Far-right election win leaves migrants questioning their future in eastern Germany

BERLIN, Oct 6, (AP): Ever since the far-right, anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany party won a regional election last month, not a day goes by without Ola Akhras and her husband discussing whether they should go back to Syria.

The couple live with their two young daughters in Magdeburg, where Saxony-Anhalt's newly elected state legislature is meeting Tuesday for the first time since the Alternative for Germany, or AfD, surged to its best result yet - putting it in a strong position to form Germany's first far-right regional government since World War II.

During its first sitting, the 83-seat legislature will elect its speaker - a job that traditionally goes to the largest party - and the AfD hopes for an initial symbolic victory. The state's next governor is unlikely to be chosen before December.

"It’s bad - we’ve built our lives here, we really loved being here, but now we don’t feel welcome anymore,” said Akhras, who fled Homs for Germany in 2018. She speaks fluent German and works as a doctor at the local hospital, where she is completing her specialist training in internal medicine.

Akhras, who wears a hijab, says she feels appreciated at work, but has lately encountered hostility while shopping and no longer feels safe leaving home in the evening. Her sense of not belonging has become overwhelming since the election.

"Our children will never be recognized as Germans here,” she said. The mood in society is very different from a decade ago, when Germans welcomed more than a million migrants from war-torn countries such as Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan under Chancellor Angela Merkel. Many built new lives, learned the language and found work.

However, as Germany’s economic problems - slow growth, high inflation, rising energy prices - have worsened, public sentiment toward the newcomers has deteriorated. The AfD and other critics of immigration have blamed migrants for the country's problems. The 13-year-old party has gained support particularly rapidly in Germany’s formerly communist and economically weaker eastern states, including Saxony-Anhalt.

However, it also continues to gain on the national level. It is the strongest opposition party in parliament and leads recent polls. The AfD's victory in Saxony-Anhalt last month underlined the party's skill in capitalizing on discontent with issues well beyond its core theme of curbing immigration as Chancellor Friedrich Merz's unpopular national government struggles to turn around Germany's stubbornly sluggish economy.