Europe appears reluctant to embrace its Muslim communities, reveals Magda El-Ghitany "In most of Europe, Muslims are made to feel that they do not truly belong," Imam Abdul-Jalil Sajid, chairman of the UK-based Muslim Council for Religious and Racial Harmony, told the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) conference on "Anti-Semitism and Other Forms of Intolerance" in June. "They feel they are not accepted, let alone welcomed ... they are seen as 'an enemy within' or a 'fifth column' ... they feel that they are under constant siege," he added. Now "the words 'Muslim', 'asylum seeker', 'refugee' and 'immigrant' become synonymous and interchangeable ... in popular imagination." According to Sajid, when the UK Home Office launched a campaign to highlight the alleged dishonesty of asylum seekers, it chose to focus public attention on Muslims. The poster read: "Ali did not tell us his real name or his true nationality. He was arrested and sent to prison for 12 months." This sentence was reproduced in five languages, each connected with a Muslim country. Only in small print would one learn that the case cited had nothing to do with asylum regulations. Sajid also cited e-mails that the Muslim Council itself received after 11 September 2001: "Have you heard the saying 'crocodile tears', well in my opinion your sentiments of sympathy regarding the attacks in New York are exactly that ... Your kind knows nothing but force. Well you've sown the seed, now reap the whirlwind, you have woken us up to what you all stand for." Another threatened: "The rest of the world will now join to smash the filthy disease infested Islam ... you must be removed from Britain in body bags. Hope you like the bombs, payback for your satanic religion." One received in February 2003 simply stated, "We know where to find you." Indeed, the majority of the 20 million Muslims of Europe -- most of which arrived after WWII to work in labour markets -- are perceived by the European continent as outlanders. According to representatives of Islamic European bodies approached by Al-Ahram Weekly and a number of recently released international reports, there is a two-way psychological barrier separating the majority of Europe's Muslims and the mainstream of European societies. Muslims are perceived as a backward community whose religion is incompatible with Western values. Indeed, Sam Vaknin -- former economic adviser to the government of Macedonia -- in the online magazine Global Politician labelled Europe's Muslims as "Europe's new Jews". The segregation Muslims have been confronting is mainly due to the "exceptionality of Islam" policy that European governments have been applying, Professor Jocelyne Cesari, research associate at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Harvard University, and coordinator of the European Commission's Network on Comparative Research on Islam and Muslims in Europe (NOCRIME), told the Weekly. Such governments have been dealing with Islam using "special, harsh measures" as its centrality to Muslims' lives has been perceived as colliding with European secular values. "Islam is simply a religion. There is nothing exceptional or radical about it," Cesari said. Further, there remains fear that Europe's social climate might dramatically change given recurrently high birthrates among Muslims, which "will [make Europe] a majority of Muslims by the end of the 21st century", according to Orientalist Bernard Lewis. Making matters worse, 11 September and the 7 July London bombings came, which "accelerated" pre-existing "negative attitudes towards Islam and Muslims". It is "unbelievable how Islam is slandered, not only by extremist groups, but also by moderate parties, intellectuals and journalists," Cesari notes. Ahmed Jaballah, director of the Federation of Islamic Organisations in Europe, believes that the September attacks led Europeans to "perceive moderate Muslims as extremists". Muslims became the target of different forms of religiously motivated harassment. "Islamophobia topped the mainstream," Jaballah told the Weekly. The 2005 report of the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF) -- a non-governmental organisation that has consultative status at the UN and the Council of Europe -- on "Intolerance and Discrimination against Muslims in the EU" backs up the claim, covering 11 EU countries: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and the UK. The report noted that attacks on Muslims markedly increased following attacks that took place in the name of Islam, especially the slaying of Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh and the March 2004 Madrid bombings. The social climate in which Muslims of Europe live differs, both between and within countries. It is noteworthy that, according to secretary-general of the European Islamic Council, Adli Abu Hajar, many European states began to "put more money" in Muslim districts to enhance their quality of life, as far as public services are concerned. European bodies also, after 11 September, began to establish a dialogue with Muslim communities in order to genuinely comprehend Islam. Yet, concurrently, almost all governments of the 11 EU countries highlighted in the IHF report pursued security policies to combat "religious extremism". While implementing new policies, governments tied security and terror with -- specifically -- Muslim immigration. Being viewed as a threat to the stability of societies, it thus became more common to publicly "express hostility against Muslims in the post-11 September period ... to use intolerant language against Muslims in a way that was not previously acceptable", like publicly linking Islam with violence and oppression of women. Muslims, therefore, face daily preexisting prejudices held against them. They have experienced "growing distrust" in their interaction with the majority, "and have felt growing pressure to justify their beliefs" and to "distance themselves from terrorism". In the UK, for example, many Muslims were arrested under anti- terrorism laws, "but only very few of them were really involved in crimes related to terrorism", Ahmed Versi, editor of the British Muslim News, told the Weekly . According to the IHF report, 64 per cent of Muslims interviewed in the UK said that they were "unfairly targeted by counter-terrorism policies". In Germany, thousands of Muslims have been screened