This Week in Germany
by Will, 2 May 2008
Guest post for now — (hopefully twill be a regular contributor to this weblodge in the near future) by Contested Terrain
The week began with 2 consecutive desecrations of Berlin’s largest cemetery , in which 40-50 gravestones and pillars were knocked over by unknown assailants. According to Der Spiegel, the Jewish Community was outraged. But was anyone else?
Former left-wing militant of the Red Army Faction, Horst Mahler, who is today a member of the neo-Nazi movement’s National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD), is being sent back to jail for greeting a jewish journalist with the Nazi salute. The judge threw Mahler out of court after he began denying the Holocaust in the courtroom. The Nazi salute and Holocaust denial are illegal in Germany. Mahler is sentenced to 10 months in jail.
Today, on the “Revolutionary First of May” demonstration in Berlin — one of the three demos from the radical Left in Berlin on Mayday — participants chanted “zionists are fascists” to applauding crowds. In chalk graffiti on the street, one could find the slogan, of solidarity with the “antifada” — a clever mixture of “antifa” and “intifada” — a demonization of Israel as “fascist.” In contrast to the euromayday demo — with its festive dance atmosphere, banners which drew attention to the precarization of work, calls for refugee rights, opposition to the gentrification of the river front, and its strong queer and feminist sensibility — the so-called revolutionary demo had the feel of a military parade.
But on a positive note, militant antifascists confronted the neo-Nazi NPD’s Mayday demo in Hamburg today. The antifa fought through police lines and successfuly blockaded the 800-person strong Nazi demo, preventing it from continuing on its scheduled march. Unfortunately, the 1,000 strong neo-Nazi mayday demo in Nuremberg was able to march unharmed, despite counter-protestors outnumbering the Nazis 3-1.
A small addition:
At the New Synagogue in Berlin, members of the Jewish community, of Parliament, and of the Green Party, amongst others, came together to found the Jewish Forums for Democracy and Against Antisemitism. The meeting aims to develop educational and organizational models for strengthening opposition to anti-democratic and antisemitic ideas. The meeting included a discussion of German antisemitism not simply as a phenomenon at the margins of society, but rather one based in the center of it. Additionally, the meeting was to focus on antisemitism in the post-Nazi society, as the generation of survivors, witnesses and perpetrators of the Shoah slowly pass away.
Friday 2 May 2008 at 2:42
And Contested Terrain would be most welcome. I have just seen the site for the first time and it is full of interest. Please join us.
Friday 2 May 2008 at 13:31
Seconded.
Sunday 4 May 2008 at 16:53
Yesterday, antifa groups held a demonstration through the neighborhood near the recently desecrated Berlin cemetery, in protest.
The usual police surveillance and searches took place, and the participants were mainly in their 20s and early 30s from the radical Left.
The unregistered march numbered about 200 people. It marched the main street, and then wound its way through the neighborhood to the main gate of the cemetery where a moment of silence was held.
At multiple points along the march, the blaring punk music was stopped in order to let the chanting crowd be heard by the bored, indifferent, and sometimes even bothered onlookers.
The passerby were informed by loudspeaker of the recent desecration of the cemetery, along with news of recent attacks by neo-Nazis on stores owned by minorities.
At points, neo-Nazis were spotted hanging out their windows video-taping the demonstrators. Some were also spotted on the street.
Flyers were passed out urging people to oppose antisemitism.
Sunday 4 May 2008 at 21:40
the “Revolutionary First of May” demonstration in Berlin — one of the three demos from the radical Left in Berlin on Mayday
You mean “… - one of the two “Revolutionary First of May demonstrations” in Berlin on May Day - one of the three demos from the radical left in Berlin on Mayday”.
Come on, say what you mean. I presume you’re referring not to the 1pm (predominantely Turkish/Kurdish) Maoist “revolutionary” demo (as it would be a waste of brain cells to even mention them), but the 6pm one. An alliance of assorted “Antifa”, Workers’ Power, and some strange onetime pro-Albanians who pray to the writings, funnily enough, of the man who was my childhood optician (and covered Berlin with pictures of Stalin to mark May Day. Thanks.).
I was on the “Euromayday” demo. It was musically/festively good. Politically though a bit crap. “Unions and strikes are irrelvant because most of us (who? ah, the lifestylist lefties who organised the demo, with speeches in Italian, English and Japanese, but none in Berlin’s main non-German languages: Turkish, Russian or Vietnamese. Well done!)..irrelevant because most of us are self-employed translators and IT people who can’t afford to strike, and we’re our own bosses too. Unions and strikes, boooring! So Web 1.0!”. Fuckwits. But the music was nice, as was the dancing. Shame there were two Sparts there though, who must have gone to the wrong demo.
Monday 5 May 2008 at 13:43
1) You can define it as you’d like. It’s not so important to me. But in a report of Berlin mayday, the 1pm demo can’t be simply ignored. It is a part of radical/far/hard Left movements whether we like it or not.
2) As for the Euromayday demo, I agree that it would be great if the speaches were also given in Turkish, Russian, and Vietnamese (or also Polish).
But I disagree with your assessment of the politics of the demo. Yes, it was quite festive and playful, but also political.
It stopped at various points along the route to give information about political issues in the neighborhood, issues effecting peoples lives in serious ways, and not simply their working lives.
It drew attention to the city’s development plans for the riverfront that is going to reshape both neighborhoods, Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg. It will result in raised rents, the privatization of public space, and all the other negative aspects of a city mega project.
The demo also stopped in front of the German supermarket chain, Lidl, and drew attention to the anti-union and precarious working conditions there.
I’m also not sure what you’re saying about the participants. Doesn’t seem to me at all that people are against unions or strikes. One of the very visible slogans printed on t-shirts and posters was infact “Ich streik.” (I strike). It seems to me that what they’re aiming to do is to find links between the various situations of changed working conditions. Hence their focus on precarization. Maybe they focus too much on the so-called creative industry/class, but good for them that they challenge the fetishized position of the industrial worker.