OPINIONOPINION,
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Islamophobia
What’s behind Germany’s raging Islamophobia?
It is not the first time the country fixates on demonising a racialised group and
blaming it for its crises.
Farid Hafez
Farid Hafez
Senior researcher with Georgetown University’s The Bridge Initiative
Published On 18 Sep 2024
18 Sep 2024
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Supporters of the anti-Islam movement "Patriotic Europeans Against the
Islamisation of the West" (PEGIDA) wave flags during a demonstration in
Dresden, Germany, March 21, 2016. REUTERS/Ina Fassbender
Supporters of the anti-Islam movement 'Patriotic Europeans Against the
Islamisation of the West' wave flags during a demonstration in Dresden,
Germany on March 21, 2016 [File: Reuters/Ina Fassbender]
On September 16, Germany started extending temporary controls along all its
borders, to the chagrin of its European Union neighbours. Interior Minister
Nancy Faeser clarified that the move is meant to not only curb “irregular”
migration, but also to stop what she called “Islamist terrorism and serious
crime”.
The announcement came in the aftermath of a deadly knife attack that killed
three people in Solingen, western Germany; the attacker, a Syrian refugee who
had been denied asylum status and was supposed to be deported, was
accused of belonging to the ISIL (ISIS) group.
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Some may be surprised that such a draconian measure has been imposed by
the liberal-left coalition made up of the Social Democrats, the Greens, and the
Liberals. But the reality is there is a shift to the right across the German political
spectrum accompanied by raging Islamophobia.
Analysts have pointed to the rise of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD)
as a driver of the rightward shift. Indeed, the party has been making significant
gains at the national and state levels. At the start of the month, it won the
elections in the eastern state of Thuringia with 32.8 percent. In the eastern
state of Saxony, it came second with 30.6 percent, just 1.3 percentage points
behind the centre-right Christian Democrats.
But the electoral successes of the AfD are not a driver; they are a symptom of a
general tendency in German politics to normalise and engage in the
demonisation and scapegoating of Muslims.
Members of the ruling coalition have repeatedly denounced “Islamism” in
Germany. The leader of the Green Party in the Bundestag, Katharina Dröge,
went as far as claiming in a recent statement that “the poison of Islam reaches
people’s minds also here, not just abroad”; later correcting herself that she
meant “Islamism” instead of “Islam.”
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Words of warning about an “Islamist threat” are not just in the mouths of
German politicians, they are also all over official documents and policy
declarations of German institutions. For example, the website of the Federal
Office for the Protection of the Constitution, a key domestic intelligence
agency, warns: “Islamists aim to completely or partially abolish the free
democratic basic order of the Federal Republic of Germany by invoking their
religion”.
The Bavarian branch of this federal office has gone even further and introduced
on its website the notion of “legalist Islamism”, which it defines as a way to
pursue “extremist goals by political means within the existing legal system”. It
clarifies: “Legalist Islamists attempt to influence politics and society through
lobbying [and] present themselves as open, tolerant and open to dialogue to
the outside world, while anti-democratic and totalitarian tendencies persist
within the organisations.”
Essentially, this concept can criminalise any group of Muslims who organise
politically or socially and conduct their activities within the bounds of the law. It
marks any expression of tolerance or openness by Muslims as suspect
because it can be a “legalist Islamist pretence”.
Using these concepts as a framework, various institutions at the state and
federal levels have created “de-radicalisation” programmes that have targeted
only Muslims. While such initiatives have been criticised and opposed in
countries like the United Kingdom and the United States by many social justice
workers, in Germany, on the whole, they are perceived as well-justified and
effective.
One such programme, the Bavarian Network for Prevention and
Deradicalisation, recently produced a video about “Salafi radicalisation”
featuring racist tropes about Muslim men exploiting Muslim women.
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Earlier this month, the video was posted on social media by the Bavarian state
government – currently controlled by the conservative Christian Social Union
(CSU) – and immediately sparked criticism of its hateful representation of
Muslims.
The decision to publish made clear that the German authorities perceive the
outwardly observing Muslims as a security risk and a danger to German
society.
The clip was eventually taken down and the Interior Ministry issued a statement
to the media, apologising for the “irritation and misunderstandings” and
claiming the video attempted “to show the approach of Salafists and other
Islamists to garner new, young followers”. It further said that some scenes of the
video would be “revised”.
What probably hastened the Bavarian government’s decision to remove the
video was the reaction of some commentators who saw parallels between its
imagery and that of anti-Semitic Nazi propaganda. In particular, the scene of a
bearded man with evil-looking features devouring a woman looks very close to
Nazi representations of a Jewish man devouring ethnic Germans.
The anti-Semitic tint of Islamophobic imagery produced by German institutions
is hardly surprising. As Israeli-German philosopher Moshe Zuckermann has
written, Islamophobia is the projection of an unutterable anti-Semitism.
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The sentiments reflected in Germany’s old anti-Semitism cannot be publicly
expressed anymore due to the state’s official embrace of philo-Semitism. That
is why they are channelled through Islamophobia. What cannot be done to the
Jew anymore, can easily be done to the Muslim.
The historical parallel here is hard to miss: far-right forces are rising, as a racist
hysteria targeting one racialised group of people spreads through the German
state and society. History may not repeat itself fully. Mass extermination may be
replaced by mass expulsion as the far-right concept of “remigration” is quickly
gaining ground; it has long left the far-right fringe to become increasingly more
mainstream.
As German politicians of various stripes and colours jump on the bandwagon of
Islamophobia, they may do well to remember that their predecessors doing
exactly the same almost a century ago did not end well for them. Hate is never
a “winning” strategy.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily
reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
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Good question.
….......……?......
BERLIN — German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Monday
there must be “consequences” following an Islamist
rally in Hamburg that sparked condemnation from
politicians across the country.
More than 1,000 people participated in a demonstration
in the northern German city on Saturday, holding up
posters with slogans like “caliphate is the solution”
and calling for the introduction of Sharia law.
Authorities said the demonstration was organized by
people close to an organization called “Muslim
Interactive,” a group which experts say
***rejects democracy and that domestic intelligence
authorities classify as extremist.***
“It is quite clear that all Islamist activities must be
tackled using the possibilities and options of our
constitutional state,” Scholz said at a press
conference alongside the prime minister of Montenegro,
Milojko Spajić.
“I believe that we must therefore also take a close
look at the specific consequences to be taken from what
we have seen there,” the chancellor said. Criminal
acts, he added, “must be prosecuted.”
On Sunday, German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser vowed
to take “tough action against Islamist terror
propaganda and hatred against Jews.”
“If you want a caliphate,” she added, “you’ve come to
the wrong place in Germany.”
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