order to prevent potential acts of violence, it is also worth emphasising that extremist violence is not a consequence of hate speech alone. Whilst myths concerning the perceived threat of foreigners and the culpable establishment do not explicitly call for hatred and violence, they do play a significant role in legitimising violence. Espousing these narratives is not a criminal offence, however extreme right-wing actors are fully adept at spreading and amplifying such myths and conspiracy theories across social media. The problem lies not in individual content and posts, but rather the complex extremist networks that disseminate such narratives and infiltrate mainstream discussions and platforms with swarm tactics.7 Thus, knowledge-sharing and collaboration between larger and smaller tech firms is required, as the latter have less resources at their disposal and extremists are more likely to exploit such platforms.
Reem Ahmed is a researcher at the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy and doctoral candidate at the University of Hamburg.
Maik Fielitz is a Doctoral Fellow at CARR and a researcher at the Jena Institute for Democracy.
1 Katrin Bennhold and Melissa Eddy, “‘Politics of Hate’ Takes a Toll in Germany Well Beyond Immigrants,” New York Times, February 23, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/21/world/europe/germany-mayors-far-right.html.
2 German Federal Government, “A Clear Signal in the Fight Against Right-Wing Extremism and Racism,” Press and Information Office of the Federal Government, November 25, 2020, https://www.bundesregierung.de/breg-en/news/cabinet-right-wing-extremism-1820094.
3 Reem Ahmed et al., “Transnationale Sicherheitsrisiken: Eine Neue Welle Des Rechts-terrorismus,” in Friedensgutachten 2020: Im Schatten der Pandemie: letzte Chance für Europa, ed. BICC et al. (Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2020), 139–57.
4 Jacob Aasland Ravndal et al., RTV Trend Report 2020: Right-Wing Terrorism and Violence in Western Europe, 1990—2019 (Oslo: Center for Research on Extremism, 2020), https://www.sv.uio.no/c-rex/english/groups/rtv-dataset/rtv_trend_report_2020.pdf.
5 Ivo Oliviera, “AfD Deputy Leader Says Angela Merkel is a ‘Dictator’,”, Politico, June 5, 2016, https://www.politico.eu/article/alexander-gauland-afd-deputy-leader-says-angela-merkel-is-a-dictator-migrants-far-right/.
6 Maik Fielitz and Reem Ahmed, It’s Not Funny Anymore. Far-Right Extremists’ Use of Humour (European Commission: Radicalization Awareness Network, 2021).
7 Bharath Ganesh, “The Ungovernability of Digital Hate Culture,” Journal for International Affairs, December 19, 2018, https://jia.sipa.columbia.edu/ungovernability-digital-hate-culture.
Germany’s Terrorist Attack: Migrant Communities Have Lost Trust
Barbara Manthe
The racist attack in Hanau on 19 February 2020 has left Germany with the question of whether the problem of radical right terrorism has been wrongly addressed so far. After the murder of Walter Lübcke in June 2019 and the anti-Semitic attack in Halle in October the same year, the Hanau attack was the third fatal crime in just nine months. The series of attacks seems to be an expression of a radicalised right-wing terrorist milieu that inspires perpetrators like the attacker of Hanau to their deeds.
Some observations
The assaults were very targeted and aimed to hit a specific target or victim group: A politician known for his pro refugee policy, such as Lübcke, the planned attack at the synagogue in Halle, and against shisha bars in Hanau, which are publicly identified as immigrant places. These targets are highly symbolic and are directed against very specific population groups. Thus, in most cases, right-wing terrorist attacks are by no means directed “against everyone” or committed randomly, but correspond to the specific radical right logic of the perpetrators. In all three cases there is no doubt about the mindset of the suspected perpetrators, which was, among others: racist, nationalist, anti-Semitic or misogynist.
The perpetrators in Halle and Hanau were obviously inspired by attacks in other countries. The use of social media, the writing of a legitimizing manifesto, and the modus operandi—to commit the act by shooting the victims in public—has been a recurrent practice over the last ten years, for example in Breivik's murders in Norway in 2011 or the massacre in Christchurch, New Zealand in 2019.
However, there have also been acts of radical right terrorism in German history that have great similarities with the crime in Hanau: in June 1982, for example, the neo-Nazi Helmut Oxner entered a Nuremberg discotheque, which was known for that many African Americans and other immigrants were regular guests. He shot two African Americans in the disco and then another Egyptian in the street. Three other people were injured.1 Similar to the killings in the shisha bars, Oxner specifically sought out a place where he knew his victims were.
The media debates about the attack in Hanau are politically charged. Radical right hatred, violence and terrorism are often addressed by many journalists and the attack is identified as a political crime. The fact that this is worth mentioning is shown by a look at other crimes, such as the massacre on the Olympia Shopping Centre in Munich in July 2016, when an 18-year-old murdered nine people for racist motives.2 This radical right terrorist attack gave rise to years of struggle over whether or not it should be considered politically motivated.
The reactions of high-ranking politicians, on the other hand, leave no concrete indications as to how the challenge of radical right terrorism can be addressed in the long term. On the one hand, action should be taken more consistently about toxic migration debates as well as radical right agitation on the Internet, on the streets and in parliaments. On the other hand, the covert structures of militant neo-Nazis, where strategies of armed struggle are discussed and weapons are procured, also pose a serious problem.
Whenever radical right terrorism was very strong in the Federal Republic of Germany, such hidden structures existed, even if not every perpetrator had direct contact with them. But they are one of the biggest nurse cells for radical right terrorism. The ban of Combat 18 in January 2020, for example, came years too late according to many observers.3
The debate also includes disturbing statements by decision-makers, which are unlikely to strengthen the confidence of those concerned in state and political institutions. Sigmar Gabriel, former SPD federal chairman and former vice-chancellor, served a clear whataboutism when he tweeted a few hours after the Hanau attack:
The enemy of #Democracy stands on the right: It cannot be denied that left-wing chaotic people are beating up policemen, setting cars and garbage cans on fire and repeatedly causing high property damage. All bad enough and not to be trivialized. #hanau4
Even though Sigmar pointed out the danger of radical right violence in the following tweet, the dominant reference to damage to property by leftists was enormously irritating.
However,
