Germany: ZDF manipulates bar chart about anti-Semitic crimes

Since the Hamas attack in October, there have been over 3,500 anti-Semitic crimes in Germany. Only a fraction of this is attributed to supposedly right-wing extremist perpetrators. However, ZDF probably wants to give viewers a different impression.

The ZDF talk show “Maybrit Illner” apparently manipulated a graphic about anti-Semitic crimes. In the November 16 broadcast on the topic “War in the Middle East: More and more hatred of Jews in Germany,” a bar chart was shown that is supposed to show anti-Semitic crimes since the Hamas attack in October.

The bar, which is supposed to show the actions of supporters from the right-wing extremist spectrum, is significantly larger than it should have been compared to the other bars. According to the Interior Ministry, a total of 163 crimes fall into the “right-wing” category, while 448 crimes fall into the “other” category.

Wie bei Maybritt #Illner Straftaten im Zusammenhang mit dem Nahostkonflikt dargestellt wurden und wie es hätte aussehen müssen. #ReformOerr #OerrBlog pic.twitter.com/YVeDnyLi7L

— ÖRR Blog. (@OERRBlog) November 20, 2023

Although ZDF reproduced the numbers correctly, it presented the bars as being almost the same size. This made right-wing crimes appear larger at first glance than they actually are.

The majority of the crimes are Islamist or foreign extremist
The Interior Ministry counted more than 3,500 crimes related to the Middle East conflict in the period following the October 7 Hamas attack. The vast majority, 2,718 crimes, were committed by Islamists or supporters of foreign extremist groups, such as the left-wing extremist Palestinian group Samidoun.

A total of 448 offenses fall under the “other” category. Right-wing acts are the second rarest, left-wing acts were counted the least - the Interior Ministry only assigns 19 acts to this area.

Public broadcasting has already been noticed several times for manipulation
Public broadcasting has already attracted attention for manipulation in the past. In May, the public television station Phoenix removed passages from an interview with CDU politician Gitta Connemann in which she had criticized the Green Economics Minister Robert Habeck.

In April 2022, the radio program WDR 5 Morgenecho presented the SPD official Julia Schwanholz as a neutral expert and asked her about the so-called “Mallorca affair”. The CDU then accused WDR of “fee-financed SPD election campaigns”.

In September 2021, the MDR retouched the logo of the image of a microphone. The broadcaster later stated that it was “the individual decision of a single person” who manipulated the recordings for “aesthetic reasons”.

Source: Junge Freiheit