This is my 3rd article in the “Christianity in
decline?” series and this is one is about Islamisation
of the West. It is more obvious that with the actual trends, Islamic
populations in Europe can become a majority
within 20-30 years and in many western European cities and countries there is
already a bigger number of practicing Muslims than of practicing Christians. After I read the report of the Barnabas Fund on the islamisation
of the West, I decided to write on the issue.
“Islam entered Europe
twice and left it…Perhaps the next Conquest, Allah willing, will be by means of
preaching and ideology…Perhaps we will conquer these lands without armies (…)”
said Youssef el Qaradawi (head of the European Council for Fatwa and Research)
on Al Jazeera on the 24th of Jan. 1999.
“Islam entered Europe twice and left it” Well yes, Islam entered twice, both times with armies and
had to leave it, under pressure of Christian armies.
First they
entered Spain in the
beginning of the 8th century, arrived to France
and were defeated in Poitiers
in 732 AD. 2.5 centuries later Reconquista started on Iberian peninsula and finished by the end of
the 15th century. As Christian population was treated as slaves,
remaining Muslims were converted to Christianity or expulsed and mosques
transformed to Churches.
Then, from the
other side of Europe, Ottoman Turkish tribes became Muslim in the 9th
century and settled in Asia Minor , they became
a major power in the region by the end of the 13th century. The
lands once ruled by the Byzantine Empire
became consecutively under Ottomans’ rule. Turks entered Europe in the middle
of 14th century, in spite of many great victories by
Europeans, most of Southeast Europe had come under
Ottoman rule by the end of the 16th century. The unsuccessful siege
of Vienna in 1683 led to the visible weakening
of the Turks in Europe and the Crusaders liberated Buda (1686) and all of Central Europe many years later. Those who were converted
to Islam converted back to Christianity.
By the beginning of the 20th century, national
sentiments became stronger in the Balkans and most of Turkey's European territories were
lost but Constantinople (now Istanbul )
remained in Turkish hands as it is until this day.
Unfortunately, political interests were stronger than
religious solidarity for European leaders.
The Islamic regime itself was abolished in 1923. But, the
legacy of Islamic rule remained strong in many areas like Bosnia , Albania , the Caucasus and areas inhabited by Tatars, surrounding the Black
Sea .
“Perhaps the next
Conquest, Allah willing, will be by means of preaching and ideology…Perhaps we
will conquer these lands without armies”
Islam was weakened around World War I, a weak Islamic (Ottoman)
empire, Muslim countries under western colonization, socialist/communist
ideology spreading quickly among poor classes and pan-arabic movements starting
to spread in arab-speaking countries.
After World War II, Europeans decided to a make an economic
union in order to make war with each other impossible, the Old Continent was
devastated after the destructions of the war and the way of thinking and the
lifestyle changed by the 1960s. Religiosity diminished on average, women bore fewer
children as women’s role in the labor market increased.
Cheap workforce was needed; migrant workers came first from Italy and Yugoslavia then from Middle-eastern
countries and ex-colonies (common historical and linguistic ties). Turks went
to Germany , Algerians,
Moroccans and Africans to France, Indians, Pakistanis and Africans to the UK .
In the 1960s there were many hundreds of thousands of Muslims
in Western Europe , which was not a problem at
the time. Fertility was lowering but Europeans were still able to maintain the
growth of society, immigrants didn’t bring their families at the time and state welfare benefits were not so generous.
By the end of the 1960s, there are 2 dates that can be
considered as the beginning of a new era:
-1967: 3rd
Arab-Israeli war. Israel
defeated arab armies which were much larger in number of men and equipment and
this caused a huge public outrage within Arabic populations. The arab leaders
and even the arab military did not fight in a disciplined way.
By that time the people realized the Arab Nationalist idea is
unable to unify Arabic speaking nations and even unable to defeat a weak and
poor state like Israel
which was really weaker at the time.
This date can be considered as the new start of Political Islam’s
strengthening.
-1968: riots in France
against the traditional social model. Daniel Cohn-Bendit led a revolt which asked
for sexual freedoms and a better world as I mentioned
in my previous article.
