Here's how German coup plotters and QAnon share a common belief

On Friday, USA TODAY explored how the failed attempt by far-right extremists to overthrow the government of Germany has one particular ideological commonality with QAnon, the U.S.-originated conspiracy movement that believes Donald Trump was at war with a secret ruling class of pedophile Satanists who consume human flesh for immortality.

The key thing they have in common: anti-Semitism.

"More details emerged this week about a wide-ranging far-right plot that was disrupted in Germany late last week when police made 25 arrests of people accused of planning to overthrow the German government," said the report. "The far-right movement that spawned the plot has some similarities and connections to QAnon, the U.S.-based conspiracy theory."

"Known as the Reichsbürger, or Citizens of the Reich, the movement believes that the German state is illegitimate, and that a secretive 'deep state' is controlling and manipulating everyday people," said the report. "As the New York Times reported, the German movement, which has existed for decades, got a shot in the arm from QAnon and from the COVID pandemic, which was a catalyst for conspiracy theories across the globe."

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One of the key figures caught up in the plot in Germany was Prince Heinrich, a man with a historical title descended from the long-defunct German monarchy, and whose House of Reuss has distanced themselves from him, describing him as a "confused old man."

"Like many conspiracy theories, including QAnon, the Reichsbürger is rooted in anti-semitism," said the report, noting that the Times said, "The mythology and language QAnon uses — including claims of a 'deep state' of globalist elites running the government and revenge fantasies against those elites — conjure ancient antisemitic tropes and putsch visions that have long animated Germany’s far-right fringe."