German Quandary of How to Deal With Anti-Immigration Movement

DRESDEN, Germany — German leaders are struggling with how, and how much, to engage with supporters of a protest movement formed around fears of an “Islamization” of their country.

Local leaders have started reaching out to supporters of the group known by its German acronym, Pegida, or the Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West, to listen to their complaints and try to forestall the movement. Although still largely confined to Dresden, it has found sympathizers in other cities across Germany.

The grass-roots movement, representing a swath of people fed up with the political and media culture in Germany and complaining that their elected officials are not listening to them, has grown swiftly since emerging in October, taking German leaders by surprise. But concerns about Pegida’s roots, as well as its support from neo-Nazis and extremists, have tainted the group’s motives and created a split among elected officials over how seriously they should take some of the group’s grievances about the country’s immigration and social fabric.

In a surprise move, Sigmar Gabriel, deputy to Chancellor Angela Merkel, turned up in the audience at a forum of about 200 people on Friday night to listen to supporters and critics of the movement. The goal of the event was for the two sides to engage each other in dialogue, under the slogan, “Why (not) go to Pegida?”

“I would not speak with organizers who move in neo-Nazi circles,” Mr. Gabriel, a member of the center-left Social Democrats, said after the two-hour event. “But the people who go there, and those who are frustrated with politics, of course we have to speak with them.” Read More at NYTimes

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