The German anti-Islamisation group which has sprung from a small meeting of a few dozen to tens of thousands in less than three months has enjoyed a record turnout despite stiff opposition from the German establishment and an increasingly violent counter-movement.
The Patriotic Europeans Against Islamisation of the West (PEGIDA) movement has now spread from its home city of Dresden, where up to 20,000 took to the streets for their first weekly ‘stroll’ of 2015, to other cities in Germany and Europe. Cadet groups who have vowed to begin their own strolls in coming weeks have been launched in the United Kingdom, Sweden, France, Italy, Spain, and Austria.
Despite the record turnout, many mainstream news outlets have chosen to focus on the growing counter protests which have outnumbered PEGIDA in German cities like Stuttgart, Munster and Hamburg. A grand coalition of left-wing political parties and local associations of Muslim immigrants have formed in these areas and claimed 22,000 counter-protesters across the country, according to reports.
The counter-PEGIDA movement now claims support from all sections of the German establishment, who have turned out in force to oppose the movement which threatens the pro-immigration status quo. German justice minister Heiko Maas, a member of coalition-government party the Social Democrats (SDP) was spotted marching against PEGIDA in Berlin, as churches, power companies, and factories turned off the power to their premises to deny PEGIDA supporters light during the winter night of Monday’s march.
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