Islam in Europe and pre-emptive dhimmitude

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/islamic-school-head-forced-out-after-weapons-and-400000-cash-found-at-flat-in-grounds-a3869781.html

[Crafty_Dog]

MEF Organizes 25,000 Strong Protest in Support of Tommy Robinson; Plans Additional Rallies
 
https://www.meforum.org/Articles/2018/MEF-Organizes-Protest-in-Support-of-TR
PHILADELPHIA – July 8, 2018 – Tommy Robinson, the imprisoned English counter-Islamist activist, journalist, and book author, justifiably titled his autobiography Enemy of the State, for he has long been a target of the U.K. authorities impatient with his criticism of Islamism.

The Middle East Forum (MEF) is helping Robinson in his moment of danger. It does so in the context of its Legal Project which since 2007 has defended activists, journalists, politicians, et al. who face harassment, fines, or imprisonment because of their views concerning Islamism and related topics.

MEF is sponsoring and organizing the second “Free Tommy Robinson” gathering in London on July 14. MEF previously provided all the funding and helped organized the first “Free Tommy Robinson” event held June 9 in London.

MEF, along with a coalition of UK advocacy groups and international figures will assemble to advocate for Mr. Robinson’s release and demand greater protections for freedom of speech and freedom of the press in the United Kingdom. MEF is arranging for U.S. Congressman Paul Gosar (Republican of Arizona) to travel to London to speak alongside the Dutch political leader Geert Wilders, and others.

The latest incident began on May 25 with Mr. Robinson reporting on a rape-grooming trial involving Muslim defendants in Leeds, England, for which he was arrested, tried, convicted, sentenced to 13 months prison, and jailed – all in the course of a few hours. To make matters worse, he was tricked out of the right to confer with counsel. Now, he has been moved to historically violent Olney prison, where he is a potential target of Islamist gangs.

“The police allow rape gangs to operate for decades but swoop down within minutes on Tommy Robinson for a peccadillo,” notes Forum president Daniel Pipes. “We worry that his life is now in immediate peril.”

Forum director Gregg Roman adds: “Western democracy requires a robust public discussion of Islam – including terrorism, terrorist funding, Islamism, immigration and related matters – not its suppression. No matter one’s views of Mr. Robinson, all decent people must support his right to discuss controversial matters without fear of arrest, secret trial, and imprisonment.”

The Middle East Forum is aiding Mr. Robinson’s defense in three main ways:
•   Legally – By using Legal Project monies to fund his legal defense.
•   Diplomatically – By bringing foreign pressure on the UK government to ensure Mr. Robinson’s safety and eventual release.
•   Politically – By organizing and funding the 25,000-person “Free Tommy” London rally on June 9 and now the July 14 protest, also taking place in London.
_ _ _ _ _

The Middle East Forum promotes American interests in the Middle East and protects Western civilization from Middle East threats. 
For immediate release
For more information, contact:
Gregg Roman, Director
Roman@MEForum.org

[G M]

I'm so old, I can remember when the idea of sharia law in the UK was a right wing fantasy.

MEF Organizes 25,000 Strong Protest in Support of Tommy Robinson; Plans Additional Rallies
 
https://www.meforum.org/Articles/2018/MEF-Organizes-Protest-in-Support-of-TR
PHILADELPHIA – July 8, 2018 – Tommy Robinson, the imprisoned English counter-Islamist activist, journalist, and book author, justifiably titled his autobiography Enemy of the State, for he has long been a target of the U.K. authorities impatient with his criticism of Islamism.

The Middle East Forum (MEF) is helping Robinson in his moment of danger. It does so in the context of its Legal Project which since 2007 has defended activists, journalists, politicians, et al. who face harassment, fines, or imprisonment because of their views concerning Islamism and related topics.

MEF is sponsoring and organizing the second “Free Tommy Robinson” gathering in London on July 14. MEF previously provided all the funding and helped organized the first “Free Tommy Robinson” event held June 9 in London.

MEF, along with a coalition of UK advocacy groups and international figures will assemble to advocate for Mr. Robinson’s release and demand greater protections for freedom of speech and freedom of the press in the United Kingdom. MEF is arranging for U.S. Congressman Paul Gosar (Republican of Arizona) to travel to London to speak alongside the Dutch political leader Geert Wilders, and others.

The latest incident began on May 25 with Mr. Robinson reporting on a rape-grooming trial involving Muslim defendants in Leeds, England, for which he was arrested, tried, convicted, sentenced to 13 months prison, and jailed – all in the course of a few hours. To make matters worse, he was tricked out of the right to confer with counsel. Now, he has been moved to historically violent Olney prison, where he is a potential target of Islamist gangs.

“The police allow rape gangs to operate for decades but swoop down within minutes on Tommy Robinson for a peccadillo,” notes Forum president Daniel Pipes. “We worry that his life is now in immediate peril.”

Forum director Gregg Roman adds: “Western democracy requires a robust public discussion of Islam – including terrorism, terrorist funding, Islamism, immigration and related matters – not its suppression. No matter one’s views of Mr. Robinson, all decent people must support his right to discuss controversial matters without fear of arrest, secret trial, and imprisonment.”

The Middle East Forum is aiding Mr. Robinson’s defense in three main ways:
•   Legally – By using Legal Project monies to fund his legal defense.
•   Diplomatically – By bringing foreign pressure on the UK government to ensure Mr. Robinson’s safety and eventual release.
•   Politically – By organizing and funding the 25,000-person “Free Tommy” London rally on June 9 and now the July 14 protest, also taking place in London.
_ _ _ _ _

The Middle East Forum promotes American interests in the Middle East and protects Western civilization from Middle East threats. 
For immediate release
For more information, contact:
Gregg Roman, Director
Roman@MEForum.org

[Crafty_Dog]

https://voiceofeurope.com/2018/07/greece-muslim-mob-brutally-attacks-christians-in-refugee-camp-even-children-were-threatened/#.W0E6npHhiI0.twitter

[Crafty_Dog]

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/07/01/world/europe/denmark-immigrant-ghettos.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur

[G M]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=220&v=SLT9JOE64WQ

Take a half hour and watch this.

Oh yeah, "I'm so old, I remember when sharia law in the UK was some paranoid right wing fantasy".

[Crafty_Dog]

manchester-arena-bomber-was-rescued-from-libya-by-royal-navy

[G M]

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/39410f46-976d-11e8-821b-8d0d10bd0d40

Sharia

monday august 6 2018


TIMES INVESTIGATION
Forced marriage: Police ‘turn a blind eye’ to child brides
Paul Morgan-Bentley, Head of Investigations
August 4 2018, 12:01am, The Times

Only three cases of forced marriage have resulted in a conviction since it became illegal four years ago

Police forces have been accused of failing thousands of victims of forced marriages by charging a suspect in only one in 38 cases.

Officials at the Home Office received more than 3,800 reports of forced marriages or victims being at risk of forced marriage in the past three years. Hundreds of the victims are children, with the youngest only four years old.

However, The Times surveyed police forces and found that fewer than 80 suspects had been charged in this time. It became illegal to force someone to marry in 2014 but only three cases have resulted in convictions.

Yesterday the police watchdog said that it would act to ensure that forces improved their performance and that victims were adequately protected.

Campaigners accused officers of turning a blind eye to victims’ complaints.


The findings come as Sajid Javid, the home secretary, instigated an investigation and conceded that more needed to be done by his department to protect victims.

Officials at the government’s forced marriage unit (FMU) received 1,196 reports last year, 1,428 in 2016 and 1,220 in 2015, a total of 3,844 in three years. About 30 per cent of victims last year were younger than 18 and half of those were 15 or under. The vast majority of victims were female.

The survey of police forces by The Times found that 77 suspects had been charged in this time. The charges included forcing someone to marry and assault in cases linked to a forced marriage. One in four police forces did not respond, suggesting that the true figure would be about 100 in three years, a charge rate of less than 3 per cent.

 
The rate for sexual offences, which is notoriously low, was 6.5 per cent to the year ending June 2017. For weapons offences in the same period it was 44 per cent.

In Lancashire there have been 259 police investigations linked to forced marriages over the past three years but no charges. More than 50 of the victims were under 16.

The Metropolitan Police have recorded 260 offences over three years and 26 charges. The majority related to assault and none was for the specific offence of forcing someone to marry. Two victims were under ten years old.

Jasvinder Sanghera, the founder of Karma Nirvana, which supports victims of forced marriage, said: “We’ve got a number of professionals who are turning a blind eye. They don’t want to rock the multicultural boat.”

Usha Sood, a barrister and expert on forced marriage, said: “The distinction between an arranged and forced marriage seems to fox the authorities but there should be no dilemma about it. It’s about pulling the veil away from the idea that this is arranged and saying no, this is forced.”

Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services, the police watchdog, reviewed forces’ responses to forced marriage cases in 2015. A spokesman told The Times: “We concluded that the police service had some way to go before the public could be confident that potential and actual victims were adequately and effectively protected. We are considering the scope of follow-up activity.”

Forces deny having turned a blind eye to concerns and say that investigations are particularly complex because victims fear making statements that can be seen by their families. The same issue is at the heart of problems with victims blocking visas for their spouses, as they have to object publicly to be sure that they will be denied entry to Britain.

Commander Ivan Balhatchet, of the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC), said: “Police are committed to protecting victims and pursuing offenders through the criminal justice system. The isolation, threats and violence that victims of forced marriage experience means that this is not something that can be tackled by police alone and requires close partnership with public and third-sector organisations.”

Detective Chief Inspector Joanne McHugh, of Lancashire police, said: “Many of the reports recorded as forced marriage incident are found not to be of that nature, albeit the person reporting had genuine concern. Potential victims are often unwilling to support a prosecution against a family member.”

The Metropolitan Police said that victims wanted the abuse to stop but did not necessarily want a family member to be prosecuted. A spokesman added: “Our fundamental aims are always to preserve life, protect those at risk and seek to bring perpetrators to justice.”

The Crown Prosecution Service said it produced an “action plan” with the police in 2016 to try to improve the number of prosecutions, adding: “It is often very difficult for victims to come forward, as it is for them to support a prosecution.”

The Home Office said that reports to the FMU were referred to a number of services, including the police, social services and UK Visas and Immigration. A spokesman added: “The FMU is working with the NPCC to improve the resources and training available to police. Almost 1,600 forced marriage protection orders have been made to prevent people being forced into a marriage.”
paul.morgan-bentley@the-times.co.uk

Sajid Javid said his department would do more to combat forced marriage and support victims

TIMES INVESTIGATION
Javid acts after Times investigation into abuse
Paul Morgan‑Bentley, Head of Investigations | Sam Coates, Deputy Political Editor

Sajid Javid has begun an investigation into his department’s handling of forced marriages after The Times revealed that abusers are being handed...
August 4 2018

Pupils such as Summaiya Uddin could use a metal spoon to alert airport staff to forced marriage
TIMES INVESTIGATION
Stirring solution to help save girls

Gabriella Swerling, Northern Correspondent

August 4 2018

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Times investigation into forced marriages

Mike Sigman 8 hours ago
Goodbye, Britain ... you brought it on yourself.  When other peoples' tradition and culture become more important than your own, you just gave away your culture.

FlagRecommendReply
Derek Emery 11 hours ago
I'm not convinced the public will accept double standards. even if councils and the police do.

FlagRecommendReply
Dr Susanna J Dodgson 1 day ago
The age of consent needs to be raised to 18.

Flag2RecommendReply
Rosa T 1 day ago
Don't blame the police. It could be that the reluctance on their part to pursue this type of crime is driven by the fact that we have an evidence-based justice system.Evidence of this type of crime is hard to establish and readily contested. Witnesses are intimidated by their families.  The CPS will not proceed with a prosecution if there is perceived to be insufficient evidence and a low chance of conviction.

Flag1RecommendReply
Alan Hawkes 1 day ago
This is almost the reverse of the allegation of institutional racism levelled against the police after Steven Lawrence’s murder. To borrow a phrase, from Clive James, this is a “cultural cringe” by the authorities when investigating crimes linked to some Islamic traditions.

Flag1RecommendReply
Bill Badger 1 day ago
You have to ask do the Police notice anything at all aside of drivers driving their own cars...... a level of attention they do not by the way extend to drivers driving someone else's car which they have stolen.

Flag2RecommendReply
Cassandra 1 day ago
These are current day crimes. Why have significant police resources been deployed to investigate allegations many years old, sometimes against dead people?

Flag3RecommendReply
David Craig 1 day ago
I thought that the police turned a blind eye to pretty much all crime nowadays except supposed "hate crimes" by white indigenous Brits against multi-cultural enrichers

Flag15RecommendReply
Markets Work 1 day ago
There is a lot that can be done with simple analytics, if the police were able to capture some basic data across the board when they are contacted or when any complaints are made.

Genereally there needs to be big shift away from the criminals "rights" to everying under the sun to respecting the rights of the victims.


Flag2RecommendReply
Harvestmoon 1 day ago
The young Sunderland footballer who had his name dragged through the gutter , lost his career , his home, and everything for a short  "fling" with a very willing 15 years and 11 month year old girl has every right to feel aggrieved if he is reading this.

Flag14RecommendReply
Harvestmoon 1 day ago
They will have HUNDREDS of cops in the Met working full time on people writing hurty words online. Yet they are allowing this. An absolute scandal.  This is the United Kingdom. Live by our laws.

Flag16RecommendReply
AOT Le Snarque 1 day ago
The police force are grossly overworked as it is. FFS hire more cops, Mr Javid!

Flag4RecommendReply
FruiTbun 1 day ago
One or two below conflating race and religion, somewhat alarmingly in an adult.

Flag1RecommendReply
Maddie Murray 2 days ago
This multicultural excuse is pathetic. The law is the law and it should be enforced regardless of colour or creed.

Flag35RecommendReply
Kalwant Ajimal 1 day ago
@Maddie Murray



Correct in theory. Suicide in terms of political practice and motivation.


Flag7RecommendReply
Richard B 2 days ago
And the Police wonder why they are losing respect but presumably they are not backed up by Politicians or the Law.

Flag12RecommendReply
FruiTbun 2 days ago
The age of consent is 14 in Germany, Italy and Portugal. Uncivilised and repellent.

Flag1RecommendReply
peter openshaw 2 days ago
It is hardly news, or surprising, that the police will soft peddle where the return on resources invested is poor.  I am sure that they deploy their resources with this in mind, so what are their priorities?  It is not burglary (the Met has given up and advertised the fact), nor drug abuse.  Maybe terrorism, knife crime?  I don't know.



Should it be true that they don't have the resources to exercise thir basic function we should be told.


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David Needham 2 days ago
Remember those voices in the wilderness 50 to 60 years ago who warned of this type of behavior and cultural differences . They made these warning based on their experiences in the Indian and Pakistan . They were called racist, fear mongers and shouted down by left wing activist and politicians

They went unheeded and ignored except when it made for a juicy front page headline that further ostracized them . Well now you have the end result coming home to roost

No need to apologies . A simple , You were right will suffice

My and others outrage against this practice is not racist . It is based on a moral code , that used to be the norm within the UK

I would be equally outraged if any group in society condoned such barbaric behavior

Flag8RecommendReply
D P 1 day ago
Why involve India in this discussion. Indians were not involved in on street grooming of 1000's of children in the UK, Indians are not involved in forced marriages (if there are some they are a much smaller % of the overall population), Indians are not producing terrorists who bomb people in the UK or go out to fight in the middle East. Just cos they are brown does not mean Indians are involved in what is predominantly a Muslim ideology which is practiced in the 2 breakaway states (Pakistan and bangladesh) where Muslims migrated 2 after the British split up India after 300 years of rule.

Get your facts right before you tar 1. 2bn people (less the Muslims) with the same brush. The other 900m people do not practice these kinds of things.

Indians were ruled by the British for 300 years. Indians have only been in this country for 60 years and they just work hard and mind their own business


Flag3RecommendReply
Richard Pursehouse 2 days ago
I cannot believe the Home Office is in total denial about its incompetence on this..... no wait, did your article say Home Office. Ah, that explains it. Time for heads to roll, all the way up to whoever is 'in charge' this week at the department....

Flag6RecommendReply
ArtemisiaFranklin 2 days ago
We have rightly heard a lot in the last few days about the failings of government and the police to protect girls and women from forced marriages.  

But what about the greatest culprits - the parents?   They are the largest elephant in the room.  Why are we hearing nothing about challenging their medieval views that are so antithetical to British values, and preventing them from forcing a marriage on their daughters?   We need an in depth and courageous look at this dark area.   The assumptions about control of women and honour need to be openly challenged, the sooner the better.


Flag12RecommendReply
Chris Todhunter 18 hours ago
@ArtemisiaFranklin A club to which I belong had a fascinating talk a few months ago by an ex-US citizen who told us of her journey to UK citizenship. She read out to us the test she and others of a variety of cultures and nationalities had to pass.  They had to know whether an EU regulation or an EU directive is directly applicable in EU member states, but not (for example) how many years you go to prison for for inflicting (eg) FGM or forced marriage on your daughter.



To teach them that kind of thing would, presumably, be 'invasive', or against human rights, or 'culturally insensitive' or something equally stupid.



Incidentally, we natural-born Brits (mostly farmers, teachers, etc) all failed the citizenship test.


