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By&nbspWolfgang Kubicki is a lawyer and leader of Germany’s Free Democratic Party (FDP). He is a former member of the German Bundestag and former Vice President of the Bundestag.

Published on
26/07/2026 – 22:04 GMT+2

Almost exactly ten years ago, on 12 June 2016, Orlando, Florida, was the scene of the deadliest terrorist attack in the United States since 11 September 2001. A gunman opened fire at the Pulse nightclub, killing 49 people and injuring 58 others. Nearly six years ago, on 4 October 2020, a terrorist attacked two men with a knife in Dresden, Germany, killing one and critically injuring the other. Yesterday, Berlin was struck by another terrorist attack, in which one person was killed and several others were critically injured.

Islamist terror against gay people

What links these three crimes is both the motive and the choice of target. The victims in Orlando were patrons of a gay nightclub, the two men attacked in Dresden were married to each other, and those targeted in Berlin were attending Christopher Street Day. As far as we know, all three attacks were motivated by Islamism and directed against homosexual people.

It is no coincidence that the sense of security among sexual minorities has deteriorated dramatically in recent years. This is not only due to the attacks mentioned at the outset, but also of a broader rise in such acts of violence. Last year the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) recorded 284 violent offences motivated by victim’s sexual orientation. That level has remained similarly high for years, after the figures had previously surged. In 2015 there were just 54 such offences.

Equal rights for same-sex couples were a victory for reason

Germany has no reason at all to feel morally superior when it comes to its treatment of sexual minorities. Just a few decades ago, gay men were prosecuted under criminal law – with the blessing of the country’s highest court in Karlsruhe. Under the Nazi regime, this persecution reached its tragic peak. For thousands, it was only the beginning of deportation to concentration camps, where many died in agony.

Those who returned were condemned to shameful silence, because the reason for their martyrdom remained a criminal offence and socially despised. We have overcome that state of affairs, although it was a long and arduous journey. Decriminalisation and, ultimately, equal rights for same-sex couples were a victory of humanist reason over crude prejudice in our laws.

Jews, women, Christmas markets – freedom is dying

Today, in 2026, the threat to gay and bisexual people no longer comes from the state. And yet freedom in this country is currently dying. Not only for this group, but also for Jews, whose schools and nurseries require ever tighter security to protect children and who are increasingly targeted in violent attacks.

It is true for women, too, many of whom feel less safe travelling home alone at night. And it is true for anyone who has paused before visiting a Christmas market, festival or other public event and wondered whether it is really safe to go.

Sections of the left cling to a warped worldview

Regrettably, there is a growing tendency not only to deny the causes of this development, but to resist acknowledging them altogether. Particularly in left-wing circles, a crude worldview is cultivated that seeks to claim entire groups for itself. Reports on this year’s Christopher Street Day in Kiel, for instance, said that the far-left organisation “TurboKlimaKampfGruppe Kiel” (TKKG) disrupted the event against the organisers’ wishes by chanting anti-police slogans.

The group said it was protesting because “the police as an institution” were supporting and driving “the authoritarian and right-wing developments of this state”, allowing “racist violence above all to continue and expand”. During the demonstration, members chanted familiar far-left anti-police slogans, including “No Cops” and “All Cops Are Bastards”.

Biggest threat to a liberal, open society: Islamism

But these tendencies and this refusal to name the greatest threat to a liberal, open way of life where it actually lies – in Islamism – are also found in more moderate left-wing circles. This stems from a misguided understanding of tolerance. Yet there is nothing tolerant about making common cause with those who fundamentally reject and seek to destroy every form of openness. Culturally, Islamists would have far more in common with the darkest chapters of German history.

Precisely because we have overcome those darkest hours, they hate us. We should therefore not fall for the illusion that the Berlin attack was aimed only at a specific group. No, it was aimed at all of us. It targets the achievements of our liberal democracy and our way of life, regardless of whom we love or with whom we celebrate.

They cannot bear the lightness of Western life and therefore want to destroy it. Long-forgotten attacks such as the one in Dresden, the attack on the music festival in Ansbach, the attack at the Holocaust memorial in 2025 or the attack on the Nazi Documentation Centre in Munich all fit this pattern.

Islamism has not only been imported – it is taking root on our doorstep

We can only hope that, after this horrific attack, more people will find the courage to confront some uncomfortable truths. That includes recognising Islamism for the danger that it is. It also means accepting that it is essential to control and decide who is allowed to migrate to this country and who is not.

And it involves the bitter truth that Islamism is no longer simply a threat from abroad but, as Berlin has shown, is also taking root here, in our own neighbourhoods.

That is partly because we have turned a blind eye to integration policy and tolerated the emergence of parallel societies, rather than using the legal tools at our disposal to confront them decisively.

Denmark as a model: the problems must be solved by the political centre

It is also because, for too long, we have allowed the enablers of terror – Islamist hate preachers and the organisations behind them – to operate unchecked. And because we have allowed the erosion of everyday freedoms to remain largely absent from public debate, while anyone who raised the issue was accused of “doing the far right’s bidding”.

Yet nothing serves the interests of right-wing extremists more than the political centre’s inability to name problems and deal with them. This situation can be overcome. Denmark has shown how.

The attack on Christopher Street Day deeply affects me. But it was not just an attack on Christopher Street Day. The attack in Berlin was an attack on freedom: the freedom to choose one’s own faith, or to have none. The freedom to love the person one loves. The freedom to go to a concert, a fair or a Christmas market without fear.

The future of our country will not be decided by how shaken we are after each attack, but by whether we have the courage to name problems honestly and tackle them resolutely.