Overview
- On Saturday Innensenatorin Dr. Eva Högl announced the wolf-in-sheep's-clothing motif would be withdrawn after many Muslim residents said it made them feel under a general suspicion.
- The poster was part of a campaign that began on Nov. 4 and used billboards and social posts to warn of so-called legalistic Islamism and networks like the Muslim Brotherhood.
- Muslim associations and local mosque communities criticized the imagery for casting friendly personal conduct as suspect and for stigmatizing large parts of Bremen’s estimated 50,000–60,000 Muslims.
- Högl said the campaign’s aim to warn against non-violent efforts to subvert democracy was justified but that the execution was wrong, and she said future work will prioritize cooperation with Muslim groups in Bremen and Bremerhaven.
- Officials noted the project was jointly prepared with Lower Saxony, which never planned public city ads, and the episode highlights a wider German debate over how intelligence agencies warn about Islamist risks without stigmatizing whole communities.