Thursday, March 3, 2011

Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan, In Germany, Urges Turks Not To Assimilate

From Jihad Watch:

Turkish PM Erdogan, in Germany, urges Turks not to assimilate


What is striking about this is that whenever there is jihadist unrest in European countries, the mainstream media starts wringing its hands about how the British or French or Germans have not done enough to assimilate Muslim immigrants. That those immigrants are called upon not to assimilate always escapes their notice.



"Erdogan Urges Turks Not to Assimilate," by Özlem Gezer and Anna Reimann in Spiegel Online, February 28 (thanks to C. Cantoni):



Thousands of Turkish immigrants gave Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan a rock star welcome in Germany on Sunday in a show of national pride that remains fervent, even after decades spent in Germany. He told them they remain part of Turkey, and urged them to integrate into German society -- but not to assimilate.

The lyric keeps echoing around the hall in Düsseldorf. "The land belongs to us all." The sentence isn't referring to Germany, but to Turkey.



Immigrants are waving hundreds of Turkish flags and the chanting and the music are deafening. One woman shouts "Turkey is great!" into a microphone to cheers from the crowd. Everyone in the ISS Dome, a huge sports and concert venue, is fired up, as if they're waiting for a rock star. There's only one show in town this Sunday, and his name is Recep Tayyip Erdogan.



The Turkish prime minister has come to Germany. He wants to meet Chancellor Angela Merkel but first he wants to speak to his "compatriots." To people who have been living in Germany for decades, who were born here, and of whom many have German passports.



They have come from all over Germany to see him live, some 10,000 people. They say things like: "The Germans will never accept us, but we have Erdogan." Or: "At last someone feels responsible for us, for the first time a Turkish prime minister isn't forgetting his compatriots abroad." One woman says: "Erdogan may get Merkel to see us as part of this society. He is our savior."



Some 3 million people of Turkish origin live in Germany, most of them descendants of Turks invited by the government in the 1950s and 1960s as " guest workers" to make up for a shortage of manpower after World War II. [...]



Erdogan wants to give his audience a clear identity. "They call you guest workers, foreigners, or German Turks. It doesn't matter what they all call you: You are my fellow citizens, you are my people, you are my friends, you are my brothers and sisters!"



"You are part of Germany, but you are also part our great Turkey," says Erdogan....



He warns Turks against assimilating themselves. "Yes, integrate yourselves into German society but don't assimilate yourselves. No one has the right to deprive us of our culture and our identity."



Erdogan knows that this statement amounts to a provocation in Germany -- no politician here is demanding that Turkish immigrants should deny their roots or give up their culture. Erdogan adds: "German newspapers will pick up on this tomorrow, but that's a mistake."



His message to devout Muslims is similar. "Islamophobia should be seen in the same way as anti-Semitism," he says....





Of course, Islamic jihad is real and the Jewish world conspiracy isn't, but that doesn't stop Erdogan.

Posted by Robert on February 28, 2011 8:47 AM

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