Europe has the advantage of having a good record in its countries regarding respect for humanity. No matter what happens in the rest of the world, its behaviour in its own countries seems to be determined in this regard.
At the same time, there are strong roots of democracy there, and the first condition for the strength of these roots is that no other country interferes, at least openly, in the electoral process of any European country. However, about the upcoming general elections in Germany, a huge question mark has been placed on both of these perceptions because Elon Musk has openly started interfering in the German elections.
The world knows very well that whoever gets the weapon of social media can manipulate matters, and who has more control over social media than the head of the company, Elon Musk?
Elon Musk has made his place in the Trump administration and his actions cannot be limited to those taken to secure the interests of a businessman.
Elon Musk wrote an article in the Welt am Sonntag newspaper and openly praised the German extremist party AfD. It should be noted that the German intelligence service has included this party among extremist parties since 2021.
The world knows very well that whoever gets the weapon of social media can manipulate matters.
Elon Musk praised the AfD’s perspective on taxes, market deregulation, etc, calling it Germany’s last hope. It should be remembered that this extremist party has been called the last hope of the country that is the largest economy in Europe. Elon Musk’s continued support for AFD are so serious that the German government spokesman had to give a formal response to it, which clearly pretented that “such open intervention is very much disliked.”
The parliamentary elections in Germany are scheduled for February 23, and according to opinion polls conducted so far, the AfD has reached second place in popularity after the CDU, although the party had 76 seats out of 733 in the recently dissolved parliament.
The CDU and the SDP have been in government in Germany since 2013. But this time it will face tough competition from the AfD. The reason for the AfD’s reputation is that this party is a champion of Islamophobia, its policy towards immigrants is extremely hostile. But the interesting thing is that it is also anti-Semitic, that is, in simple terms, close to Nazism. But then it is very surprising that Elon Musk and the next Trump administration are supporting this party.
The AfD advocates leaving the European Union, calls for exiting NATO, and talks about friendship with China and Russia, but despite this, it has the support of the US or Trump administration. It should be studied carefully to see why this is so.
The European Union, NATO, and Semitism are important pillars of US policy, so why is this happening? One opinion is that the US does not want to see the European Union become stronger than a certain limit and that is why it is supporting extremist parties in Europe because internal conflicts are the biggest obstacle to strengthening. But extremism is not only in German politics, but in the European parliamentary elections in June, far-right parties also achieved dramatic success.
The centrist Working Party still has a majority, but the wind of change is still felt. In the same way, the Freedom Party also planted flags of success in Austria and their ideologies are similar to Germany’s AfD. In the Netherlands, a toxic person like Geert Wilders has succeeded in gaining extreme political power.
He is a big supporter of taking the Netherlands out of the European Union, and is such an enemy of Islam that he keeps showing blasphemous cartoons. Even before the elections, he made a blunder that he would ban the Holy Quran in the Netherlands.
All these situations and individuals are mentioned because extremists in Europe have entrenched themselves in politics and are becoming stronger day by day, which is evidence that high moral values in Europe are facing a battle. And it remains to be seen how German citizens will view the open American intervention on February 23rd, whether they will reject or accept American intervention. If extremism fully reappears in Europe, politics around the world will change and no one will be safe from it.
The writer is a freelance columnist.