At the height of Merkel’s political vulnerability over the refugee issue, there would be stories about crimes committed by Syrian refugees. A rape, for instance, caused a huge outcry in a community. For days, there were protests, political fallout. “And then?” I asked. “And then we investigate this story and learn that it never happened,” he said. “And we trace the story, and it started with a social media user with a German-sounding name, but something is not exactly right. The name is a little off. And the server, it is not German.” “It’s probably in eastern Ukraine or Moldova,” I said.
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