Freedom of association
Raids on homes, premises of activists in Berlin and Duisburg
In December 2023, Berlin police deployed almost 200 officers to conduct raids on homes and premises connected to members of pro-Palestinian, anti-fascist feminist collective Zora. According to a police press release, six members of the collective are suspected of spreading propaganda on behalf of a banned terrorist organisation, referring to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, or the PFLP. The raid was prompted by a statement the group posted on its Instagram account on 12th October which said: “No liberation of women without the liberation of Palestine.”
On 26th September 2024, German authorities banned the pro-Palestinian association Palestine Solidarity Duisburg, citing its alleged support for Hamas and an “anti-Israel worldview.” North Rhine-Westphalia’s Interior Minister Herbert Reul stated that the group’s assets were confiscated, and that its websites would be taken offline. According to a ministry statement reported by the Anadolu news agency, police raided the homes of several members in the early hours of the morning and confiscated documents and electronic devices. Reul justified the ban as a measure against antisemitism and extremism, asserting that the group supported a vision of Palestinian liberation that involved the dismantling of the Israeli state.
On 30th September, Berlin police carried out coordinated raids in several districts, targeting five activists suspected of committing “pro-Palestinian crimes.” The operation, which involved 125 officers, focused on suspects aged between 18 and 40, whose homes were searched for evidence. During the raids, the authorities confiscated mobile phones, computers and other data storage devices, which are now being examined by investigators. According to Deutsche Welle, no arrests were made. Two of the men are facing charges of disrupting public order, while two others are being investigated for incitement. Another person is alleged to have violated German law by displaying symbols of banned organisations. Among the suspects is an 18-year-old who is accused of attempting to attack Berlin’s Senator for Culture Joe Chialo in mid-September. As reported by Deutsche Welle, the suspect is said to have thrown a microphone stand at Chialo during an event, missing him and accidentally injuring a woman.
Partly state-owned bank freezes accounts of Jewish Voice for Peace group
In March 2024, a partly state-owned bank in Germany froze the accounts of Jewish anti-Zionist group Jewish Voice for a Just Peace in the Middle East. In a letter, the bank demanded the group turn over a list of all its members, including addresses, tax documentation, income statements and other internal documents, under threat of terminating their accounts, noting that freezing the funds represented a “precautionary measure”.
Special task force set up to investigate pro-Palestinian activism
In April 2024, Al Jazeera reported that Berlin police had set up a special task force in October of the previous year, shortly after the Hamas attack on Israel and the beginning of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, which serves as “the contact point available for all police forces in connection with the Middle East conflict.” The task force, which is part of the Landeskriminalamt (LKA), the police intelligence centre, is tasked with investigating “left-wing and foreign ideologies”, including communist and pro-Palestine groups. This information was confirmed to Al Jazeera by a police spokesman. One of the task force’s competences is issuing guidance and instructions to police forces about what phrases and words used by activists may be deemed illegal. The Berlin police spokesperson told Al Jazeera that the use of the phrase “from the river to the sea” is currently considered a criminal offence in Berlin.
Freedom of expression
Palestine Congress shut down
In April 2024, Berlin police forcibly shut down a pro-Palestine event, the Palestine Congress, shortly after it began. Officers entered the auditorium, seized the microphones, and disconnected the live-streaming equipment. Authorities justified the action by citing a ban on political activities in Germany imposed on one of the speakers, Palestinian researcher Salman Abu Sitta, who was participating via video link.
Berlin police deployed 930 officers, with reinforcements from other regions, to secure the event. Another speaker at the Palestine Congress, British-Palestinian doctor Ghassan Abu Sitta, was denied entry into Germany and deported to the UK after several hours of interrogation. German authorities had also warned Abu Sitta that joining the conference online would be considered a breach of law and could lead to fines or imprisonment. Yanis Varoufakis, former Greek Finance Minister and leader of the DiEM25 pan-European political party, was also scheduled to speak via video link. After the event was broken up by police, he posted his intended speech online, which led to him also receiving a ban on political activities in Germany.
In May 2024, doctor Ghassan Abu Sitta succeeded in overturning the Schengen-wide travel ban imposed on him by Germany. His legal team argued that the ban violated his rights to freedom of expression and travel. The ban, imposed after Abu Sitta’s return from Gaza where he had worked in hospitals and witnessed war crimes during Israel’s military offensive, restricted him from entering countries such as France, Germany, and the Netherlands, where he was scheduled to speak about his experiences.
German citizenship to be tied to support for Israel
As part of a revision of its citizenship law, Germany has introduced new naturalisation requirements, including a commitment to Israel’s right to exist. This follows a similar move by the eastern German state of Saxony-Anhalt, which has required applicants to recognise Israel’s right to exist since December. A statement from the Interior Ministry described the changes, which came into force on 27th June, as follows: “In response to increasing antisemitism in Germany, the list of questions in the naturalisation test has been expanded. New exam questions have been added on the topics of antisemitism, the right of the state of Israel to exist and Jewish life in Germany.” This comes alongside other amendments streamlining the citizenship process: applicants who work in Germany and are deemed "well integrated" can now qualify for citizenship in five years instead of eight.
However, in light of the shrinking civic space for pro-Palestinian activism in Germany, many have described the changes as infringing on the rights of pro-Palestinians to freedom of speech and freedom of assembly.
