Berlin's Christopher Street Day (CSD) weekend — the city's annual LGBTQ+ Pride gathering — opens this Friday against a backdrop of deep divisions within the queer community, with competing marches, rival organising groups, and bitter disputes over the Middle East conflict pulling activists in opposing directions. The newly inaugurated Drag March has been accused by organisers of the historic Dyke* March of deliberately undermining lesbian visibility by scheduling their event at the same time, while separate pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli factions have each mounted their own parallel Pride demonstrations, including the Internationalist Queer Pride and East Pride Berlin. Trans activist groups have similarly split along political lines over Palestinian solidarity, resulting in two separate trans-focused marches this year, as the main CSD event presses ahead under the electoral slogan "Haltung ist hot" ("Taking a stance is hot") ahead of Berlin's state parliament elections in September.