Interview with Rebecca Sommer (Official English version) AG F+M

Rebecca Sommer gave in January 2018 two interviews in Poland

An interview with Rebecca Sommer
By Natalia von der Osten-Sacken, for EuroIslam, 18.1.2018

N.O-S .: Rebecca, you are a celebrated human rights activist. For many years now you have been working with refugees and immigrants. Years before the refugee wave of 2015 you were already well-known because you demanded that these people be admitted to Germany without any limitation. So what made you change your mind?

Rebecca Sommer: It’s not true that I ever supported “unlimited” admission of immigrants, because it’s impossible for any country to go on admitting people forever. I am a humanitarian and a human rights activist. For the first few years I thought that the people coming here were real refugees and that they were happy to be in a safe place. So I thought they would be willing to adapt to their new surroundings here and become integrated. But as time went by, step by step I awoke to an unpleasant truth. There were so many different clues that pointed to this conclusion that I just could not go on ignoring them any longer. Certainly one of the decisive turning points was what happened on New Year’s Eve 2015 in Cologne. That’s when I finally had to admit to myself that that sort of behavior is characteristic for the overwhelming majority of the Muslims I was seeing on a day-to-day basis.

That’s when I said to myself: “Rebecca, now is the time to pull the emergency brake, simply because as a women’s rights advocate you bear collective responsibility as a woman.” Until then I had tried somehow to justify to myself these constantly recurring attitudes and patterns of behavior shown by most refugees, their way of perceiving the world, based on their religion – Islam — and their culture. For example, I would tell myself that they behaved that way just because they were newcomers. I thought that their medieval views would gradually change over time.

I had great confidence in our European and western values of freedom and equality, and I naively thought that nobody could ever possibly disagree with these values or refuse to adopt them. But after looking back at years of recurring experiences of this kind in my work as a volunteer, I had to admit to myself that as far as Muslim refugees go, they grew up with completely different values from ours, that ever since childhood they have been brainwashed and indoctrinated with Islam, and most of them have no intention of adopting our values – worse, they look down on us unbelievers with disdain and contempt. I call it the “headscarf inside their heads“. And in addition, after they arrive here, many of them fall into the tentacles of fundamentalist imams, representatives of political Islam (imported from Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Iran etc.), who encourage their fundamentalist tendencies, tell them to avoid us infidels and our way of life and forbid them to accept our view of the world and our scientific achievements. And unfortunately, the German government has completely lost control of the situation.

One example that opened my eyes happened in 2016, when I found out the truth about a certain group of refugees whom I had been taking care of for a long time. By then they had already become my friends. I helped them get through the asylum procedures, I dealt with government agencies for them, located apartments for them, furniture, computers, bicycles, clothing, training, courses, jobs and scholarships, and spent countless hours of my own time on their individual cases. There came a time when I finally realized that these people were deceiving me. They were practising taqyyia with me. They had tricked me. It was a great disappointment. But I had been warned against this deceptive Muslim taqyyia practice by Arabs and by Kurds, by people who had not only escaped from war zones, but escaped from Muslims as well. But I had ignored what they were telling me.

And suddenly I found out that those people, all of whose problems I had solved, with whom I had been eating, laughing and dancing, people who did not pray, did not go to mosque, did not keep Ramadan and mocked traditional devout Muslims, while sitting in my garden, had been calling me “a stupid German tart” behind my back.

This not only hurt me a lot, because I was their friend, their sister and their mother, and I really trusted them, but it gave me another impulse to reflect. Because they were a living example, they represented hope for successful integration and for friendship between us westerners and Arabs and Muslims.

Since then I have assembled the records of all the cases that I have ever worked on, and the ones I am still working on, to follow up much more critically and accurately than before the progress of my current and former protégés, as well as the cases handled by the other members of our team of volunteers. Unfortunately, many volunteers have had experiences similar to mine, so they eventually quit, and their replacements, the beginners, are sometimes just as naive as I once was. But, contrary to what the media tell us, the number of new volunteers has diminished considerably. On the other hand, many of those who have been doing this kind of wk for a long time – like me — have become institutionalized and are earning good money with their work. From them you won’t hear about disappointment, it would not be in their interest.

N.O-S.:And what have you found out by tracking the progress of immigrants?

Rebecca Sommer: Many still have no job, and many still speak only broken German. What’s more, they keep to themselves, they have few German friends or none at all. Others even turned to crime, or became radicalized. Or for example I find out later that they had been al-Nusra or ISIS fighters who still admire those organizations. Of course there are exceptions – people who have a job and speak proper German, but most of them keep the so-called “headscarf in their heads“, their feeling superiority because they are Muslims, that excruciating contempt for us.

As a result I have lost all my commitment. I am no longer willing to help Muslims who glorify patriarchal ideology. Now I understand how they think.

