain politicians in Britain, particularly during the last election. And it’s not just me saying this, this is, you know, like experts we talk to and we’ll talk to in the next film, um, that are saying, well, politicians are using this for their own political gain. And the danger is that people then on the street will pick this up and it’s potentially going to create great fissures in society in Europe.
RANEY ARONSON-RATH: Evan, thanks for joining me on the Dispatch and I look forward to your future reporting out of Europe.
EVAN WILLIAMS: Thanks so much, Raney. And thanks so much to you for getting behind this. It’s really important we, we keep monitoring this. I think it’s, it’s really fraught times.
