Germany's Holocaust Redemption?

"If Europe fails on the question of refugees, then it won't be the Europe we wished for."

"I don't want to get into a competition in Europe of who can treat these people the worst."

"Refugees have a responsibility to adapt to German ways. Multiculturalism is a sham."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, 2015

"To shelter one refugee is a humanitarian act, but to allow one million strangers in is to endanger German civilization."

Former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger

 

"The sense is that there has been comparatively little Islamic extremism or extremist crime resulting from this immigration, and that on the whole, the largest number of these immigrants have been successfully integrated into the German work force and into German society overall."

"Germans were more than happy -- in fact, thrilled -- to see themselves in the role of humanitarian saviors."

Constanze Stelzenmuller, expert, Germany and trans-Atlantic relations, Brookings Institution, Washington

"With the passage of time, [Merkel] turned out to have chosen the absolutely right course for not only Germany but for the world."

"I just thought, wow, who is she, and how is she getting away with this [committing Germany in 2015 to absorbing one million Middle Eastern migrants who arrived illegally, flooding Europe with their demand for asylum]."

"When their trains pulled into the gleaming Munich station, exhausted men, women and children were greeted by a sea of signs that read, 'Welcome to Germany', held aloft by cheering citizens lining the platforms." 

"[Merkel] was determined to avoid the dense concent4ration of immigrants that ring cities like France and Great Britain."

"We now have a case study, an example, of how it can work, and I'm hoping the world will make use of Merkel's example. [When, in 2015 the chancellor said]: 'We can do this'. If only the rest of us could too."

Kati Marton, former ABC News bureau chief in Germany

A rose lies at the Gleis 17 (Platform 17) memorial, a platform at Berlin-Grunewald train station from which Jewish citizens were deported by train to the Nazi concentration camps between 1941 and 1945, in Berlin, Germany, Jan. 27, 2021.

 

They came, unbidden, refugees from their own countries; Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Eritrea... Fleeing war and sectarian persecution, poverty and fear of the future. They entered Turkey and made their way overland, at sea, paying human smugglers to facilitate their arrival in Greece, Italy, to penetrate and invade Europe. But it was not the less wealthy countries of Europe they sought haven and opportunity in, it was Austria and it was more popularly, wealthy Germany where opportunities beckoned for their future. A very large portion of the haven seekers were single, young men.

 

Angela Merkel, daughter of an East German Lutheran pastor, saw an opportunity to expunge a horrible historical record for her beloved Germany, deciding to open her country's borders to the immense influx of humanity, to absorb men, women and children of another culture, history, values and religion. Their stay was contingent on their success in adapting to German society and its values, and above all, learning to speak the language; the latter to accommodate the former.

The German public holds their chancellor, soon to step down from the lofty perch she has occupied for fifteen years, endearing herself to her public by her stoicism, intelligence, wisdom, communication skills and practicality. She is their celebrated grandmotherly leader who has brought new respect to Germany within Europe and as virtual leader of the EU. 

And while most of the German public appeared at first glad to welcome refugees-in-need, their numbers and foreignness with the destabilization of German culture began to grate on some -- leading to the rise of an opposition party billed as nationalist right-wingers the Alternative for Germany party (AfD) which won seats in the 2017 elections from Mrs. (Frau) Merkel's Christian Democratic Union.

Onlookers abroad and in Europe looking in on Mrs. Merkel's courageous stand over the refugees -- when other countries in Europe, particularly in the east, refused them entry --speculated that her support in the public arose from a national wish to cleanse the country of the indelible stain of genocide. In the years following World War II and the Holocaust atrocity, Germany has cast itself as owning its responsibility, pledging amends, seeking redemption. 

 

Anti-Semitic attacks and hate crime have been increasing in recent years, including the deadly attack outside a Synagogue in Halle in 2019

 The initial euphoria of 'doing good for humanity' was tainted when on New Year's Eve in Cologne, 2015, a mob of Middle Eastern and North African men sexually assaulted dozens of women. From that point forward there were random events of violence emanating from a small number of the refugee group which the police handled, but which gave cause to rising suspicion of the foreign element that had entered Germany with a generalized attitude of cultural misogyny and violence.

But then the aging population with its low birth rate also had a bonus with the entry of young working age refugees contingent with the larger effect of boosting the country's economic outlook, an infusion of badly-needed bodies for the German workforce. The economy "was looking for labour before the pandemic and so there was a real demand and presumably a willingness from the labour market and companies to help people. And of course, we have a long experience, a decades-long practice, of on-the-job training that is seen as a model by other European countries and in fact by America", added Professor Stelzenmuller.

 

A Jewish man stands between police officers at a Jewish cemetery and synagogue in Halle, Germany, October 9, 2019. (Jens Meyer/AP)

Before the 2015 arrival of the Syrians, Iraqis, Eritreans, Afghans, there was already present a sizeable German citizenry of Turkish origin who had originally come into Germany as a plentiful, cheap labour force in a then-growing post-war economy. They numbered in total -- among them Muslims from other origins -- some five million Muslim Germans. With the arrival of the additional million Muslim refugees, Germany now hosts the equivalent number of Muslims to the total number of Jewish lives Nazi Germany eradicated in the Holocaust.

The Jewish population of Germany currently stands at about 118,000, a fraction of the Muslim population in the country. The Jewish community has seen a rapid rise in anti-Semitism in Germany, from a number of sources. German politics avoids, along with their news media, implicating the Muslim population in Germany with instances of anti-Semitism. It prefers to put the finger of blame on 'far-right' populist groups. Yet Muslim protests in support of the 'Palestinian cause' mounting public displays of anti-Israel hatred extending to anti-Semitism is a noted source of great discomfort to German Jews.

Frau Merkel is no innocent in the woods. She knows human nature. She took steps to ensure that the Islamic presence in Germany did not result in the ghettos called banlieues that circle Paris with its hostile Muslim-French residents where French police and authorities dare not enter. With the experience in 'absorbing' Muslims into their population base that Britain and France ended up with, she determined that the immigrants be required to settle throughout the country in avoidance of ghettoization.

Germany bears ample interference by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan who has financed the building of huge mosques in Germany, who feels that Turks living in Germany are loyal only to Turkey, that Turks who are citizens of Germany should be allowed to vote in Turkey's elections, and that Turkey should be welcome to electioneer in Germany and nor is he disinterested in fomenting unrest and dissatisfaction among Turkish-German citizens, to his advantage.

Cologne Central Mosque. Photograph: Iain Masterton / Alamy/Alamy