The Saudi government will not accept any migrants from Syria, but it will build 200 Saudi-run mosques in Germany to hinder any social integration of the Muslims into Germany’s liberal and low-conflict society.
“The Lebanese newspaper Ad-Diyar first reported the offer last week, citing a request by a committee of sheikhs,” reports International Business Times. “Saudi Arabia also vowed to donate at least $200 million, according to the Lebanese paper, although whether that was to support the refugees or to build the suggested mosques was unclear.”
In Islamic traditions, which Saudi Arabia claims to uphold and enforce, Islam should be spread by jihad wars and by migrations, dubbed a hijra. By building mosques run by supervision of Saudi-selected clerics, Muslims in Europe can be kept under Saudi influence, and expand the faith though births and a continuing hijra. Turkey has followed a similar course by pushing for Turkish-run mosques and schools in Germany that would segregate the many Turks who have migrated to Germany, which is the birthplace of protestant Christianity.
IBT notes this Saudi proposal “comes amid growing accusations of hypocrisy directed toward the wealthy gulf nation and its neighbors for taking in few, if any, refugees from the ongoing four-year civil war in Syria, even as they funnel support to groups fighting there.”
The Saudis took in less than 700 refugees and asylum seekers last year, while a vast tide of 800,000 migrants rolls into Germany along with hundreds of thousands next year.
The fast majority of the migrants are military-age Muslim men, many from countries other than Syria, and all are seeking to first anchor themselves so they can bring over their spouses, children, siblings, and cousins.
The UK Independent argues that the Saudis are perhaps a bit more generous to refugees than the number of permanent residents they accept would imply, because they have allowed temporary work permits for some 500,000 Syrians since the civil war began and donated $900 million to refugee camps around the Syrian border.
But there is a huge difference between temporary work permits and permanent demographic-shifting residence, and the Saudi offer to build 200 mosques for the population Germany is importing spotlights that difference. The Saudis want to help the Muslim migratory wave pouring into Europe settle in for a very long stay.
By the way, good luck trying to build a church, synagogue, or any other non-Muslim house of worship in Saudi Arabia. In fact, the top Muslim cleric in Saudi Arabia, the Grand Mufti, has cited Islamic law in calling for the “absolutely necessary” destruction of all churches on the Arabian peninsula. I would not recommend trying to display symbols or recite prayers from any other faith during a visit either.