The Alternative for Germany party started the year by railing against “barbaric, Muslim, gang-raping hordes”, ending months of relative post-election calm and any remaining doubt about its hardening far-right course.
If the AfD had been at pains to portray itself as a patriotic conservative force after the September 24 polls, the latest slur signalled that an extremist faction is winning the battle for control, say political scientists.
“The radical course has been cemented,” said Hajo Funke of Berlin’s Free University, adding that the AfD was now openly reaching out to the right-wing extremist fringe, including neo-Nazis and white-pride Identitarians.