heute journal 11.01.24 Klage gegen Israel, rechtsextremes Geheimtreffen, Homöopathie-Aus? (english)

Südafrika hat vor dem Internationalen Gerichtshof Klage gegen Israel eingereicht. Der Vorwurf: Völkermord. Nun hat der Prozess begonnen. Das Recherchenetzwerk Correctiv hat berichtet, dass sich AfD-Politiker, Neonazis und Unternehmer im November 2023 getroffen haben, um die Vertreibung von Millionen Menschen aus Deutschland zu besprechen. Und: Gesundheitsminister Lauterbach will die Finanzierung von Homöopathie durch die gesetzlichen Kassen streichen. Mehr dazu und weitere Nachrichten des Tages im heute journal.

English Subtitles

00:00 Vorspann

00:22 Konsequenzen nach AfD-Geheimtreffen?
Scharfe Kritik folgt auf die Berichte über ein Treffen von AfD-Politikern und Neonazis. Wie auch erneut Rufe nach Konsequenzen, etwa einem Verbot der Partei.

03:12 „Richtig, dass die Hürden hoch sind“
Die jüngsten Enthüllungen könnten für ein AfD-Verbotsverfahren eine Rolle spielen, sagt Rechtswissenschaftler Christian Waldhoff. Aber „allein das reicht nicht aus“.

08:03 Cottbus: Scholz-Empfang mit Protest
Ein neues ICE-Werk für Cottbus. Neue Arbeitsplätze für eine Region, die aus der Kohle aussteigen soll. Der Protest der Landwirte erreicht den Kanzler auch bei der Werkseröffnung.

11:51 Völkermord-Anklage gegen Israel
Völkermord an Palästinensern in Gaza – so lautet der Vorwurf Südafrikas gegen Israel. Vor dem Internationalen Gerichtshof in Den Haag hat heute der Prozess begonnen.

18:26 Homöopathie nicht mehr als Kassenleistung
Karl Lauterbach will Homöopathie als Kassenleistung streichen. Nach wissenschaftlichem Sachstand habe Homöopathie keinen medizinischen Nutzen, so der Gesundheitsminister.

24:21 Gefängnisroman “Der Idiot”
Ein unschuldiger Romanheld erfindet im Verhör absurde Sabotageakte, die unmöglich sind, in der Hoffnung freigesprochen zu werden. Davon handelt der Gulag-Roman von Georgi Demidow.

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Abonniert unseren Kanal, um nichts mehr zu verpassen.
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AfD SECRET MEETING DEBATE IGNITES OVER PARTY BAN FACING THE UN COURT SOUTH AFRICA CHARGES ISRAEL WITH GENOCIDE END OF THE LINE LAUTERBACH WANTS TO DEFUND HOMEOPATHY And now, the “heute journal” with Heinz Wolf and Marietta Slomka. Good evening. Findings from CORRECTIV reporters are making political waves.

The chancellor also commented on it today, although the findings as such are not all new. The times when AfD politicians were still afraid to appear together with the Austrian extremist Sellner are long gone in any case. The extensive deportation plans discussed in Potsdam according to CORRECTIV

Are not new ideas among high-ranking AfD people either. Björn Höcke, for example, has been saying this for a long time. He wants to remove parts of the population who do not have the right-wing mindset with “well-tempered cruelty”. However, the Potsdam meeting is fuelling a debate about a possible ban of the AfD.

More on that soon. First, Karl Hinterleitner reports. The outrage spread through political Berlin. The reason is the meeting between high-ranking AfD members and right-wing extremist networks in this hotel in Potsdam in November, with plans to expel millions of people from Germany. This is illegal and clearly unconstitutional, according to the federal interior minister.

I can’t tell you in detail what we think about this yet, but from what we have seen and from what the Constitution Protection Office has assessed, is that nationalist ideology was the founding principle of this meeting. That’s why I expect anyone close to this, or anyone who even remotely approves of it,

To distance themselves from it, as it clearly violates our constitutional rules. There is little sign of distancing at the AfD. Quite the contrary. On X, formerly Twitter, an AfD member of the Bundestag affirmed that his party is in favour of mass expulsion. “We will return millions of foreigners to their homeland.

