Militant Islam Monitor > Articles > Eurabia as geographical entity : Europeans fear Muslim rioting will erupt in their countries too
Eurabia as geographical entity : Europeans fear Muslim rioting will erupt in their countries too
November 6, 2005
In a 1995 article entitled "Muslim France" Dr. Daniel Pipes predicted:
"...Future of the country. Beyond these specific problems, some French believe the very nature of their country to be in play. One prominent journalist in Paris told me he thinks that France may change from what it is into an Arab and Muslim country in the course of the next century. How so? He pointed to two main trends, the demographic and the political. The French, like almost all modern peoples, are not sustaining their own population even as the nearby North Africans have one of the highest rates of reproduction in the world. Over time, he holds, the North Africans will ineluctably fill the vacuum in France.
Secondly, there's the matter of will. As a post-Christian country, he sees the French lacking the will to maintain their own against the powerful wishes of the Muslim immigrants. As the latter population gains in numbers and sophistication, he sees a real possibility of French civilization drying up and the country fundamentally changing course...." http://www.danielpipes.org/article/272 (complete article below).
MIM: Muslim France 2005:
"...Evreux mayor Jean-Louis Debre, a Chirac confidant who is speaker of the Lower House of Parliament, told reporters at the scene: "A hundred people have smashed everything and strewn desolation. Well, they don't form part of our universe..."
"...Authorities say the rolling nightly riots are being organised via the Internet and mobile phones, and have pointed the finger at drug traffickers and Islamic militants..."http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=81512
French riots spread wider; Chirac summons ministers
By Elisabeth Pineau and Brian RohanPARIS (Reuters) - France's urban riots reached a new peak in their 10th night as petrol bombings spread from Paris's run-down suburbs to the centre of the capital and began to unnerve neighbouring countries.
President Jacques Chirac summoned his security, social affairs and finance ministers to an emergency meeting at 1700 GMT to plot a response after 1,300 vehicles were destroyed in the latest night of chaos -- a new high.
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| A French fireman runs as smoke rises from the burnt out buildings of a commercial centre in Evreux, 96 km west of Paris, early November 6, 2005. Urban violence scaled new heights in France as gangs of youths torched cars, shops and firms in the 10th straight night of violence in poor suburbs of Paris and provincial towns (REUTERS/Franck Prevel) |
Aides said Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin would make "concrete proposals" on tackling tough neighbourhoods this week.
Rioting began 10 days ago with the accidental electrocution of two youths apparently fleeing police. Their deaths ignited frustration among ethnic minorities over racism, unemployment, police treatment and their marginal place in French society.
"This is too much, stop! Stop, do something else, but not this, not violence," sobbed a woman in Evreux, a normally quiet town in rural Normandy where a shopping mall, 50 vehicles, a post office and two schools were destroyed overnight.
"My wife's out of a job now," fumed another resident. "I've two kids, a house to pay for and a car loan. What do I do now?"
1,300 CARS BURN
Across France, 1,300 vehicles went up in flames. For the first time, more than 30 were destroyed inside the city walls of Paris. Previously quiet towns such as Dreux, to the west, and the city of Nantes were also affected.
Authorities say drug traffickers and Islamist militants are helping to organise the unrest, via the Internet and mobile phones, among the North and black African immigrant communities who make up a significant part of many poor suburban housing estates.
Police have drafted 2,300 extra officers to tackle the unrest in the capital, and seven helicopters buzzed over the region through the night, filming disturbances and directing mobile squads to incidents.
Officers made 349 arrests, including six youths who had manufactured a stock of 90 Molotov cocktails in a disused police building south of the capital.
The violence has tarnished France's image abroad, forcing Villepin to cancel a trip to Canada, while Russia and the United States have warned their citizens to avoid troubled suburbs.
Neighbouring Germany, too, has a large immigrant population, including over 3 million Muslims -- most of Turkish origin.
Wolfgang Bosbach, deputy leader of the conservative Christian Democrats in parliament, told a Sunday newspaper:
"There are differences between the situation in France and here, but we should not be under the illusion that similar events could not happen in Germany."
In Italy, opposition leader Romano Prodi called on the government to take urgent action, telling reporters:
"We have the worst suburbs in Europe. I don't think things are so different from Paris. It's only a question of time."
"FAILURE OF LEADERSHIP"
French Socialist Party leader Francois Hollande said the riots were a failure of government policy and leadership.
"Where is the president when such serious events are taking place?" he asked, noting Chirac had won re-election in 2002 by attacking the then-governing Socialists' record on law and order.
