In critical reference to Carl Schmitt’s works, the paper puts forth a theoretical framework for understanding rhetorical strategies used by the German-speaking far right in their opposition to civil sea rescue. I argue that the far right constructs different categories of enmity. While an imagined external enemy is characterized in racist terms, the putative internal enemy is framed in anti-Semitic terms. Differentiating between different logics of enemy construction helps me to unpack the simultaneity of seemingly conflicting enmities. I show how civil search and rescue NGOs are construed as an internal enemy to the survival and the supposed future of an ethnically homogenous collective. This enables the far right to mobilize its own illiberal interpretations of democracy and European identity. In confrontation with actors in favor of civil SAR, the far right propagates the co-operation of different European nation-states. The opposition to civil sea rescue demonstrates how national and European identity are linked and how the fight against an alleged invasion of ›foreigners‹ is framed as a defense of democracy.