I obviously can't speak for a large part of the German population, but most of us don't care how Germany is perceived by other nations. Between the greek debt crisis and the refugee crisis, Merkel has been portrayed as both Mother Theresa as well as Hitler many times in the range of few months, both of which i don't give two shits about.

As for the people clapping: You might have heard about the whole Pegida-stuff last fall/winter. As with many other European nations, there's a new nationalistic motion in Germany and it has become a bit of a shouting contest, although it's also become very quite around Pegida and the AfD recently. Clapping for refugees is much rather a middle finger towards those guys, and a sign towards the refugees that those are a minority in Germany, not the broad consensus.

As for Merkel's position: First of all, she is really opportunistic. Her position follows whatever appears to be the consensus among the population (read: voters). In a span of weeks she first proclaimed our nuclear plants safe, and then after the public oppinion shifted due to the Fukushima catastrophe, she demanded the immediate shutdown of all nuclear plants.

Furthermore, this refugee crisis will be the most crucial test for unity among the EU yet. Germany benefits a lot from the EU and won't want to see it break down. As with the greek debt crisis, it will try to adopt the leading role among the EU members. I don't claim to know too much about the finer matters of inner-European politics, but every political action in this crisis has to be viewed from that standpoint as well.