Jewish supporters of Germany’s far-right AfD see party as means to counter anti-Semitism

JNS.org, October 9, 2018

At a nondescript community center in the city of Wiesbaden on Sunday, dozens of Jews got together to officially form the Jewish faction of the rising right-wing political party in Germany: Alternative for Deutschland (AfD). Judging from the amount of cameras and reporters present—from Deutsche Welle to The New York Times magazine—it would seem that this was the most important Jewish event in Germany since the opening of Berlin’s Holocaust Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe.

The press conference felt more like a trial: This could be the AfD’s moment of redemption, a chance to prove that it’s not the party of anti-Semites or neo-Nazis that the mainstream media (and the official German Jewish establishment) claims it is. For Jews, it was an ultimate act of defiance—not against the ruling German coalition, but against their co-religionists.

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