This is not a secret plan. It is a promise.” Political observers are alarmed, but not really surprised. What we have witnessed here is a revelation that we should and could have known about. Because the AfD, even if it now presents itself as more moderate,

Is once again in contact with right-wing extremists in many areas. It has cooperated with right-wing extremists who have one thing in mind: the genuine abolition of democracy. Nevertheless, the minister of justice is sceptical about banning the AfD. Because if it fails in court…

There is, of course, the threat of a PR victory for the AfD. In the end, a radical right-wing extremist or at least right-wing populist ideology would not have been combatted but rather possibly strengthened. A ban procedure would thus be risky. Ultimately, the only way to combat extremism is through political debate.

We’d like to speak about this with constitutional law expert Christian Waldhoff. He is a professor at Humboldt University in Berlin and was the Federal Council’s legal representative in the NPD ban proceedings, which were discontinued in 2017. Good evening, Professor Waldhoff. Good evening. Not everyone knows what a legal representative is.

In layman’s terms, you were, so to speak, the legal representative of the federal states in this application for a ban. Exactly, me and my colleague. -Yes, Christoph Möllers. Based on this experience, you dealt intensively with the question of the extent to which parties can be banned.

In this current debate, are you with the sceptics or the supporters of a ban procedure? At the moment, I am sceptical of a ban procedure. We saw at the time how complex it was, how high the hurdles were. It’s also right that the hurdles are high,

Because, of course, you can’t simply ban unpopular parties in a democracy. The constitutional requirements for such a procedure, such as the right to a fair procedure, are also particularly complex. What can be a bit strange, and what is difficult to understand as a layman,

Is that at the time, these NPD proceedings were discontinued not because the NPD would have been unconstitutional, which was also the view of the judges in Karlsruhe, but because they said the party was “not significant enough”.

Now, we hear an argument that it would be better not to even try to ban the AfD because it is already too big and too important and has too many voters. So either too small or too big? This criterion that the NPD was so insignificant that it wasn’t banned,

Even though it is ultimately a Nazi party at its core, was invented by the court in the 2017 ruling. That’s not even in the Basic Law but was, so to speak, a legal creation by the Federal Constitutional Court. That is the only point that cannot be disputed about the AfD,

That it is not too small or too insignificant to be banned. This means that in the case of a possible AfD ban procedure, the problems do not lie in the significance of the party, but in the question of whether the conditions for a ban are otherwise fulfilled,

Whether this is an anti-constitutional party within the meaning of the party ban article. There is now also a discussion as to whether this Potsdam meeting, which just caused an outrage, and the expulsion of millions of people according to ethnic criteria, not just legal criteria and so on,

And the participation of very influential AfD people who were there, including the personal advisor to the party leader… Could this meeting somehow play a role in legal terms, in your opinion? That could of course play a role, but that alone is not enough. This was not an AfD event.

One would have to be able to attribute such incidents to the party. That’s not trivial. I mean, if high-ranking politicians, high-ranking functionaries such as the leader of the parliamentary group from Saxony-Anhalt or the personal advisor to the party leader take part, that’s a step towards perhaps being able to attribute it.

But of course there would have to be something like this across the board. It couldn’t be isolated incidents. The security authorities would have to collect material that is characteristic of the party as a whole. When you say party as a whole, there are also indications from constitutional lawyers

That one does not necessarily have to try to ban the entire party, but that one could start smaller, with individual state associations or even individual persons, if you think of Björn Höcke as an example. The Federal Constitutional Court could also legally ban individual state associations in response to an application for a ban.

The prevailing opinion is, as lawyers always express it, that you would still have to file an application to ban the party as a whole. This would be a larger move to produce a smaller action. It might not be the party as a whole that would be banned,

But perhaps a particularly extremist regional association. The Basic Law also stipulates that individuals can have their basic rights stripped away in the political battle of opinion. If you use these fundamental rights, for example freedom of opinion or assembly, to fight against the constitution.

