QUEDLINBURG: As a far-right regional election victory looms in an ex-communist eastern German state, many migrants are readying to pack their bags, fearful of the AfD party’s threatened “deportation and remigration offensive.”
A week from now, the anti-immigration, Islamophobic and Russia-friendly Alternative for Germany party is expected to score a historic win in the small state of Saxony-Anhalt, with hopes of taking its first-ever governing majority.
It is an ominous scenario for Syria-born cardiologist Ayman Alyoussef, head physician in a clinic in the picturesque town of Quedlinburg, who voiced a common sentiment: “I fear that hatred of foreigners will spread.”
Alyoussef, who arrived in the country in 2014 and is now a German citizen, said he has been welcomed by patients and colleagues but sometimes faces hostility on the streets, as do his wife and daughter who wear Muslim headscarves.
“There are patients who arrive at 3:00 am with a heart attack. I am able to get them through an acute crisis,” Alyoussef told AFP. “Afterwards, they are very grateful when they realize that a foreigner helped them.
