The number of Germans who say Islam does not belong in their country has risen from just over half to more than 60 per cent in two years, as over a million mostly young Muslim men arrived last year.
Only 34 per cent of respondents to a poll for Infratest Dimap on Thursday said that Islam belonged in their culture, with 60 per cent rejecting it in Germany.
The mass sex attacks in Cologne by Muslim migrants on New Year’s Eve, and the terror attacks in Paris and Brussels, no doubt effected the German people. The poll revealed that 72 per cent worry about a terror attack in Germany, while only a quarter do not believe it will happen.
However, the rise of anti-Islam views seems to have begun around 2010, prior to the attacks, and it only accelerated as the migrant crisis got underway last year.
Six years ago, more than half of the German population were ready to embrace Islam when ex-President Christian Wulff infamously declared: “Islam is now also a part of Germany”.
However, a poll conducted in August 2014 showed the tables had turned, and the majority was now opposed to Islam. In that year, 52 per cent of respondents were against the idea that Islam is a part of Germany, while 44 per cent supported it.
This latest polling of German opinion will re-enforce another survey released last week, which found almost identical results. The two results from different companies may suggest a strong trend away from Islam, rather than a one-off fluke result.
A similar poll published in France last week found opinions were even harder there. There was a “total rejection” of Islam from across the political spectrum, with a further 47 per cent saying Muslims threatened France’s identity.
In Germany both liberal and right wing voters were united in their rejection; 76 per cent of Free Democratic Party (FDP) voters, a liberal party, and almost all right wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) voters said Islam had no place in Germany.
In the past couple of years, it is Chancellor Angela Merkel who has become associated with an embrace of Islamisation, rather than Mr Wulff, after she promised “no upper limit” to the number of Middle Eastern migrants.
It might not a coincidence, then, that Breitbart London reported just yesterday that a new survey has shown 64 per cent of Germans do not want the Chancellor to stay on for another term.