Flag1RecommendReply
ArtemisiaFranklin 12 hours ago
@Chris Todhunter @ArtemisiaFranklin

I would have failed the EU directive questions too and have long thought how useless and irrelevant this is.   All that should be needed for new migrants to this country in future is to impress upon them our values of equality and freedom, which others have fought and died for, and that these will be upheld in this country.  Perhaps some sort of undertaking on their part to uphold them too.



If only this had been done a few decades ago, we might not have the wilful ignoring of our basic values that we see now from some 'communities'.


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falanf 2 days ago
Once more political correctness and ethnic and religious “sensitivity” are used as an excuse to allow people to flout the law of our land. So Rotherhams, forced marriage and knife crime cannot be tackled effectively. Well done chaps.

Flag22RecommendReply
Ella Guru 2 days ago
As a retired Police Officer with 34+ years service... I despair at what the Police Service has come to...

Common sense?

There is none...


Flag18RecommendReply
C J Delmege 2 days ago
This puts the ongoing fuss over Labour anti semitism in perspective.

Flag3RecommendReply
MargaretL 1 day ago
@C J Delmege  No it doesn't.   The Left defer to Islam and some of its unpleasant cultural practices, such as election fraud in Tower Hamlets.   It was mostly Labour councils who turned a blind eye to the grooming gangs for years.



This issue is very much related to the anti-semitism scandal in the Labour Party.


Flag28RecommendReply
Ros from Wareham 1 day ago
@C J Delmege I used to be stalwart Labour but don't like what the Labour Party has become. Not only the anti-semitism but the pandering to misogynistic Muslims and the seeking to make political capital out of the Grenfell Tragedy ( but extremely silent about the Gosport deaths many of which occurred on its watch)



Labour were in power for 13 years but appear to have done precisely nothing during that time to address the forced marriage issue


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Foreversideways 2 days ago
More evidence of the uselessness of our police forces.

Flag6RecommendReply
Kalwant Ajimal 1 day ago
@Foreversideways



Nothing to do with the Police. Talk to their political masters.


Flag11RecommendReply
Thomas McDonald 2 days ago
So various ethnic groups are allowed get get away will appalling crimes but if a decent honest English chap goes a few mph over the speed limit on his way to work plod comes down like a tonne of bricks... Priorities all wrong due to lefty stance of police.

Flag21RecommendReply
Kalwant Ajimal 1 day ago
@Thomas McDonald

Please see my reply to @ Foreversidesways.


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AOT Le Snarque 1 day ago
Decent English chaps don't marry child brides or force their offspring into child marriages, and that goes for the ones of Muslim origin, too.

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Richard James 2 days ago
British society, our culture, our security, our way of life. All being ignored in the name of political correctness and multi-culturism. Time to hit the reset button. And get a new political leader, not far right, but will respect our traditional values and represent the largely silent majority. That's while we still have one.

Flag32RecommendReply
Maddie Murray 1 day ago
@Richard James Its happening all over Europe and is the reason why right wing parties and support for them is rising. There is no dialogue, no conversation, all conversation is immediately shut down by branding the person wishing to discuss it as racist




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D Holley 2 days ago
I was told by a police officer that they spend most of their time prosecuting white crime because the process is understood by both sides and there is only the legal matter to be dealt with.



They fear to pursue ethnic crime with the same vigour as the alleged racial discrimination aspect is too much of a deterent.


Flag29RecommendReply
The Woodster 2 days ago
@D Holley



Take it from me, that's nonsense or an excuse used by a lazy and incompetent officer. When I was a homicide detective, I pursued black gang members for murder as vigorously as any other ethnic group and charges and convictions were at the same level (very high - 90%) as any other racial group encountered. Instead of talking about resolving gang murder, my colleagues and I actually went out and did something about it.


Flag1RecommendReply
Kalwant Ajimal 1 day ago
@D Holley

Someone has lost the plot. The LAW is the law.


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Thomas 2 days ago
Anyone who has been burgled, or knows someone who has, knows the police are bone idle. But given the vehemence with which they go after alleged paedophiles, on the flimsiest false evidence, this report of their failure to protect child brides is particularly damning.

Flag20RecommendReply
Gerry 2 days ago
Political correctness and cultural diversity trumps child abuse.    Is this going to change now?

Flag28RecommendReply
Bryn Lewis 2 days ago
They found enough resource to investigate dead celebrities and politicians.... simple matter of priorities.

Flag26RecommendReply
J McGill 2 days ago
In case anyone thinks Brexit will change any of this totally illegal madness; it won’t.

Even better, when we get our fantastic trade deal with India they will demand unlimited visa access.

That’s just inflammatory, you’re thinking.

Well, go check out what Modi told Dr. Fox.


Flag8RecommendReply
C J Delmege 2 days ago
@J McGill Spectacularly irrelevant. Forced marriage is a crime, Brexit or no.

Flag9RecommendReply
Richard Pursehouse 2 days ago
@J McGill Who ever said Brexit would do that? And if India does demand what you claim it will, the answer will be "No"

Flag3RecommendReply
D P 2 days ago
@J McGill Have you read where most forced married take place? Mostly bangladesh and Pakistan. So what has the trade deal with India got to do with it. Just cos everyone looks Brown does not mean they are same. Indian ( non Muslims) don't marry their own cousins either.

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George Aimer 1 day ago
Well said D P.

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William Isaac 1 day ago
@J McGill We can always say no.

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Trader Vic 2 days ago
Police cannot do the impossible . When they present a case to the cps it has to have witnesses prepared to speak up . If no witnesses will

Complain in court what should they do ?

We are all to blame. We have allowed a society where - notably the left- are selectively racist . Action against an ethnic minority criminal is racist . Action against an Anglo Saxon isn’t .

Do we hear the Labour Party railing against child brides ? The Labour Party councils in Rochdale and Rotherham knew what was happening but did nothing- or worse condoned it . Would you act as a policeman if you knew your career would be at risk from those political people ?


Flag90RecommendReply
MaryR 2 days ago
Yes the rot lies in the politics.

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Old Boot. 2 days ago
@MaryR As bad as Russia.

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jet199 2 days ago
If no witnesses speak you look for other evidence. Bruises on the victim, email and text messages, previous statements, things said to friends and teachers. In cases of domestic abuse police are now happy to go ahead without the victim giving evidence, this is very often also the case in other types of child abuse so there is a reason they are not using those tactics in these cases.

Flag4RecommendReply
Ros from Wareham 1 day ago
@jet199 All very well but if they prosecute and can't get a conviction because the victim (for whatever reason) won't cooperate they face allegation of racism and worse. Why would they put their career on the line?

FlagRecommendReply
Andrew Cole 2 days ago
@Trader Vic Remember that creep Denis MacShane, former Labour MP, Government Minister of State for Europe and more recently convicted criminal: MP for Rotherham from 1994 to his resignation in 2012 managed to see no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil during his eighteen year career in Parliament.




FlagRecommendReply
JCW 2 days ago
At Trader Vic

Spot on ,

But don’t expect the people who have hijacked the Labour Party to change

They are people who are the guilty ones but they are to bigoted to see it.


FlagRecommendReply
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[Crafty_Dog]

Migration to Europe Becomes a Crisis
by Daniel Pipes
MEF Wire
July 31, 2018
https://www.meforum.org/articles/2018/migration-to-europe-becomes-a-crisis
Daniel Pipes taught Middle Eastern and world history at Harvard University and the University of Chicago, served on the Policy Planning Council under President Reagan, founded the Middle East Forum, and oversaw $28 million in grants to allies. He has written sixteen books. He briefed the Middle East Forum in a conference call on July 31, 2018.

LISTEN HERE

The mass Muslim migration to Europe has galvanized civilizationist forces of populism and nationalism across the continent. This happens in three different ways, as shown by recent elections:
* In Hungary, the civilizationist part on its own forms the government.
* In Austria, the conservative party joined in a coalition with the civilizationist party.
* In Italy the anarchist-left Five Star Movement formed a coalition with the civilizationist party.

Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, Switzerland, and Norway have likewise shifted towards a civilizationist stance. Even Germany, which opened the migratory floodgate in 2015, is in the throes of a backlash as Islamism is turning a substantial number of its five million Muslim Turks against their host society and culture. A recent study has found that 60% of German Turks align themselves with Turkey’s Islamist President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who has funded and built hundreds of mosques throughout Germany led by imams who receive their instructions from Ankara.

In Holland and Bulgaria, the creation of Turkish-Islamic political parties has created tensions between the two governments and Ankara, while Denmark is experimenting with the assimilation of migrants through imposed regulations aimed at countering feelings of alienation and marginalization. In Eastern Europe, by contrast, the conversation is mainly about the incompatibility of Christian and Muslim cultures.

Spain, Italy, and Greece have been the entry points for illegal immigration into the continent, which can be stopped should Europe display the necessary resolve. Expelling criminal migrants is possible, though it is difficult to find countries that will accept them. A far greater challenge is expelling non-criminal illegals, which Italy’s Deputy Prime Minister Salvini has pledged to do at the rate of 100,000 migrants per year over the next five years.

