German authorities issued deportation orders for three E.U. citizens and a U.S. citizen living in Berlin over their participation in anti-Israel protest rallies, according to reports in the German media on Tuesday.
The four deportees have been given until April 21 to leave Germany, their lawyer told The Irish Times. They “pose a threat to public order,” their deportation orders said, according to the ND Aktuell news site. It also sas they “indirectly supported” terrorist groups like Hamas.
The deportation is an unusual move for German authorities, which have taken a relatively firm stance on banning or restricting expressions of anti-Israel and antisemitic vitriol following Oct. 7, 2023.
Two of the E.U. citizens in question, Roberta Murray and Shane O’Brien, 31 and 29, are Irish. The third, Kasia Wlaszczyk, is Polish. The U.S. citizen has been identified as Cooper Longbottom.
O’Brien, an organizer of anti-Israel protests in Berlin, was previously brought to court charged with insulting a police officer and was accused of calling the officer a “fascist,” though he was acquitted of that charge. There are several outstanding charges against him, according to the Irish paper. The deportation order against him said he expressed antisemitic views, The Irish Times reported.
Murray has been accused by police of using “banned slogans.” German authorities have banned the slogan “From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will Be Free,” which advocates the ethnic cleansing of Jews. Both Murray and O’Brien have denied the allegations against them. They and the two other deportees dispute that they pose a threat to public order and that they support terrorism by Hamas or others, their lawyer, Alexander Gorski, told the Irish daily.
A spokesman for Berlin’s immigration office told The Irish Times that it did not comment on inquiries on individuals, citing privacy issues.
Germany and several other Western European countries, as well as the United States, Canada and Australia, have seen a surge of antisemitic violence since the outbreak of the Gaza conflict on Oct. 7, 2023.
After thousands of Hamas-led terrorists murdered some 1,200 people in Israel on that day and abducted another 251, hundreds of thousands of Europeans took to the streets for rallies and marches against Israel’s retaliation against Hamas.
In Germany, some 1,383 antisemitic incidents were recorded in the first half of 2024, topping the entire tally for the previous year.
