He goes by "Hunter” on the messaging app Telegram. And the young German makes no secret of his political orientation. He’s from a "NatSoc Family,” he claims, writing in English – a family with national-socialist sympathies. Where they live in the German state of Saxony, he writes, there are fewer "non-whites” than in western Germany, and the far right is gaining ground, "especially the militant scene.”
In a chat with a Telegram user claiming to share his views, "Hunter” goes into detail. He writes that he is training a group of teenagers and young men between 13 and 25 and posts photos of them marching in camouflage. Sometimes, they drive to Poland or the Czech Republic, apparently for target practice. He is planning to conduct detonation tests in the woods with a mixture of diesel and manure, he claims. His role model: Timothy McVeigh, the man who blew up a federal building in the U.S. state of Oklahoma in 1995.
* All messages are excerpts from chats, some have been anonymized
The actual name of this Neo-Nazi from Eastern Germany is Jörg S. What he doesn’t know while chatting: His alleged sympathizer is an undercover agent for the FBI, the U.S. domestic intelligence agency. Through their liaison officer in Berlin, the FBI tips off the German intelligence service and the public prosecutor.
After months of investigation, the police arrested Jörg S. in November 2024 together with seven other men. They are purported to have founded the terrorist group called the "Sächsische Separatisten” (Saxon Separatists). Jörg S.’s lawyer declined to comment. In previous statements he disputed any accusations of terrorism, claiming the defendants were a "relatively harmless hiking group.”
The article you are reading originally appeared in German in issue 17/2025 (April 17th, 2025) of DER SPIEGEL.
The authorities are convinced that Jörg S., 24, and his associates belong to a militant far-right subculture that in recent years has been attracting young men from around the world. Their groups have names like "Atomwaffen Division” (Atomic Weapon Division), "National Socialist Brotherhood,” or "The Base.” They long for the day when the state order will collapse, and they propagate violence against Jews, Blacks and migrants.
The "saints” that they venerate are right-wing terrorists like Anders Breivik, who murdered 77 people in Norway in 2011, and Stephan Balliet, who attacked a synagogue in Halle in 2019 and subsequently killed two people in the neighborhood.
AfD politician Björn Höcke with terror suspect Jörg S.
[M] Elsa Hundertmark / DER SPIEGEL; Foto: Vue Critique
Experts have termed the phenomenon "militant accelerationism.” Followers of this ideology believe in the decline of the West and try to speed up the process through acts of violence. The loose network of channels and chat groups is often referred to as "Terrorgram,” since they communicate using the Dubai-based messaging app Telegram.
They occasionally post photos of themselves wearing skull masks. Their digital pamphlets are teeming with swastikas and violent fantasies. Germany must "fully descend into chaos” before "something normal” can reemerge, the Neo-Nazi Jörg S. wrote in a chat. At one point he fantasized about a "white jihad.”
Photos posted in chats by right-wing extremists
[M] Elsa Hundertmark / DER SPIEGEL
The Center for Monitoring, Analysis and Strategy (CeMAS), a non-profit organization in Berlin, recently ascertained just how large this subculture is. Their findings are alarming: According tothe study, which was made available to DER SPIEGEL prior to publication, there are at least 164 active chat groups that can be attributed to the "Terrorgram” network.
CeMAS counted 651 German users in these groups who have sent over 317,000 messages since 2022. According to the experts, 83 of them are "heavy users,” which points to an "increased potential for violence.”
One group in which German users were particularly active was named "Terror Wave.” Their members hid behind pseudonyms like "Gestapo Officer” or "Proud Nationalist.” The mass murderer Breivik "dindu nuttin wrong,” one of them wrote. Middle Easterners should be "killed like pigs,” wrote another. In the chat, the users shared info on how to make explosives. It has since been taken offline.
Miro Dittrich, right-wing extremism expert with CeMAS
Right-wing extremist expert Miro Dittrich of CeMAS
Miro Dittrich, an expert on right-wing extremism at CeMAS, speaks of the "most dominant current in right-wing terrorism” today. He says that it has long been clear that there are many Germans active in this online terrorist network but adds that he had not expected such high numbers. "Policymakers and the security services need to act,” he says. "Other countries are ahead of Germany in combating these structures.”
What began 10 years ago in the U.S. with an ominous "Atomwaffen Division” has now grown into a worldwide movement. New subgroups are constantly popping up on Telegram. This makes it difficult for the authorities to monitor them.
