The culture of welcome in Germany in 2015 was met with admiration at home and abroad. Many people showed that they had great empathy for refugees. Yet the country could afford this feeling — unlike after the two World Wars, when the population itself was suffering and in need of assistance. Between 1946 and 1960, ten million families received care parcels from American welfare organisations. With the rise in its own prosperity, Germany’s willingness to help others also grew. In the early 1980s, citizens donated large amounts of money, medical supplies and clothes to the people of crisis-ridden Poland. Numerous individuals gave their support, as did church communities and welfare associations. Yet this chapter shows that empathy can also exclude people. Under the National Socialist regime, empathy had to be restricted to one’s own people and excluded ‘aliens’, such as Jews, foreign forced labourers and prisoners of war. Attacks on migrants and refugees since the 1990s show that some circles want to build walls around empathy and do not want it to be felt for everyone.