Schoolchildren are converting to Islam in German schools as Christian students feel like outsiders and are desperate to try and fit in, a new study has warned.
‘More and more parents of German children are turning to counselling centres because the Christian children want to convert so that they are no longer outsiders at school,’ a state security officer told German tabloid Bild.
A study by the Criminal Research Institute of Lower Saxony found that 67.8 per cent of the surveyed students believe that the Koran is ‘more important’ than the laws in Germany.
Nearly half of them (45.6 per cent) think that ‘Islamic Theocracy is the best form of government’.
In several schools in large cities like Berlin or Frankfurt, Muslim children make up more than 80 per cent of the student body, which the expert claims is due to the strong immigration in the last eight years.
Schoolchildren are converting to Islam in German schools as Christian students feel like outsiders and are desperate to try and fit in, a new study has warned (file image)
They said that in addition, many of these Muslim students come from strictly religious families from ‘very archaic cultures’ in Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, where people live according to the morals and laws laid out by the Koran.
‘When girls at school behave too westernised in the eyes of Muslim young people, don’t wear a headscarf or meet boys, the male students think they have to defend their honour and warn the girls to behave like a devout Muslim,’ the state security officer said.
‘In addition, there is also peer pressure: you want to belong.’
They added that the male Muslim students can ‘appear very threatening and sometimes violent’ in their pursuit to ensure girls abide by the rules of the Koran.
Due to this, ‘parallel societies’ can be seen emerging in schools as the Muslim students assume a dominant role.
‘And if a lot of refugee children come to school again in the summer, the situation will become even more explosive,’ the expert said.
For the new study, researchers asked 308 Muslim students in the German state of Lower Saxony a plethora of questions on their view on religion and governance.
More than half, 51.5 per cent of the children, said that only the Islam would be able to ‘solve the problems of our time’, while 36.5 per cent believe that the German society should be structured more according to Islamic rules.
Questions on violence against non-Muslims revealed shocking beliefs held by the youngsters.
More than a third (35.3 per cent) said that they can understand violence against people who insult Allah or the prophet Mohammed.
Meanwhile 21.2 per cent think that the threat to Islam from the Western world justifies Muslims violently defending themselves.
In addition, 18.1 per cent of the children believe that violence is justified if it is to spread and implement Islam.
A study by the Criminal Research Institute of Lower Saxony found that 67.8 per cent of the surveyed students believe that the Koran is ‘more important’ than the laws in Germany. Nearly half of them (45.6 per cent) think that ‘Islamic Theocracy is the best form of government’ (file image)
Carl Philipp Schroeder, from the research institute which conducted the study, told local media: ‘The data in the latest Lower Saxony survey gives cause for concern and shows how important political education is in schools.’
The state security officer also warned that Islamist propaganda on social media was ripe, with Islamist pop stars using TikTok to ‘convince students that they have to oppose the Western way of life’.
They said that children are being told ‘that only a caliphate is the right form of government’ and that Muslim students are ‘special’, while non-Muslim students, like Christians, are ‘worthless’.
Politicians and experts have been left horrified by the findings, with Christoph de Vries from the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) telling Bild: ‘The study shows how deep the traces that the political Islam has already left in Germany are.’
De Vries said the views expressed by the children in the study were ‘systematic indoctrination at work’.
Another CDU politician, Karin Prien, who is the party’s federal deputy and the school minister in the German state of Schleswig-Holstein, told Bild that the families, schools, federal centres for politicial education and youth work in the Muslim communities are ‘responsible’ for the Islamic values held by children in German schools.
She also said that the role of social media platforms like TikTok has to be ‘re-evaluated with a view to the spread of Islamist and extremist content’.
Ksenija Bekeris from the Social Democratic Party (SPD) has called the findings of the study ‘alarming’ and said there should be a ‘significant strengthening of democracy education in schools’.
The head of the German Teachers’ Union, Stefan Duell, said that the conclusion of the study was ‘worrying’ and that there is now a need for more democracy education in line with German values and the law.
‘There is zero tolerance,’ Mr Duell told Bild, urging that Islamism in German schools must be stopped.