www.nkwatch.info – @neukoellnwatch
Documentation and analysis of the Neukölln-Complex: Right-wing/racist attacks in Neukölln, and the connections between police, neo-nazis and the AfD
Below is an incomplete English translation of the timeline put together by Neukölln-Watch. They have chronicled incidents in the district from the 1970’s up to today. We have added the glossary ourselves, to provide some background information for people not familiar with the local context or specific terms. Another glossary can be found here.
– – – Glossary – – –
Abschnitt 54 : Police station on Sonnenallee 107
AfD : Alternative für Deutschland is a right wing to far-right political party and is represented in the 19th Bundestag with 89 members. The faction is the third strongest in parliament (after the CDU/CSU and SPD factions) and the largest in the opposition, whose leadership it thus assumes.
Anti-Antifa : right wing individuals or groups which specifically target anti-fascist organisers or groups.
Breitscheidplatz attack : 19.12.2016, a truck was deliberately driven into the Christmas market at Breitscheidplatz, Berlin killing 12 and injuring 56. ISIL claimed responsibility for the attack.
BSG Elektro Krause – Ultra right-wing football club whose chairman Thomas Schirmer is an known neo-nazi.
BVV : Bezirksverordnetenversammlung – Each of Berlin’s 12 borough is governed by a council (Bezirksamt) with five councillors and a mayor. The council is elected by the assembly (Bezirksverordnetenversammlung). The borough governments’ power is limited, and subordinate to the Berlin Senate. There are five AfD members sitting on the Neukölln Bezirksverordnetenversammlung: Christian Blank, Danny Damerau, Andreas Lüdecke, Stephan Piehl, Steffen Schröter (https://www.berlin.de/ba-neukoelln/politik-und-verwaltung/bezirksverordnetenversammlung/online/pa021.asp)
CDU : Christian Democratic Union of Germany is the largest party in the Bundestag.
Christian Blank – Since March 2019, the AfD has repeatedly nominated Christian Blank as a member to the BVV Neukölln. Despite being a member of the right-wing hooligan group “Wannsee Front”, he receives the votes of the CDU.
Damascus – a pastry shop in Sonnenallee attacked several times.
Dritte Weg : The Third Path – a minor far-right and neo-nazi party. They stood in the 2019 EU elections.
Gerrit Kringel – Gerrit Kringel is CDU district councillor and chairman of his parliamentary group.
Hanau – shooting in two shisha-bars where nine people were killed and five others wounded by a far-right extremist.
K-fetish – a collective bar in Wildenbruchstrasse 86 with members from different radical left and anti-nationalist contexts.
Kontraste – Political news broadcaster.
Die Linke : the Left Party (die Linkspartei) a democratic socialist party.
LKA : Landeskriminalamt – The criminal investigations division.
Morgen Post – a newspaper
NDR : Norddeutsche Rundfunk – Northern German Broadcasting
NPD : Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands is a far-right and ultranationalist party
NW-Berlin : Website of the neo-nazi network “Nationaler Widerstand Berlin”
NSU – National Socialist Underground was a far-right German neo-Nazi terrorist group which was uncovered in November 2011. Families and survivors of NSU attacks still demand clarification from the German state of how the group was not stopped.
Sebastian Thom – known neo-nazi, Thom and Paulenz are both main suspects of arson and graffiti attacks in the area since 2016.
SEK : Spezialeinsatzkommandos – Special Operational Units.
Thomas Schirmer – part of the “Autonomous Nationalists Berlin” as well as the NPD. In 2017 Schirmer founded the soccer club “BSG Elektro Krause”.
Tilo Paulenz : member of the AfD Neukölln, in 2003 with about 30 other neo-Nazis and hooligans he attacked a group of young people with glass bottles and baseball bats in Britz.
2020
13.1.20 – The press reports that a hard-drive confiscated from Sebastian Thom could be decrypted by an external service provider. This included Anti-Antifa-data from the early 2010s on about 30 people, several of which were already appeared on the website of “NW-Berlin”
18.1.20 19:00 – AfD – BVV faction hold an event at the Casino Zwickauer Damm in Rudow, with Jeanette Auricht, Gottfried Curio and Nicolaus Fest.
