Michael Stürzenberger is a well-known Islam critic in Germany, and was one of the honored guests at last summer’s Brussels Conference. His outspoken style and uncompromising attitude have made him — along with Politically Incorrect and Die Freiheit — persona non grata with the Bavarian government. As with so many other Counterjihad figures who draw the baleful gaze of the authorities, Mr. Stürzenberger has been prosecuted by the state. In his case, the issue was the display of a photo of Heinrich Himmler at a Freiheit rally. No Nazi propaganda was included — and, as everyone familiar with the larger European Counterjihad movement knows, Nazi references are employed to wake citizens up to what lies ahead if their governments continue to cosset Muslims in their midst.

Yesterday Michael Stürzenberger was acquitted in a Munich courtroom. JLH has translated a report from Politically Incorrect on the auspicious occasion, and includes this introductory note:

As Stürzenberger often does, he allows his opponent to “speak” at length, by including Kaster’s article and surrounding it with his own atmospheric descriptions of the scene.

I said recently when introducing an article leading up to this trial, that Stürzenberger’s technique of disputation reminds me of a verbal version of a Clint Eastwood film. He seems to revel in the encounters and in his victories. I suspect that this alone will make him a permanent target of Islamists and leftists.

The translated article:

Munich Trial: Acquittal
No Penalty for Himmler Poster
May 13, 2013

Every seat in courtroom A225 of the Munich court building was occupied on the second day of the Islam-Himmler-poster trial. Several interested parties had to stand in the hall. After four more hours of witness interrogations, viewing of the TV documentary “Sarrazin’s Germany,” summations by the prosecutor and the defense attorney and final comments from the accused, the judge announced his verdict: acquittal. With that, the very fairly conducted trial of the Islam-clarifiers came to a welcome end.

Among the spectators, besides an editor of the Münchner Merkur, was Bernd Kastner of the Süddeutsche Zeitung, who followed both days of the trial and had already posted his article, “Trial of Stürzenberger — no Penalty for the Himmler Poster.” In it, he opines that the “activist of the Islam-hostile scene” had “used the court as a political stage.”

[The PI article includes Kaster’s entire article, minus one heading and one caption:]

Judge Rolf-Dieter Madlindl based the acquittal on the fact that the Himmler poster had only been shown for a few seconds on Marienplatz, before the police intervened. Furthermore, officers who testified had not seen any Nazi symbol like a swastika on Himmler’s SS uniform and were themselves not sure whether showing the photo was illegal. Certainly, anyway, there was no propaganda for Nazis.

An earlier meeting of the Stürzenberger group in a pub, where the poster had been shown, had been a limited display. Stürzenberger, said the judge, had been lucky, because a TV team which had filmed the poster had placed it in a critical context.

Whether a Himmler photo could be allowed to be shown in public had not yet been judicially decided. At any rate, according to the judge, Himmler had not been portrayed “iconically,” as seen by prosecutor Peter Preuß. He [Preuß] had asked 80 per diem fines for each of the defendants and emphasized the interdiction on NS symbolism, in order to exclude it from political disputation. In this case, Himmler’s photo [he said] had been “exploited” for political purposes. Stürzenberger is the leader of the Bavarian state section of Die Freiheit party and of the Munich group of the blog Politically Incorrect. Both of them are classified as extremist by Bavarian security service because of their hostility to Islam.

Stürzenberger also used the court as a political stage on the second day of the trial and talked himself into a rage, as in his appearances on the street, saying that there had just been a desire to explain the dangers of Islam, which, like National Socialism, is a totalitarian ideology.

Once again, he held up large photos and turned again and again to the public, sometimes going directly to political opponents sitting there. The judge interrupted him once (“No public speeches.”), but Stürzenberger could not be stopped. He shouted: “Listen well!” At the end, he spoke with fists clenched.

Judge Madlindl made it clear to the defendants that they were on “very thin ice” despite the acquittal. He advised them to inquire punctually of state security or the state’s attorney’s office about what is allowed, but was contradicted by prosecutor.

Preuß: “We are not allowed to give legal advice.”

Tomorrow, by the way, is the trial for the false report by the Süddeutsche Zeitung that a participant in a Freiheit demonstration in the Munich pedestrian zone had shouted: “Germans, fight back! Do not buy from Jews!” However, it was demonstrably a leftist counter-demonstrator who is now being investigated for hate speech. The Freiheit group, on the other hand, was waving Israel flags.

In conclusion, an appropriate quotation from Frederick the Great:

“Truth needs neither weapons to defend itself nor violence to force people to believe it. It need only appear and, when its light has banished the clouds which hide it, its victory is assured.”