For now, proposed solutions to relieve the migration crisis plaguing Europe are at an embryonic phase. The extent of their success, however, is not only important for the vast and prosperous continent but will likely influence future developments in the United States.

Summary account by Marilyn Stern, Communications Coordinator for the Middle East Forum.

[DougMacG]

"like a military action."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-45181321

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2018/08/18/isis-sex-slave-survivor-says-met-her-captor-in-germany.html

[Crafty_Dog]

Investigation Finds Dutch Program Aided Terror-Tied Groups
by Abigail R. Esman
Special to IPT News
September 17, 2018
https://www.investigativeproject.org/7623/investigation-finds-dutch-program-aided-terror

[Crafty_Dog]

Euro pean Muslims: A Demographic Opportunity
Sep 20, 2018
By Jacob L. Shapiro
Summary

The Muslim population in Europe has been growing since World War II, topped off by the migration crisis in 2015. Today, about 33 million Muslims live in Europe, equal to 6 percent of the population. Not since the Ottomans laid siege to Vienna in 1683 has Islam played such a prominent role in European affairs.

Yet the numbers are slightly deceiving. Islam has become such a serious political issue in Europe not because of the growth in Muslims itself but because the Muslim population is younger and growing faster than other demographic groups. This is in part because of the migration wave and in part because European fertility rates have fallen below replacement level. The trend sows fear among the native population that its influence and way of life is ending, and it is compounded by the desire of the immigrants to retain at least elements of their previous national, ethnic and religious identities. These demographic shifts have led to internal disagreements that threaten to tear the European Union apart. They also profoundly shape internal political dynamics in many of Europe’s most powerful countries. Forty-five percent of Europe’s Muslims live in one of three countries: France (5.7 million), Germany (5 million) or the United Kingdom (4.1 million).

The future of the EU, and of countries like France and Germany, will be shaped by whether these countries can assimilate Muslims. Since France, Germany and the U.K. have the largest Muslim populations, this Deep Dive will focus mainly on the challenges that each faces. We’ll attempt to estimate the scale of the challenge of integration, but we’ll also cover its benefits for the host countries, where immigration will help solve labor shortages to come. We then draw on the history of European Jewry in the 18th century for insights into how European Muslim integration might proceed. We conclude that the significant minority of European Muslims who thus far have refused to assimilate will continue to pose a problem for their host countries, and the prospects for the majority to eventually “belong” in their new homes are mixed.

The Nature of the Problem

First, a caveat: Demographic data on European Muslim populations are difficult to parse and fraught with inconsistencies. France, for instance, does not account for religion in its national statistics, as doing so would violate its strict adherence to “laicite,” a distinctly French approach to secularism to which we will return. Whereas Pew estimates that Muslims make up 9 percent of France’s population, a French think tank called the Institut Montaigne puts the figure at closer to 6 percent. German data on religious affiliation depends on public affiliation with a public law religious society – in Germany’s last census in 2011, 33 percent of Germans did not identify with any religious society. Furthermore, there is no specific category for “Muslims” in the German census – they are instead subsumed by a general category of “others.” The data that follows thus constitute a useful but imprecise snapshot of the issue.
 
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Europe’s Muslim population first began to increase during the dramatic period of economic growth and reconstruction after World War II. There was a critical need for low-skilled labor throughout Western Europe, and though the bulk of that need was satisfied by internal European migration from east to west, substantial numbers of Muslim migrants also came to Europe for work. In 1936, there just 70,000 Muslims living in France, or 0.17 percent of France’s population. By 1960, there were 1 million, or 2 percent of the population. From 1960 to 1970, the Muslim population of the United Kingdom increased from 105,000 to 668,000. The German figures are perhaps the most staggering, growing from 20,000 Muslims in 1951 to 1.2 million in 1971.

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The ethnicities and nationalities of the immigrants depended somewhat on their destination. Many of the Muslim migrants to France came from Algeria, which France ruled as a colony from 1830 to 1962. Today, 38 percent of French Muslims are of Algerian descent. Muslim migration to the U.K. came predominantly from Britain’s former colonies in South Asia: More than 50 percent of British Muslims today are of Pakistani or Bangladeshi origin. Germany had fewer former colonial holdings from which it could import foreign labor, which is a major reason Germany has had a tougher time integrating its Muslim population than the U.K. and France. Germany instead recruited cheap labor from its former World War I ally: Turkey. More than half of all Muslims in Germany in 1973 were Turkish, and the German Federal Office of Statistics estimates that the current population of Turkish descent in Germany is roughly 3 million – a number that is widely considered conservative.

The demographic makeup of Muslim migration to Europe in this period was equally important. Many Muslims who came to Europe in the 1960s and 1970s were young, single men. They were taking advantage of labor shortages in European countries, and the jobs that they got were often menial. This was not a problem at first. In fact, Muslim migration was one of a number of migrations that helped supercharge the Western European economies after the war. But by the end of the 1970s, the period of economic growth had run its course. The first workers to get laid off were the foreign workers and migrants who had left their families and homes behind in search of higher wages and better opportunities. In West Germany, the government did not even count Turkish workers in its official unemployment statistics; instead, it encouraged Turks to return home. But many Muslim migrants throughout Europe decided to stay – and used the money they had earned to bring their families to join them in Europe too.

The result was a self-perpetuating disconnection between Muslim migrants and the countries they now called home. Even though European countries had encouraged Muslim migration to fill low-skill jobs, the concern was never to integrate them into German or French or British society but to profit from their labor. The social mobility that a citizen of these countries enjoyed was not enjoyed equally by Muslim migrants. Furthermore, the migrants were far from home, living in a political culture and a religious environment radically different from the ones in which they had grown up. Sour prospects and the innate human desire for familiarity led to a de facto segregation that was as much by choice as it was by imposition. Muslim migrants felt unwelcome, so they created their own, often separate communities, which only raised suspicion and hostility among the natives toward Muslims, for whom there were fewer jobs and prospects.

This dynamic has only worsened over time as more Muslims have migrated to Europe, not in response to labor shortages but to escape violence or poverty. A 2016 U.K. Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government report identified 42 wards where a minority faith or ethnic group was a local majority. Nine of the top 10 were Pakistani Muslim wards. The same report also found that almost 16 percent of all British Muslims speak little or no English – double the next highest group (Hindus at 8 percent). In France, the Institut Montaigne estimates that the unemployment rate for those of North African descent is roughly 30 percent, whereas countrywide unemployment is 9.1 percent as of July 2018. Similar conditions are present among Turkish workers in Germany. They face an unemployment rate of roughly 16 percent, more than three times the national average of 5.2 percent in August.

The issue has been aggravated by high fertility rates among European Muslims relative to other religious and ethnic groups. In France and the U.K., for example, Pew projected the average total fertility rate for Muslims would be around 2.9 children per woman – compared to 1.9 and 1.8 children per woman for non-Muslims, respectively. In Germany, the total fertility rate of 1.9 for Muslims is actually below replacement rate, but that is still significantly higher than the non-Muslim rate of 1.4. The average European total fertility rate for non-Muslims is around 1.6, compared to 2.6 for Muslims. Combine this with continued migration to European countries from the Muslim world – Germany alone received almost 1 million Muslim migrants from mid-2010 to mid-2016, before Chancellor Angela Merkel came under intense political pressure to stop migration – and it is not hard to imagine the more aggressive projections on Muslim population growth in Europe coming to fruition.
 
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These statistics led one well-known French financial analyst, Charles Gave, to estimate in 2017 that within 40 years, Muslims would become a majority of the French population. That seems far-fetched, and Gave wouldn’t be the first to be guilty of overestimation. After all, in 2003, Pew estimated that Muslims would make up 10 percent of Europe’s population by 2020 – well over the actual rate, according to Pew in 2018, of 6 percent – and worried that it was projecting too low a figure. Even so, the broader issue remains: Muslims have more babies and are younger and poorer than non-Muslims. In the U.K., the median age for Muslims is 25; the national median age is 39. In France, the average age of Muslims is 35.8 years, compared to 53 for Christians. That Europe will become more Muslim in the coming years is a given – what’s unclear is how much more.
 
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The Challenge of Integration

The deeper and often unasked question is why the growth of Europe’s Muslim population is so controversial. Muslims are not the only minority group in Europe. Both the U.K. and France, for instance, have significant black minorities (at roughly 3 percent and 1.5 percent of the total population, respectively). The U.K., France and Germany have all seen significant migration from India, Vietnam, China and other Asian countries in recent years as well – to say nothing of intra-European migration, including the high number of Poles who have migrated west in search of better jobs. The number of Muslims in these countries is also still quite low. Pew estimates that if European countries get tough on migration, by 2050 the Muslim population in most European countries won’t exceed 10 percent, with France being an exception at 12.7 percent. Western European countries are not as monochromatic as Eastern European countries, but compared to a country like the United States, where a recent U.S. census report projected that whites will be a majority-minority by 2045, they aren’t especially diverse.