I carry on with my pending cases, but I only accept new ones if the refugees involved seem genuine to me, namely the ones who really had a good reason for coming to this country, to a secular state where women and men are equal in the eyes of the law, where we can eat pork and even sunbathe naked on the beach if we feel like it. This freedom is precious and very vulnerable. Just think of the crowds of people that suddenly pour into the country, wearing a „headscarf in their heads“, and change everything here because there are so many of them. We can see the effects already. Now I have become very cautious and extremely distrustful. I think that the ones who don’t fit in with us should go to a Muslim country and seek asylum or employment and a better life there, instead of trying to impose their misogynistic, medieval values on us, which in the long run will simply harm us all.

So now I primarily help women and religious minorities, people who were forced to flee Muslim countries: political refugees, journalists and Muslims who have renounced their faith and are persecuted as a result. And as I said, I am particularly happy to help women. Since here in Germany many women have found financial security, they now want to separate from their husbands. They were forcibly married and for a lifetime were forced to serve with a smile men whom they inwardly hated. Many of these Muslim marriages are characterized by psychological violence and rape. Woman have no human worth, they are considered sexual objects instead of partners, they are no more than workhorses and birthing machines. That is their role in life as good Muslim women. Just as most Muslim men do not respect us, they treat their women with contempt. Not all of them — I also know very loving couples — but most of them. The same applies to Muslims with German citizenship. It is Islam that teaches them this attitude. That’s why I am warning you against it right now. I have seen, heard and experienced enough of it. I know what I’m talking about.

N.O-S: You mentioned the word taqiyya. What do you mean by it, and how did you learn about it?

Rebecca Sommer: Most Europeans are unfamiliar with the word taqiyya. People who try to warn you against this form of religiously justified dishonesty are routinely stigmatized as racists, even if they themselves come from the same regions and cultural background as the immigrants that we call refugees here in Germany. Taqiyya means “deceit”. Taqiyya (originally intended to protect Muslims against persecution – ed.), permits Muslims to be extremely devious toward us non-Muslims, if it helps protect Islam and Muslims.

In certain situations Muslims are allowed to tell lies to non-Muslims. There are several different sorts of lie that are allowed when dealing with non-Muslims. The one that people hear about most is called taqyyia. The situations when you’re allowed to lie are typically when the interests of Islam are at stake, or the interests of an individual Muslim, who belongs to the Ummah community – for example by gaining the trust of unbelievers by telling them lies, which then makes them vulnerable and weak, so eventually they can be defeated.

A Muslim is allowed to deceive and lie to a non-Muslim, morally it isn’t shameful, as long as the deceit furthers his interest or the interest of the Ummah community. He need not be ashamed of doing it. For the sake of obtaining advantages from the unbeliever, they are allowed to feign friendship or love, as long as they don’t really mean it in their hearts. Taqiyya releases Muslims from any responsibility towards unbelievers – I’m warning women who get involved with Muslim men! But I’m especially warning our politicians who make deals with Islamic associations, because thanks to taqiyya, they are not bound by any oath, not even an oath uttered in Allah’s name, because Allah has already released his faithful in advance from any oaths they may swear to unbelievers. There is only one condition: a liar must firmly believe in the Koran and in Allah. Taqiyya even allows a Muslim to pretend that he’s not a Muslim. He’s allowed to say and do anything to deceive, as long as it helps, for example, in gaining somebody’s trust. Or the trust of a country. Now think about what kind of religious ideology we are dealing with! Taqiyya, I think, comes from Shiism, but it’s also used by Sunnis, even though they deny it. It even lets them eat haram (impure) food, or pretend to be atheists. So you should be aware that telling falsehoods to non-Muslims isn’t considered reprehensible in Muslim countries. Consequently trusting German volunteers encounter a culture that they simply cannot grasp.

Especially in the refugee volunteering line of work you notice after a while that many refugees, of course not all of them, but far too many of them, manipulate you through deception to obtain as much help from you — and especially help that is given with devotion — as they can, and most of all they hide the fact that in reality they are religiously extremely devout, and they hide how deeply they reject our system of values and our society. They all tell similar stories: that they studied medicine, law or computer science, that their parents are dead, and that their minor brothers are dying of hunger on the streets of Turkey and we must help them bring them here, or even that their whole family died in a war. And we have to help this man – who presents himself as secular and reasonably modern in outlook – bring his beloved wife (who would be living here just as freely as we are) and children. Suddenly, aunts, uncles and parents show up in Germany, and suddenly the whole deceased family numbers 15 people and owns three apartments. The younger brother arrives and unlike what they told you, he’s not defenseless at all, but was actually a fighter with Al Nusra in Syria. The parents aren’t really dead at all, it turns out, but are living safely in Turkey, and the older brother is anything but a moderate Muslim. Or you find out that his diploma is a forgery. Or that although his family is poor, they live in a safe part of Syria, and the real reason they came to Germany was to improve their standard of living. Or else, after a successful family reunion, the supposedly moderate husband asks you to help him bring over his second wife and the children he has with her. One day the wife arrives. He had told you how much he loves her and how enlightened and up-to-date she was, but she shows up completely veiled and starts telling you how miserable she is because he beats her and doesn’t let her do anything, since he’s a strictly observant Muslim. I learned from such experiences that among Muslims, exploiting naive people – which for them is the same as being weak, isn’t something condemned as evil.

