It appears that a growing number of Germans are becoming disaffected due to the policies of their chancellor, as her approval rating decreased by a whole 12 percent in July.
A recent ARD-DeutschlandTrend opinion poll revealed that while in June, 59 percent of respondents (the highest number since September 2015) approved of Merkel’s policies, this figure shrunk to 47 percent in July, Focus news magazine reports.
On July 18 an axe-wielding teenage refugee attacked and seriously injured several people on a train near the city of Würzburg.
A few days later, on July 22, a German citizen of Iranian descent went on a shooting spree at a shopping center in Munich that claimed the lives of nine people.
Then, on July 24 a Syrian refugee armed with machete slaughtered a pregnant woman in broad daylight on the streets of Reutlingen, and a few short hours later, a Syrian suicide bomber blew himself up in Ansbach.
As Merkel’s rating sags, her political opponents have become more popular. For example, the leader of the Christian Social Union and Minister President of Bavaria, Horst Seehofer, gained even more popular support as his rating increased from 33 percent to 44 percent during July.
It should be noted that Seehofer is a bitter opponent of Merkel's migration policy, which has become gradually less popular among ordinary Germans: a DeutschlandTrend poll revealed that only one third of the respondents was content with how the Chancellor is handling this issue, according to Focus.
Will Merkel be able to reverse this negative trend or will it ultimately lead to the eclipse of her career? She remains unrepentant regarding her "open-door" refugee policy, and believes that it represents both the country's core values and those of the European Union, despite the disastrous effects that mass-immigration have had on the EU's Schengen border-free area, terrorism aside. On July 28, she announced that the Daesh (ISIS/ISIL) terrorists "want to undermine our sense of community, our openness and our willingness to help people in need. We firmly reject this."