22.1.20 – The AfD members in the BVV Neukölln once again nominate Christian Blank for the BVV Executive Board. Blank is part of the neo-nazi hooligan group “Wannsee Front”.
19.2.20 – In Hanau a white fascist shoots 11 people at Shishabars: Gökhan Gültekin, Sedat Gürbüz, Said Nessar Hashemi, Mercedes Kierpacz, Hamza Kurtović, Vili Viorel Păun, Fatih Saraçoğlu, Ferhat Unvar, and Kaloyan Velkov. He also shoots his own mother.
20.2.20 – In Neukölln, several thousand people march from Hermannplatz down Sonnennallee in memory of those murdered in Hanau. They walk to the crime scenes of the latest neo-Nazi attacks located around the local police station (Abschnitt 54) Meanwhile, the Green Party’ s functionary Antje Kapek announces via Twitter selfie at the Brandenburg Gate that it is now time for “radical clarification”. However, the Greens continue to reject a commission of inquiry into right-wing entanglement with Berlin authorities.
23.2.20 – A fire breaks out in the basement of an apartment building in Hermannstraße. 32 people are rescued from the house and several are injured. The cause of the fire is unclear. Arson attacks in hallways and cellars become more frequent in North Neukölln.
26.2.20 – The neo-Nazi and AfD district councillor Christian Blank makes a personal statement (without public observation) to the BVV. After reports come out about his close contact to the Neukölln neo-Nazi scene, he withdraws his candidacy for the BVV board. The CDU faction remains silent on the connection their own faction leader, Gerrit Kringel, has to the Neukölln neo-nazi Thomas Schirmer and his soccer club BSG Elektro Krause. The CDU had always voted unanimously with the AfD in support of Christian Blank.
5.3.20 – Two cars are set on fire on the corner of Wildenbruchstraße and Laubestraße. The police station Abschnitt 54 is located 50 meters away from the fire.
10.3.20 – In response to a parliamentary question by Die Linke, the Interior Senator admits that Sebastian Thom’s hard-drive, which was confiscated on 2.2.2018, was actually not encrypted and that all the sensitive data was simply located in the virtual trash bin of the drive. The police had given the impression that the decryption of the hard disk had dealt a substantial blow to the Neukölln neo-nazis.
18.3.20 – At the corner of Wildenbruchstraße and Laubestraße three cars are again set on fire. The heat from the fire also melts the shutters of a nearby apartment building. During further arsons on 10.5.20, SS runes and a swastika are sprayed under exactly this same window.
21.3.20 – A planned anti-fascist demonstration in Rudow is forbidden due to the Corona-Orders of the Neukölln district authority.
24.4.20 – In Tempelhofer Weg two cars are sprayed with swastikas and racist threats.
30.4.20 – Neo-Nazis from the “Dritte Weg” distribute flyers in Britz and Buckow.
10.5.20 – In Laubestraße a house is sprayed with SS runes, in front of the house four cars are set on fire. Another house in Laubestraße, (in front of which cars were set on fire on 5.3.20 and 18.3.20), is also sprayed with SS runes and a swastika.
29.5.20 – District meeting of the AfD in the Hotel Novi Sad in Rudow.
5.6.20 – NDR and Kontraste report that the Neukölln policeman and AfD functionary Detlef Moritz shared internal police information in an AfD chat group on the evening of the Breitscheidplatz attack on 19.12.2016. Members of this group were the neo-Nazis Tilo Paulenz and Christian Blank as well as other Neukölln AfD functionaries. The police officer’s messages were found on a mobile phone belonging to Paulenz, retrieved during a raid on 2.2.2018.
5.6.20 – At night in Wildenbruchstraße several shops and the hallway of an apartment building are sprayed with Nazi symbols. Again, these are shops which have been attacked several times before.
5.6.20 – A SEK operation at takes place at Neukölln S-Bahn station. One of the heavily armed officers wears a T-shirt from “Grunt Style”, a right-wing brand used by US American scene of Alt Right and White Supremacists. This SEK is also deployed during raids in Shisha-bars.