The fact is, in this Islam-dominated culture, what counts is the law of the strongest, and if you help someone simply out of compassion, that doesn’t jibe with their world view. For them that makes you a nincompoop, a weakling. And that is how they see us – as idiots, as a fallen society of weaklings. Most Europeans cannot grasp this because it does not match our reformed, enlightened, Christian-humanist values, on which our culture is based. Of course I know of many individual exceptions, but they simple confirm the rule. I consider it important in dealing with Muslims to be accessible for everyone, and I still am that way. I have Muslim friends, too. However, if you start noticing inconsistencies in thweir stories, or in the way they act, you had better be careful, because of taqiyya.

N.O-S: You work in refugee shelters. Have you noticed anything out of the ordinary there?

Rebecca Sommer: In refugee shelters, people of many regions, cultures and religions meet, mostly Muslim men, but also people who have been oppressed, persecuted, raped, tortured, and even had their entire villages burned down by by Muslims. It creates a lot of tension. But usually what happens is that the people of other religions, or non-believers, are oppressed by the Muslims, or at least treated by them with disrespect. Muslims form the majority in shelters. Many of them seem to believe they are superior beings, so to speak, and anyone who does not profess Islam they consider inferior. In cramped spaces these conflicts intensify. For example, sometimes non-Muslims are not allowed to use the community kitchen or washroom at the same time as they do, and are simply chased away contemptuously or even belligerently. Of course, as always happens, the opposite can occur, for example when women belonging to different religious and language groups become friends while cooking, and even arrange to cook their meals together, sometimes just so as not to be alone with men in the kitchen. Muslim men are constantly harassing women, even Muslim women traveling alone. We’ve even had incidents where security staff who were Turkish, Arab, or even Roma migrants were doing it. Here this phenomenon recurs — Muslims against the rest, no matter what country they come from. I know of a case where a refugee woman, a Muslim from Eritrea, was sexually harassed by a security guard. We had no choice but to report it to the police, but nothing happened.

Rebecca Sommers (second left) with her AG F+M refugee-youth-dance-group at a refugee shelter in Berlin

N.O-S: You mentioned volunteers being molested. However, no information on that can be found in the press. Why?

Rebecca Sommer: Volunteers are constantly here and there being subjected to sexual harrassment, but none of us has ever reported it to the police because we didn’t want to be seen as enemies of refugees, or make trouble for the refugee shelters. In these cases, the volunteers’ behavior is dictated by the same mechanism that drove mine — constant rationalization: he’s new here, he’s clueless, he does not understand our culture. In these cases, the volunteers’ behavior is dictated by the same mechanism that drove mine — constant rationalization: he’s new here, he’s clueless, he does not understand our culture. And in this way we justify such behavior to ourselves, without associating it with the sense of superiority over unbelievers and over women that Islam gives these men — and first and foremost their sense of superiority over European „sluts“, because that is exactly what those men think of us women when they arrive here from their home countries. Women in my team are harassed all the time, especially the volunteers who teach the refugees German and meet them several times a week.

One example: After a volunteer spent three months teaching German to a Syrian twice a week for an hour and a half, she was sure that everything was fine. Since she wanted to treat him kinidly, like a regular human being, she accepted her pupil’s invitation to dinner. She thought he wanted to thank her for her help. But he was thinking, “The whore wants sex”. The woman didn’t understand that many men from that cultural background consider her an infidel, immoral, a sex object who is at a man’s disposal. Because at the beginning most refugees seem to be very nice and polite and well-behaved, in other words they often do taqyyia, as I mentioned before. And then she experienced a nasty surprise when the refugee — who until now had been so friendly — dragged her by the hair into the bathroom just as she was saying goodbye. Because he could not understand why she wanted to leave all of a sudden: How come the “whore” came into my room all alone?

N.O-S: How would you describe the attitude of immigrants to women and toward women’s rights in general?

Rebecca Sommer: Especially when you ask Muslim refugees what their attitude is toward basic human rights, like personal freedom, self-determination, equality of men and women, an estimated 75% of the ones I know tell me that they disagree with them. So I really worry a lot when I see more and more young girls, and grown women too, who unsuspectingly get involved in romantic affairs with them. They don’t understand their culture and haven’t the faintest idea what the refugees are saying about them behind their backs. They don’t know that many of those men already have wives in their own country, who will come and join them in the course of family reunification. Or else that the “mail-order“ cousin, a marriage previously arranged in the family, is only waiting for the visa to come to Germany. The fact is that at the beginning, most of the younger Muslim refugees don’t show their religious beliefs. They hide them. They drink alcohol, they eat German dishes and take advantage of all the benefits and all the enjoyment that that kind of relationship offers them.

