After the Berlin election to the House of Representatives, a political and media campaign against the Berlin Left Party began. There are allegations of organized crime and anti-Semitism. The left's response to this is once again more contradictory. – A comment from Bruno Schüller.

In the run-up to the Berlin House of Representatives elections, the Left Party became the target of various media campaigns. The media and other parties paid particular attention to the Neukölln district association.

After an election campaign event at which the rapper Dahabflex appeared and shouted slogans such as “Yallah Yallah Intifada – West Bank, Palestine, Gaza” or “Death, death to the IDF”, countless media outlets reported on alleged anti-Semitism in the Left Party.

The party was the clear winner of the election with more than a quarter of the votes. But even after the elections in Berlin, the hostile mood towards the Left Party has not subsided. He launched a real political and media campaign. Top politicians from the Greens and SPD explained that, in order to form a joint government in Berlin, they were calling for the Left Party to clearly demarcate itself from alleged anti-Semitism.

The left looking for a position on genocide

In recent years, the Left party has shown an ambivalent relationship to the genocide in Palestine and has not yet made any fundamental decisions in its search for a stringent anti-imperialist policy.

What should be highlighted in this context is the adoption of the Jerusalem Declaration on Anti-Semitism at its 2025 party conference in Chemnitz. In doing so, the party has taken a step that has been part of the basic understanding of the Palestinian solidarity movement in Germany for years and distinguishes criticism of the state of Israel from hatred of Jews.

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Otherwise, in its public appearance and especially at the federal level, the party tried to push references to Israel into the background as much as possible. For this purpose, various intra-party working groups were founded at the state and federal level, which openly represented Palestinian solidarity and in some cases anti-imperialist positions. However, these clearly deviated from the positions of the party leadership.

The ambivalence just mentioned can be seen, for example, in other working groups such as the Shalom working group. This openly represents Zionist politics and calls for solidarity with Israel. A contradiction within the party that comes to a head in the debate about anti-Semitism within the party.

Intra-party struggles with consequences

This disagreement within the left when it comes to the apartheid state of Israel has led to a dispute for years that other parties have seized on as a source of fodder. The most recent example is the Neukölln district association.

While the Left campaigned in Neukölln with open solidarity with Palestine, there was a hail of criticism. And not just from other parties, but also from their own top candidate, Elif Eralp. Now she has to deal with the consequences herself.

She sharply criticized the rapper Dahabflex for slogans in which he called for the “Intifada” and wished the Israeli army death. However, Eralp himself falls into old patterns that the party actually hoped would be completed with the acceptance of the Jerusalem Declaration.

Soexplainedshe: “I stand clearly for the protection of Jewish life.” A thesis that seems incoherent when it responds to a call for resistance against a state and an army that has displaced more than a million people and killed tens of thousands in recent years.

How radical is the Berlin Left really?

Instead of starting the election campaign with a unified position and being able to defend it argumentatively and politically, the Berlin Left decided to hold the discussion about genocide and anti-Semitism only a few days before the election and in public.

It was probably not taken into account that this would continue to be relevant in the weeks after the election. Now the Berlin Left is once again faced with the decision of whether to ingratiate itself with the SPD and the Greens in order to create a red-red-green coalition, or to forgo the government in Berlin despite winning the election.

The election party: A visit with consequences

While the debate on anti-Semitism dominated the discourse within and about the Left Party before the election, media reports about the election party on the evening of September 20th caused a further stir. Issa Remmo, the alleged head of a criminal network primarily active in Berlin, was discovered at the event. Many media outlets see him as the head of so-called “clan crime”. Issa Remmo himself, however, was never legally convicted.

Shortly after he was discovered, he is said to have been expelled from the hall. The Berlin Left also stated that Issa Remmo was not invited. Afterwards, Firas Remmo, Issa Remmo's son, published chat messages with the chairman of the Neukölln Left district association, Ferat Koçak. A meeting between Koçak and Issa Remmo is said to have been arranged. Koçak then respondedannouncedto withdraw from the public “until full transparency is achieved.”

It wasn't just left-wing politicians who maintained contact with Issa Remmo

The connection between the alleged criminal network and the left-wing politician caused an uproar, especially within the CDU. Thistitledthe Left Party as a “security risk” due to what has happened since the evening of the election and, if it participates in the government, wants to examine what sensitive security data could be shared with the Senate. This can also be understood as an indirect warning to the SPD and the Greens, who are once again presented with reasons against a possible red-red-green coalition.

The CDU's reaction appears particularly interesting when you look at an incident from January 2025. Even then, Issa Remmo appeared in the Berlin House of Representatives. At that time he accepted an invitation from CDU politician Christian Zanders. Afterwards he denied having known who Remmo was.

It can therefore be assumed that much of the hustle and bustle that has been stirred up around the Left Party in recent weeks was spread primarily in the context of a red-red-green coalition. Old debates were brought to the fore and double standards were applied to politicians. It is not for nothing that the federal government is currently trying to introduce the “ban on expropriation” as quickly as possible in order to prevent expropriations in the wake of a government in Berlin led by the Left Party.

The Left speaks of diversionary tactics

Meanwhile, the Left Party has a viralvideoresponded to the allegations. They talk about the fierce attacks on them after Election Day by political elites and the real estate lobby. Because as they correctly point out: The Left did not win the election in Berlin because of solidarity with Palestine, but primarily with demands for affordable rents.

There is no doubt that the current media and political campaign against the Left Party is being conducted in the interests of real estate companies such as Deutsche Wohnen. But as the referendum in 2021 showed, a majority of Berliners support the socialization of living space. Therefore, connections to organized crime or rampant anti-Semitism are invented to defame the party. These diversionary maneuvers are also mentioned by the Left Party.

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Renewed exclusions because of Palestine solidarity?

But here again the Left Party's contradictory approach to the allegations becomes visible. Although they make it clear that the allegations are a distraction campaign, they still partially agree with the right-wing politicians and media and declare: “Officials and individual activists have made mistakes.” One thing is clear: this explicitly includes Palestinian solidarity activists like Ferat Koçak.

Instead of completely fending off the attacks, the party leadership is once again on the defensive and distancing itself from its party comrades. In keeping with the campaign against Palestine solidarity, another one is also underwayElimination processagainst the Berlin member Hannah Bruns. She only found out about her request for exclusion through reporting by right-wing media.

It remains to be seen whether the Left will give in to political and media pressure and separate from other members supporting Palestine solidarity. This is the only way a coalition with the Greens and the SPD in the Berlin House of Representatives will be possible.

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