The primary reason the Muslim population is problematic for European governments is because of its reluctance to assimilate into European society. “Islam,” after all, does not denote where one is from; it denotes adherence to a faith, one that informs how a believer should think about politics, cultural norms and justice. Non-Muslim migrants, or Muslim migrants who are not particularly religious, have typical immigrant struggles – overcoming language barriers or nostalgia for their home or their family or a particular kind of food. But these obstacles do not lead groups to want to be treated differently from British, French or German citizens. If anything, it leads to a greater desire to “belong.” There are, however, groups of religious Muslims in Europe who have no desire to belong at all. They want to practice their religion free of government influence and are even confused as to why this is problematic – from their perspective, European states are supposed to be “freer” than the states they came from. They also view European society as potentially corrupting – and try to isolate themselves from those influences as much as possible.

To be clear, these Muslim communities are a minority of the Muslims in European countries, and a fairly small minority at that. In the U.K., for instance, almost half of all Muslims were U.K.-born. Even more striking, a recent U.K. government report found that 86 percent of British Muslims feel a “strong sense of belonging to Britain” – higher even than the national average of 83 percent. Seventy-eight percent answered in the affirmative in a follow-up question about whether they desire full integration into British life. This is an overwhelming majority – but it’s the other roughly 20 percent who are the problem for London. The same U.K. study showed that 23 percent of British Muslims supported the introduction of sharia (Islamic law) in parts of Great Britain. Thirty-one percent said polygamy should be legal (compared to 9 percent for the national average), and 32 percent would not condemn violence against someone for mocking the Prophet Muhammad. Four percent even said they sympathized with terrorists and suicide bombers.

In other words, in the U.K., there are some 800,000 Muslims who do not value some of those basic fundamentals of British political life like the rule of law and freedom of speech. That 4 percent of British Muslims sympathize with Islamist terrorists may seem like a small figure, but it adds up to more than 150,000 people. The national average for Britain was 1 percent, so this is not a strictly Muslim issue – if no one except these Muslims supported terrorism, they would make up 0.3 percent of the total British population. The larger issue is that although all societies have radical fringes, the fringe of European Muslims is a relatively larger part of the whole and is resistant to assimilation or change. This, in effect, poisons the well. Even though the vast majority of British Muslims identify with their country and want to integrate, their reputation in Britain is damaged by those who resist assimilation. And the fear and suspicion that these Muslims create only reinforces prejudices and discrimination, which in turn further radicalizes British Muslims who feel isolated from British life.

A similar picture can be seen in both France and Germany. Institut Montaigne found that while 71 percent of French Muslims generally supported the French secular state, 29 percent “consider religious laws to be more important than the laws of the French state.” The study also pointed out that the vast majority of people with these views are young, low-skilled laborers living in segregated communities inside France. As in the U.K., a significant minority of French Muslims reject some basic tenets of French political life and French culture. Even more distressing in France is that those with more radical views are also the youngest – 50 percent of young people held these views as opposed to 20 percent of the French Muslim population over 40. Whether growing old will moderate the views of these young French Muslims is an open question – that 20 percent is still a distressingly large figure is not.

For Germany, the picture is less clear, partly because Germany experienced such a massive influx of Syrian refugees in the past three years. These migrants have had as little time to assimilate into German society as German sources have had to collect data on how well they are assimilating. Yet in a 2015 study, before the influx of Muslim refugees to Germany had really begun, independent German think tank Bertelsmann Stiftung noted that almost a quarter of the 4.7 million Muslims in Germany at the time had arrived since 2011. That Germany opened its doors to Muslim migrants has historical precedence: Germany recruited Turkish laborers to come to Germany in the 1960s to help cope with labor shortages. But Germany, more so than France and the U.K., never expected or wanted Muslims to integrate. Muslims and other migrants were not considered part of German society, and Germany only began trying to integrate Muslims (and migrants in general) in the 1990s.
 
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Indeed, until legal reforms were instituted in 2000, it was hard for Muslim migrants and their families, the majority of whom were Turkish, to become German citizens. (German nationality laws were based on a Wilhelmian law from 1913 that stressed German descent over all else.) But though the German government has sought to make Germany more welcoming to immigrants and has instituted policies specifically to better integrate them into society in recent years, their success so far has been mixed. The Bertelsmann Stiftung study found that 96 percent of German Muslims feel “connected with Germany,” though it also noted that almost one quarter of Muslims born in Germany did not learn German as a first language. A U.S.-based think tank, the Migration Policy Institute, pointed to high membership among Muslims in German associations (50 percent) and high numbers receiving school qualifications (85 percent) as signs that integration is succeeding.

What is most striking about this evidence is how similar the situation is in the U.K., France and Germany, despite radically different politically structures, ethnic makeups of the Muslim populations and approaches toward integration into society. In all three countries, a large majority of Muslims assimilate into society and become as British, French or German as any citizen, despite discrimination and in general poorer economic prospects compared to the national average. And yet in all three, a significant minority of the population not only resists assimilation but hives itself off from the rest of the country’s citizenry, espousing different views on everything from who should possess legitimate authority to what women should be allowed to wear in public. All three countries have also in recent years experienced Islamist terrorist attacks, which have reinforced mistrust of Muslims, which creates a vicious cycle that gives way to the very isolation that breeds radicalization among Muslim youths.

A Historical Comparison

The only real historical basis for comparison to the challenges European Muslims currently face is the fate of European Jews in the 20th century. Like European Muslims, European Jews were spread throughout the Continent, and at times, Jews would migrate to new countries to escape persecution or violence. This is not to say it’s a perfect comparison. The Jews living in Europe had been there for centuries, and especially in Western European countries, they were often well-off. And unlike European Muslims, the majority of European Jews lived in Eastern Europe (in 1933, in Poland, they made up 9 percent of the population, as compared to just under 1 percent of Germany’s population). Despite the differences, the experience of European Jews – a religious minority in Europe – informs thinking about Islam’s future in Europe.
 
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European Jews lived through one of the most transformative periods in European history – the slow, centuries-long transformation of Europe from a patchwork of multiethnic monarchies into individual nation-states. The European Jewish experience varied greatly depending on the given state. In Great Britain, membership in a religious community was not mandated by law. As a result, British Jews felt less dissonance between their religious lives and their national lives. British Jewish institutions even mimicked the Anglican Church in their development, so strongly did Jews want to integrate into British society.

The situation was much different in France. After the French Revolution, the National Assembly debated granting citizenship to French Jews and concluded famously that “the Jews should be denied everything as a nation but granted everything as individuals.” To become French, Jews had to check their religion at the door. In that sense, not much has changed in the intervening centuries.

Germany was a more complicated case. Before 1871, there was no Germany to speak of, and local Jewish communities interacted with the various Germanic states in a variety of ways. In Prussia, Jews were offered equal rights – but only if they recognized the absolute authority of the Prussian government and did not hold views antithetical to those of Prussian society. That “but” helped create a de facto Jewish reformation. For a long time, European countries were often made of different confessional groups, with authority delegated to the spiritual leaders of those groups. But the advent of the nation-state and the attempted integration of Jews into the new national European societies created crises in various religious communities, and Judaism was no exception. The very concept of today’s three main Jewish denominations came from this tumultuous time and from internal arguments about how much tradition to conserve versus how many reforms should be undertaken so that Jews could live prosperously in the new Europe.

Germany became the center of gravity for Jewish religious reform, but in truth, throughout Europe, Jews reconceptualized their relationship between organized religion and the state. (Eastern Europe, which we won’t address at any length here, became the epicenter of Jewish nationalism, one strain of which became Zionism.) Many Jews assimilated seamlessly into European society. Others held on to tradition with fundamentalist zeal, closing themselves off from what they saw as the corrosive influence of European modernity. In the end, it didn’t much matter. European Jews was never truly integrated into European society. The word “anti-Semitism” was coined by a German association in 1879 – eight years after a recently unified Germany had granted Jews full equal rights. Jews eventually became an easy scapegoat for Hitler during his rise to power, and European Jews, as well as gypsies and political dissidents, were marked for slaughter as a result. (Anti-Semitism also was not a strictly German phenomenon – Germany had only some 600,000 Jews. With the notable exception of Denmark, no European nation-state conquered by the Nazis defended Jewish citizens as if Jews were national brethren.)