The truth is that at the beginning, most younger Muslim refugees do not show their religiosity, they hide it – they drink and eat German dishes and take advantage of all the aspects and fun that such a relationship offers them. And these women think that their partner is an exception and that all circulating stories are not true. Even if there are among them people with moderate views who integrate and marry German or other women, I fear their intolerance then begins with their daughters.

In the end, almost everyone wants to have a subordinate Muslim woman, preferably wearing headscarf, of course, who does not wear short skimpy clothes, serves him, gives birth to children, has no male friends, who can be commanded, does not refuse him, does not leave the house without permission and obeys him in everything. These marriages are not about love. Love belongs to the mother and family. The woman is always subordinate. She is an object with specific tasks. Western women are mattresses and a trampoline, and at the end they are also badly treated. For the very reason that they are “whores”, just because she slept with him. They are considered no good material for a wife.
But if a western woman wants to part with him, it can happen to her that she is murdered for it. Just like what recently happened in Kandel. Or he leaves no stone unturned to harm her reputation. And I always say again and again, exceptions confirm the rule. I know those too. Still. We’ll see it when it’s over.

N.O-S .: What is the gender ratio and level of education among this new immigration? We have heard that these are women and children who are fleeing the war and highly educated specialists.

Rebecca Sommer: The overwhelming majority of the so-called refugees and immigrants, including those from way before 2015, are men. However, in recent years we have already had many family reunification cases, and on this basis, the refugee lobby creates myths about many women and children fleeing to Germany from bombs. During my work, by 2015, they were almost exclusively young men; I helped them, in a few cases I still help, bring their relatives to Germany, and I know that such procedures are carried out intensively all the time. Most women brought to Germany are either pregnant, or already gave birth again in Germany.

Regarding the level of education of the Syrian refugees, who form the majority of the Muslim refugees who have come to us since 2012, I regret to say that the majority of them have no adequate education. I know that at the beginning the press reported that they are highly educated people and specialists in various fields, but it is simply not true. I myself disseminated such information, because I simply believed what the refugees told me. The truth is that this information was just repeated by everyone, but few journalists have ever met the refugees. An additional problem is that if these people really have some education, it is often not compatible with our system and they often need to start from scratch. Most of them, like all young people, still have to learn something, have an apprenticeship, finish school, some are already studying. It costs millions. In many cases, I see that most Syrians are not and will not be able to support their family.

People from Somalia, Nigeria – also very difficult when we talk about education. What’s more, many are extremely aggressive, religious fundamentalist. Refugees from Eritrea: Most are peaceful Christians, but there are Muslims among them. Culturally speaking, the people of Eritrea are very different from the people of the Middle East. In my experience they almost always have an inadequate education and they are learning German extremely slowly. I know cases where after 3 years still no German is spoken, despite repeated German courses, for which we all have to pay. Afghanistan, Pakistan: the same. I accompany some refugees who have yet to learn the ABC. Most live on state aid, and if I observe how people have developed since 2012, I’m afraid, it will stay that way.

Even if you come from the Middle East as a doctor or dentist, the studies there are so different from ours that it can take a long time for them to practice here. Of course, there are also many positive exceptions. A Syrian friend has completed his education and is now working for the pension insurance. A pharmacist found a job. Another opened a restaurant. An educated Muslim Eritrean was an architect in his homeland and has found a job in an architectural office. There are also many refugees who do not concentrate on further education or training, but are looking for a job immediately after completing the obligatory German courses in order to earn money. As a guard in a refugee shelter, or as a helper at a supermarket such as Lidl. Others do their driving license and work as drivers without having to do a long training or study. A Syrian friend, an IT specialist, found a job very quickly and now earns 3,000 euros a month. But it may be interesting to note here that she is an atheist and differentiates herself from fundamental religious compatriots. She says she suffered her entire life as a modern-minded woman under the yoke of Islam in Syria, and she says „religious Muslim people are all the same“.

N.O-S: I have heard that the influx of new immigrants from Muslim countries also pose a threat to the liberal Muslims living here?

Rebecca Sommer: In Germany, we have a particularly large number of women with Arab, Kurdish or Turkish migrant backgrounds who come from Muslim families who have been living here for many years, women who have fought for their right to self-determination within their Muslim family structure. I have friends who had escaped honor killings, and live with a new identity on the run to this day from their family that would murder them. In the middle of us here in Germany, imagine that! They are educated, are doctors, artists, teachers, social workers, professors, and they do not cover their hair. They live with their boyfriends without marrying. They take their freedom as it is normal for us. And they say that in areas where many Muslims live and now the many refugees from Arab countries are flooding in, they have less freedom again. When such fundamental Muslims recognize them as a woman of their own culture, they constantly speak to them, criticize their Western clothes, and insult and even threaten them. Refugee women also do this and exhort them to wear a headscarf to dress „morally“.