This is called a forfeiture of fundamental rights under Article 18 of the Basic Law. Of course, this has never been used in the history of the Basic Law or the Federal Republic of Germany. The hurdles are presumably high there too. Yes, and this would not necessarily result in these individuals

Being shut out of party politics, but may instead have the opposite effect. Constitutional law expert Professor Waldhoff. Thank you for the interview and your expertise. You’re welcome. Extremism researchers are happy to assume that it is almost impossible to reach people with a closed nationalist world view.

They say it is more important to focus on those who are dissatisfied and angry, but have not yet fundamentally abandoned the democratic system. The voter potential for radical parties is high in places where large-scale changes are sparking fear. If this analysis is correct, even if it certainly cannot be the sole explanation,

Then governments can at least try to counteract this with structural policy, for example. Katrin Lindner with an example from Lusatia. Luzie Bobusch got to stand next to the chancellor today. The 21-year-old has prospects again. She learned her trade in open-cast mining at LEAG.

But after her apprenticeship, this metalworker went to work for the railroad. My grandpa, my uncle, lots of my friends and acquaintances are in the coal mine, which is why I went to LEAG. It’s just like family. I only left because I was told that it was shutting down.

The mine wouldn’t be around for much longer, so they weren’t taking any of us on. Olaf Scholz wants to celebrate a success in Cottbus. The railroad’s most modern plant to date has been built and will bring well-paid industrial jobs to the region, which has suffered under the coal phase-out.

1,200 jobs will be created here. This shows that the tide is turning, and it has already turned here in Cottbus and in many other places in eastern Germany. It’s not just these huge railroad halls that have been built and are in the pipeline.

The railroad plant will ignite a spark for the entire surrounding area. At the end of December, the Jänschwalde open-cast mine near Cottbus ceased operations. Other mines are soon to follow. The last coal-fired power plant is due to be decommissioned by 2038. Funds for structural conversion from the federal government

Flowed into the new railroad plant. This is very urgently needed throughout Germany. After Nuremberg turned down an ICE plant, it is a blessing that it will be completed on schedule in Cottbus. One modern hall has already been built, and a second one is to follow.

Train maintenance in Cottbus has a long tradition going back 150 years. But the old plant was on the brink of collapse for a long time because fewer diesel locomotives needed to be serviced. Over the years, at city, state and federal level, we really had to fight to keep that industry.

Now, the most modern ICE plant in Europe is being built here. They are used to fighting tough battles here. During the opening ceremony, farmers outside vented their anger. I just have a pre-set milk price at my farm. The price is set by the dairy industry and I can’t do business any other way.

But we simply can’t do this any longer. The chancellor didn’t give the struggling farmers an audience. He spoke with their regional president instead. In agriculture too, we are currently losing production sites. We are currently undergoing structural change. I think that was also the message of the conversation,

That we should look for a solution together, to fix agriculture not only for next year, but also for the years to come. One thing was clear on two levels today in Cottbus: structural change demands a lot of energy and money.

Of course, it would be nice if Cottbus could not only repair ICE trains, but also have an IC connection. This has not been available so far. Now, we’ll turn to international politics. The Middle East conflict in general and the current war between Israel and Hamas in particular are polarising. This is nothing new.

To some extent, it also has historical roots. The Middle East conflict was also overshadowed by the Cold War for decades, with the USA on one side and the Soviet Union on the other. This is still partly the case today. South Africa is now suing Israel for its actions in Gaza

Before the International Court of Justice in The Hague. The South African ANC was supported by the Soviet Union during the apartheid era. The USA and Israel, on the other hand, were seen as supporters of the white apartheid regime. The German government finds the lawsuit incomprehensible. Israel sees it as defamation.

