On October 14, the State Office for Constitutional Protection of the German State of Lower Saxony (LfV) announced on its official account on X: “We are also Antifa. Of course.”
Yet research by the German Federal Office for Constitutional Protection showed that in 2023 left-wing extremists committed 727 violent crimes, a rise of almost 20 per cent. Among the extremist organisations mentioned by name were “Antifa-Ost”, “Antifa Süd” and “Antifa AK Köln”.
The LfV is one of 16 state-level security agencies in Germany. It adheres to the Lower Saxony interior ministry under its minister Daniela Behrens (Social Democratic Party, SPD).
Antifa, as defined by the scientific services of the German parliament, is a generic term encompassing various movements on the Left to left-wing extremist political spectrum.
The German Federal Office for Constitutional Protection – the federal equivalent of the state-level LfV – said in its 2023 annual report that left-wing extremism posed a significant danger for democracy.
The report stated that there were around 11,200 “violence-oriented” left-wing extremists in Germany, a rise of almost 4 per cent compared to 2022.
In 2023, left-wing extremists committed 727 violent crimes, a rise of almost 20 per cent, including by extremists called “Antifa-Ost”, “Antifa Süd” and “Antifa AK Köln”.
The LfV’s post was part of a series of “educational” messages on the history and definition of Antifa. A user posted a screenshot of a Tweet from 2020 by then-leader of the SPD, Saskia Esken, in which she wrote she was “58 and Antifa” – to which the LfV answered with its own message of solidarity.
Esken was heavily criticised for her post in 2020 and later shut down her Twitter account.
In replies to perplexed users, the LfV later explained that it merely referred to its “antifa(scist) attitude regarding its legal task and liberal democratic values”. Confronted with a call to violence by Antifa, the agency replied that it “disapproved of all forms of violence”.
Brussels Signal reached out to the LfV’s press service but has not received a reply.
The post has caused concern with commentators. Marc Felix Serrao, editor-in chief of the newspaper NZZ in Germany, wrote that a security agency should know the difference between Antifa and antifascism. Marcus Pretzell, a former member of the right-wing AfD, lamented that the Office for Constitutional Protection was, in his opinion, siding with violent enemies of the Constitution.
The Federal Office for Constitutional Protection is currently preparing a report on AfD as several German MPs are trying to have the right-wing party banned for allegedly “endangering the liberal democratic order“.