Germany’s defense and security overhaul entered a new phase on Wednesday, with cabinet approval for a bill to significantly expand the powers of national intelligence agencies. Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt celebrated the biggest intelligence shake-up since the Second World War as “transforming our intelligence services into genuine secret services”, but opponents see something more sinister behind the reforms.
A group of German lawyers, judges, and prosecutors have signed a petition calling for the launch of constitutional proceedings to ban Alternative für Deutschland (AfD). The initiative was organised by the Republican Lawyers’ Association (RAV), which has repeatedly urged the federal government and parliament to submit a formal application to the Federal Constitutional Court.
Täteropferumkehr is the German term for “victim blaming” – often hyphenated as Täter-Opfer-Umkehr to make it look slightly less clunky. In recent times, our political and media establishment have turned it into a sharp tool, employed with reference to both foreign and domestic politics.
Unsurprisingly, Germany’s woke lLeft – always eager to champion the alleged plight of the “oppressed” – views Israel, the only functioning democracy in the Middle East, as the ultimate perpetrator, while framing bloodthirsty Arab aggressors as the true victims. In 2025, five Berlin-based “activists” (four of whom openly identify as “they/them”) ransacked an Elbit Systems facility in Ulm, causing over a million euros in damage. Now standing trial in Stuttgart, they naturally view themselves as the victims.
Dr Rainer Zitelmann doesn’t even remember posting the meme on social media that nearly landed him in prison.
“When I opened the letter from police, I thought it was a misunderstanding,” Dr Zitelmann, a German historian and author of about 30 books, told The Telegraph.
Berlin police told Dr Zitelmann he had been accused of violating a post-Second World War law that bans the display of Nazi symbols, slogans and imagery – and could now face three years in prison if found guilty.
Germany’s domestic intelligence agency could soon be authorised to secretly alter digital data, hack into private computers and mobile phones, enter homes without occupants’ knowledge, recruit 16- and 17-year-olds as informants, and never inform citizens that they had been subjected to surveillance.
The draft law, prepared by Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt, would dramatically expand the powers of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, BfV), Germany’s domestic intelligence agency.
Germany has proven again that there is nothing it is more afraid of than democracy itself, especially when people vote the ‘wrong way.’
The country’s state interior ministers are discussing plans that could block future AfD-led state governments from accessing sensitive intelligence and criminal investigation data, according to Junge Freiheit.
The discussions are taking place within the Conference of Interior Ministers, a body that brings together the interior ministers of Germany’s 16 federal states.
Germany’s Christian Democrats (CDU), who currently rule the country in coalition with the Christian Social Union (CSU), have sent out pamphlets to all AfD lawmakers, explaining to them just how dangerous their party is and providing a template resignation letter to facilitate their departure from the anti-migration party.
The 35-page booklet titled “Decline for Germany. No Alternative” claims that the party is “harmful to democracy, anti-Semitic, nationalist.”
North Rhine-Westphalia recorded a sharp rise in politically motivated crimes targeting the Alternative for Germany (AfD) in 2025, with more than 1,000 offences reported, according to figures released by the state government in response to a parliamentary inquiry by AfD lawmaker Markus Wagner.
The data also show that several investigations into attacks on AfD-linked premises in the western German city of Wuppertal were discontinued after prosecutors failed to identify suspects or concrete leads.
Tens of thousands of pupils across Germany are expected to boycott the classroom and take to the streets in a nationwide protest organisers say is to stop the government’s rearmament policy turning young people into “cannon fodder”.
Despite threats from teachers’ associations and education ministries, which have said anyone who demonstrates during school hours could risk penalties and even expulsion, organisers say they expect the number of participants at Friday’s school strike to be at least as high as the estimated 50,000 who attended each of the first two.
A criminal investigation in Germany has drawn international attention and reignited debate over freedom of speech and religious criticism. At the center of the case are two Christian YouTubers who spoke out against Islamic antisemitism and are now under scrutiny by prosecutors for it.
The case involves ‘Niko’ and ‘Tino,’ creators of the YouTube channel Eternal Life, where they publish content about Christianity, faith, and social issues. In 2024, they uploaded a video titled “Islam is not peace,” in which they criticized what they described as Islamic antisemitism in Germany.
The US Department of Defence plans to withdraw 5,000 troops from Germany, amid a spat between US President Donald Trump and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz over the war with Iran.
The decision comes a day after Trump criticised Merz, who suggested the US had been “humiliated” by Iranian negotiators.
In social media posts on Thursday, Trump said Merz was “doing a terrible job” and had “problems of all kinds”, including on immigration and energy. Trump has also suggested pulling US troops from Italy and Spain.
US is being ‘humiliated’ by Iran’s leadership, says Friedrich Merz
The US is being “humiliated” by Iran’s leadership, according to Friedrich Merz, Germany’s chancellor, who suggested the Trump administration was being outwitted at the negotiating table by Tehran.
Two days ago Donald Trump cancelled a trip by US negotiators to Islamabad for indirect talks with an Iranian delegation. A previous round in the Pakistani capital two weeks earlier, when JD Vance, the American vice-president, led the US delegation, broke up without progress.
Merz’s trenchant assessment of the stalled US-Iranian talks, which appeared certain to deepen the severe transatlantic rift between the US and its Nato allies, directly contradicts Trump’s effort to cast the limbo in a positive light.
What do they think they are doing? Germany’s AK Polis are running a campaign with posters of supposed Muslims showing a man drinking alcohol and saying, ‘I am a Muslim and I drink alcohol’. Another says ‘I am a Muslim’ and shows two Muslim men kissing and wearing suits with roses, indicating they have just been married [1]. Would AK Polis run commercials showing ‘I am Catholic and I had an abortion’ as a way to celebrate diversity as well?
No, they would not.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is in favor of a proposal to build new nuclear power plants in the EU. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz says it’s impossible.
At a nuclear summit near Paris earlier this week, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen described the transition from nuclear energy undertaken by some EU countries as a “strategic mistake.” Nuclear power, she said, is a “reliable, affordable source of low-emission electricity.” She announced new EU financial assistance for nuclear power plants.
Von der Leyen’s words reverberated in Germany, which switched off its last nuclear reactor in 2023.
Much of the sense of European superiority towards America has long rested on an elitist belief that America is dominated by the wrong kind of voters.
Trump has no idea of foreign policy.” “Amateur diplomats.” “Trump privatises foreign policy.” These are the phrases echoing through German newsrooms and opinion columns—often accompanied by imagery that goes considerably further: Der Spiegel’s covers depicting Trump as Hitler or as a dictator are only the most prominent examples. The cumulative effect on public opinion has been measurable. A recent Allensbach survey found that German approval for cooperation with and trust in America had fallen dramatically, from 62% in 2020 to just 34%. A full 64% of respondents agreed that “Donald Trump disregards international rules and long-standing alliances, thereby bringing chaos to the world.”
