The menace of neo-Nazi activities and other extreme right-wing manifestations was stressed separately this week by Justice Minister Juergen Schmude and Heinz Galinski, chairman of the Jewish community in West Berlin. Galinski accused the authorities of failing to take measures to counter the danger.
Schmude said here Sunday that recent developments “definitely refute” the contention that neo-Nazi and extreme rightwing attacks are isolated, local incidents. He said it has become clear that neo-Nazi groups have managed to develop a carefully planned infrastructure with branches in all parts of the Federal Republic and contacts with similar groups abroad.
Galinski, who spoke Monday at ceremonies marking the 43rd anniversary of “Kristalnacht” when synagogues, Jewish homes and businesses all over Germany were destroyed, said the emergence of a nationwide neo-Nazi organization has been observed for a considerable time. He said the recent discovery of 32 neo-Nazi and rightwing weapons caches in the state of Lower Saxony, was an “alarming sign” that should put an end to indifference.
Schmude’s statement, issued by the press service of the ruling Social Democratic Party (SPD) followed an angry debate here over who was responsible for playing down neo-Nazi activities. Ulrich Klug, former Justice Minister of the Hamburg City-State and a member of the Free Democratic Party (FDP), said all three democratic parties represented in Parliament have behaved as if rightwing extremism was nothing but a marginal, unimportant phenomenon. He stressed that he included his own party, the SPD’s junior coalition partner.
Schmude defended the federal authorities’ decision to take over the investigation of the weapons caches in Lower Saxony. That decision has been criticized by the state government there, which is headed by the opposition Christian Democratic Union (CDU), as politically motivated. But Schmude argued that efforts to curb neo-Nazism should be commensurate with the dangers it poses which are now on a national scale.
Meanwhile, neo-Nazi vandals caused an estimated 200,000 Marks damage to the Jewish cemetery in Giessen, North Rhein-Westfalia where 100 gravestones were desecrated. The small Jewish chapel at the site was broken into and smeared with swastikas and other Nazi symbols in brown paint, apparently to indicate the ideological affiliation of the vandals. Police are investigating.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
