Arabs in Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 form the second-largest predominantly Muslim immigrant group in Germany after the large German-Turkish community. There is an estimated number of 400,000- 500,000 people of Arab origin residing in Germany. Most Arabs came to Germany in the 1970s, partly as Gastarbeiter

Gastarbeiter

Gastarbeiter is German for "guest worker." It refers to migrant workers who had moved to West Germany mainly in the 1960s and 70s, seeking work as part of a formal guest worker programme...

 from Morocco

Morocco

Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...

, the Turkish Province of Mardin

Mardin Province

Mardin Province is a province of Turkey with a population of 744,606. The population was 835,173 in 2000. The capital of the Mardin Province is Mardin...

 (see: Arabs in Turkey

Arabs in Turkey

The Arabs in Turkey are a Semitic people.Arabs in Turkey are mostly Muslims living along the southeastern border with Syria in the provinces such as Batman, Bitlis, Gaziantep, Hatay, Mardin, Muş, Siirt, Şırnak and Şanlıurfa. The Arabs in this part of the border consist of many Bedouin tribes...

) and Tunisia

Tunisia

Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...

. However, the majority of Arabs are refugees of the conflicts in the Middle East, e.g the Lebanon War

Lebanon War

The term Lebanon War can refer to any of the following wars, fought in Lebanon:*Lebanese Civil War *Hundred Days' War 1978 *1982 Lebanon War...

s and the recent Iraq War. The Arabs in Germany aren't a homogenous group, because they originate from about 20 countries and are of different ethnicity.

Geographical distribution

The largest concentration of Arab people in Germany, can be found in Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

, where they make up 2%-3% (70,000 people) of the population. The percentage is significantly higher in the Berlin boroughs of Neukölln, Kreuzberg

Kreuzberg

Kreuzberg, a part of the combined Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg borough located south of Mitte since 2001, is one of the best-known areas of Berlin...

 and Wedding. Other significant centres of Arab populations in Germany can be found in Frankfurt am Main, Cologne

Cologne

Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...

, Munich

Munich

Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...

, in the Ruhrgebiet, Hanover

Hanover

Hanover or Hannover, on the river Leine, is the capital of the federal state of Lower Saxony , Germany and was once by personal union the family seat of the Hanoverian Kings of Great Britain, under their title as the dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg...

, Bonn

Bonn

Bonn is the 19th largest city in Germany. Located in the Cologne/Bonn Region, about 25 kilometres south of Cologne on the river Rhine in the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, it was the capital of West Germany from 1949 to 1990 and the official seat of government of united Germany from 1990 to 1999....

 and Hamburg

Hamburg

-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...

. Most Arabs reside in urban areas and cities in former West-Germany

BRD

BRD was an unofficial Cold War-era abbreviation for the Federal Republic of Germany . It is now uncommon, but was used consistently by the German Democratic Republic between 1968 and 1990 to refer to what was generally known in English as West Germany...

. The only place in former Eastern Germany with a sizeable number of Arabs is Leipzig

Leipzig

Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...

, where people of any Arab descent make up 0.8% of the total population (4,000 out of 522,800).