European Muslims come from countries that, like 18th-century Europe’s multiethnic empires, are not organized on the basis of liberalism or nationalism. One of the reasons some Muslim migrants have such difficulty integrating into European societies is that in Islam, there is little distinction between governance and piety, and in most Muslim states, there has been no social or political revolution that necessitated the reinterpretation of Islam to allow for a separation of mosque and state. A religious Muslim’s primary identity is wrapped up in the “ummah” – the greater Islamic community – not his or her state of residence. Tribes, families and sects – not nations with constitutions and individual rights – are the political environments from which most of these Muslim migrants come. As with European Jews in the 18th century, this clash between Islam and Western political values may well lead to institutional religious reform to attempt to integrate.

This is not a process that will happen overnight, nor will it be seamless. But it is already possible to see the different ways in which European Muslims are struggling to maintain their religious beliefs while integrating into their new national communities. For example, in a recent 134-page report published by the Muslim Council of Britain, a Muslim sheikh made a religious case that Islam actually requires Muslims integrate into the societies in which they live. Quoting heavily from the Quran, the sheikh concludes that “Islam places a lot more emphasis on integration and human relationships than the worship of God itself.” The problem, for both European Muslims and for the nation-states where they live, is that while compromises and reforms may help integrate Muslims into European society better, no country or group has yet found a successful way of bringing the fringe elements in from the cold. And for as long as a fifth of European Muslims resist assimilation, domestic hostility toward Muslims will continue, as will Islamists attacks.

A Silver Lining?

There is one silver lining to this story. The rise of anti-Semitism in Europe and the horrors wrought by World War II were in part a result of economic crisis. The dismembering of Germany after World War I, followed by the Great Depression, essentially catapulted the world into a temporary Dark Age. Discrimination is often a byproduct of economic duress, and Jews in Europe were an obvious target for the masses: a religious minority that had always seemed to be a nation living within nations, with whom Christendom had a violent past, and which had in general profited seemingly at the expense of ordinary people, or so the line of thinking went. It is easy to dismiss it now, but it is impossible to dismiss how attractive such ideas were in the decade leading up to World War II.

European Muslims are by and large not wealthy. They are also generally younger than their neighbors. And that may make all the difference. Muslim migration first came to Europe when European countries were experiencing shortages of labor due to economic growth. Now, European countries are getting older and their populations are shrinking, a situation that is in turn creating new demand for labor. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has suffered grievous political harm because of her open migration policies, but the flipside is that migrants in Germany have essentially functioned as an economic stimulus. Oxford Economics recently published a report suggesting that the influx of Muslim migrants into Germany would raise gross domestic product by almost 1 percent by 2020, and that the influx of people might also curb inflationary pressures. The deeper problem for Germany is that it is simply an aging population: Next year, there will be fewer Germans under 30 years old than Germans over 60. Making its Muslim migrants truly German would go a long way toward combating Germany’s aging process.
 
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The U.K. and France, while also aging, do not face as stark a challenge as Germany does in this regard, but neither are they immune from demographic factors. France is in the least danger, though its non-Muslim total fertility rate has dropped for three consecutive years, falling to 1.9 children in 2017. Indeed, both the U.K. and France have total fertility rates that exceed the European average. The rub, however, is that Muslims in the U.K. and France are having babies at a significantly higher rate than non-Muslims. And though it is impossible to know whether the Muslims who are reproducing at these higher rates belong to the portion of the Muslim populations that have not assimilated into European societies, it is a good bet that they do, as a combination of traditional values, marriage at an early age and lack of access to education all lead to higher birth rates – and are all ways one could describe those Muslim communities that don’t integrate into British and French society.

The aging of Europe provides an opportunity. Nothing is better for integration than the prospect of economic opportunity and social mobility. And there will be plenty of jobs for young people in Europe in the coming decades, so much so that Poland is literally paying women to have babies, and Germany was willing to break taboos on immigration just to attract younger people to a country that has historically been hostile to immigration. The existence of opportunity is hardly a guarantee of Muslim assimilation, but it also means that Muslims will not be seen as stealing jobs from qualified German, French or British citizens. For the first time since the 1970s, European societies are actively encouraging migration and attempting to integrate Muslims into European societies, which may help balance against the hostility toward Muslims in these countries. At the very least, economic issues will not exacerbate the problem of integration that is already there.

The situation can be summed easily, even if it defies an easy solution. The size of the European Muslim population is increasing. While many European Muslims have assimilated into European society, a substantial minority, perhaps as many as one-fifth of all European Muslims, have not only failed to assimilate but reject the basic political and cultural tenets of the countries in which they live. These pockets of resistance to assimilation, often egged on by lack of economic prospects and discrimination, lead to hostility and suspicion on the part of the domestic population, while only exacerbates the problem of integration. The countries with the three biggest Muslim populations in Europe – France, Germany and the U.K. – have struggled to integrate Muslims into their societies, and despite the various differences in their approaches, all have failed to prevent the emergence of a strain of Islamic identity that the nation-state has yet to metabolize successfully. Europe is aging, and the economic opportunity that this will offer to young and relatively less wealthy European Muslims may help lead to assimilation. Even so, Europe’s historical approach to religious minorities leaves much to be desired and suggests integration will never truly be successful.

The post European Muslims: A Demographic Opportunity appeared first on Geopolitical Futures.

[G M]

Euro pean Muslims: A Demographic Opportunity form of suicide

[Crafty_Dog]

Austria May Ban Four-Fingered MB Salute
by John Rossomando  •  Oct 3, 2018 at 6:06 pm
https://www.investigativeproject.org/7644/austria-may-ban-four-fingered-mb-salute

 
The Austrian government is considering outlawing a four-fingered salute representing support for the Muslim Brotherhood. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan popularized it and began using it after Egypt's military toppled the Brotherhood in 2013.

Muslim Brotherhood members and sympathizers around the world use the image on websites, posters and literature. If the ban is approved, anyone in Austria who flashes the salute could be fined $4,600.

It also has been used by Muslim Brotherhood supporters in the United States, including members of Egyptian Americans for Freedom and Justice (EAFJ) and former Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official Mohamed Elibiary.

Erdogan's role in popularizing the gesture seems to be driving the Austrian ban. It also would outlaw a wolf-head like salute used by the pro-Erdogan Turkish fascist group the Grey Wolves. Its most infamous member, Mehmet Ali Agca, tried to assassinate Pope John Paul II in 1981. The Wolves have become some of Erdogan's greatest non-Islamist supporters and aim to unify all Turkic peoples in Turkey across and throughout Central Asia into a single nation.

It was the only group besides Erdogan's ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) that backed constitutional changes allowing him to consolidate power.

So far Turkey hasn't responded.


Relations between Austria and Turkey have become tense due to reports that Erdogan's intelligence agency, the MIT, spied on Erdogan's enemies in Austria. In February 2017, a member of Austria's Green Party alleged that an umbrella organization headed by the Turkish embassy's religious attaché had carried out spy operations in Austrian mosques.

Turkey was inserting "unacceptable Turkish government politics in Austria," said Green Party member Peter Pilz.

Austria closed seven Turkish-linked mosques in June due to concerns over political Islam. Chancellor Sebastian Kurz complained about "parallel societies, political Islam and radicalisation." The Turks responded by accusing the Austrians of racism. The imams were paid by Turkey's Directorate of Religious Affairs, also called the Diyanet. It has a close relationship with Turkey's MIT intelligence agency.

Related Topics: John Rossomando, Austria, Muslim Brotherhood, hand gestures, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Egyptian Americans for Freedom and Justice, Grey Wolves, AKP, Mehmet Ali Agca, Peter Pilz, Sebastian Kurz, Diyanet

[Crafty_Dog]

https://gellerreport.com/2018/10/london-423-new-mosques-100-shariah-courts-more-than-in-many-muslim-countries.html/

[Crafty_Dog]

https://israelunwired.com/france-closes-muslim-zahra-france-center-after-massive-police-raid/

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/10/free-speech-sharia-european-court-of-human-rights-ruling/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Saturday%202018-10-27&utm_term=NR5PM%20Actives

[G M]

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/10/free-speech-sharia-european-court-of-human-rights-ruling/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Saturday%202018-10-27&utm_term=NR5PM%20Actives

I wonder how many Europeans are still in denial about what's happening.

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13362/netherlands-problem

[Crafty_Dog]

    While France Burns, Macron Fiddles away 16 Million Euros to Terrorists
    By JNS News Service,

    The government of France recently donated 8 million euros to the Palestinian government’s 2018 general budget. [Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 13, 2018]. This brings France’s direct support to the PA’s general budget to 16 million euros in 2018 (67,869,600 shekels).

    The PA’s “general budget” is used by the PA to finance what has been termed its “Pay for Slay” program under which the PA pays salaries to terrorist prisoners, released terrorist prisoners and allowances to the families of dead terrorist “Martyrs”.

    Despite the severe criticism of the PA practice by the international community and the PA’s constant complaints regarding its financial woes and the need for continued international monetary support, in 2018 the PA allocated 1.237 billion shekels – or over 7% of the entire PA budget – to fund its  terror rewarding practice.

