German anti-Islamization group PEGIDA in crisis

BERLIN, Germany – Germany’s controversial anti-Islamization organization PEGIDA is facing a leadership crisis after five of its board members resigned this week, following a Hitler impersonation by its leader Lutz Bachmann.

Kathrin Oertel, the organization’s spokeswoman, resigned on Wednesday followed by four other board members. in a dispute over leadership, according to PEGIDA deputy chief Rene Jahn.

Oertel had assumed PEGIDA’s leadership following Bachmann’s resignation last week.

According to a post on PEGIDA’s Facebook page, Oertel resigned after facing “massive hostility and threats.”

PEGIDA, or Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the West, made headlines across the world when it organized an anti-Islam and anti-immigration rally in Dresden last October.

PEGIDA supporters swelled following the attack on the Charlie Hebdo magazine in Paris earlier this month, and tens of thousands turned up at a rally.

The organization, however, seems to be unraveling from inside, especially after  Bachmann’s resignation. He stepped down after pictures circulating on social media showed him in a Hitler moustache.

Amidst the resignations, PEGIDA has cancelled a rally planned for next Monday in Dresden.

According to the German tabloid newspaper Bild, the organization’s deputy leader Jahn resigned because he “did not want to have anything to do with these Nazi things and right-wing comments."

German Vice Chancellor and Social Democrats (SPD) chairman Sigmar Gabriel told ZDF TV it was good for Dresden that the organization had cancelled its next meetings and rally, saying: “I think that these demonstrations are probably past their best."

PEGIDA and two offshoot organizations, Kogida and Bargida, have faced many counter-demonstrations across Germany, overshadowing PEGIDA’s anti-immigration rallies.