BERLIN: Chancellor Angela Merkel and most of her Cabinet will join a rally for an “open and tolerant Germany” organized by Muslim leaders on Tuesday in Berlin in the wake of the militant attacks in France, a spokesman said.

Several German Muslim groups have called for a silent march in Berlin on Tuesday to denounce violence and social division.

Merkel will take part in the event at the Brandenburg Gate in the heart of the capital, along with Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and other top officials, government spokesman Georg Streiter told reporters Monday.

Merkel joined French President Francois Hollande and several other world leaders at a huge Paris solidarity rally Sunday following the massacre of 17 people by gunmen in the city last week.

Germany’s anti-Islamic movement held a new rally on Monday, this time condemning the attacks in France, in a move slammed as an attempt to exploit the bloodshed.

Leaders of the so-called “Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the Occident” (PEGIDA) have asked participants to wear black armbands and observe a minute’s silence for “the victims of terrorism in Paris.”

Euphemistically dubbed “evening strolls” by the group, Monday’s march in the eastern city of Dresden rode a wave of fear and revulsion at the killings of 17 people in France to beat last week’s record attendance of 18,000.

However counter protests are gaining momentum, with 35,000 people turning out Saturday in Dresden against the Islamophobic group.

As a security precaution, the eastern city of Leipzig has banned marchers from displaying cartoons, which have been seen at other events.

With tensions running high, political leaders even urged PEGIDA to call off the event, saying it had no right to whip up hatred against Muslims in the name of solidarity with terror victims.

“If the organizers had a shred of decency they would simply cancel these demonstrations,” Justice Minister Heiko Maas told the mass-selling daily Bild.

“It is simply disgusting how the people behind these protests are trying to exploit the despicable crimes in Paris.”

The head of Merkel’s Bavarian sister party, Horst Seehofer, echoed the call.

At a time “when the whole world is mourning and in shock over the events in Paris,” PEGIDA leaders should at least “for the time being” cancel their rallies, Seehofer said.

The demonstrations, though largely limited to Dresden in former communist east Germany, have shaken the reunified country’s hard-won reputation for openness and tolerance.

Merkel, who used a New Year’s Eve address to call on Germans not to take part in the PEGIDA rallies and on Sunday attended a huge solidarity march in Paris, was to meet Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu in Berlin Monday.

Davutoglu is expected to ask Merkel to address growing anti-Muslim sentiment in Germany with concrete action, according to Turkish press reports.

Germany, Europe’s most populous nation with around 80 million people, is home to about four million Muslims, three-quarters of Turkish origin.

In a survey conducted several weeks ago and released Thursday, 57 percent of non-Muslim Germans said they felt threatened by Islam, four points higher than in 2012.