By the turn of the millennium, the Soviet threat was no longer present,
Europeans had the opportunity to concentrate on economic growth and they saw
that immigration could solve demographic issue. With the introduction of the
single currency, there was a general conviction that there will be no wars anymore
and in many decades cultural and political unity will be obvious and
multicultural society, like that of the USA was an ideal anyway.
The difference is that immigration to Europe
was not a selected immigration, and rights
exceed duties, immigrants were encouraged to conserve their traditions and
customs rather than learn the language and habits of the host country.
Nowadays, the number of Muslims reached 5,5 million in France
only. In Europe their number became
around 30 million. The ratio of radicals within the community is relatively
much higher than in other communities and this is only one source for the
conflicts between them and the host societies.
The tensions between Muslim immigrants and local people and
the rise-up of extreme right movements in Europe
are because of many factors, many examples just for better understanding:
- Demographics: their number is growing much faster than
other communities because fertility of Muslim women is 2.5 times higher than
average women in
- Islamisation: hundreds of mosques are built in European
cities, many aided by the “non-confessional” state. Oil rich countries are funding
Islamic mission organisations to spread Islam among non-Muslims rather than
spend on their poor classes. They want to convert non-Muslims to their religion
and high, visible rate of women is wearing headscarf, many with hijab or niqab in the streets, a high number of men have beards or wear a djellaba, changing the image of the population in general. Muhammad has
become the most common name for newborn boys in
- Social: unemployment is becoming a bigger problem as cheap
workforce is employed rather than locals. In
- Security: in
- Lobby in politics: Muslims are influencing internal and
external politics of the host country. They are an important voter base as their number is
rising and they seem very determined. Many politicians, for example Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schröder campaigned for the accession of
Getting back to the
report, the islamisaton of the West is achieved the following way. Muslims are immigrating massively to the West, making more
children and converting non-Muslims with different means.
The extreme-left,
which is weakened after the fall of the Soviet Union
is finding a new ally in radical Islam
to fight Christianity and the market economy. They are common in their hatred of the USA . In the French presidential campaign in 2012, the Front de
Gauche, which built its campaign on social justice and “confiscation” of the
fortunes of the rich, has invited
radical islamists many times to its meetings.
Muslims have a mission:
what many converts see in Islam is that they have a struggle and fight for
their right (Palestine , Chechnya
They are building much more and much bigger mosques to show their self-confidence and their strength, extreme-right
and European radical movements often accuse Muslims of show of strength by the
aim of having more and bigger places of worship than Christians.
They want to introduce Islamic
Sharia as western societies became mostly hedonistic and based on consumption;
they see that their style of life is a solution to drug-consumption, alcoholism
and prostitution.
The Islamic groups are asking more openly the public to
accept their Sharia law, in East London there are some districts where radicals declared
Sharia to be the official source of laws (no to gambling, music or concerts,
prostitution and drugs).
As the western governments recognize these interpretations
of Sharia as representing all Islam, they are strengthening radicals and
weakening moderate Muslims.
Sharia courts are functioning in Britain
and being introduced to Belgium ,
they are operated from mosques and this shows the weakness of the national
“laic” arbitration system.
They are threatening free
speech and make a threat of violence, the situation here is similar to
radical secularists and LGBT organsiations as they require respect, tolerance
and objectivity but don’t always give it to others.
The fatwa against Salman Rushdie (1989) and the killing of
Theo Van Gogh (2004) show that radical Muslims represent a threat to all those
who openly speak out against them.They are a threat to freedom of religion, there were many
cases recently when converts
from Islam to Christianity were insulted and disadvantaged in several
fields.
Islamisation is
financed in many ways and from many parts:
- Individuals: Muslims donate more intensively as they use
mosques more frequently than Christians use churches. There are lots of cases in
the
- Islamic organisations: mostly charity organisations which are specialized to help the poor and women accepting to wear headscarf and spread Islamic teachings.
- Islamic States: lots of them are oil-rich, the
- Local councils: an example, Alain Juppé, the current
Foreign Affairs minister of France, also mayor of
- Western European countries: In 2004, Nicolas Sarkozy asked for state funding for mosques in spite of the Republic’s secularist status. According to a report, 30% of the money the mosques received each year, was given by the Government.
