German Der Spiegel whitewashes neofascist Björn Hocke

This 18 January 2017 video says about itself:

Germany: AfD‘s Hocke condemns Berlin’s WWII monument as ‘memorial of shame’

Bjorn Hocke, founding member and speaker of the parliamentary group for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, criticised what he described as Berlin’s ‘memorial of shame’, during his speech at a Pegida rally, Tuesday. The AfD politician is believed to have been referring to the German capital’s Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe.

Bjorn Hocke, member of Landtag in Thuringia for Alternative for Germany (AfD) (German): “The bombing of Dresden and the following firestorm destroyed Florence at the Elbe river and its inhabitants. The bombing of Dresden was a war crime, comparable with the nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. With the bombing of Dresden and the other German cities, they wanted nothing else than destroying our collective identity.”

Bjorn Hocke, member of Landtag in Thuringia for Alternative for Germany (AfD) (German): “Until now, our state of mind, our frame of mind, is still the one of a completely conquered people. The Germans – and I don’t speak about you patriots who are gathered here now -, the Germans, so our people, are the only people in the world who constructed a memorial of shame in their capital.”

Peter Schwarz from Germany reports that in its 3 November 2018 issue, German weekly Der Spiegel published an interview with neofascist politician Björn Hocke. The uncritical interview whitewashes Hocke; even as he is, according to Der Spiegel itself, the most right-wing leading politician in the racist AfD party.

Hocke became infamous for calling the Holocaust monument in Berlin ‘a shame’; and for demanding the destruction of plaques (‘Stolpersteine’) commemorating Jewish people murdered by Hitler’s Third Reich.

Der Spiegel quotes an interview by Hocke with the Rupert Murdoch owned Wall Street Journal. Hocke told the United States Big Business daily:

The big problem is that Hitler is depicted as absolutely evil.

Hocke told Der Spiegel:

The world should finally realize that Poland too was guilty of [World] war [II] and that not only the Germans but also the Jews, with some justification, could be described as “a nation of perpetrators”.

Hocke bases this whitewashing of nazism almost verbally on the late amateur historian Ernst Nolte, a defender of Holocaust denial.

The English language version of the Peter schwarz article is here.