Executions Are Now Banned at Demos
The Berlin police have decided that while they can still employ violence at protests, nobody can reenact any.
Monday, April 13
The Berlin police have decided that mock executions, or any other realistic depictions of killings, are no longer permitted at protests. The decision came down over the weekend after a video from a pro-Palestine rally last week caused a stir in German press.
The video was taken by a reporter from Berliner Zeitung at a demonstration at Alexanderplatz on Wednesday, during which four activists wearing keffiyehs and black sacks over their heads stood beneath fake gallows and staged a mock hanging. The action was in protest of the introduction of the death penalty in Israel, which was passed in late March. The law is intended to be applied to homicides that "neglect the existence of the State of Israel," and will effectively only target Palestinians.
Public reenactment of killings and realistic depictions of executions are no longer permitted, and any props that could be used to depict violence are also banned.
The stunt generated a wave of outrage in the German press, with the police and administration swiftly weighing in to tighten regulations. Public reenactment of killings and realistic depictions of executions are no longer permitted, and any props that could be used to depict violence are also banned. In addition, people attending protests may no longer be bound or restrained.
"From our perspective, this is a swift and flexible adjustment that proportionately takes into account relevant changes in the assembly situation as needed," police spokesman Florian Nath told Berliner Zeitung.
In its own statement, the Senate Department for the Interior pointed out that it had previously permitted this type of theatrical protest before, pointing to symbolic mock self-immolations by Tibetan activists protesting China's Tibet policy, and symbolic burials of Syrian refugees (they could have also mentioned the mock gallows erected by Fridays for Future activists in front of the Brandenburg Gate in 2019, or by Iranian diaspora protesters outside the Reichstag in 2023, to oppose the Islamic Republic's execution of demonstrators). Yet this 100-person pro-Palestinian demonstration staging the killing of prisoners by Israeli authorities, in response to Israel's new death penalty law, was apparently where they drew the line.
This is not the first time Berlin has moved to restrict the type of actions permissible at demonstrations on this particular issue: since October 2023, the city has issued numerous assembly bans and sweeping conditions targeting pro-Palestinian protests, moved to forbid slogans like "from the river to the sea." They have also faced documented reports of disproportionate police violence against demonstrators.
Despite quickly criminalising such forms of protest, no formal investigation was launched into Wednesday's mock execution, with the police stating that it had "no criminal relevance."
The move also comes a few weeks after Germany's foreign minister issued a joint statement with France, Italy, and Great Britain, expressing "deep concern" about "the discriminatory nature" or Israel's death penalty law.
