Pegida`s anti-Islam rallies stir fears of German Turks

  12 January 2015    Read: 1117
Pegida`s anti-Islam rallies stir fears of German Turks
For four months, the Patriotic Europeans against the Islamisation of the West (Pegida) movement has been sweeping through Germany, causing concern in the Turkish community, the largest immigrant population in Germany. Turkish-German journalist Lamiya Adilgizi reports.

"A horror film" is how Sirin Manolya Sak, a 29-year-old German-Turkish woman from Berlin, describes the rise of Pegida.

Islamophobia tops the list of reasons why young German Turks are prone to leave their native Germany - the European country with the largest number of immigrants - to go to Turkey, their country of origin.

Many of them have never been to Turkey but have heard about it from their parents, guest workers who preferred not to return to their homeland due to better living conditions in Germany.

Ms Sak says Pegida`s rallies are not surprising as it is not a new issue for her community, which has been exposed to discrimination for years in Germany.

`Nothing new`
"This newly emerged Pegida movement had always existed in German society, and foreigners - as they call us - from various cultures and ethnicities, especially from Muslim backgrounds, have always faced this type of discrimination and racism," Ms Sak said.

She calls Pegida the main threat to multiculturalism, as representatives of the movement come from mainstream German society.



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