Far too often, as a country, we pay high social assistance (benefits) to these people for their lack of integration, and look helplessly at how they threaten and attack integrated people. We also have a step backwards, a clear regression – many who have lived here for a long time wear a headscarf today. In addition, the number of honor killings is growing – we should remember that in this culture, the woman is the property of the man. Worrying things recently shook the university in Hamburg. The university had to publish at the beginning of last October a ten-point code of conduct for personal and religious freedom, because the Muslim students attacked women who did not wear headscarves in a terrible way. It interfered with the functioning of the whole facility. Meanwhile, other forms of aggression such as the demand for pork-free canteens or gender-separated prayer rooms are part of everyday life.

Above all, political Islam in Germany is trying hard, as they say, to get the foot in the door even deeper. Muslims are constantly trying to portray themselves as victims, complaining that they are being insulted and discriminated against, that the West is to blame for everything that causes us to retreat and to give in. Especially our politicians. This is a mistake and a wrong understanding of tolerance, born of the desire that no one should feel oppressed in Germany. But no one seems to realize that this is where our own values begin to be discriminated against, and we are discriminated against by Muslims. It makes me furious. I feel sorry for Germans, especially women. We have good intentions, but what we are harvesting is the loss of everything our grandmothers have fought so hard to obtain.

N.O-S: I have heard from Seyran Ates from the Berlin’s liberal mosque that forced marriages are a very big problem in Germany.

Rebecca Sommer: I love Seyran Ates, a great and courageous woman. Yes, due to the rapid growth of the Muslim community from Turkey, the Middle East and the Balkans, we are seeing more and more forced marriages, even of trafficking in children and girls. We have reported such cases to the police, but the police and authorities are struggling with such cases, and there are even excuses and reasons „that this is part of their culture“. So, suddenly we have two legal systems that exist in one country! And sometimes such a girl does not want to leave her husband, because she knows nothing but her people and her culture, in which she grew up. This is what authorities mean when they „“That’s how it is with them“, that’s their experience. But the fact is, the girls are bought and sold. They live as sex- and work slaves, always guarded and deprived of their freedom. In Germany!

In a case I know, a girl was sold for 8000 euros. Another was kidnapped, a Roma child from Poland. And then we have such for me already criminal politicians who call for the marriage of minors not to annul, they argument this wouldn’t be for the benefit of the already married. This is their answer to our growing problem, also as a result of the Muslim refugee wave, where of course many minors were already forcibly married in their homeland and thus come here as a married couple. I demand the separation of the spouses; The girl should first develop freely, go to school, and at 18 she can then decide whether she wants to be with him or not. No one can force her here in Germany by law. We also had the case of a Pakistani who raped a 6-year-old girl who was given a suspended sentence for his „cultural-religious background“

The next problem is the violence in the marriages. A typical anecdote, which I like to tell: New arrivals with women and children are often warned by others not to beat their wife and children in front of Germans, that it is forbidden here. That is, among each other, is it normal for a man to do that? A man from Afghanistan who was reported to the police by his wife because he had raped her many times, was not sentenced to prison because „he was unaware that it was a rape.“ Because it is allowed in Islam or the woman has to sleep with him, unless she has her period or she is ill. Otherwise she can not refuse him.

And there are instructions in the Koran where the beating of the woman, if she is „unruly“, is permitted. The judge referred to this in his judgment as a mitigating circumstance. This means that even judges, through such false tolerance, undermine our legal system. It looks like we have more and more double standards. The courts here are rather leftist. Many judges are pro-immigrant and there are cases where refugees and Germans with a migratory background receive a “cultural and religious bonus” and are favored. Among them are also female judges who award this bonus, and I consider them particularly bad — women who are against women! In one case, a female judge was looking for reasons that could justify a Turkish rapist. He thrust the woman’s head between the rungs of the bed and raped her brutally for hours. The forensic investigations revealed clear extreme violence, the woman was barely able to walk for two weeks, she was marked with bruises everywhere. But the decisive factor for the end of this case was the question of the judge addressed to the victim witness: “Is it possible that the accused thought that the victim consented?” “It is possible” – the witness replied. She could not say whether this event, which was experienced by the victim as a rape, the rapist – with the mentality of his Turkish cultural background – only considered it as so-called “Wild sex.” The perpetrator was acquitted. The prosecutor admitted that it had to be a big blow for the injured party, but a conviction was not possible because no intent could be proven. Rape usually rarely leads to severe convictions before German courts. Especially when migrants are the perpetrators. Therefore, the public has long been talking about a cultural-religious bonus for rape and other capital offenses. Slowly our laws stop working. The next problem is polygamy. We also have cases where politicians are calling to allow them.

N.O-S: What about criminality?

