by Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff
Anti-immigration movement Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West draws 17,500 people to Dresden rally • Group leader Lutz Bachmann says Germany is not a "land of immigration" • Chancellor Angela Merkel condemns all forms of xenophobia.
Protestors at the anti-Islamization and anti-immigration rally in Dresden on Monday
Photo credit: Reuters
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Anti-immigration and anti-Islamization movement PEGIDA, or Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West, gathered in Dresden on Monday for the latest in a series of public actions criticizing the German government for ignoring its fears of being overrun by Muslims.
According to police estimates, 17,500 demonstrators from the grass-roots movement staged a rally in front of the city's Semperoper opera house, waving flags and holding banners reading: "Against religious fanaticism."
Credit: Reuters
Grass-roots movement PEGIDA has drawn support from the far-right as well as some ordinary Germans alarmed by a sharp rise in refugees, many fleeing conflict in the Middle East.
The group's leader, Lutz Bachmann, told the crowd from a makeshift stage that Germany was not a "land of immigration."
"Integration does not mean to live beside each other, but to live together on the basis of our Christian-Jewish merits of our constitution and our German culture with its Christian-Jewish roots, determined by Christianity, humanism and clarity," Bachmann said.
Bachmann started PEGIDA in October to protest plans to add 14 centers for roughly 2,000 refugees in Dresden.
The rallies have spread rapidly across Germany since starting with a local social media appeal in Dresden two months ago.
They are now beginning to unsettle the German political establishment, which has spent decades restoring Germany's image as an open, tolerant country after the devastation of the Nazis.
Even though foreigners are scarce in Dresden and the Saxony region compared to other parts of Germany, Bachmann's protest reverberated and his rallies have grown from a few hundred to over 17,500 on Monday.
The number of asylum-seekers in Germany has surged to some 200,000 this year, more than any other western country, due in part to an influx of Syrians.
In recent weeks, media reports have exposed Bachmann's own criminal record for among other things burglary, drunk driving and drug dealing, which have led to him lashing out against what he said were lies about the movement.
Germany's Justice Minister Heiko Maas, a leading figure in the center-left Social Democrats, has called the PEGIDA movement a disgrace for the country.
Chancellor Angela Merkel has condemned all forms of xenophobia and stressed that Germany needs immigrants to help it cope with a looming demographic crisis resulting from one of the lowest birth rates in Europe.
But she is also keen to avoid alienating voters that might ordinarily support her conservatives. Some are already leaving for a new party, the Alternative for Germany, which was founded last year in opposition to the euro currency but now talks tough on immigration and law-and-order issues. The party scored surprisingly well in three eastern state votes, including Saxony, earlier this year, entering regional parliaments for the first time.
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=22327
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