German Jewish Students Block Far-Right Politician From Holocaust Memorial

Jewish students in Germany formed a human chain on Friday to block the entry of a senior far-right politician, Hans-Thomas Tillichneider of the AfD party, to a synagogue in Halle. Tillichneider, who was recently elected deputy president of the state parliament of Saxony-Anhalt, had arrived to attend a memorial ceremony for the 2019 antisemitic attack that occurred at the site on Yom Kippur. Ron Dekel, President of the Jewish Students' Union, confronted Tillichneider at the entrance, stating, "You are not welcome here, we will not allow a far-right extremist to enter our synagogue again." After a prolonged confrontation and police attempts at mediation, the politician was forced to leave.

The students' strong opposition stems from the record of Tillichneider, 48, who is considered a central ideologue of the extremist wing of his party and is monitored by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution. The article recalls that a year after the Halle attack, in which two people were killed by a neo-Nazi terrorist who attempted to massacre worshippers, Tillichneider called the attacker "a madman who acted alone" and denied any political connection to the event. He also made sharp remarks against Germany's sense of historical responsibility, claiming Nazi history was present in the country "like a zombie," and promoted a curriculum with the slogan "More Bismarck, less Hitler." Otto von Bismarck was the first chancellor of unified Germany, considered the central figure in its 1870 unification.

In response to the incident, the state parliament, headed by Tillichneider's party colleague Tobias Rausch, quickly issued an official statement claiming "a group of left-wing students" prevented participation while the police stood by. The statement also called the antisemitic attack an "act of frenzy." Tillichneider himself condemned the blockade as "mob behavior."

Conversely, Dr. Josef Schuster, President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, clarified that Tillichneider had disregarded the community's request for a non-political ceremony, stating that anyone who denies the antisemitic nature of the attack mocks the victims and is unworthy of participating in a memorial. The incident occurs against the backdrop of the dramatic rise of the AfD party, which recently garnered about 44 percent of the vote in the state. The article questions whether the BSW populist party will allow the AfD to form a government. Both parties share an adversarial stance toward Israel, with a June 2025 poll indicating that 75 percent of AfD voters and 83 percent of BSW voters oppose selling German arms to Israel. This position aligns with Tillichneider's own statements after the October 7th massacre, when he accused Israel of collective punishment of Palestinians and equated it to German responsibility during the Holocaust.