In 1980 he visited Soviet-occupied Afghanistan and started to raise money for refugees. Todenhöfer is one of the most prominent German critics of the US-led wars against Afghanistan and against Iraq in 2001 and 2003, respectively. He claims that during the war in Iraq the Bush administration was deceiving the public and that the USwar in Iraq has killed several hundred thousand Iraqi civilians. He has visited Iraq several times and did original research for his book Why do you kill, Zaid? Following the International Criminal Court's arrest warrant against the Sudanese dictator Omar al-Bashir, he sent an open letter to the Prosecutor General of the ICC, Luis Moreno-Ocampo. He asked for the reasons which led the prosecutor to indict the Sudanese dictator but not the US president George W. Bush or the British prime ministerTony Blair, seeing that neither Sudan nor the US have recognized the International Criminal Court. In June 2019, he was shot in the back with a rubber bullet by an Israeli sniper in a protest.
First western journalist to visit ISIL
In the summer of 2014 Todenhӧfer sent a message on Facebook to more than 80 German ISIS soldiers asking whether he could visit the ISIS fighting cadre. His goal was to understand the motivations of ISIS. On September 9, Abu Qatadah, a 31-year-old German and an important person in ISIS media, answered the message. They had Skype discussions for several months. Finally, Todenhӧfer received a document from the Caliphate guaranteeing his safety. In October 2014, Todenhӧfer was the first western journalist to travel to ISIS-controlled territory. He was accompanied by his filmmaker son, Frederic. Todenhöfer wrote that he stayed with an ISIS soldier who was armed with a Kalashnikov rifle. The soldier told him that he was sure to return home alive because ISIS wanted to be accepted as a state, so he had the guarantee of safety from their leadership. In other words, violation of the guarantee would mean violation of this state. Todenhӧfer spent most of his time in Mosul, Iraq but he could have visited ISIS-controlled cities in Syria such as Raqqa and Deir ez-Zor.
Interview with al Nusra commander
In 2016 Todenhöfer filmed an interview with an alleged Syrian rebel commander near Aleppo. The commander, said to be with the al-Qaeda affiliated group the Al-Nusra Front, claimed to have American support and said his group opposed humanitarian aid to civilians. Whether the commander was truly a Nusra fighter was later questioned and the authenticity of the video disputed. Todenhöfer did not respond to questions about his interview.