    This approach was clarified by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, who, in response to US and Israeli legislation designed to combat the PA policy, declared:  “The salaries of our Martyrs, prisoners, and wounded are a red line. From 1965 until now, this matter is sacred to us. The Martyrs and their families are sacred, [and so are] the wounded and the prisoners. We must pay all of them. If one penny remains in our hands it is for them and not for the living.” [Official PA TV, Oct. 28, 2018]

    This unequivocal statement, which Abbas has repeated several times, makes the PA’s priorities crystal clear: To promote, incentivize, and reward terrorism before feeding, educating, or catering to the other needs of the PA’s non-terrorist population.

    “It must be clear to the French government, that any donation it makes to the PA’s general budget, according to the PA itself, will be used first and foremost to give financial rewards to terrorists,“ explains PMW’s founder and director, Itamar Marcus.

    “While French officials may claim that their specific euros do not fund the PA’s  ”Pay for Slay” program, the French government must recognize that the 293 million euros the PA paid to terrorists and their families in 2018 is drawn from the same general budget enriched with 16 million French euros.

    Moreover, it is important to note that any foreign donation to the PA – general budget or otherwise – which fails to condition the receipt of the funding on the PA ceasing to reward terror, legitimizes the PA’s terror payments. We call on the French government to immediately suspend its support of the PA general budget and to consider adopting legislation – as other donor countries have done – that would condition all of France’s  aid to the PA on the latter abolishing this practice which squanders more than 7% of its entire budget on rewarding terror. “

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.dw.com/en/germany-mulls-introducing-mosque-tax-for-muslims/a-46866041

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13711/germany-immigrants-prisons

[Crafty_Dog]

MONSTERS: British Government Rules Christianity Is Not a Religion of Peace, Refuses Convert Asylum
gellerreport.com/2019/03/uk-christianity-not-religion-of-peace.html/
By Pamela Geller - on March 23, 2019 March 23, 2019

The UK government “has claimed Christianity is not a religion of peace “after refusing a Christian convert’s bid for asylum in an ‘unbelievably offensive’” letter quoting passages from the Bible. While stepping and fetching for the most brutal and extreme ideology on the face of the earth, banning those of us who stand against jihad terror and sharia oppression, abandoning a million non-Muslim British tweens to Muslim child sex trafficking gangs — now this. They have turned a corner and gone over to the dark side.

Where is the Queen, defender of the faith? Surely they are sending this brave soul to his death. Imagine, the UK government cited the Bible in a breathtaking denial of reality. Have they ever approached the horror and hate speech in the Quran? No one is killing in the name of Jesus Christ, but millions are being slaughtered in the name of Allah. Especially apostates.

British Government Rules Christianity Is Not a Religion of Peace, Rejects Convert
By Jack Montgomery, Breitbart News, March 23, 2019:

The Home Office has rejected the asylum application of a Christian convert from Iran who said they had been drawn to the faith by its peaceful nature, due to a Government official ruling that Christianity is not peaceful.

The applicant indicated that they had converted to Christianity from Islam because of its peaceful nature, stating that “In Islam there is violence, rage and revenge. In Christianity in the contrary it is talking about peace, forgiveness and kindness.”

This earned the ire of the Home Office bureaucrat or bureaucrats charged with assessing the application, the Times reports.
The official cobbled together six passages from the King James Version and New International Version of the Old and New Testaments — such as Matthew 10:34, in which Christ proclaims he “came not to send peace, but a sword” — in an effort to prove that the applicant’s view of Christianity was wrong, and that Christian scripture is in fact “filled with imagery of revenge, destruction, death and violence”.

“These examples are inconsistent with your claim that you converted to Christianity after discovering it is a ‘peaceful’ religion, as opposed to Islam which contains violence, rage and revenge,” the rejection letter to the applicant admonishes passive-aggressively; an implicit ruling that Christianity is not peaceful — certainly not relative to Islam — and indeed is so clearly not peaceful that the Home Office does not consider perceived peacefulness a credible reason for conversion.

“I am extremely concerned that a Government department could determine the future of another human being based on such a profound misunderstanding of the texts and practices of faith communities,” commented Paul Butler, Bishop of Durham for the Church of England.

“To use extracts from the Book of Revelation to argue that Christianity is a violent religion is like arguing that a Government report on the impact of Climate Change is advocating drought and flooding,” he added.

The United Kingdom is, at least nominally, a Christian country, with the Queen also serving as the Supreme Governor of the established Church of England, and charged with defending the Protestant faith by her Coronation Oath.

Meanwhile the Islamic Republic of Iran is, as the name would suggest, officially Islamic, with a religious cleric acting as Supreme Leader.   Conversion from the state religion of Islam to Christianity in Iran is officially deemed as “apostasy” — a criminal offence which is punishable by death.
==================================================================

Robert Spencer: Freedom of Speech Dead in UK as London’s Muslim Mayor Defends Arrest of Christian Preacher
gellerreport.com/2019/03/spencer-speech-london.html/
By Robert Spencer - on March 23, 2019 March 23, 2019

How much has Britain deteriorated as a free society? This much: a Christian preacher from Nigeria, Oluwole Ilesanmi, recently discovered that preaching Christianity in public is illegal in London, because it offends Muslims. And London’s Muslim mayor has defended the arrest of Ilesanmi, saying that “there are limitations” on the freedom of speech.

Ilesanmi was arrested on February 23 while he was preaching, after a Muslim complained to police. A London activist, Ambrosine Shitrit, filmed the arrest. She explained what happened in an interview with CBN News: “A man with a hoodie was trying to humiliate, to be aggressive towards this Christian street preacher. I could see that he was a Muslim man because he was talking about, ‘No. Allah is the right way.’”

The Muslim who was harassing Ilesanmi was not arrested. Ilesanmi was. A police officer asked him, “What are you doing here?”

“I am preaching,” Ilesanmi answered.

The police officer responded: “You’re preaching. I am going to require you to go away.” To that, Ilesanmi said: “You can never.”
“Okay,” said the police officer, “then I will arrest you for breach of peace.” When Ilesanmi asked him how he was breaching the peace, the officer replied: “What you’re doing. You’re causing problems, you’re disturbing people’s day and you’re breaching their peace.”

Ambrosine Shitrit explains: “Nobody was offended by the preaching, nobody. Nobody was offended and nobody came to see what was happening.”

Andrea Williams of the Christian Legal Centre, which is working with Ilesanmi on his case, explained: “This was completely an overreach of their authority. There was no basis upon which to arrest the pastor - they did know clearly what happened because it’s caught on the camera. There was no proper investigation. They arrested him for Islamophobia which isn’t an offense and certainly there was no evidence that he was Islamophobic or racist.”

London’s Muslim mayor, Sadiq Khan, thought this arrest was just fine. According to Christian Today, Khan was asked about the arrest of Ilesanmi during Mayor’s Question Time at the London Assembly on March 21. Instead of saying that he thought the arrest was appalling and gratuitous, and defending the freedom of speech in general and Ilesanmi’s right to preach Christianity in particular, Khan said with studied blandness: “I expect the police to take this matter seriously.”  He added: “It’s always been clear that freedom of speech is critical and must be protected but also the police must be able to investigate when allegations are made of a criminal offence.”

The possible “criminal offense” in Ilesanmi’s case is “Islamophobia” or offending a Muslim, which are criminal offenses according to Sharia, but not illegal in Britain – at least not officially.

This is in a London that has become so unsafe that Somali Muslim migrants are actually sending their children back to war-torn Mogadishu in order to keep them out of harm’s way. Crime rates are skyrocketing in Khan’s London, and Khan’s police are devoting time and attention not to stopping knife crime and making the city safe again, but making sure that Muslims don’t have to suffer hearing the sound of Christian preaching.

And when Khan was asked whether Christians could preach in London without risking arrest, he answered: “There’s not an unlimited right to freedom of expression or free speech. There are limitations and there’s a balance that needs to be done. But I’m quite clear in my own views – we should go as far as we can to uphold that really important principle [of free speech] and that includes discourse about religion.”

If there are any limits to the freedom of speech other than prohibitions on open calls for violence and criminal activity, then there is no freedom of speech at all. And if there is no freedom of speech, there is no longer a free society. Muslims complained about Oluwole Ilesanmi’s preaching, and now it is official: Muslims in Britain are a protected class whose wishes must be catered to in all circumstances.

As long as that principle goes unchallenged, Britain will continue to race toward its own ruin.

Robert Spencer is the director of Jihad Watch and a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. He is author of the New York Times bestsellers The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) and The Truth About Muhammad. His new book is The History of Jihad From Muhammad to ISIS herehere.

