Yesterday up to 3500 people came to the last fascist Pegida gathering in 2016 in Dresden, Germany. The fascists gathered to sing christmas songs. About 1000 people attended at a liberal counter concert where mayor Hilbert had a speech in which he actually didn’t really took a position. About 350 people attended at a antifa counter gathering. About 120 people attended at the NoPe antifa gathering. Only 8 people attended at a third counter gathering. Pegida is still alive and the antifascist movement is still outnumbered by the fascists in the german city of Dresden. Since Trump won the US presidential election, European fascists are celebrating and hoping to win elections in several European parliaments.
Fascism is on the rise everywhere. In Dresden the fascist Pegida moverment might not be able to mobilise tens of thousands people week by week anymore but they are still outnumbering anti-fascist counter protests. Since the german fascist AFD party have won seats in several german state parliaments, becoming the second big party in the state of Saxony Anhalt, the german federal government of Angela Merkel is trying to win voters back by adopting xenophobic policies of the far right. On Wednesday the federal government started to deport Afghan refugees to war zones in Afghanistan.
But this doesn’t seem to help the federal government. The AFD isn’t losing any consent in the polls. After Donald Trump won the US presidential elections, german fascists were celebrating in the streets and are hoping for support from the Trump team.
In the first days after Trump was elected, it became clear that European fascists have good chances to become the support they are hoping for. Trump annouced that former Breitbart chief Steve Bannon will become the head of strategy in the White House. Breitbart is a media outlet of the fascist altright movement in the US. It played a major role in the elction of Trump and also has an office in London where it supports the fascist UKIP party. The London office also played a role in the Brexit campaign. On the night of Trumps election Breitbart had the most interactions on social media. More than big media outlets like CNN, BBC News or Fox News.
Shortly after Bannon was appointed by the Trump team, Breibart announced it will open branches in Germany and France to support nationalist parties in next years elections. In both European countries elections will take place in 2017 and the Front National and AFD have growing support already.
An AFD member of Berlin state parliament said in his speech at yesterdays Pegida gathering in Dresden: “The street needs you, the parliament needs AFD.” The fascist mob on the streets and their parliamentary arm are uniting more and more and although the anti-fascist movement is fighting against fascism in Germany, it seems that itisn’t able to stop the rise of fascist parties and moverments.
It often looks like as if parts of the antifascist movement everywhere are trapped in their own subculture, not able to reach big parts of society anymore. An antifa activist from Hamburg wrote that many people like to hang around wearing black in lefties bars and social centers, but are never seen during actions and demonstrations. Its something that can be seen in many other cities as well. Not only in Germany. Thats worrying, as the antifascist struggle is probably facing its biggest challenge since the 1940’s.
According to a statistic of the German Office Of Criminal Investigation fascists are attacking refugees several times a day for more than a year now. Arson attacks, beatings and harassment of refugees and refugee shelters on a daily basis. People who support refugees are also attacked on a daily basis.
This kind of attacks also take place in Greece, Sweden, the Netherlands, Czech Republic and other countries. In Bulgaria fascist militias are hunting refugees who crossed the border and in European countries like Hungary and the Ukraine fascists are in power.
Fascists are using social media very effective to mobilise people. Many antifa groups dont want to use corporate social media for good reasons, but this also means they leave social media to the fascists.
In many german cities antifa counter actions still outnumber fascist activists at fascist protests but this does not stop the growing support of the fascist AFD party. Apart from counter continuing protests against fascist demos and gatherings, the anti-fascist movement and groups need to discuss their tactics and strategies against the growing fascist movement in Europe and the US. What’s good and what needs to be changed or modified? How are we going to be able to fight fascism more effectively? How can we improve our own media work? The vibrancy of an antifa subculture which is starting to harm the anti-fascist struggle more and more also needs to be discussed. The anti-fascist struggle is not about listening to the right music or wearing the right clothes.
We support the #DisruptJ20 protests in Washington DC against the inauguration of Donald Trump and even want to propose to extend it to a global day of action on January 20, 2017 against fascism, racism, anti-semitism, sexism and homophobia. This day of action wont solve the problems of the anti-fascist movement but could be a strong sign that we will continue to resist.
No Pasaran!
Enough is Enough
Länk: https://enoughisenough14.org/2016/12/19/european-fascists-hope-for-a-trump-effect/
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