Germany’s most senior Jewish leader has said he is “personally horrified” after the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party won an important regional election in the country’s east.
Josef Schuster, president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany (ZDJ), shared his concerns as the anti-immigration party more than doubled its share of the vote in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt.
Sunday evening projections put the AfD at around 44 per cent of the vote, placing it on the brink of governing the state, whose internal security service classifies the party as extremist, a designation it rejects.
The remaining parties, including the CDU, which governs federally, are in talks to form a minority coalition and have vowed not to work with the AfD but, should it form a state government, it would mark the first time a far-right party has reached such office in Germany since the Second World War (the AfD has been the largest party in neighbouring Thuringia since 2024 but sits in the opposition bloc across from a CDU-led minority coalition).
“The outcome of the election is still open, but one thing is already certain: a party classified as confirmed right-wing extremist is only just short of governing a German federal state alone,” Schuster told German newspaper Welt.
“I am personally horrified by this election result.”
Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s centre-right CDU came in second, falling from 37.1 per cent of the vote in 2021 to around 18 per cent this time around.
The hard-left Die Linke party was a distant third on just over nine per cent, with the Greens and centre-left Social Democrats winning a similar share.
Meanwhile the populist far left Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW) — which, like the AfD, is opposed to immigration and to German military support for Ukraine — was hovering around the five-per-cent threshold needed to enter the state parliament.
One projection put the AfD on 41 of the 83 seats if the far-left BSW fails to enter parliament, just one short of the 42 required for an absolute majority.
But another, which had the BSW getting across the threshold, gave the AfD 39 seats.
But Schuster said voters could not claim they had been unaware of the party’s direction.
“It has been clearly apparent in recent months what goals the AfD is pursuing,” he said.
“Anyone who voted for it today – despite or because of these goals – bears responsibility for this result.
“The damage that the so-called Alternative for Germany could now cause if it assumes responsibility is immense.
“[Education is] the most important cornerstone for preserving an open society and fighting antisemitism”.
The party’s lead candidate, Ulrich Siegmund, has been a member of the state parliament, the Landtag, since 2016.
In 2024, he was removed from his position as chair of the parliamentary Social Affairs Committee after it was revealed that he had attended a meeting in Potsdam attended by a number of far-right figures, including Martin Sellner, leader of the Austrian Identitarian Movement.
According to reports of the meeting at the time, Sellner made a speech advocating a “master plan for remigration” which would include the relocation of asylum seekers and what he called “non-assimilated” German citizens, potentially to a “model state” in North Africa.
The AfD has also been criticised by Jewish groups for its advocacy in favour of a ban on kosher slaughter and the import of kosher meat.
However, the party has consistently denied allegations of antisemitism, insisting it does not tolerate anti-Jewish hatred within its ranks.
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