Itongadol.- More than half of the right-wing populists Alternative for Germany (AfD) lawmakers in the German state Baden-Württemberg have resigned following their failed attempt to oust a fellow parliamentarian who referred to Judaism as an “enemy” of Europe.
As reported by Deutsche Welle (DW), Germany’s international broadcaster, the AfD leader in the state’s parliament and 12 other members of the 23-member group stepped down.
The controversy is over Wolfgang Gedeon, a former doctor who quickly came under fire for several antisemitic remarks in writings he had published years earlier. One statement he made was to criticise the creation of the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in central Berlin, saying “certain crimes” were being given too much attention.
His three-volume, 600-page opus on Christian culture in the West was subtitled “The challenges presented to Europe by secularism, Zionism and Islam”. He also wrote that while Judaism was the “domestic enemy” of the Christian West, equal suspicion should be placed on the “external enemy,” Islam.
Jörg Meuthen, the leader of the AfD in Baden-Württemberg, vowed to remove Gedeon from office. But to do so, he needed a two-thirds majority which he did not secure.
As quoted by DW, Meuthen said that “a clearing-out process” was often necessary in newly founded political parties, and that he believed that “antisemitism cannot and may not have any place in the AfD”.