Clashes at “Generation Deutschland” blockades

More than 35,000 opposed the founding conference of AfD youth party

~ Josie Ó Súileabháin ~

Tens of thousands of people arrived in Gießen, Germany as part of a united front against the formation of a far-right youth party, relaunched by the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) on 29 November. Political actions organised by the antifascist alliance Widersetzen saw multiple highways and roads in the district of Hessen blocked by activists.

Photo: Wiederzetzen

Around 800 people attended the launch of the youth party Generation Deutschland, an event that was postponed for more than two hours as a result of anti-fascists’ disruption. German police responded with heavy repression including pepper spray, rushing protesters with baton charges, and water cannons from police tanks, causing multiple injuries.

Photo: Mouafak Mahmalji

“Thank you for standing firm despite the massive police violence,” Widersetzen said after the event. “The scale is shocking and aligns with the decisions of the city of Gießen. Anyone who tries by all means to ban protest is willingly doing the dirty work for fascism.”

This was the AfD’s second attempt to launch a youth party, after its predecessor Junge Alternative (JA) became uncontrollable, was classified as an extremist organisation by domestic intelligence and disbanded by its parent party last March. With Generation Deutschland, membership in the parent party is now mandatory and the AfD is hoping it can keep it in line.

Photo: Wiederzetzen

However, the current reboot appears to follow directly in the former youth party’s tragic fascist footsteps with the election of Jean-Pascal Hohm as chairman, himself classified as a right-wing extremist. “Germany is not lost yet,” he said after becoming the leader. “We will argue decisively, for a real migration turnaround that ensures that Germany remains the country and the homeland of the Germans.” Hohm himself has previously been part of the far-right Identitarian Movement and Pegida, as well as a proponent of conspiracy theories including ‘population exchange’ and the resistance the medical-led preventions of Covid-19.

Photo: Mouafak Mahmalji

The last elections in Germany saw the AfD gain 20.8% of the total vote and it is now the second largest part in Germany, gaining more than 69 seats, and surpassing the power of the former government run by Social Democrat Party (SPD) for the first time in its history. This was seen widely as a political disaster, considering the leading Christian Democrat Union (CDU) have become increasingly extreme.

This was shown in January, after a lethal stabbing committed by Enamullah Omarzai, an Afghan asylum seeker with untreated schizophrenia. Before the investigation had begun, CDU and AfD joined forces for the first time to pass legislation stopping arrivals of all refugees on Germany’s borders. In contrast, those who requested to the court that Enamullah receive psychiatric support instead of imprisonment were those who survived his attack.

What ‘generation Antifa’ have proved on the streets of Gießen is that the youth are not so easily manipulated to fight a cause only beneficial to billionaires. “It continues,” Widersetzen writes in the aftermath, “because today was not the first day: we struggle in everyday life and remain uncomfortable. We have the hope that the new AfD youth can count on our protests.”

Top photo: Mouafak Mahmalji

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