That means a test. As in a litmus test. As in the proving ground. As in testing times.
Yeah, that’s it. Testing times. And that, according to Chancellor Merkel herself, is what Germany is going through at the moment.
But it ain’t no big deal because, well, no. There still is no Plan B. And yes, “wir schaffen das” (we can do it). “We” meaning “you” in this case, of course. But still.
“Das ist eine Bewährungsprobe. Ich bin überzeugt, dass wir das schaffen.”
Yesterday we discussed the German Willkomenskultur (welcome culture). Today the very latest big thing is a new German word called Abschiedskultur (farewell or send-off culture).
There are over 200,000 asylum seekers who have been denied asylum here in Germany but are still here. After the latest terror attacks – committed by two of them – a CDU politician (from Angela Merkel’s welcome culture party itself) has now had the audacity to say that it’s high time for the German government to see to it that those denied asylum actually go.
Boy oh boy did this guy ever take a dive into some hot water.
Wer abgelehnt wird, muss gehen.
PS: Sorry, I just double-checked. Only one of those two asylum seekers was denied asylum. The other one was “well-integrated.”
Again, I mean.
There will be no jumping to conclusions here, dear German readers. It is verboten or something. But we do have to consider the remote possibility that maybe, just perhaps, this latest attack in Ansbach was also an act of Islamic terror (itself). It is too early to tell, however, like I said. And we certainly would not want to hurt anybody’s feelings by doing so.
What is going on in Germany?, the BBC journalist above asks. Well just don’t ask any German journalists if you want to know.
Es „fühlte sich wie Terror an“, muss aber keiner gewesen sein.
Neanderthals once populated the entire European continent. Around 45,000 years ago, Homo neanderthalensis was the predominant human species in Europe. They reached their population peak right before their population rapidly declined and they eventually became extinct.
Or so it was thought until recently.
Precisely why this species will finally die out for good is still unclear. Perhaps it will be due to low genetic diversity, perhaps to the rise of Homo sapiens like the rest of us with real brains. This question will continue to occupy amateur scientists like myself for some time to come.
And we shouldn’t jump to any conclusions here, German politicians have been quick to say (and this is also why you will not find a single German news report with the word “terror” in it).
Just because the attacker was a refugee from Afghanistan who shouted “Allahu Akbar” (God is great) during the attack does not necessarily mean that this is the latest Islamic terror attack, you know. It is much more the case, we are about to be told, that German society isn’t doing enough to integrate these unfortunate individuals. And that police brutality is rampant überall these days, etc. Stay tuned.
A hand-drawn Islamic State flag was found in the room of the 17-year-old Afghan refugee who attacked passengers on a train in southern Germany before being shot dead by police, the interior minister for the state of Bavaria said on Tuesday.
Er war wohl ein afghanischer Flüchtling. In seinem Zimmer wurde eine handgemalte IS-Flagge gefunden.
PS: I think it’s high time that Germany introduce more stringent axe control.
The U.S. State Department said Friday that two American citizens were among those killed in the truck attack in Nice, as authorities here began the grim task of identifying the scores of dead and hospitals remained in a state of emergency.
Reinhard Naumann, mayor of the Berlin borough of Charlottenburg and Wilmersdorf, said two German students and one teacher from the Paula Fürst School in his district were killed in the attack.
Huh? Since when?
“A spokesman for the prosecutor declined to comment on whether the two suspects posed as refugees or sought asylum in Germany or elsewhere in Europe.”
Germany arrested three Syrian citizens on suspicion of planning an Islamic State terror attack in the city of Düsseldorf, the country’s top prosecutor said Thursday.
Two men, identified as Saleh A. and Hamza C., joined Islamic State in Syria in early 2014 and received orders from the organization’s leadership to carry out an attack in the bustling old town in Düsseldorf, the prosecutor’s office said in a statement on the arrests. The two plotted to attack one of Düsseldorf’s main streets with two suicide bombings, and then “to kill as many passersby as possible with guns and further explosives,” the prosecutor said. The two left for Turkey and then separately traveled to Germany via Greece in March and July 2015, the prosecutor said. Hundreds of thousands of refugees and migrants also entered Europe via Turkey and Greece last year.
Über Balkanroute eingereist
PS: And call me bekloppt (wacky), but I think I detect a pattern here, too.
And it must be those glasses that are making them so suspicious, right? She tried to kill a police officer in Hanover in February.
Reporters from German public broadcasters WDR and NDR as well as the daily newspaper “Süddeutsche Zeitung” were able to gain access to chat logs between Safia S. and a fellow Islamist in Hanover.
The chat logs showed that the 15-year-old met with IS members during a trip to Turkey in January. She intended on crossing into Syria, but wrote that there was a “change of plans.”
The IS members asked her to travel back to Germany to “surprise the unbelievers.”
“They told me it has a greater benefit,” Safia S. wrote, adding that it would be “really fun.” She also wrote about a “martyr operation.”
Die 15-Jährige Schülerin Safia S., die im Februar einem Polizisten am Hauptbahnhof in Hannover in den Hals stach, soll im Auftrag von ISIS gehandelt haben!
German prosecutors have said a 15-year-old girl who stabbed a police officer was conducting a “martyrdom operation” for the militant “Islamic State” (IS) group. The teen had previously met with IS members in Turkey.
I’m sure she’ll be punished harshly for her actions. By German standards, I mean.
Meanwhile, when it comes to more serious crimes like free speech… I mean serious things like thought crimes…
German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced Friday that her government will grant a Turkish request for the prosecution of Jan Boehmermann after he recited a crude poem about Turkey’s president, despite “diverging opinions” within the German ruling coalition.
“We are Germans, renowned for our world-famous sense of humor.”
So like, it doesn’t even qualify as a sex bomb?
German police called to the scene of a suspected bomb could breathe a sigh of relief when the feared explosive device turned out to be a sex toy…
Three explosives experts of the Office of Criminal Investigation in the state of Saxony-Anhalt were called in to defuse the ‘bomb’
However, when the bomb squad examined the bin, they found that the explosive device was in fact a battery-powered vibrating penis ring.
Two men in the squad, Dick und Doof, answered the ring, saying “Hallo? Hallo?” but were unfortunately unable to determine just who had placed the call.
Aus Sorge vor einem Sprengsatz evakuierte die Polizei die Spielothek sowie umliegende Geschäfte, brachte etwa 90 Menschen in Sicherheit und sperrte eine Straße.
Observing Hermann 