In large and small cities, from Aschaffenburg to Bad Tölz: According to police estimates, more than 130,000 people across Bavaria set an example for cohesion and tolerance in society over the weekend. In demonstrations such as those in Munich, Nuremberg, Würzburg and Regensburg, participants spoke out against exclusion and extremism.
The protest was also directed against the AfD, which is monitored by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution in Bavaria, among others. The crowd in the state capital was so large that the organizer ended the demonstration after around an hour after consulting with the police. The safety of the participants can no longer be guaranteed, a police spokesman said on Sunday. The organizer spoke of around 250,000 protesters, the police said there were more than 100,000. In the middle of the week, the city was still expecting 10,000 to 20,000.
Many participants in the demonstrations promoted coexistence in Germany with self-designed posters. “Björn Höcke is a Nazi”, “Better colorful than shit brown”, “Stop the arsonists” could be read. The demonstrators in Nuremberg clearly turned against the right. Chants shouted: “The whole of Nuremberg hates the AfD!”
The Alliance to Stop Nazis took part in the rally in Nuremberg under the motto “Now! Not an inch from the fascists!” called. According to police, around 15,000 people came, including many families. Around 1,000 participants were expected. To ensure that everyone had space, the police closed the streets around the demonstration site. The organizer spoke of at least 20,000 people. “The entire eastern city center of Nuremberg is full,” said a spokesman for the Alliance to Stop Nazis.
Across Germany, hundreds of thousands took to the streets on Saturday alone; according to police figures, around 15,000 people came together in Nuremberg. In Würzburg the police counted up to 3,000 people, in Aschaffenburg around 800. In Bamberg, according to the police, around 6,000 people took part under the motto “Defend Democracy”, and in Regensburg on Sunday at least 3,000 took part.
The protests were triggered by a report from the media company Correctiv from last week about a previously unknown meeting of right-wing extremists in a Potsdam villa on November 25th. Several AfD politicians as well as individual members of the CDU and the very conservative Values Union also took part in the meeting. The former head of the right-wing extremist Identitarian movement in Austria, Martin Sellner, said he spoke about “remigration” there. When right-wing extremists use the term, they usually mean that large numbers of people of foreign origin should leave the country – even under duress.
Holocaust survivor Ernst Grube said in Nuremberg that when he heard about the meeting in Potsdam, he was horrified and upset. “My family was persecuted.” He himself survived the Theresienstadt concentration camp. Regarding the plans of the right-wing radicals involved in the meeting, Grube said: “It is an attack on millions of people.”
Thousands of people have already taken to the streets in German cities in the past few days. Often significantly more people took part in the protest than were registered by the organizers. The President of the Central Council of Jews, Josef Schuster, welcomed the rallies. “I’m really pleased that the middle of society is standing up,” he told the Augsburg General.