Freedom of peaceful assembly
Excessive use of force against protesters
Germany continued to severely repress pro-Palestinian protests, with numerous instances of excessive force and police brutality documented on social media. These include:
- Footage captured on 15th June in Berlin shows multiple instances of excessive and disproportionate force, such as an officer suffocating a protester by placing a hand over his mouth before dragging him away. In another segment of the video, several police officers are shown kneeling on one protester, and one appears to punch him in the lower back even though he’s restrained with handcuffs.
- Another video, from 17th August, shows police choking a woman from behind while she’s kneeling on the ground, and telling her to “stop acting.”
- In a video from 18th August, police are shown repeatedly punching a protester in the head while handcuffed on the ground.
- In a video from Berlin dated 19th August, police officers in riot gear are shown forcefully pushing a woman to the ground from behind. The woman calmly moves away from the police officers, and the attack appears to be unprovoked. As soon as she stands up, she is surrounded and detained by several officers. Berlin police later confirmed to the media that an investigation had been launched into the incident.
- A video from 14th September shows a protester unconscious and bloody on the ground, while police attempt to slap him awake. According to a statement by the Palestine Speaks collective, he was injured when police stormed the demonstrators without prior warning. Witnesses report seeing police strike the young man several times, leading him to fall and hit his head on the ground. Instead of providing him with medical assistance, police carried him away to a side street, and paramedics only reached him 20 minutes later.
- In another video, from 19th October, police can be seen intimidating protesters with dogs. According to the user who posted the video on X (formerly Twitter), this was preceded by kettling and “brutal and violent arrests.” In the footage, the protesters that are seen aren’t engaging in any disruptive or violent activity.
Numerous other videos appear to show other instances of police punching and choking protesters.
Arrests of minors at pro-Palestinian demonstrations
In early June 2024, Berlin police detained several children during pro-Palestinian demonstrations, an action that activists describe as an intensification of police response against such protests. One incident involved the arrest of a seven-year-old boy who allegedly struck an officer's helmet with his flag. According to the boy's father, who shared his account with The New Arab (TNA), he was carrying his son on his shoulders at a demonstration when they were surrounded by officers, who forcefully engaged the crowd before detaining them in a police van. The police confirmed that six children under 16 were detained on 8th June, including the seven-year-old, whom they suspected of assaulting a police officer.
A video published on social media shows the seven-year-old in visible distress as he and his father are surrounded by a large number of police officers in riot gear. The boy's father reported that his son has been suffering from anxiety since the incident and needs psychological support. Another child, a 13-year-old, was arrested on the same day; he was handcuffed and taken away by police, who used a so-called “pain grip” on him, after he allegedly made a rude gesture. TNA reported receiving confirmation from police that the boy was detained on suspicion of insult.
University encampments
The Scholars At Risk initiative’s Academic Freedom Monitoring project expressed concern about police conduct during their interventions to disperse peaceful student encampments in Germany.
Freie Universität Berlin
On 7th May 2024, police arrested 79 protesters, including students, during a peaceful pro-Palestinian encampment at Freie Universität Berlin (FU Berlin). Organised by Student Coalition Berlin, a group of over ten student collectives, the protest called for a boycott of Israeli institutions and an end to repression of student activism. Around 150 people set up tents on campus, and approximately 50 occupied an adjacent building, holding signs and chanting slogans such as “Viva, viva, Palestine!” and “From the river to the sea.”
By 11:00 a.m., FU Berlin's administration called the police, who ordered the protesters to leave by 2:00 p.m. After they refused and formed a human chain, police dismantled the encampment and had detained 79 protesters by late afternoon. Police later opened investigations into alleged offences including trespassing, incitement, and participation in an unregistered assembly.
A statement from the Student Coalition alleges student protesters were met with “unjustified police violence and racially motivated detentions.” Students reported they were subjected to insults and physical attacks by police, and that a number of them had sustained serious injuries. They also reported that police had subjected them to racist intimidation, questioning or mocking students about their immigration status as their information was registered.
Humboldt University
On 23rd May 2024, police forcibly removed dozens of students from Humboldt University's (HU) Institute for Social Sciences, ending a protest occupation that had started the previous day. The occupation, involving around 50 students, called for HU to advocate a Gaza ceasefire and press the German government to impose an arms embargo and end aid to Israel. Initially, HU’s administration engaged with the students and agreed to let them occupy the building until 6 p.m, moving teaching online in the meantime.
However, Berlin Mayor Kai Wegner convened a crisis meeting with HU President Julia von Blumenthal and local officials, urging immediate action. Wegner later publicly called for HU to end the occupation, framing it as incompatible with the university's role in promoting critical discourse. Police began dispersing protesters outside the building in the afternoon and eventually cleared the interior around 6:30 p.m.
In the process, police reportedly injured a journalist from Berliner Zeitung, Ignacio Rosaslanda, detaining him for hours without medical attention, while some protesters also reported injuries from the evacuation. Two weeks after the encampment was evicted, on 6th June, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Rosaslanda was summoned for questioning by the police, interrogated for three hours and told that he was under investigation for resisting police, assault and trespassing.
HU's president stated that government pressure had led to the police intervention, noting that the order to end the occupation came “from the very top.” At a press conference, von Blumenthal and HU Vice President Niels Helle-Meyer clarified that officials had insisted on ending the otherwise peaceful occupation.