Florian Neuhann reports on the opening arguments in court. It’s day 96 after the Hamas attack on Israel, day 75 after the start of the Israeli ground offensive. In The Hague, 17 judges took to the bench with a very measured step,

And this Middle East war was brought before a world court for the first time. The state of Israel stood in the dock today in The Hague at the International Court of Justice. They are being charged with the gravest of crimes: genocide, defined as acts committed with intent

“to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.” The prosecution was certain: Israel has killed an unparalleled, unprecedented number of civilians, in full knowledge of how many lives every single bomb ended. No one in Gaza was spared, not even newborn babies.

Over three hours, South Africa carefully presented its case, with evidence of soldiers celebrating after successful attacks or quotes from acting politicians who called for the destruction of Gaza. They sought to prove intent and incidentally to function as spokesperson for the growing corps of Israel critics worldwide.

Almost everyone in South Africa agrees on their support for Palestine. They equate the Palestinian struggle with their own history, the struggle against apartheid. This solidarity dates back to Nelson Mandela and former Palestinian President Yasser Arafat. The ruling party in South Africa, the ANC, was a liberation movement and part of a worldwide movement

That fought against colonialism, imperialism and for freedom. As Nelson Mandela once said, “Our freedom is not complete as long as there are others who have not yet achieved theirs.” Hamas’ acts only appeared in the indictment as an initial spark for the violence.

Israel, which will not have its say in court until tomorrow, was already outraged today. The country fears for its reputation. The prime minister spoke in the evening: We are fighting against terrorists and lies. Today, we have experienced an upside-down world. The Israeli state is accused of genocide while it itself is fighting genocide.

The court could soon decide whether it demands an end to military action. It may not be able to enforce its ruling, but The Hague is also negotiating the sovereignty of global opinion. Over to Heinz Wolf with further news of the day. According to media reports, British Prime Minister Sunak

Has called for a cabinet meeting via telephone this evening. Talks are likely to revolve around an imminent joint military strike in cooperation with the USA against the Houthi rebels in Yemen. Since the outbreak of the Gaza war between Israel and the Islamist Hamas,

The Houthis have repeatedly attacked ships with alleged Israeli connections in the Red Sea. Major shipping companies are increasingly avoiding this important trade route. The SPD parliamentary group met in Berlin for a meeting to kick off the new year and decided to call for a reform of the debt brake.

Parliamentary group leader Mützenich said Germany is capable of sustaining debt, because debt is necessary to make investments, so that Germany can maintain its leading position in the world. Within the traffic light coalition, the FDP, led by Finance Minister Lindner, is particularly opposed to a relaxation of the debt brake

And a renewed suspension for this year. In view of the ongoing strikes by the train drivers’ union GDL in the wage dispute with Deutsche Bahn, CDU leader Merz has called for the federal government to intervene. As the owner of Deutsche Bahn, the government now has a responsibility, Merz told the Rheinische Post newspaper.

Transport Minister Wissing must bring all parties to the table. Yesterday and today, around 80% of long-distance trains were cancelled. There were also considerable disruptions to regional services. The strike is expected to continue until tomorrow evening. During her trip to Asia, Foreign Affairs Minister Baerbock criticized China

For its aggressive actions in the South China Sea. During her talks in the Philippine capital of Manila, Baerbock said risky manoeuvres by the Chinese coast guard threatened the freedom of the sea routes, guaranteed under international law for countries around the world. The Foreign Ministry in Beijing reacted immediately

And emphasized that no country that is not part of the region has the right to intervene in conflicts around the South China Sea. In Poland, supporters of the national conservative opposition party PiS demonstrated against the centre-left government of Prime Minister Tusk. Several thousand people gathered in front of the parliament in Warsaw.

Their protest was directed against the latest reforms of public media and the arrest of two convicted PiS politicians the day before yesterday. Poland’s Head of State Duda, who is close to the PiS party, announced that he would once again pardon the two. German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach has made an announcement

That even well-meaning people fear will stir up a hornet’s nest, in already troubled times. Belief in the blessings of homeopathy is widespread. In the future, however, it will no longer be a publicly funded benefit. The financial relief this will bring is limited. But that is probably not Lauterbach’s main motivation.