[Crafty_Dog]

https://gellerreport.com/2019/03/hungary-refugee-isis.html/

[Crafty_Dog]

A high level Paris LEO friend tells me the Notre Dame fire was truly a terrible accident.

OTOH, it is not like suspicions were implausible-- this from 2+ years ago:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/sep/09/cell-of-french-women-radicalised-by-isis-behind-failed-notre-dame-attack?fbclid=IwAR3YxIYM9jrH6sVGipAnB5z_9EwJFHQaYXRLOvSiiAQaXQDCZqfjmcrIZ9Q

More recently:

https://www.breitbart.com/faith/2019/03/20/twelve-french-churches-attacked-vandalized-in-one-week/?fbclid=IwAR3JS8hSbbmelQiAHhGP_jctbDtZ0fCu08Ft78zeVDAMfptyjpPRIDOmTg4

[Crafty_Dog]

The unfortunate truth is that the ruling class and its pravdas, in the name of preventing Islamophobia, are perfectly willing to squash the search for Truth.  Just as unfortunately, this can lead to conspiracy theories.

Which is, unfortunately, where we find ourselves with regard to the Notre Dame fire:

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-04-24/burning-notre-dame-and-destruction-christian-europe?fbclid=IwAR08f7CJAwX57UGrf-ZA60rNBQlCvXwgVsdwgOA_RF7uxGR0iXnb3IZ84kw

https://www.sott.net/article/411378-Chief-architect-of-Notre-Dame-We-installed-new-detection-system-in-2010-and-completely-rewired-the-cathedral-so-the-fire-wasnt-caused-by-electrical-short-circuit?fbclid=IwAR1R2I8dkAMa9p7qg61eVOod0Xaw4mbkcSKpF2sTFDC23wBu0g_Lgo8ctk8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRoilgJ4qI8&fbclid=IwAR3Kr-brUDrZacCdCf5G6IdLXGLFdPitsf_LhFDlb7fjEYfOJanwPcYI36U

[G M]

You do of course realize that "conspiracy theory" is a construct used to attack anyone who questions the official narrative. Funny how the French govt. knew it was an accidental fire before even the most basic investigation could be conducted.

The unfortunate truth is that the ruling class and its pravdas, in the name of preventing Islamophobia, are perfectly willing to squash the search for Truth.  Just as unfortunately, this can lead to conspiracy theories.

Which is, unfortunately, where we find ourselves with regard to the Notre Dame fire:

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-04-24/burning-notre-dame-and-destruction-christian-europe?fbclid=IwAR08f7CJAwX57UGrf-ZA60rNBQlCvXwgVsdwgOA_RF7uxGR0iXnb3IZ84kw

https://www.sott.net/article/411378-Chief-architect-of-Notre-Dame-We-installed-new-detection-system-in-2010-and-completely-rewired-the-cathedral-so-the-fire-wasnt-caused-by-electrical-short-circuit?fbclid=IwAR1R2I8dkAMa9p7qg61eVOod0Xaw4mbkcSKpF2sTFDC23wBu0g_Lgo8ctk8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRoilgJ4qI8&fbclid=IwAR3Kr-brUDrZacCdCf5G6IdLXGLFdPitsf_LhFDlb7fjEYfOJanwPcYI36U

[Crafty_Dog]

"According to the data gathered, which was reported on by left-leaning French newspaper Le Figaro, 753 people were killed in terror attacks across Europe from 2000 to 2018.

"The figures also include a further 1115 European victims who were killed abroad by jihadists.

"91 per cent of these victims were killed by Muslim extremists, with just 14 victims being killed by right-wing extremists and 13 by left-wing extremists, as well as one killed by an animal rights extremist."

[Crafty_Dog]

https://gellerreport.com/2019/05/doctor-who-faces-inquiry-for-treating-a-muslim-child-says-he-will-quit-after-23-years-as-a-gp-due-to-the-major-injustice-of-the-investigation.html/

[G M]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7077943/Bodybuilding-steroids-did-not-make-London-Bridge-attackers-aggressive-inquest-hears.html#comments

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.algemeiner.com/2017/07/07/muslim-extremists-are-main-perpetrators-of-antisemitic-violence-in-europe-major-norwegian-academic-study-concludes/?fbclid=IwAR1-SXzwvS36DMcOJ--FrdhkDSHJROYeWZS5FdimsC5psdFRbXnPM7jc4TE

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.jpost.com/Diaspora/Antisemitism/Merkel-refuses-to-outlaw-Hezbollah-snubbing-German-Jews-after-kippah-row-591169?fbclid=IwAR2xSzJaDD-62Bn4MeOB2Uq1GnqEYAJEa6mH81U7xk1Y4pZRmg_7QdxqL_M

[DougMacG]

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2019/11/11/as-bombings-spread-denmark-closes-border-with-sweden/

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) – Denmark will temporarily reinstate border controls with Sweden and step up police work along the border after a series of violent crimes and explosions around Copenhagen that Danish authorities say were carried out by perpetrators from Sweden.
The checks, which start Tuesday for six months, will take place at the Oresund Bridge between Copenhagen and the Swedish city of Malmo and also at ferry ports.

Lene Frank of Denmark’s National Police said there will be both random and periodic checks of people crossing the border and officers will focus “particularly on cross-border crime involving explosives, weapons and drugs.”
---------------------------

"Swedish city of Malmo" is a majority "immigrant" city. 

[Crafty_Dog]

https://israelunwired.com/muslims-chant-death-threats-to-jews-at-rally-in-sweden/

[G M]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-50339977?

Unexpectedly!

[DougMacG]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-50339977?

Unexpectedly!

Same story, more coverage of it.  Let me know if the "criminal gang" problems in Malmo Sweden fall under anything other than our discussion of 'Islam in Europe'.  Swedish police and media don't like to tie ethnicity or religion to "crime" which is really terror.

https://quillette.com/2019/11/15/abandoning-malmo-to-its-criminals/
https://www.dailywire.com/news/how-muslim-migration-made-malmo-sweden-crime-michael-qazvini

Bernie says, make the US more like Sweden and Denmark while Sweden is becoming more like Syria and Denmark is building a wall.  Vote Bernie and his ideas down and add Sweden to the 'travel ban' list.

[G M]

Oh, I'm sure it's just Sven and Olaf that have suddenly taken to bomb building and gun crime. Magic soil in europe and the US ensures that all immigrants (legal and otherwise) leave all their 3rd world pathologies behind!

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-50339977?

Unexpectedly!

Same story, more coverage of it.  Let me know if the "criminal gang" problems in Malmo Sweden fall under anything other than our discussion of 'Islam in Europe'.  Swedish police and media don't like to tie ethnicity or religion to "crime" which is really terror.

https://quillette.com/2019/11/15/abandoning-malmo-to-its-criminals/
https://www.dailywire.com/news/how-muslim-migration-made-malmo-sweden-crime-michael-qazvini

Bernie says, make the US more like Sweden and Denmark while Sweden is becoming more like Syria and Denmark is building a wall.  Vote Bernie and his ideas down and add Sweden to the 'travel ban' list.

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15159/islamophobia-political-weapon

[G M]

https://gatesofvienna.net/2019/11/dont-hurt-me-im-dutch/

C'mon magic soil! Make everyone nice!

[DougMacG]

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15198/norway-pakistan

Fourteen Years after Cartoon Crisis, Norway again Knuckles Under to Islam

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15248/sweden-confronting-reality

[G M]

https://summit.news/2019/12/19/muslim-police-officer-hired-to-promote-diversity-ends-up-being-part-of-grooming-gang/

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.newsweek.com/migrants-europe-violence-crime-germany-study-770105

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15366/europe-anti-christian-attacks

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15448/france-jews-murder

[Crafty_Dog]

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15414/sweden-welfare-crisis

[DougMacG]

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15414/sweden-welfare-crisis

I remember being (properly) questioned for putting a Swedish immigration story in our healthcare thread.  Open borders?  Generous welfare state?  Choose one, or neither, never both.

Question for the Left, Sander et al:  Is Sweden better off without the (unassimilated) immigrants, better off without the welfare state, or better off bankrupt?  [And why do you want that here?]

[G M]

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15414/sweden-welfare-crisis

I remember being (properly) questioned for putting a Swedish immigration story in our healthcare thread.  Open borders?  Generous welfare state?  Choose one, or neither, never both.

Question for the Left, Sander et al:  Is Sweden better off without the (unassimilated) immigrants, better off without the welfare state, or better off bankrupt?  [And why do you want that here?]

Think of all the jobs created for Bomb Techs and Forensic Nursing Sexual Assault Examiners!

[Crafty_Dog]

Dutch Museum Debates Censoring Degas Work to Avoid Muslim Offense
by Abigail R. Esman
Special to IPT News
February 18, 2020
https://www.investigativeproject.org/8308/dutch-museum-debates-censoring-degas-work-to