Rebecca Sommer: We have real problems. I can only talk about my region, where I live and information from the media. In Hamburg and the Schleswig-Holstein area, we have an Arab clan that shakes the surrounding area. In Berlin, we have a clan from Lebanon, which according to experts in only 20 years has grown up to 1000 people and which mainly but not only trade drugs. Parallel laws have developed, where our legal system does not reach anymore, it seems that everyone is afraid of them: judges, lawyers, the police. The state has lost all the control.Judge Kirstin Heisig was murdered in my opinion because she tried to do something about it. Currently, it is the third generation of Berlin gangs. For Berliners they are extremely dangerous. They have a culture of hatred and scorn – and that’s why they commit their crimes in cold blood and without emotions. They have no scruples and are brutal, which again can be reduced to a Muslim – religious ideology, but – to be fair it has to be added here – it is being rejected by many moderate Muslims in this form.

The clans recruit refugees too. As far back as 2012 we were seeing fancy cars parked in front of the refugee shelters, and we wondered who those relatives were who were picking people up or talking to them. Soon we volunteers and the social workers found out that they were not relatives at all, but local Lebanese who were recruiting young refugees to do their dirty work. They have businesses everywhere, money laundering businesses, bakeries, pizzerias, hair salons, corner shops, gambling dens and shisha bars, where they employ refugees illegally and use them to make drug deliveries. There was a report on television – most of them still collect benefits, they swindle our welfare system and we simply let them do it. I even say the Muslim world is mocking us! If you look at everything that’s going on, we’re completely crazy!

We also have clans from the Balkans. Many of those people come to Germany again and again, applying for asylum every time. They collect welfare payments from the state, and many of them simply settle down. They operate businesses forging passports and exploiting girls as sex slaves, namely pimping. Some of the girls are only 12 years old, and are sold to men whom they are then forced to marry. Many of these clans make a business of raping and then blackmailing girls, and they make child pornography. One of my wards, a 14-year-old Serbian girl, was raped by several adult men while being filmed. You can find the movie on the Internet! I had known her since she was 10 years old. It was a terrible blow for me. And I know even more cases of sexual abuse. I sent hundreds of letters to the media, but nothing happened. The police were stymied. The lesson that that incident taught me is that girls who have no outside support and no family backing them up and helping them, have practically no hope of escaping from that kind of predicament. In addition, immigrants make up a huge share of people who get in trouble with the law. In my opinion, Somali refugees are particularly dangerous because of their religious fundamentalism, their culturally rooted contempt for women.

N.O-S: I have heard that the situation in German schools is alarming. What do you have to say about that?

Rebecca Sommer: According to the latest survey based on testing fourth-grade children in cities, more than 50% of them are immigrants. The report says that the educational level has sunk to the level of a developing country. But children from Muslim families give us the most trouble, and they are the largest share of immigrant children. As I said before, it is a culture where the strongest prevail, and their potential for aggression is a big problem. Unlike in German families, those children are often brought up with corporal punishment. According to what I have seen and heard, beatings from one’s father or elder brother are routine. This makes the children very aggressive – to resolve conflicts they do not hesitate to resort to violence.

And they show typical herd behaviors. Children brought up differently, in the kind of culture where people use argument, where kids are taught to be tolerant and are allowed to express their opinions from childhood on – those children are doomed from the start. They try to argue, so the Muslim children view them as weaklings and potential victims. have a fight with one of them, you are up against the whole group of several dozen people, because they perceive the world as a struggle of the “Muslims against the rest.”

I’ve seen Roma kids behave that way too. Kids are often injured, sometimes severely, but the teachers’ hands are tied, because German law doesn’t allow teachers to discipline their pupils harshly. All the special schools for socially disadvantaged children are already full. Few teachers are familiar with Muslim culture, and teachers are ineffectual because they lack the means to master the situation. An additional problem that I have noticed is accelerated training programs for teachers – refugees who were teachers back home, who are hastily being trained to work as teachers here. There are several problems here. First of all, many of these female teachers wear headscarves, which violates the religious neutrality rule (in Berlin) and sets a bad example for the schoolchildren. Secondly, even after 11/2 or 2 years, they still speak German poorly, and as a result their pupils are going to learn faulty German. Thirdly, the education of some of these newly trained teachers is not up to the standard we expect of teachers in Germany. And fourthly — and most disturbingly for me: some of them are extremely religious and do not believe in science. They only believe what the Koran says. Some of the women teachers refuse to shake a man’s hand. I do not want that kind of teachers in our schools, where our future generations are being educated. And I don’t want any teachers wearing headscarves, because teachers should be role models for the young. A headscarf signals that segregation by gender is a good thing; that is the silent but eloquent message of the headscarf: The headscarf says “I am men’s underling.” Wearing it is a profession of faith. It is a religious-ideological symbol that divides the world from the Muslim perspective into haram and halal. The message says: women’s hair is so embarrassing that it becomes pubic hair. Why would we ever want that in our schools?

N.O-S: Which do you think is the worst mistake of German immigration policy?

