The immunity of the controversial Thuringian AfD parliamentary group leader Björn Höcke has been lifted again because he is to be investigated on suspicion of incitement to hatred. The vote in the Thuringian Judiciary Committee was almost unanimous, with one abstention, as the German Press Agency learned from committee circles on Friday.

According to the Mühlhausen public prosecutor, the investigation is about a post by Höcke on Telegram about an act of violence last year in the Ludwigshafen district of Oggersheim in Rhineland-Palatinate. At that time, a man stabbed two 20 and 35-year-old men and injured a 27-year-old. The police shot at the alleged perpetrator, a Somali.

Relativizing National Socialism?

Höcke wrote on Telegram that the "everyday war of repression" claimed two victims: "The perpetrator is probably mentally ill and suffers from that widespread disease among immigrants, which causes those affected to scream "Allahu Akbar" and distorts their perception so much that they see in the "unbelieving" hosts a life unworthy of life."

The public prosecutor sees two indications of hate speech in this statement: On the one hand, by using the Nazi term "life unworthy of life", Höcke equates an individual act with the mass murders of the time, which is a trivialization of Nazi injustice. On the other hand, Höcke's statement should be understood as "incitement to hatred" against immigrants living in Germany.

The spokesman for the public prosecutor's office in Mühlhausen said that Höcke would first be given the opportunity to comment. Höcke is head of the Thuringian AfD state association, which has been classified as right-wing extremist and is being observed by the state constitutional protection.