A member of the far right German political party AfD is being investigated over an incendiary New Year’s Eve tweet, that cast Muslims as violent and rapacious.
Beatrix von Storch, a member of the German parliament and deputy leader of Germany’s far-right AfD party, accused the Cologne police of pandering to “barbaric, gang-raping Muslim hordes of men” after the department sent out a celebratory tweet in Arabic to ring in the new year.
Von Storch’s twitter account was suspended for 12 hours Monday, saying her message violated their rules. She then posted the message to Facebook, where it was blocked.
#PolizeiNRW #Köln #Leverkusen
تتمنى الشرطة في كولن لجميع الناس في منطقة كولن وليفركوزن والمدن الأخرى إحتفالاً سعيداً بعام 2018 الجديد.
https://t.co/G5erMWFNQyرأس السنة 2017 ـ لمزيد المعلومات: # pic.twitter.com/BGxs4Kew7K— Polizei NRW K (@polizei_nrw_k) December 31, 2017
The police are now investigating whether von Storch’s tweet constitutes “incitement to hatred,” a criminal charge under Germany’s hate speech laws, which were recently amended to impose fines on social media companies that do not remove “obviously illegal” content.
