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During the protest against the Crown measures in Berlin, right-wing protesters pushed their flags to the seat of the German parliament. The main politicians reacted in horror, because the images are symbolic.
Protesters cheer in front of the Reichstag building. Shortly before, they broke a cordon.
From the police point of view, the day had gone well into the evening. Officials had under control the protest against the Crown state measures on Saturday in Berlin. Shortly before they escaped, they spread a message that encouraged them on social networks.
After prominent cookbook author Attila Hildmann again made incendiary speeches at the rally, the police arrested him. Images of the burly officer holding Hildmann in a headlock quickly made their way across the net, but were soon replaced by photos that had never existed in Germany before.
Shortly after 7pm, numerous protesters broke through the barriers in front of the Reichstag building, which houses the German Bundestag, from two sides. They climbed the stairs and tried to break into the parliament building. Police officers wearing helmets and batons ran after them but were unable to stop the protesters. The police were outnumbered and seemed overwhelmed.
There were only three policemen standing between the glass doors of the parliament building and the aggressive crowd. But they did not step aside and even in this exceptional situation they exercised prudence. The officers used their batons, but only to keep the crowd at a distance. An officer yelled at a protester to come down the stairs. A little later, tabloid journalists celebrated the three policemen as “heroes.”
The police used pepper spray
The crowd did not enter the building, but posed on the steps in front of the Reichstag. They filmed with the mobile phone and waved flags, which are popular on the right-wing extremist scene and among the so-called citizens of the Reich. The black, white and red flag of the German Empire, which is often carried along with neo-Nazi marches, was seen several times. Police had called in reinforcements and were able to gradually push back the protesters with pepper spray.
The police initially had no control over the situation.
Shortly after the incident, the officials were attacked. Why was the German parliament building not heavily guarded at all times, despite the fact that right-wing extremists had announced a “storm in Berlin” days ago and were also talking about storming the Reichstag? A Berlin police spokesman said: “We cannot always be present everywhere, it was precisely this gap that was used to scale the barricade, break it down and then climb the stairs in front of the Reichstag.”
It is not yet clear what criminal consequences the self-proclaimed Reichstag strikers will face. Journalists and activists have now been able to identify several of them through images. A younger man can clearly be assigned to the radical right-wing scene, another man is said to be a member of the AfD Junge Alternative youth organization.
A wide variety of groups participated in the large-scale demonstration against the federal government’s crown measures, but the event was also a meeting point for the radical right-wing scene. The photos show that Jürgen Elsässer, editor-in-chief of the right-wing magazine “Compact”, was in Berlin on Saturday, as was Martin Sellner, the head of the Identity Movement in Austria, whose German branch is classified as a right-wing extremist by the protection of the constitution.
The action on the steps in front of the Reichstag can be fully exploited in this setting for propaganda purposes. The flags often seen at neo-Nazi demonstrations are flown in front of the heart of German democracy. Look how far we have come, the state is weak and we are strong, this is how the action of the right-wing extremists can be interpreted from their point of view.
“Attack on our democracy”
The main German politicians reacted indignantly. Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier condemned the action as an “unbearable attack” on democracy that would not be accepted. Bundestag President Wolfgang Schäuble said: “It affects us all if a violent radical minority, clearly right-wing, wants to storm the seat of parliament.” There are “limits to decency” and therefore, according to Schäuble, the protesters should ask themselves if they really want to protest alongside the radicals.
Federal Interior Minister Horst Seehofer called the scenes in front of the Reichstag “unbearable”. “The Reich flags in front of the parliament are shameful,” wrote Foreign Minister Heiko Maas on Twitter, where SPD Chancellor candidate Olaf Scholz also said: “Nazi symbols, Reich citizens and Imperial flags have absolutely no place in front of the German Bundestag. ” The leader of the Greens Annalena Baerbock spoke of an “attack on our democracy”. CDU General Secretary Paul Ziemiak, for his part, seemed to insist on not discrediting all protesters, writing on Twitter: “The Corona protests were used by various groups, including right-wing extremists, for their own purposes.” .
In fact, there is no evidence that radical right or right wing participants formed a majority in the demonstrations. According to estimates by the authorities, a total of around 38,000 participants gathered for the protests in Berlin on Saturday. According to the Berlin Senate, around 300 people were arrested, most near the Russian embassy, not far from the Brandenburg Gate.
So-called Reich citizens and right-wing radicals had attacked the police there with stones and bottles, according to officials, the prisoners were also released. Most of the protesters were peaceful and did not seek disturbances, but the images of the riot in front of the Russian embassy and, above all, the horrible scenes in front of the Reichstag must remain in their memory.