First and foremost, it is probably about enforcing the principle of scientific evidence in the health insurance billing system. The demand for enforcement of this principle, with regard to homeopathy is not new. Kristina Kayatz and Dorthe Ferber report. There have always been doubts about the effectiveness of these pellets.

Nevertheless, doctors trained in conventional medicine still rely on homeopathic treatments. One of them is Jürgen de Laporte, a practising specialist for internal medicine. Amongst patients in the field of general medicine, the largest area for treatments concerns people who are not quite healthy, but also not really sick. And that’s what it’s all about.

General practitioners call this the “wait and see” approach. If you can give a patient something, to make them feel cared for while asking about further symptoms, you often have very good results. Karl Lauterbach doesn’t want to accept that. For him, it’s about the principle.

No scientifically proven effectiveness, no money from the statutory public health insurance, the health minister explained today in Berlin. Homeopathy does not offer a service that provides scientifically proven benefits. Such a service, therefore, should not be paid for with public funds.

Statutory health insurances should not pay for insurance services that have no medical benefit. We cannot afford that. Even a good 200 years after Samuel Hahnemann formulated the principles of homeopathy, studies intended to prove the connection between treatment and healing are still considered insufficient. Fundamentally, we stand for evidence-based medicine.

This also means that treatments that are paid for with public funds should be evidence-based. And I think it can also be said that this is rather questionable in the case of homeopathy. Not all statutory health insurance providers offer homeopathic services as a voluntary treatment in their portfolio.

And the prices for globules are low. The savings potential is therefore meagre. According to the ministry, savings are estimated from 20 to 50 million euros, out of a total cost of around 290 billion euros. The opposition calls it a smokescreen, and Dr de Laporte sees more harm than good.

For patients, it would mean that the higher earners who are privately insured, would continue to receive homeopathic treatments at no extra cost. But those currently reimbursed by statutory health insurances no longer would and I find that unfair. A ban will probably not deter convinced supporters of homeopathy.

However, the minister’s initiative could cause some unrest in doctors’ offices. And now let’s take a look at the financial markets. The US Securities and Exchange Commission, SEC, has announced a long-awaited decision, clearing the way for exchange-traded bitcoin funds. Sounds complicated. Valerie Haller, what kind of investment is this?

It means that bitcoins can be traded on the stock exchange for the first time, in the form of funds set up by asset managers. So now, you no longer have to take the detour via crypto exchange platforms, which can be unstable. Instead, you acquire a fund share from a regulated provider,

Which you can use to enter or exit at any time. This is seen as a turning point for the crypto industry. It makes trading bitcoins easier and more professional, which should now make it more interesting for people. Analysts expect inflows in the billions. Initially, the price of Bitcoins rose sharply,

But now it’s crumbling again. This shows that trading with Bitcoins might now be safer. However, the investment is still far from being truly secure. If the Bitcoin price falls, the fund will also lose value and the price fluctuations can be huge. Investors have already lost a lot of money with bitcoins.

Even a total loss cannot be ruled out. The new fund regulation does nothing to change this. Even the SEC, which has just given the green light, warns that Bitcoin is a speculative form of investment that is also used for money laundering and terrorist financing.

Investors should be wary and cautious, considering the many risks involved. Valerie Haller, many thanks. The German team won another two medals at the Track Cycling World Championships in the Netherlands today. Roger Kluge and his partner Theo Reinhardt won gold in the two-man team race,

While the four-woman team won bronze behind Italy and Great Britain. At the home World Cup in Ruhpolding, the German men’s biathlon relay team took second place. In a thrilling race, the first victory for a DSV quartet in almost three years seemed possible once again.

Two penalty rounds of shooting threw the Germans far back again. But final skier Philipp Nawrath reached the podium behind the victorious Norwegians. Italy finished in third place. You can imagine what a Russian prison can do to you if you look at Putin critic Alexei Navalny before and after his imprisonment.

