ON OCTOBER 8, Greta Thunberg was set to speak in the West German metropolis of Dortmund, where since May, activists and students had maintained a pro-Palestinian encampment near the university. However, giving very short notice, the Dortmund police banned the Swedish climate activist from taking part in a pro-Palestinian event.

The authorities explained that they had drawn up a “danger forecast” after “intensive examination” and come up with the assessment that, “the most recent events in connection with Thunberg led to the assessment that she is a participant who is prepared to use violence.”

What was meant by “recent events” was not specified. German media speculated that it was about Thunberg’s involvement in the demonstrations in Berlin last Monday, on October 7.

The Dortmund police headquarters also stated that Thunberg’s visit meant that there were more people at the protest camp than had been announced in the registration form. However, the police did not leave it at that: although Thunberg’s appearance was cancelled, the cops also broke up the encampment.

Thunberg reported via X: “After almost 4 months of encampment, the student Palestine encampment in Dortmund were forced by German police to take down the camp and leave, and police said they would arrest me if I went there. All this just because the students had invited me to speak at their event and I had been to a pro-Palestine protest in Berlin the day before that police has stormed.”

The whole affair is reminiscent of the shutdown of the Berlin Palestine congress in May of this year. In that episode of suppression, the authorities had also harassed and sabotaged the event before it even occurred with entry bans and arbitrary fire safety requirements, only to shut it down a few minutes after it started.

Fallen icon

Swedish climate activist Thunberg long enjoyed great popularity in the German political Establishment, especially in the green and left-liberal spectrum. Her protests inspired the vibrant international Fridays For Future (FFF) movement, wherein millions of young people staged weekly protests demanding immediate action against climate devastation. In Germany, the movement was active for many years. 

But with her commitment to Palestine, her left-liberal Establishment appeal changed radically. As early as November 2023, she was defamed as an anti-semite on the Heute Show, a satirical programme on Germany’s second-largest state television channel.

Since then, several mainstream media outlets have repeatedly incited hatred against her, or instituted an informal media silence on her actions and speeches.

Some of the fiercest attacks against Thunberg have come from the Christian-conservative CDU/CSU. Deputy chairwoman of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, Andrea Lindholz, called on X for Thunberg to be banned from entering the country.

She introduced her tweet with the words: “From climate protection icon to Jew-hater.”

The CDU’s domestic policy spokesman, Alexander Throm, also called Thunberg a “Jew-hater” for whom there is “no place in Germany” in an interview with the right-wing conservative and staunchly pro-Israel tabloid Bild.

Some media cautiously questioned Thunberg’s classification by the police as “ready to use violence.” Overall, however, it was neither openly criticised nor was the ban on participation or the groundless dissolution of the protest camp in Dortmund seen as a scandal.

The Dortmund police headquarters did retract its classification of Thunberg after the sceptical media reports and spoke of an “internal error.” However, they had already achieved what they had seemingly sought out to do: Thunberg’s appearance did not take place at the university and the encampment was cleared in time for the start of term.

These acts of repression have not intimidated the movement for Palestine in Germany or Thunberg herself, who participated in a Fridays For Future march against genocide and ecocide in Milan on October 11.

In her post about the mobilisation she wrote: “The climate justice movement must be a decolonial, anti-capitalist, anti-fascist movement that fights against genocide as well as ecocide, that demands liberation and justice for all, and a system that puts people and planet over profit.”

This article appeared at peoplesdispatch.org.