A cinema in western Germany has caused something of a stir with an offer of free entry to showings of Schindler's List to members of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD).

The Cinexx movie theater in the town of Hachenburg is set to show the 1993 epic, which depicts some of the horrors suffered by European Jews during the Nazi era, on January 27 – International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Although the cinema would normally charge an entry fee of €7 ($8) to customers, it extended an offer of free admission to members of the AfD.

That caused a stir, with party members complaining that they felt insulted that their party should be linked to the Holocaust.

The party is best known for its anti-immigration, anti-Islam stance, becoming particularly critical of Chancellor Angela Merkel over Germany's 2015 refugee influx. Leading members of the AfD have repeatedly drawn criticism for comments that appear to play down or trivialize the Holocaust.

Criticism from AfD

The offer was met with disdain by the AfD in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate, where Hachenburg is located.

"We find the fact that the AfD is being linked to the Holocaust, the industrial mass extermination of people of the Jewish faith, to be an unspeakable mistake," the state party told German public broadcaster SWR.

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks Alexander Gauland Co-chairman Alexander Gauland said the German national soccer team's defender Jerome Boateng might be appreciated for his performance on the pitch - but people would not want "someone like Boateng as a neighbor." He also argued Germany should close its borders and said of an image showing a drowned refugee child: "We can't be blackmailed by children's eyes."

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks Alice Weidel Alice Weidel generally plays the role of "voice of reason" for the far-right populists, but she, too, is hardly immune to verbal miscues. Welt newspaper, for instance, published a 2013 memo allegedly from Weidel in which she called German politicians "pigs" and "puppets of the victorious powers in World War II. Weidel initially claimed the mail was fake, but now admits its authenticity.

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks Frauke Petry German border police should shoot at refugees entering the country illegally, the former co-chair of the AfD told a regional newspaper in 2016. Officers must "use firearms if necessary" to "prevent illegal border crossings." Communist East German leader Erich Honecker was the last German politician who condoned shooting at the border.

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks Björn Höcke The head of the AfD in the state of Thuringia made headlines for referring to Berlin's Holocaust memorial as a "monument of shame" and calling on the country to stop atoning for its Nazi past. The comments came just as Germany enters an important election year - leading AfD members moved to expel Höcke for his remarks.

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks Beatrix von Storch Initially, the AfD campaigned against the euro and bailouts - but that quickly turned into anti-immigrant rhetoric. "People who won't accept STOP at our borders are attackers," the European lawmaker said. "And we have to defend ourselves against attackers."

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks Marcus Pretzell Pretzell, former chairman of the AfD in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia and husband to Frauke Petry, wrote "These are Merkel's dead," shortly after news broke of the deadly attack on the Berlin Christmas market in December 2016.

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks Andre Wendt The member of parliament in Germany's eastern state of Saxony made waves in early 2016 with an inquiry into how far the state covers the cost of sterilizing unaccompanied refugee minors. Thousands of unaccompanied minors have sought asylum in Germany, according to the Federal Association for Unaccompanied Minor Refugees (BumF) — the vast majority of them young men.

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks Andre Poggenburg Poggenburg, head of the AfD in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, has also raised eyebrows with extreme remarks. In February 2017, he urged other lawmakers in the state parliament to join measures against the extreme left-wing in order to "get rid of, once and for all, this rank growth on the German racial corpus" — the latter term clearly derived from Nazi terminology.

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks Alexander Gauland - again ... During a campaign speech in Eichsfeld in August 2017, AfD election co-candidate Alexander Gauland said that Social Democrat parliamentarian Aydan Özoguz should be "disposed of" back to Anatolia. The German term, "entsorgen," raised obvious parallels to the imprisonment and killings of Jews and prisoners of war under the Nazis.

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks ... and again Gauland was roundly criticized for a speech he made to the AfD's youth wing in June 2018. Acknowledging Germany's responsibility for the crimes of the Nazi era, he went on to say Germany had a "glorious history and one that lasted a lot longer than those damned 12 years. Hitler and the Nazis are just a speck of bird shit in over 1,000 years of successful German history."

AfD leaders and their most offensive remarks Andreas Kalbitz The Brandenburg state AfD chief admitted in 2019 to attending a 2007 rally in Greece by the ultranationalist Golden Dawn party at which a swastika flag was raised. "Der Spiegel" had published a leaked report by the German embassy in Athens naming him as one of "14 neo-Nazis" who arrived from Germany for the far-right rally. Kalbitz released a statement saying he took part out of "curiosity." Author: Dagmar Breitenbach



In a statement, the cinema said it had received numerous messages of support, as well as some that were critical of its actions and even threats.

Read more: Teaching brochure sparks spying row and far-right outrage

The theater said its aim was not to exclude or defame the AfD, but rather to spur discussion about the Holocaust among members of a party that has trivialized the extermination that occurred under Nazi rule.

"That so many feel so powerfully attacked is not our intention and is incomprehensible to us. We are not saying AfD voters are Nazis. Whether or not you need historical enlightenment is at your own discretion," its statement read.

"In our opinion, however, the AfD's party program strongly suggests a trivialization of the events of that time."

The cinema added that it regularly offers free entry to similar events for different groups of people, such as women, migrants, youth, and church members, among others.

'Memorial of shame'

In June, AfD co-leader Alexander Gauland described the Nazi era as a mere "speck of bird shit in over 1,000 years of successful German history."

Read more: Understanding the populist narrative

Another leading AfD figure, Björn Höcke, who heads the party in the state of Thuringia, told supporters last year that Berlin's memorial to the victims of the Holocaust was a "memorial of shame." He said Germany's World War II remembrance culture needed a "180-degree" turnaround to concentrate more on the German victims.

Schindler's List, which won seven Academy Awards, is currently being celebrated on the 25th anniversary of its release.

The film tells the story of Oskar Schindler, who helped save the lives of some 12,000 Jews from the overcrowded Krakow Ghetto who worked in his ammunition factory. However, in more harrowing scenes it also shows some of the atrocities suffered by those who were among 6 million Jews murdered by the Nazis.

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