Rebecca Sommer: In the first place, the law treats every refugee as an immigrant, instead of as someone seeking protection who will be here only for a limited time for her safety, and will then return home. If they are really immigrants, then we should call them immigrants, as you do in Poland, not refugees. And accordingly set laws that people no longer need to lie in their asylum claim. Develop immigration laws that allow us to let in those we need and others not. Who will work and are not dependent on the social system. The next problem are gaps in our asylum law. Our law says that everyone has the right to asylum until the asylum seeker has been checked, accepted or rejected. Such a proceedure, however, takes a very long time and such persons may receive the “tolerated” status (Duldung).According to the definition of German residence law, this mandates a “temporary suspension of deportation” concerning foreigners obliged to leave the country. It does not give you the right to stay. That is why “tolerated” are still obliged to leave Germany. Asylum seekers file complaints when they receive notice to leave Germany, and for bureaucratic and legal reasons, such cases can take years. These people remain in Germany for a long time, and after a few years most of them receive at the end a residence permit.

People who have been rejected once, return here with the same documents and surnames, apply for asylum again and take the place of the real needy. If such a person leaves voluntarily, he has the right to return to Germany after three months. Beyond every human being, there may be a reason to ask for asylum and be persecuted, for example as a sexual minority, even if it comes from a country that is considered safe. From safe countries there are crowds of people in Germany who demand asylum for the most bizarre reasons, for example: “My neighbor is angry with me because I destroyed his car and I can not cover the costs.” And this is how the Asylum law machine is put into motion, which takes many months and even years. Most often these people receive the final decision and notice to leave Germany, and suddenly one of the family members gets sick — mental illnesses, a nervous breakdown — and due to this illness, the proceedings, also concerning the whole family, are stopped.

As I have realized, many “asylum seekers” have houses and even farms in their homelands, and there is no reason why they would have to leave their country. These are economic migrants fleeing poverty, which is of course a good reason if we are considering it from a human point of view, but it has nothing to do with asylum law. Some of them live here during the asylum procedure with benefits, some may work illegally. I often see large cars that transport the acquired goods to their homelands, which they then sell when the order to leave Germany is irrevocable, and leave voluntarily. Then many families come back and try again for asylum, with the same cause, passport and name. In my opinion, at the latest at the second attempt, you should not let these people in and do not drag them over again through asylum procedures, multiplying the related costs.

N.O-S: As we know, there are also family reunification plans. What do you think about it?

Rebecca Sommer: A security official with whom I spoke to told me that in the next three years several million people would arrive to Germany, both family members through family reunification and new asylum seekers. We all know that integration is extremely problematic, but some of our politicians are still following this path, shouting slogans such as “Nobody is illegal.” Among my past and present refugees that I do support, I can count on one hand cases of those who are, in my opinion, completely and successfully integrated. And here I don’t mean the loss of identity or culture, but acceptance of our lifestyle here in Germany, which is associated with having several German friends, not just one or two who help you in the struggle of filling out forms. Most people I deal with surround themselves only with people from their countries, or other Muslims and live in a parallel society, where their cultural-religious value systems ​​are upheld; they are thus rather separated from our society.

As more and more people settling here, they no longer have to adapt, it clearly strengthens a Muslim parallel society. This is the problem with family reunion as I see it. I think that it is important to evaluate those who want to simply stay here as classical immigration cases. It should be much more accurately checked if there is a real reason for applying for asylum. If necessary, control cells, FB, TT, in every possible way. Because the question arises: where is the main part of the family? We have many minor refugees whose family is living in a safe place, but is waiting for the ability to move to Germany. Why should we bring the whole family if their young one could go back to them? We know that some are here only because their family sent them in the beginning. From Beirut, I hear that many people are waiting to be brought to Germany by family reunification.

Then we have those who really need protection, who want to stay here forever and have very good reasons – those who are persecuted in their homeland, often because they have a different faith, Christians, Yazidis. Ex-Muslims. These people have to wait far too long for their family to arrive, which is absolutely tragic and not right. Also because these families are often waiting in Muslim countries, where they have to be afraid. They should be treated separately and should be entitled to a special accelerated procedure. But one thing must be said: they actually often come with whole families to us.

And we still need to check who is looking for temporary protection and then wants to return to his country. In this case, I think it is wrong to allow bringing the whole family, because once this family is here, most will stay. What worries me about family reunification: In oriental Muslim societies, family means a patriarchal-organized clan, an extended family, covering a large group of people. With family reunification we are importing an Islamic family system that only leads to parallel societies and integration problems. The teenager does not have to adjust anymore, he stays among his own, imported traditions live on. And this is exactly what I observe in the case of minors who came alone, who have already adapted well after three years, also thanks to the network of social workers, introducing them to our culture and our values. Who made friends by going to school with German teenagers. It all disappears when the family arrives. We’ve seen it often. Where the adolescent met us with openness and curiosity, the defense against us, the contempt, the rejection of our non-Muslim way of life solidified in no time at all, because the family now stands behind it, which rejects it. And to sum up: I just do not want to expand on a parallel society, which ultimately is oppressing us women, harassing us, depriving us more and more of our freedom.

