Berlin, July 24, 2024

The Mideast Freedom Forum Berlin (MFFB) explicitly welcomes the ban of the Islamic Center Hamburg (IZH) and its sub-organizations. It represents an important step in maintaining internal security and in the fight against the influence of the Iranian regime in Germany.
The IZH was Tehran's most important outpost in Europe and one of the central hubs for coordinating the export of revolutionary ideology in Europe. Its directives and senior staff came directly from Tehran, and there were always close personal ties with the Revolutionary Guards. Unsurprisingly, the organization's orientation was therefore anti-democratic, openly hostile to Israel and aggressively anti-Semitic.
The core element of the IZH's work was the targeted influencing of the Shiite communities in Germany, in particular, also via the IGS umbrella organization, of which the IZH was a co-founder. As the geographical distribution of the house searches related to the ban also shows, the IZH operated as the center of a network.

The work of the IZH went far beyond mere propaganda. Until its ban, the IZH was the central point of contact for the terrorist organization Hezbollah, which was regularly provided with premises and other infrastructure. This made the IZH a concrete danger to public security in Germany.

Unfortunately, parts of the German authorities have overlooked all these aspects for far too long. Until 2022, the IZH was part of the Schura Hamburg association, with which the city of Hamburg has had a state treaty since 2012, and thus a dialogue partner. At the same time, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and the Hamburg State Office for the Protection of the Constitution have been issuing increasingly urgent warnings about the dangers posed by the IZH for years.

Ulrike Becker, Head of Research at the Mideast Freedom Forum Berlin, calls on the German government to take further action: “The closure of the IZH was a necessary and long overdue step. However, it is also clear that banning the IZH and its sub-organizations must not be the last step in the fight against the activities of the Iranian regime and its supporters. The structures of the Islamic Republic in Germany must be crushed and all agents expelled. In particular, the Revolutionary Guards are still active in Germany and, according to the intelligence services, are preparing attacks. We therefore demand that the Revolutionary Guards be added to the EU terrorist list and that they be banned from operating in Germany.”