Since 2021, a hard core group has formed in the global Neo-Nazi subculture: the "Terrorgram Collective.” The group produces digital hate-pamphlets of up to 268 pages – one of the suspected contributors being a German user. The readers of these pamphlets are incited to blow up bridges and radio towers, or they are provided instructions on how to build a "dirty” bomb out of radioactive uranium. "Terror is the language of the unheard,” one of the documents states. In the United States, United Kingdom and Australia, the "Terrorgram Collective” is now classified as a terrorist organization and some of its leading figures have faced criminal charges.
Acts of violence from around the world testify to the danger posed by this parallel world:
In February 2025, a 17-year-old from the U.S. state of Wisconsin allegedly killed his mother and stepfather in order to get money for a planned assassination. In a manifesto found on his phone, he called for the initiation of a revolution to "save the white race." In a chat obtained by DER SPIEGEL, he asked for tips on how to carry out drone attacks with explosives.
In August 2024, an 18-year-old live-streamed a knife attack on the attendees of a mosque in the Turkish city of Eskişehir, which resulted in five injuries. He wore a skull mask and a protective vest with a black sun, popular symbols in the scene. According to investigators, he distributed "Terrorgram” pamphlets online.
In November 2022, a 16-year-old broke into schools in Aracruz, Brazil, and killed a child and three adults. The attacker likewise had connections to the online hate network. Because Telegram would not release the full user data, a judge temporarily blocked the platform in Brazil.
In October 2022, in the Slovakian capital of Bratislava, a 19-year-old shot two people outside a bar frequented by homosexuals. In a manifesto published online, he described being influenced by the network’s propaganda. People in the scene proclaimed him "Terrorgram’s first saint.”
In Germany, investigators have already foiled multiple attacks. A Nuremberg court convicted a young man – active in the chat group "Feuerkrieg Division” (Fire-War Division) – of planning to commit terrorism. His online moniker was "Heydrich,” after the SS war criminal and Holocaust organizer Reinhard Heydrich. Similarly, in Brandenburg, a teenager from the "Terrorgram” scene received a juvenile sentence of nearly four years for planning a bomb attack.
A memorial following the attack in Bratislava in 2022
[M] Elsa Hundertmark / DER SPIEGEL; Foto: Vladimir Simicek / AFP
Equipment used by the attacker in Turkey in 2024
[M] Elsa Hundertmark / DER SPIEGEL; Foto: AliYerlikaya / X
What CeMAS expert Dittrich finds especially disconcerting is how young some of the members of these chat groups are. "Many are underage,” he says, "some even 12 or 13 years old.” It alarms him to see such young people involved in a subculture that calls for attacks and venerates perpetrators. "If you belong to this scene, you’ve reached the end of a spiral of radicalization.”
In a chat from October obtained by DER SPIEGEL, members of a "Terrorgram” group announced an attack on a synagogue in Berlin. A boy was said to be planning a gun attack on the Jewish house of worship. "I'll wish him good hunting," posted one user. When the police intervened, they realized that the boy in question was a 13-year-old from North Rhine-Westphalia. The suspicion of a planned attack was not confirmed.
"A lot of teachers have little idea what their students are up to on the internet,” says Dittrich. "And oftentimes, unfortunately, neither do the parents.” Recognizing the codes of the scene is not always easy for outsiders.
SHTF is one of their abbreviations. It stands for "Shit Hits The Fan” and refers to Day X, the day when everything will fall apart. Day X will be followed, according to the ideology of the scene, by the "boogaloo” – a civil war from which the whites will emerge victorious.
Blocking channels that glorify terrorism is an effective measure, says Dittrich. But now as ever, Telegram takes this measure too rarely, as shown by the new study, Dittrich argues.
For years, the platform has faced accusations of not doing enough to counter extremist content. For this reason, the French police decided in 2024 to take a drastic measure and arrest the company’s CEO, Pavel Durov, during a layover of his private jet in Paris. The investigators accused Durov of tolerating criminal acts and failing to provide adequate data on suspects to the authorities.
Shortly thereafter Durov pledged to "significantly improve" his platform's measures against criminals. Since then, he has been permitted to leave France. When contacted, Telegram denied that it is a safe haven for violent extremists. The company says it has blocked 74,000 groups and channels related to terrorist extremism and calls for violence thus far in 2025, and that it removed more than 35.6 million extremist posts in just three months in 2024.