N.O-S: What do you think you should do with immigrants who do not integrate?

Rebecca Sommer: It is not so simple. You cannot get rid of someone from a war country, even if he lied about his age, or committed crimes. This should change — whoever commits a crime should be kicked out, and those who held a weapon in their hands and killed other people, shouldn’t get asylum. Whoever is against our state must leave. The government is helpless here. For example, the Syrians — first they were here because of the war and now because everyone claims they were against Assad and they face the death penalty there. And although there are those among them who belonged to ISIS or other terrorist groups, or have already been radicalized or committed crimes, the law does not allow their deportation. It’s not even taken into consideration. And another question — how do we measure integration? You are not integrated just because you can speak German and you do work. If you reject our values, you don’t show loyalty to the West, Germany and to us, or you think that Germany must accept Muslim values and give in to your cultural — religious special wishes, then I think you do not fit here.

N.O-S: And how should Islam be treated in Germany?

Rebecca Sommer: Political Islam must be prevented by all means, rather than continued to be courted. This includes not only a few of the mosques. First, we need regulations of what can be preached in mosques, but above all – what should be forbidden. Therefore, one should not just allow the continuous building of more mosques, before you examine the already existing ones more attentively, and above all to observe more closely at who finances it. In many mosques, people are called upon to reject „unbelievers“, not to integrate. This was shown by the study of many mosques by ARD journalist Constantin Schreiber. In some mosques, people are even radicalized; experts have been warning against this for years. Mosques are built from the resources of Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the imams are also paid from there. Many do not speak German. But politicians do not seem to care. I am also for a ban of wearing headscarf in the school for teachers and students, and in the public service.
I am afraid that in the next election, in four years, we can see a new phenomenon – Muslims will sooner or later establish their party and because they already have a large electorate, they will be unstoppable. With the help of the left wing and almost all parties, they will begin to change the rules to which we will have to adapt. As we know, many Muslims believe that unbelievers should be converted or taxed, or oppressed with other methods. Many Muslims, most notably the political, state-driven Islam, are considering how to assert their interests – and they do not even hide it. As long as they continue to do so, they will continue to grow in Germany. We know about FB profiles, which clearly call for the Islamization of Germany, where we find posts contrary to the constitution, and such discussions can be found everywhere. FB profiles where a dog pees on the Israeli flag, profiles spreading hatred and call for violence against us. And these profiles are not removed, as well as Salafite profiles! Despite the fact that FB is very thoroughly controlled in this country. Profiles of people expressing anti-Islamic views are blocked. If we don’t wake up quickly, the whole situation will end badly.

N.O-S: What would you like to tell to Poland and Poles?

Rebecca Sommer: Remain strong in your opposition to the violation of international law by the EU, and in this case against an external distribution of refugees. Every country and nation has the right to choose their guests. No state should give up its self-determination. People within their state have a right to govern themselves without outside interference. International law states that you have a right to determine your own political path and status and to be free from foreign rule.
Do not lose your identity, no nation, group, be it indigenous peoples, Italians, French or Poles can preserve themselves if they do not delineate themselves in a rational way according to their interests. I would suggest to you to think carefully, whom you would like to accept willingly. There are so many refugees who are increasingly fleeing Muslim countries, as they are being persecuted there more and more. These include, for example many Christians and other minorities who will be coping well with your Western-oriented value system and who will integrate well with your support.

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• Rebecca Sommer is an internationally known German artist, journalist, photographer and award-winning filmmaker. She’s been living in Berlin since 2012. Before returning to Germany, she worked as a non-governmental human rights advocate with special consultative status to the ECOSOC (UN Economic and Social Council) at United Nations headquarters as well as in Geneva. She specializes in the rights of indigenous peoples. For over a decade, she worked with UNHCHR (United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights), with UNPFII (United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Peoples) and with UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees). She participated in the negotiations regarding the Declaration of the Indigenous People Rights, and was part of the  promotion that lead to the adoption in 2007 by almost all countries. She visited numerous indigenous peoples around the world and provided human rights documentation to the UN, organized various campaigns, reported  human rights violations against indigenous peoples in UN reports, pictures, writing and films and publications. As a recognized indigenous peoples rights expert, she produced the film “Indigenous Peoples and the United Nations”, commissioned by the UN. In addition, she took part in climate negotiations (UNFCCC) and is member of Climate Justice Now. She worked as an editor in major British magazines, such as “Scene”, “The Face” and “Spirit”, as well as in American magazines “Black Book” and “Madison”. She lived and worked in India, Great Britain, South Africa and the United States. Since 2012, she has been involved in the human rights of refugees in Europe, set up the Workinggroup refugees+human rights (AG F + M), an initiative supporting refugees in Berlin.