Jean-Marie Huet, a senior Justice Ministry official, said 160 people had been brought before the courts since the unrest started. Around 20 had been jailed, 30 others released on bail, and 50 minors had been brought before juvenile courts.
Communist and Green Party officials demanded one symbolic measure, the resignation of Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, who is challenging to replace Chirac in 2007.
Sarkozy, accused by opponents of stoking the unrest by calling troublemakers "scum", maintained his tough line on Saturday, saying the government stood by its demand for an end to the violence.
"Those who commit such actions will have to account for them before the law," he told reporters.
A poll published on Sunday indicated his public image was holding up, even if many disapproved of his language.
Villepin also has ambitions to be the right wing's presidential candidate in 2007 and has tried to position himself as a much more consensual figure than Sarkozy. The effect on the crisis on his ratings is still unclear.
(Additional reporting by Astrid Wendlandt in Paris and Paul Carrel in Evreux)
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http://www.danielpipes.org/article/272
Muslim France
by Daniel Pipes
Middle East Forum Wire
October 1, 1995
With eight bombings or attempting bombings in three months, France is convulsing over the problems of terrorism, fundamentalist Islam, and Algeria. During a recent trip to France, spent in Paris and at the Riviera, this writer had an opportunity to concentrate on the Middle Eastern dimension of life in that country. What's happening there will probably come as a surprise to most Americans.
Problems. With a population of over three million Muslims, about half of them citizens, France has the largest Islamic presence of any country in Western Europe, both absolute and relative. Of this number, some 90 percent have North African origins (Algeria especially, followed by Morocco and Tunisia). In addition, France suffers particularly acutely from several problems.
(1) The Muslims live more concentratedly together in what the French call the "suburbs of Islam." In part, this reflects a characteristically European difference from the United States: whereas here the affluent and the middle class have virtually abandoned the city for the suburbs (in order to have more space), in France and most of Europe, the well-off have stayed in the city (wanting to travel less). This has relegated immigrants and other poor to dreary "suburbs" in the periphery of the cities. In the French case especially, Muslims tend to live isolated from others, creating their own subculture and building their own resentments.
(2) Muslims engage disproportionately in criminal activity, and mostly of a violent nature. Muslim youth gangs, not all that different from American gangs of the inner cities, for example, like their counterparts here, smash a stolen car into a luxury store, push aside the bewildered shopkeeper, and run off with the loot. It's gotten to the point that Arabs intimidate the French without specific reason. For example, the household I visited in the Riviera employs three gardeners, named Nabil, Ali, and Mustafa. Although one of the three has proven to be incompetent, the owners of the house dare not fire him, fearing retribution. When I asked if they knew of violence in other cases of dismissal, they said no, they simply had a bad feeling. Behind the idyllic appearance of the Côte d'Azur, in other words, lurk some quite powerful fears.
(3) Terrorism committed by Muslims takes place more often than elsewhere. One spasm of violence took place in 1986; another has occurred over the past three months, including attacks on a busy subway station and a Jewish school. The terror has prompted not only a massive manhunt (which led to a shootout and death of the apparently lead perpetrator) but a host of security measures. Public trash bins throughout Paris have been sealed tight (to prevent them from being used as bomb containers) and air travelers must run a gamut of physical and paper obstacles. The police set up impromptu road blocks here and there, causing traffic delays. Virtually every person I talked to agrees that the French population, famously ornery when it comes to authority, has accepted these inconveniences without complaint. This, they further agree, points to the widespread conviction that the country needs to protect itself.
Future of the country. Beyond these specific problems, some French believe the very nature of their country to be in play. One prominent journalist in Paris told me he thinks that France may change from what it is into an Arab and Muslim country in the course of the next century. How so? He pointed to two main trends, the demographic and the political. The French, like almost all modern peoples, are not sustaining their own population even as the nearby North Africans have one of the highest rates of reproduction in the world. Over time, he holds, the North Africans will ineluctably fill the vacuum in France.
Secondly, there's the matter of will. As a post-Christian country, he sees the French lacking the will to maintain their own against the powerful wishes of the Muslim immigrants. As the latter population gains in numbers and sophistication, he sees a real possibility of French civilization drying up and the country fundamentally changing course.
I checked out this astonishing prediction with others and found that while no one else put the case so strongly as did the journalist, no one entirely disagreed with him either. Rather, a wide agreement seems to exist that unless something changes, the historic French population will over the long term not be able to control the immigrant population. Needless to say, this prospect worries more than a few of the French.
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