10.6.20 – NDR and Kontraste report that another Berlin policeman, officer Marcel H., shared internal police information in chats, including a message identical to one of the Breitscheidplatz messages from AfD policeman Detlef Moritz. Contacts between Moritz and H. are not yet known.
10.6.20 – The AfD policeman Detlef Moritz is transferred to office service, his service weapon and computer access is confiscated. (Morgenpost)
17.6.20 – The charges against Sebastian Thom and Tilo Paulenz for propaganda offences in summer 2017 are largely admitted. In November 2019, the public prosecutor’s office had brought charges against him for stickering and spraying SS rune. The district court had partially rejected this charge in January 2020, whereupon the public prosecutor’s office filed an appeal. The many arson and death threats continue to go uncharged. (Tagesspiegel)
19.6.20 – A pastry shop in Sonnenallee is sprayed with Nazi symbols at night and a van parked in front of it is set on fire. The shop had been attacked seven times in the past months. As in previous cases, the police do not mention the Nazi symbols, only reporting the incident in a collective report on car fires. Only two days later do they admit that there were Nazi symbols. It is reported from the neighbourhood that the police failed to examine the burnt-out van for possible traces until 22.6.20.
21.6.20 – At noon, a car in Jahnstraße is scratched and sprayed with racial slurs.
25.6.20 – A car is set alight in Donaustraße. First of four nights with burned cars in Donau- and Schönstedtstraße. Background is unclear.
26.6.20 – Four cars burned in Donaustraße and Schönstedtstraße. Background unclear.
26.6.20 – Several thousand people attend an anti-fascist demonstration in Neukölln, the route passes by the police station Abschnitt 54, the Damascus pastry shop and k-fetish.
27.6.20 – A car is burned in the Schönstedtstraße. Background unclear.
27.6.20 – Several Stolpersteine in Dieffenbachstraße are damaged.
28.6.20 – A car is set alight in Nansenstraße, and three more in Donaustraße. Background unclear.
1.7.20 – Several different leftists receive letters from the LKA, informing them that their data has been found hard drives belonging to Sebastian Thom and/or Tilo Paulenz. Which concrete data is concerned is not disclosed. However a journalist from Hamburg, who is informed by the police there receives detailed information, the problem lies once again with the LKA Berlin.
2.7.20 – In the evening, four local neo-Nazis and AfD functionaries, who all live within 300 metres of the last Nazi attacks, are outed with posters around Sonnenallee and Karl-Marx-Strasse. Robert Eschricht is the AfD chairman for Neukölln, Julian Potthast is also AfD executive board member, Hendrik Pauli is an AfD cadre who threatened people with knives (see 11.1.17 and 25.5.19), Marcel Feltin is an NPD activist.
4.7.20 – A fire breaks out in the early morning at the Lebanese restaurant Al Andalos in Sonnenallee. Six people are injured, two of them seriously. The BZ use the headline “flambierter Döner”, and a police spokesman the term “xenophobia” as a matter of course.
4.7.20 – The tires are punctured and Nazi stickers stuck around the car of an anti-fascist in Britz. The victim has often been the target of death threats and arson attacks.
6.7.20 – The police announce that their will be no consequences to the right-wing clothing of a SEK officer. There will be a “renewed awareness” at the SEK. The officer also has continued access to ammunition, weapons, training and data-banks.
7.7.20 – The police speaks of negligent handling of propane gas cylinders at the burnt out Al Andalos restaurant, remaining silent on the details.
7.7.20 – The leader of die LINKE parliamentary group Anne Helm from Neukölln and many other politicians receive death threats with the signature “NSU 2.0”. Earlier threats against a lawyer signed with this name were proved to be made by a group of at least 70 police officers in Hesse. In 2017 in Berlin there were also threatening letters sent from a police computer.
13.7.20 – Nine cars in a tenant parking lot in Jahnstr. are set on fire. The fire spreads to the apartment building and six people are injured by smoke gas, including two children. A car is also burned in Karl-Marx-Strasse.