Beatrix von Storch
Hezbollah Ban
German Bundestag, December 19, 2019, Plenarprotokoll
19/137, pp. 17074-17075
[Beatrix
von Storch is an Alternative für Deutschland Bundestag member from Berlin. She is a lawyer and here responds to proposals by some of
the other parties in the Bundestag concerning Hezbollah in Germany. Horst
Seehofer (CSU) is the German Interior Minister.]
Herr President. Ladies and gentlemen.
As a matter of fact, the Alternative für Deutschland six months
ago presented a motion to ban Hezbollah. All of you here then loudly rejected this
motion and since then block it in committee.
Stefan Liebich
(Linke): We have rejected you!
Now, six months later, you turn about and go through the door
which we have politically opened.
Benjamin Steiner (FDP): Herr Gedeon and others still
have leadership positions among you. That
is hypocisy.
If you
openly presented this procedure with many AfD demands, things in Germany would
then again be getting along.
Michael Grosse-Bömer (CDU/CSU): Traveling
to Syria, or what?
If
only. Consider yourself kindly encouraged by us.
You
finally and expressly renounce the hitherto absurdly sensed distinction between
a legal, political arm and an illegal, military arm of a terrorist organization
and thus now demand a ban on the activities of both arms. That is headed in the
right direction.
Yet
in June, during the last debate on this theme, colleague Grötsch of the SPD
stated here in this place: Hezbollah in Lebanon is “a relevant social factor.”
Therefore, it could not be banned in Germany. By the same logic, the Mafia or
the Taliban must be allowed to act politically here. That is completely absurd.
We rejoice that you now recognize this absurdity and are marching in the right
direction.
Yet
your motion exhibits two central weaknesses. You want only an activities ban.
We want an association or organization ban. According to the 1994 anti-crime
bill, the activities ban is the milder means compared to our organization ban.
There is not a reason in the world to proceed against a terrorist organization
with the milder and not the harder means. You are doing a Seehofer: Your bark
is louder than your bight.
The
second, serious deficit is the reasoning of your motion. You write, I cite:
The association structures attributable to Hezbollah
on which an associations law organization ban could be based are…not
ascertainable.
That
is objectively false. There is in the Constitution Defense report, word for
word in 2017 and 2018, I cite:
In Germany, the adherents of “Hizb-allah” attend to
the organizational and ideological cohesion of, among others, local
associations of mosques…
Have
you actually read your Constitution Defense report? In case it is too long for
you: It is in the 2018 report on page 214. Simply refer yourself to there for
once.
Vice-president Thomas Oppermann: Frau von Storch, do
you consent to an interim question from the FDP?
Nein, I consent to nothing now. If
you do not want to touch the Hezbollah mosque associations then you are
conducting a purely symbolic policy. It plainly ought not to remain a symbolic policy.
It is about a substantial transformation. Hezbollah’s propaganda in Germany and
terrorism financing in Germany must be stopped. The mosque associations which
provide it must be abolished and – this is especially important – Hezbollah adherents
must be expelled.
That,
besides, corresponds with the demand of the Bundestag’s anti-semitism
resolution. It expressly demands residence termination measures against
anti-semitism. If that is not appropriate for Hezbollah adherents, who want to
put Jews in the gas and destroy Israel, then what?
We
here in Berlin for every year since 1996 must put up with the hideous,
Hezbollah spectacle on the so-called Al-quds day. We expect you to have solved
the Hezbollah problem by the next Al-quds day which will occur in half a year. The
citizens are pained by your lip service and sermons. You must finally stop with
making proclamations only. Please get busy.
[Translated by Todd Martin]
