The ISS on Monday presented its yearbook, which this year focused in part on radicalization. Although no names were named in that chapter, Kalev Rebane could well be referred to, "Pealtnägija" reported.

Rebane is a seasoned protester who began his activism even before the 2007 Bronze Soldier Night riots. Having disappeared from the public eye for a time, he is now back under a changed name, now Andrew Rebane, but with new controversies.

"Pealtnägija" took a closer look at why the authorities consider this 44-year-old unemployed man to be a radical. Rebane first emerged into the limelight nearly 20 years ago, during tensions at a Soviet monument in central Tallinn, between Estonian nationalists and mainly Russian-speaking Victory Day celebrants. Victory Day is marked on May 9 in Russia, a day later than VE Day is in the West.

Speaking to "Pealtnägija," former journalist Imre Kaas recalled the Victory Day events of 2006, the year before the Bronze Soldier Night.

He said: "On May 9, 2006, during a memorable incident at Tõnismägi, when Jüri Böhm came with an Estonian flag, suddenly, out of nowhere, Kalev Rebane appeared and announced that from now on, every Saturday, conservative young people would gather at Tõnismägi to demand the removal of the Bronze Soldier."

According to Kaas, Rebane at that time came across as somewhat of a positive figure, a hero even, and indeed kept his promise, showing up at the Bronze Soldier every Saturday.

"I said I'd be there every Saturday at noon until the statue was taken away, and I kept my word until it was clear that even the president and the prime minister were backing us up," Rebane himself recalled. Kaas, who had reported on Rebane multiple times, recounted how the young man — then a member of the conservative Isamaa — soon lost his halo.

"His downfall began quite quickly //...// word got out that he had run into trouble with narcotics. Also, in the summer of 2006, there was an incident where he made strongly anti-minority statements," Kaas went on.

August 2006, and one of the first major gay pride parades ever to have taken place in Tallinn: Rebane and some like-minded associates attacked the marchers — mostly verbally, but some attacks even became physical. According to Kaas, it was that point in time that it became clear that Rebane was something of an extreme personality. Rebane himself explained the events: "I probably just wanted the attention, that's all there is to it," he recalled.

Rebane was expelled from Isamaa, but by that stage the momentum surrounding the Tõnismägi statue, a soldier cast in bronze and which was a war memorial, had become irreversible. When then-prime minister Andrus Ansip's (Reform) government decided in April the following year to relocate the Bronze Soldier to the military cemetery, protests — fueled in large part by Russian agitators — deteriorated into riots, with violent clashes and looting in the city center over several nights.

Rebane said: "I remember I was coming home from band practice, riding my bike, when some random guy on the street said: 'Hey, where are you going, Kalev? Look what you've done. You know there are cars burning in the damn Old Town?'"

On the one hand, the statue's relocation was a turning point for Estonia; on the other hand, Rebane's own reputation suffered as a result of the various incidents and protests.

One of the most bizarre of these episodes happened in November 2008, when Rebane in his car ran into a traffic marshal in Freedom Square (Vabaduse väljak) who had tried to stop him.

The traffic marshals were in place at the time as the square was undergoing a major revamp, to construct the Freedom Square we know today – previously it had been used as a car park as much as anything.

As it happened, the traffic marshal Rebane made contact with – and who ended up clinging to the hood of his car while Rebane continued driving – was a member of the Center Party, a party whose bedrock support then even more than now was Estonia's Russian-speaking populace.

"I'll say this — there was a context, but my actions were justified. I was in a real rush, and the guy just refused to get off my hood. I get that to the average person, that might have looked very strange," Rebane explained of his actions.

With hindsight, Rebane — who was hit with a suspended criminal sentence over the incident — concedes that during that period of time, he suffered from both burnout and a craving for attention. At one point, he announced that he was leaving "repressive" Estonia.

"People need to understand that I was 26 and I took it upon myself to push back against the so-called Russians, and I felt like the police, the parliament, the city of Tallinn, the prosecutor's office, the courts — they were all against me. I was constantly being persecuted. That's why I basically raised my middle finger at it all. Of course, many of my statements were impulsive," he added.

Rebane mainly earns a living in the IT sector, and went to live in London for a while, officially changing his first name to Andrew. Then in the fall of 2023, he once again came under police scrutiny.

Raigo Prants, head of the West Harju PPA station's investigative department, said that in November 2023 they received an anonymous tip-off that a post had been made from the Instagram account "rahvavaenlane" ("enemy of the people"), belonging to Andrew Rebane. This post called for violence against Israel and the Jewish people.

Prants said: "Among other things, it called for Israeli blood, and what made the situation especially alarming was that the final lines stated a desire for the death of an Israeli child in exchange for every Palestinian child."

Rebane still refers to himself as an independence advocate. In his view, the full independence for Estonians is hindered by a global conspiracy, supposedly orchestrated by the Jews, who he claims have historically influenced regimes that have oppressed smaller nations — be it the Bolsheviks in Russia, later the Soviet Union, global capitalism in the U.S.

Critics say Rebane's worldview is a hodgepodge of distorted history and clichés.

Rebane sees Hamas, for instance, as a resistance movement almost on a par with Estonia's post-war Forest Brothers, or the French resistance of World War Two, just that in this case, the organization is fighting against what he calls genocide by the state of Israel.

In November 2023, he posted an English-language video from the same "rahvavaenlane" Instagram account, which featured Hamas logos and which made the call for a Jewish child's life to be taken in return for every Palestinian child killed. Notwithstanding freedom of speech, the authorities responded forcefully.

That winter, the PPA searched his apartment and several other addresses connected to him, confiscating computers, storage devices, phones, and other electronics. In their search warrant, the PPA provided justification as the chance that Rebane or his associates might even act on their words. A large amount of tech equipment was found in Rebane's home, bearing in mind he is an IT specialist, including high-end drones, which could be deployed for various purposes.

According to Prants, the main goal was to determine whether Rebane was acting alone. "We needed to find out whether Andrew Rebane's statements were his own thoughts or whether he is a useful person for someone else, in propagating these views. Could his circle—others who think like him — be much wider, and how threatened might Estonia's Jewish community feel?" Prants added.

Rebane himself said he can't understand why a person's "stray thoughts" are enough cause for a home search and for legal proceedings. "There have to be suspicions, there has to be some kind of evidence," said Rebane.

According to Rebane, the purpose of his Instagram video was merely to draw attention to what he says is stated in the Bible. "The point of that statement was that the international public cannot allow such mass murder of women and children. We must demand accountability for the criminals, and since they themselves have written in their Bible 'an eye for an eye,' then why not draw attention to that. That was the point of it," Rebane explained.

ISS spokesperson Marta Tuul, who helped compile the section on radicalization, said the danger with Rebane is that he could lead similar-minded youths — some of whom ISS has already dealt with — further astray down the path to violence.

As noted at the start of this piece, one of the focuses of the ISS' yearbook, released earlier this week, is youth radicalization—particularly online. Tuul said Rebane displays several common hallmarks of someone who has consumed too much toxic online content.

Rebane's response was: "They can say that, but in my opinion the ISS does not work in the interests of Estonian independence."

Tuul said: "Freedom of speech is a very important freedom, one which we also protect, but it has its limits.
When that freedom of speech becomes a threat to someone's life and well-being, then there must be accountability," said Tuul.X

The punishment Rebane received for the video post — a €600 fine — became final in March.

On top of everything else, he is also involved in a road rage incident, where he claims a driver intentionally hit him as he was crossing the road illegally — an altercation that ended with the driver getting a bloody nose.