O reflorescer do nazismo
Muslim Immigration
" So many Muslims are attracted to the West. They like it so much they want to be part of it. millions of Muslims "ask little better for themselves than to abandon their own societies for a European one." The growing Muslim immigration to the West raises a host of disturbing issues-cultural this time, not military-especially in Western Europe.
All immigrants bring exotic customs and attitudes, but Muslim customs are more troublesome than most. Also, they appear most resistant to assimilation. Elements among the Pakistanis in Britain, Algerians in France, and Turks in Germany seek to turn the host country into a Islamic society by compelling it to adapt to their way of life.
On a small scale, they demand that factories keep to the Islamic calendar, with its distinctive holidays and special rhythms; or that public schools be segregated by sex and teach the principles of Islam. The editor of a Bengali-language newspaper in England, Harunur Rashid Tipu, explained that the leaders of the Young Muslim Organisation, seek ultimately "to build an Islamic society here."Islamic fundamentalism is rapidly growing into a much bigger threat of violence and intolerance than anything emanating from, say, the [extreme right] National Front; . Jean-Marie Le Pen, leader of the French movement to oust immigrants, characterizes Islam as "a religion of intolerance" and openly fears "an invasion of Europe by a Muslim immigration." He heads a political party, the National Front, which explicitly advocates expelling immigrants from France. The Republicans in West Germany and xenophobic groups in other countries share Le Pen's outlook and program.
The far right looms large to the Muslim immigrants, insecure and largely disenfranchised as they are. Crude remarks and jokes, especially among Germans ("What is the difference between a Jew and a Turk?" "The Jew already got what he deserves, the Turk has yet to get it") lead some Muslims to worry about a Holocaust lying ahead. Kalim Saddiqui, director of London's Muslim Institute, speaks of "Hitler-style gas chambers for Muslims"; Shabbir Akhtar, a member of the Bradford Council of Mosques, writes that "the next time there are gas chambers in Europe, there is no doubt concerning who'll be inside them." However exaggerated, these statements reflect a genuine apprehension.
In contrast to Westerners, who are not able even to maintain their present numbers (today, only Poland, Ireland, Malta, and Israel have naturally growing populations), Muslims revel in some of the most robust birth rates in the world. According to a study by John R. Weeks, countries with large numbers of Muslims have a crude birth rate of 6 children per Muslim woman, 1.7 per woman in the developed countries. The average rate of natural increase in the Muslim countries is 2.8 percent annually; in the developed world, it is a mere 0.3 percent.
These higher rates apply in almost every Muslim country from North Africa to Southeast Asia, as well as within the confines of a single country.
Some see in this demographic imbalance the single greatest challenge to Western civilization. For a millennium, the struggle for mankind's destiny was between Christianity and Islam; in the 21st century, it may be so again.... .High Muslim birth rates already drive politics in the two non-Muslim states of the Middle East. Christians lost control of Lebanon after Muslims became a majority there. The challenge of maintaining a Jewish majority lies near the heart of the Israeli political debate; the local Muslim population keeps up a fertility rate of no less than 6.6 children per woman (1981 estimate). Comparable political tensions have arisen on the fringes of the Middle East-in Ethiopia, Cyprus, Armenia, and Serbia-as the minority Muslim population climbs toward either political power or majority status.
Of course, the situation is very different in the West, but there too Muslim populations are growing. Muslims total 2-3 million in the United States and about 11 million in West Europe. Over 3 million Muslims live in France, about 2 million in West Germany, 1 million in the United Kingdom, and almost a million in Italy. Half a million Muslims live in Belgium. Almost five centuries after the fall of Granada, Spain now hosts 200,000 Muslims. In France, Muslims outnumber all non-Catholics combined, including both Protestants and Jews. In the United States, Muslims already number as many as Episcopalians; they should become the second largest religious community in about ten years.
Further, the Muslim birthrate far exceeds that of native Europeans and Americans, so that one-fifth of all children born in France have a father from North Africa and Muhammad is one of the most common given names in the United Kingdom. Estimates point to the Muslim population of West Europe reaching twenty to twenty-five million by the year 2000.
West European societies are unprepared for the massive immigration of brown-skinned peoples cooking strange foods and not exactly maintaining Germanic standards of hygiene. Muslim immigrants bring with them a chauvinism that augurs badly for their integration into the mainstream of the European societies.
Muslim immigrants will probably not change the face of European life: pubs will not close down, secularist principles will not wither, freedom of speech is not likely to be abrogated. The movement of Muslims to Western Europe creates a great number of painful but finite challenges; there is no reason, however, to see this event leading to a cataclysmic battle between two civilizations.
My skepticism about the end of ideology leads me to the following conclusion: Future relations of Muslims and Westerners depend less on crude numbers or place of residence, and much more on beliefs, skills, and institutions. The critical question is whether Muslims will modernize or not. And the answer lies not in the Qur'an or in the Islamic religion, but in the attitudes and actions of nearly a billion individuals.
Should Muslims fail to modernize, their stubborn record of illiteracy, poverty, intolerance, and autocracy will continue, and perhaps worsen. "
The Muslims are Coming! The Muslims are Coming!by Daniel PipesNational ReviewNovember 19, 1990
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