- Islamic finance: Islamic banking is as widespread in
They are taking over
education institutes and radical preachers are very active in western
universities. They ask for separate prayer rooms in schools and universities
and radical imams are let into universities, there are many
terrorists who studied
in western universities. Muslim girls are asked to wear Islamic dress.
Another issue related to this topic is the pressure on educational institutions to teach topics related to Islam in a way to give a
positive image on their religion. Governments, educators and publishers who
want to avoid being accused of racism and islamophobia often yield to such
requests.
Their isolation and separation is making their integration
and assimilation harder. There are many examples like the “gay-free zones” in
the UK and Kreuzberg in Berlin which was a city-part populated by labor class
and young leftists in the 1920s, today 80% of its half a million population is
from Turkey. In France ,
the banlieues can be considered as the ghettos of the unemployed 1st,
2nd or 3rd generation immigrants, islamisation
is spreading there the quickest.
And everything mentioned above is the islamisation of Europe only, I have previously written
on the persecution of Christians in the Islamic territories. Just to close the listing of examples I would like to
mention that the board of one of the most prestigious European football clubs, Real Madrid, decided to delete the cross from the logo of the football club to please Qatari investors
(officially Muslim fans).
As the Football World Cup in 2022 will be in Qatar: 'Will England ,
Sweden and Denmark have to choose between the
vertical or the horizontal line in their flag?', as a Hungarian blogger asked
in his article stating also that this can be considered “Re-reconquista”.
“Perhaps the next
Conquest, Allah willing, will be by means of preaching and ideology”
Well, it’s about ideology, preaching, money (maybe the most
important) and the identity crisis of Western Europe itself.
“Perhaps we will
conquer these lands without armies”
It seems very possible, but I guess there is a Christian
minority in Europe that has a mission to
counter this trend.
What would the resolution be?
“Who wants to avoid suffering, suffers twice”, according to
a proverb.
Many european leaders think that by bringing immigrants
inside their countries, they will assure the supply of cheap workforce to the economy and save
the pensions, this is irresponsibility. Many believe they have to let the immigrants into their
countries as colonized nations suffered a lot from colonization, this is a
widespread thinking in France which is partly true, but we have to know that
the number of locals (Arabs and Berbers) in Algeria for example was many
hundreds of thousands in 1830 and they were 9 million (!) in 1960. Most of the
infrastructure and monuments in the country were built by the French
and the Europeans. Europeans are really avoiding the responsibility after their
societies are ageing and unable to sustain the retirement system and many
others are accepting the fact the colonization had only bad effects and
Christianity was a tool
to keep people in slavery.
We Europeans have to get back our self-confidence, we have
to be proud of our past, of our history, ancestors and achievements and we have
to appreciate our religion and its Saints. We have to try to revive our older habits, respect of the
old people, marriage, help of the relatives and general solidarity.
Most immigrants come for better careers, higher standard of
living, but they don’t see Europeans have strong beliefs or identity; there are
too many divorces, drugs problems, prostitution and solitude, so they prefer to
conserve their habits rather then get integrated. Most Muslims are conserving their style of life, but Islamists require heavily from their entourage to get accommodated to their
beliefs and habits and this is unacceptable. They have to accommodate to our style of life, but we have
to respect our religion and past and they will see a positive example.
Funding of islamisation has to be stopped from the European states and institutions and from abroad and Muslims have to solve their
finances themselves as other communities do. That will diminish tensions.
Muslims have to realize they should not be advantaged even if their number will
double in 25 years. There are few statesmen who have the courage to take the
responsibility in this issue as lobbying is strong from inside Europe
and from abroad. But we have to be an organized and determined lobby group as well.
Europeans have to understand the question of identity. An
immigrant never becomes French or English or German if he arrives there older
than 18-20 and spends there 30-40 years or if he becomes a citizen. If only one
of the parents is european, the child will be half European. In the USA ,
99% of the population has a second identity after or before being American.
In France
there are no minorities, officially. An immigrant is officially named French if
he has the passport, there are hundreds of thousands of children who are born
in France and Germany
and don’t speak the language of the host state and don’t meet with the host
nationality except in school.
Finally, religion is part of the identity; this is something
leftists don’t want to hear or to understand. Another religion means different
habits, different holidays, different language of prayer, different role of the
Clergy and different meaning of life.
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