..."On March 10, Hans-Georg Maaßen, the head of Germany's domestic intelligence agency, the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz (BfV), told the German newsmagazine Focus that the number of committed Salafists in Germany had jumped to 4,500 in 2012, compared to 3,800 in 2011.
Around 70% are Germans and 30% are non-Germans, coming from a variety of nations including Turkey, Morocco and Bosnia, according to an anonymous security official interviewed by the Associated Press. About a quarter of the Salafists in Germany are Muslim converts.
Although Salafists make up only a fraction of the estimated 4.3 million Muslims in Germany, authorities are concerned that most of those attracted to Salafi ideology are impressionable young Muslims who are especially susceptible to committing suicide attacks in the name of Islam.
Maaßen said the Salafist threat to Germany is rising and he warned that unless the government "takes decisive action against violent Islamists" the Salafist groups "will continue to grow and the threat of violence will increase."
On March 13, German police announced they had foiled an Islamist assassination plot against Markus Beisicht, the head of the anti-immigration party PRO NRW (North Rhine-Westphalia).
Police arrested a total of four Salafists involved in the plot. Two of the suspects were apprehended in Leverkusen near Cologne, where they were apparently observing Beisicht. Two others were arrested in Essen and Bonn, where police discovered a loaded firearm and ingredients to make explosives. Police also found a "death list" with the names of eight individuals marked in red.
On March 24, the citizen's movement Die Freiheit Bayern (Freedom Bavaria) organized a demonstration against a project to build a mega-mosque in the southern German city of Munich.
The massive mosque complex—known as the Center for Islam in Europe-Munich (ZIE-M)—will cost an estimated €40 million ($51 million) and is designed to be a key strategic platform for spreading Islam throughout Europe.
Speculation is rife that the Persian Gulf Emirate of Qatar will pay for the project, although the Qatari Ambassador to Germany told the newspaper Münchner Merkur that no final decision has been made.
In April, Peer Steinbrück, the chancellor candidate for the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), said at a campaign stop in Berlin that he supported the idea of physical education classes in German schools being divided by gender as a courtesy to Muslims.
Steinbrück said: "If schools are able to do it, then they should." After his comment was greeted with silence, Steinbrück added that the measure should be taken "out of consideration for [Muslim] religious convictions."
The reaction to Steinbrück's comments was immediate and fierce from across Germany's political spectrum, an indication that overt support for multiculturalism is becoming a political liability in Germany.
On the same day that Steinbrück made his controversial comments about Muslim-friendly gym classes, Germany's Central Council of Muslims (ZMD) demanded that the German government introduce statutory Muslim holidays throughout Germany.
In an interview with the daily newspaper Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung (WAZ) on April 3, council chairman Aiman Mazyek said that granting one day during the month of Ramadan and another on the fast-breaking day of Eid al-Fitr would be "an important sign of integration" and "would emphasize tolerance in our society."
The proposal was not well received. Wolfgang Bosbach, a member of parliament for the ruling Christian Democrats (CDU), told WAZ that he sees "far and wide no need" for the legal recognition of Muslim holidays, adding that Germany has "no Muslim tradition." The current public holidays—such as Christmas and Easter—are part of a Christian-Western heritage, Bosbach said.
Also in April, Bavaria became the first state in Germany to classify so-called Islamophobes as extremists. The Bavarian branch of Germany's domestic intelligence agency, the BfV, also began monitoring German activists accused of fomenting hate against Muslims due to their "unconstitutional" opposition to the construction of a mega-mosque in Munich.
The move to silence critics of the mosque was announced by Bavarian Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann in a press conference on April 12, and represented an unprecedented threat to the exercise of free speech in post-reunification Germany.
Herrmann made the announcement while presenting an annual report about threats to democratic order in Germany. A seven-minute video of the press conference with subtitles in English can be viewed here.
Herrmann singled out Freedom Bavaria as well as the Munich branch of a highly popular free speech blog called Politically Incorrect (PI), which focuses on topics related to immigration, multiculturalism and Islam in Germany.
