The New York Times reports on opposition to the building of a new mosque in Munich:

“… a vocal minority of residents has resisted, holding protest meetings, collecting signatures, and filing a petition with the Bavarian Parliament. ‘Bavarian life’, the petition declares, ‘is marked by the drinking of beer and the eating of pork. In Muslim faith, both are unclean and forbidden.’ With the support of Bavaria’s conservative state government, the residents have been able to tie up the project in court…. ‘Whenever Muslims in Germany come out of their closets or hidden places, the controversy starts’, said Claus Leggewie, a political scientist at the University of Giessen who has written about mosques in Germany. ‘The protests begin on technical issues, like parking problems and noise’, he said. ‘But it has a cultural bias. There is a nationalist minority, which opposes immigration and especially Muslim immigration’.”