He is currently being held in an isolation cell again, in a penal colony at the end of the world, in the Russian polar region. The camp is a successor to the Soviet Gulag, the infamous penal and labour camps in which Stalin had imprisoned millions of Soviet citizens during his reign.

Writers such as Solzhenitsyn and Georgy Demidov, who is still relatively unknown in the west, have written about these places of damnation. A short novel by him has now been translated into German for the first time. Christhard Läpple reports. Last stop Kolyma, an Auschwitz without the gas chambers.

The road to the gulag was built on the bones of the prisoners. They extracted coal, uranium or gold from the Siberian earth in the freezing cold. Georgy Demidov was one of them, a physicist by trade. “Ten times I was half dead. Twice, I was dying of hypothermia.

Then I swore to myself that I would survive just so I could describe this hell.” Only now, half a century later, is his incredible story being published in Germany. The title of the book is “Fone Kwas”, which translates to “The Idiot”. “Fone Kwas” is Hebrew and means “fool” or “idiot”.

The plot: the innocent protagonist fabricates lies about absurd and impossible acts of sabotage during his interrogation in the hope of being acquitted. His work compares to Kafka. Someone had to be arrested, but he did not know why. So the following weeks consist of him finding out why he was actually arrested.

The plan fails. Stalin’s system of absurdity and brutality knows no mercy. Everyone is a suspect, which drives the paranoia of the Great Terror. Demidov describes hunger, lack of sleep, torture, nightly interrogations. In the cells, it stinks miserably from the only available bucket. Fresh water in the morning only, not in the evening.

People died like flies. Demidov’s gulag document gets under your skin. This is unfortunately very topical. I worked on the translation of the book and read Russian news in parallel. And it’s terrible that this history is repeating itself. Physicist Demidov survived 14 years in Stalin’s camps. His novel was finished in 1964.

The manuscript remained in the drawer. In 1980, all the texts are confiscated, including his three typewriters. Protocols provide proof. The man became desperate. “I find it difficult to judge what purpose my writing serves. Probably only the same as the mouse gnawing on its own teeth.

In any case, I have no hope of being published.” Demidov died in 1987. Two years later, under Gorbachev, the texts were returned to his daughter. Too late. It takes another 30 years before this stirring book is published. That is why it is very topical.

I believe it could be applied to the proceedings against Navalny, for example. He is in the same situation right now. He is facing the same prison conditions, as well as bizarre accusations against him. This gulag novel is a real discovery, oppressively explosive and highly recommended. That’s it from us.

Maybrit Illner is up next. Her panel today includes Cem Özdemir, Hendrik Wüst and the writer and lawyer Juli Zeh. At 12:30 AM, Nazan Gökdemir will be presenting the “heute journal up:date”. See you tomorrow. Good bye. WEATHER REPORT Good evening. Like a spider in its web, high Hannelore is crouching over Great Britain.

But there will be movement in the weather. Low pressure systems are approaching, bringing not only clouds but also a bit of rain or snow. We’re already noticing that tonight. It can get dangerously slippery on the roads and sidewalks, if snow or sleet should fall. In the south, it’s partly clear.

Temperatures will drop to minus 1 to minus 12 degrees. The night will be milder in the northwest with 3 degrees. There we can expect maximum temperatures of 3 to 6 degrees tomorrow, otherwise, maximum temperatures will be around freezing. In northern Germany, it will be mostly cloudy and overcast tomorrow.

At best, you’ll see the sun towards the Baltic coast or northern Schleswig Holstein. There will be a bit of rain, and in the centre, a bit of snow, sleet, and drizzle can be expected. It will remain slippery. The situation is different in southern Germany. Especially between Breisgau and the foothills of the Alps,

The sun will shine brightly in places. At the weekend, clouds will move over the north, then the north-east and on Monday over the south-east. Dense clouds expected with snow, sleet and drizzle. And then it will also get a little milder. It’s a different story in the southwest.

It will remain pleasant the whole time. And as you can see from the trend for Stuttgart, it will stay frosty, especially at night, until the middle of next week. Have a nice evening.