Mike Hembury

If you want to understand the priorities of Germany’s political establishment, look at what happened this month. The far-right AfD won almost 44% in Saxony-Anhalt. Two weeks later, it won 38.2% in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Then, on the very same night as that second AfD victory, Die Linke won Berlin with 25.7% - campaigning on rents, inequality and the socialisation of hundreds of thousands of homes owned by large real-estate corporations. And suddenly, much of Germany’s political debate has become consumed by Die Linke and accusations of antisemitism. The Google Trends graph offers one preliminary indication of where attention shifted after election night: searches for “Antisemitismus” overtook searches for “AfD Mecklenburg-Vorpommern”. What we are witnessing is a desperate attempt of the establishment to smear Die Linke by weaponising antisemitism. It is something the German establishment has been relentlessly doing over the last 3 years, to shield itself, as well as, Israel from accountability for war crimes and the genocide in Gaza. After all, Germany and the US still supply 99% of the weapons to Israel. Since the left’s victory in Berlin, allegations of antisemitism have rapidly become a central issue in Berlin’s #coalition debate. Meanwhile, the right wing AfD, that has just received nearly four in ten votes in another German state continues its march into the political mainstream. There is another issue that should not disappear behind this debate: housing and economic power. Die Linke is demanding implementation of Berlin’s 2021 referendum to socialise the housing stock of major corporate landlords. CDU (conservatives) opposes the policy, while SPD (centre-left) has proposed a substantially different approach. A government excluding Die Linke - potentially CDU, SPD and Greens - is mathematically possible. When a left-wing party wins the capital on a programme challenging landlords and concentrated economic power, enormous political energy is devoted to smearing it. There is a profound contradiction at the heart of all this: Germany’s establishment turns its fire on the Left in the name of fighting antisemitism, while a far-right party with a track record of antisemitic and racist rhetoric surges towards the political mainstream - threatening Jewish, Muslim, LGBTQI+ and other minorities. When the far right takes power at the national level, remember who Germany’s political establishment chose to spend its political capital fighting.