On April 28, a major research study on religious attitudes in Germany found that more than half of all Germans view Islam as a threat to their country and believe it does not belong in the Western world.
The findings confirm the results of dozens of other surveys, and reflect a growing divide between the views of ordinary Germans and those of Europe's multicultural elites, who for decades have promoted mass immigration from Muslim countries.
The study, entitled "Religion Monitor 2013: Religiousness and Cohesion in Germany" (German and English), was produced by the Bertelsmann Foundation, one of the most influential think tanks and lobbying groups in Europe, and a strong proponent of "progressive" causes such as multiculturalism and global governance.
On April 29, the television news program RTL Extra (a 23-minute video of the RTL report can be viewed at YouTube here) explained how Muslim polygamists are being financially supported by German taxpayers.
Although polygamy is banned in Germany by Paragraph 1306 of the Civil Code and Paragraph 172 of the Penal Code, in practice these laws do not apply to Muslims.
The RTL report shows how Muslim men residing in Germany are taking advantage of the social welfare system by bringing two, three or four women from across the Muslim world to Germany, and then marrying them in the presence of an imam, a Muslim religious leader.
In November, the Marzahn-Hellersdorf Adult Education Center in eastern Berlin sparked a nationwide debate after it removed a series of six nude paintings out of deference to Muslim immigrants. Critics said the decision was an overzealous bid at cultural sensitivity.
School officials feared the works may shock Muslim students and prevent them from attending class. The school is located nearby a newly established refugee center, which draws immigrants and asylum-seekers to the neighborhood.
In December, a new study found that the majority of Muslims in Europe believe Islamic Sharia law should take precedence over the secular constitutions and laws of their European host countries.
The "Six Country Immigrant Integration Comparative Survey"—a five-year study of Moroccan and Turkish immigrants in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Holland and Sweden—was published on December 11 by the WZB Berlin Social Science Center, one of the largest social science research institutes in Europe.
According to the study (German and English), which was funded by the German government, two thirds (65%) of the Muslims interviewed say Islamic Sharia law is more important to them than the laws of the country in which they live.
Three quarters (75%) of the respondents hold the opinion that there is only one legitimate interpretation of the Koran, which should apply to all Muslims, and nearly 60% of Muslims believe their community should return to "Islamic roots."
The survey shows that 44% of the Moroccans and Turks interviewed agree with all three of the above statements, which makes them "consistent fundamentalists," and fundamentalist attitudes are just as widespread among younger Muslims as they are among older Muslims.
In a commentary on the study, the German newspaper Die Welt said the findings cast serious doubt upon the unbridled optimism of European multiculturalists, who argue that Muslim citizens will eventually internalize the liberal democratic mindset of Western society.
"The data are not suitable for simple conclusions," the paper writes. "But it must be recognized: democracies must beware of those who believe a free society is something that needs to be vanquished."
Also in December, a discussion paper (German and English) published by the Berlin-based Gustav Stresemann Foundation—a think tank dedicated to the preservation and advancement of liberal democracy in Europe—warns that national and international Islamic organizations are increasingly putting pressure on Western politicians gradually to criminalize any critique of Islam.
The author of the report, the German political scientist Felix Strüning, provides a meticulously detailed analysis of the Islamic lobbying effort—by means of a "human rights lawsuit"—to silence Thilo Sarrazin, a prominent German banker who has criticized the refusal of Muslim immigrants to integrate into German society.
Strüning writes that German political authorities are increasingly bending to pressure from German Islamic organizations by adopting Muslim definitions of "Islamophobia" in public discourse, thus creating legal uncertainty as to "who can say what about Islam and Muslims in Germany."
"Critics of Islamic ideology and its organizations are constantly confronted with lawsuits and have to legally defend themselves against the accusations of blasphemy or incitement-to-hatred," Strüning writes. "Even if it does not come to a conviction, such processes cost a lot of time and money, which in many cases includes one's reputation and possibly even his or her job. Thus, also in the West, we are experiencing an increasing de facto application of Islamic law in matters of Islam."
Ultimately, the only means to save Europe from muslim barbarians and their leftist collaborators will be hot lead and cold steel.
MFBB.