Reporting by DER SPIEGEL has revealed that multiple members of the "Terrorgram” network are politically linked. "My name is Luka. I'm 19, I come from Germany and I'm also German,” wrote a young man in one of the associated chat groups in summer 2024. "I hate LGBTQ and immigrants,” he added and posted photos of himself doing the Hitler salute. He plans to go into politics, he wrote, "as a young politician for the AfD.”
Right-wing extremist Luka Z. in a chat post (left), and standing together with AfD Bundestag member Matthias Helferich.
[M] Elsa Hundertmark / DER SPIEGEL
The man in question is Luka Z. from a small town in Brandenburg. According to his own statements, he became a member of the right-wing extremist political party Alternative for Germany (AfD) a few months ago. Photos show Z. with an influential party functionary from Eberswalde, as well as with AfD Bundestag member Matthias Helferich, who once described himself as the "friendly face of National Socialism.” Z. was also present at a demonstration of the right-wing extremist group "Deutsche Jugend Voran” (German Youth Ahead).
Some of the online circles that Luka Z. apparently moves in are even more extreme. For example, he participated in a chat group made up of Dutch Neo-Nazis. The group’s logo depicts a man with an assault rifle and a skull mask along with a swastika and the slogan "defend the white race.”
Luka Z. posted photos in the group, showing himself with a baseball bat. "Destroy the f* and immigrants,” he wrote in English under one of the pictures. He has, he claimed, already used the bat to clobber Antifa activists, breaking legs and a hand.
Apparently, he got along especially well with the administrator of the Dutch Neo-Nazi group. Luka invited him to his house near the German-Polish border. The Dutch user replied: "Kamerad, we are going to drink some German beers in your house." The person in question was 17 years old. In mid-March he was convicted in the Netherlands for incitement of terrorist crimes and membership in a terrorist organization. He belonged to the group "The Base,” which since July 2024 has stood on the EU’s list of terrorist organizations.
When approached for comment, Luka Z. claimed that the Dutch administrator never visited him and that he had nothing to do with "The Base.” The portrayal of his attack on Antifa activists was "somewhat overdramatized.” He claimed that he had withdrawn from these groups since joining the AfD around the turn of the year. People from the party had supposedly caught wind of the chats and told Luka that their content was too extreme. Now he understands that they were right, he said.
A changed man? Messages obtained by DER SPIEGEL contradict this story. As late as March, Z. was still active in a "Terrorgram” chat group and posted a video with a swastika and a black sun. After being confronted with this information in mid-April, Z. suddenly disclosed that he had left the AfD, claiming that he was "tired” of politics. The regional AfD leader of Brandenburg merely stated that "Mr. Luka Z. is not a member of the AfD.”
Among those involved in the suspected terrorist group "Sächsische Separatisten” were three AfD members, some of whom sat on the city council or worked for a member of state parliament. After the arrest of the men last fall, the party announced their expulsion.
The involvement of Jörg S., the putative head of the outfit, with the international "Terrorgram” scene appears to have been particularly intimate, both on- and offline.
Investigators discovered that he shared photos of the 2022 Bratislava attack in a chat group. In the images, one could clearly see the bodies of the two victims on the sidewalk in front of the LGBTQ bar. "LMAO,” Jörg S. commented.
The former military airport in Brandis-Waldpolenz
[M] Elsa Hundertmark / DER SPIEGEL; Fotos: 126Edward / Wikipedia; Christian Grube / IMAGO
In December 2022, he received a visit from a suspected member of the "Vorherrschaft Division” (Supremacy Division) from the U.S., another group from the parallel world of "Terrorgram.” During his trip to Germany, the American right-wing extremist apparently made a stop at the Bundestag. The authorities were also able to follow his tracks to the decommissioned military airfield Brandis-Waldpolenz near Leipzig.
After being tipped off by the FBI, the German investigators kept Jörg S. under close supervision. In summer 2024 they observed the men doing a kind of urban warfare training on the former airfield in Saxony. A few months later the police arrested the suspects.
Whether the authorities can rely on support from the U.S. in the future is doubtful. Under President Donald Trump, the FBI’s efforts to combat right-wing extremist groups have been scaled back. "The Germans,” says terrorism expert Dittrich, "have to get a handle on the problem themselves.”
Translated from the German by Charlie Zaharoff