only because "their profiles have matched basic criteria, including an affiliation with Islam", the IHF report states. Jaballah confirms that a large number of mosques have been raided in Germany, "with soldiers entering without taking off their footwear -- contrary to Islam's regulations". Meanwhile, right wing parties have deftly exploited European fears. They gained wide popularity in advocating anti- immigration policies that would "oblige immigrants to adapt to [European life]". The French Front National, for example, according to the IHF report, stated publicly that France's Muslims "share an allegiance to a wider community of believers that threatens national sovereignty". Right-wingers in Sweden warn of a "Muslim invasion". Aside from security fears, Europe's Muslims confront discrimination in labour markets, health care systems, housing, and in building mosques. According to Versi, those who carry Muslim names are unlikely to get employed, unlike those who have Christian or Jewish names. "Mohamed, a British national, applied for a vacancy and was not accepted. Then he reapplied for the same job but identified himself as Jacob and he was promptly accepted," Versi said. According to the IHF report, Muslims in Sweden, Denmark and Austria are encountering similar barriers. In Sweden, Muslims are advised to change their names to "Swedish- sounding ones" to enhance their chances in getting employed. In Denmark and Austria, the report reveals, Muslim women wearing headscarves are less likely to find a place in the labour market. According to Jaballah, the number of mosques has greatly increased in Europe -- France now sports 1600 mosques alone. Muslims in certain countries, however, have experienced difficulty in building mosques. It has been frequently stated in Denmark and the Netherlands that mosques with minarets are "incompatible with the [countries'] architectural landscape". In Germany, citizens organised several movements to oppose the building of new mosques. Muslims, according to the IHF report, gather to pray in apartments or basements. Adli Abu Hajar told the Weekly that the Greek Orthodox Church has so far opposed the establishment of mosques in Athens. The IHF report also indicates that throughout the 11 EU countries studied, media have played a role in reinforcing perceptions that Muslims are "alien and dangerous" in using terms like "Islamic terrorists". In doing so, an "us and them" difference has been established between Muslims and the rest of the society. According to the IHF report, Muslim organisations in Denmark, France and the UK have observed that media coverage tends to enhance prejudices against Muslims through the use of "sensationalist" headlines and photographs and giving greater airtime to extremist versions of Islam over more moderate ones. "The newspapers and TV news would give enormous amount of space and airtime to people like Abu Hamza, and do not seek moderate voices. He is a nothing figure in the Muslim community ... Young Muslims are not particularly attracted to his teachings," said Versi. Why would Western media focus on Hamza? "It is Islamophobia," Versi concludes. Of all places, it has been the liberal-minded Netherlands where Muslims became targets of dozens of religiously motivated attacks. Tensions passed boiling point following the murder of the Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh. Van Gogh directed a film on the treatment of women in Islam. The film, entitled Submission, presented a naked woman with verses of The Holy Qur'an on her body. Van Gogh was murdered on 2 November 2004 by a Moroccan-Dutch Muslim. Following his visit to the Netherlands in May, Ambassador Omur Orhun, personal representative of the chairman-in-office of the OSCE on Combating Intolerance and Discrimination Against Muslims, stated that "there is a problem in Holland as far as tolerance and non-discrimination is concerned." A 2004 report by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, entitled "An Uncertain Road: Muslims and the Future of Europe," on Van Gogh's death -- which came two years after the killing of sociologist Pim Fortuyn, who had described Islam as "backward and incompatible with modern Western values" -- led Dutch Deputy Prime Minister Geritt Zalm to announce that "the Netherlands will step up the fight and make sure radical Islamists will disappear." Muslims in the Netherlands were reportedly subject to 106 violent incidents from 2-30 November 2004 alone, which, according to the IHF report, included "verbal abuse, intimidation, graffiti, physical violence, vandalism, bomb attacks at mosques and Muslims' schools, and arson". Following Van Gogh's death, Versi noted, "there was a girl wearing a headscarf while on a bus in Amsterdam, and she had a glass smashed on her head by a young man. No one tried to intervene. The bus driver did not stop to see what was going on." Meanwhile, a recent survey demonstrated that 80 per cent of the Dutch population favours harsher measures for ensuring integration, while the popularity of Geert Wilders, a former Liberal Party member who has described Islam as "retarded", sky-rocketed. Such discrimination forms led IHF executive director Aaron Rhodes to warn: "these developments threaten to undermine positive efforts at integration and further increase the vulnerability of Muslims to human rights violations and marginalisation". IHF thus recommends that EU government "enhance efforts to prosecute and punish discriminatory and violent acts". The extent to which Muslims are integrating in European societies has been the subject of heated debate. Some parties -- in Germany for example -- warn that Muslims are forming "parallel societies" that do not adhere to the values adopted by the "lead culture" of European states. According to Robert S Leiken in an article published in Foreign Affairs, the means through which European states attempt to augment Muslim integration differs from one country to another. While countries like the UK adopted "multiculturalism" -- where people of different cultural and ethnic backgrounds live peacefully within the same society -- which allowed it "to seem tolerant" by "showering minorities with rights while segregating them from, rather than absorbing them into, the rest of the society", other countries like France favoured assimilation, making Muslims full French citizens. Both strategies failed to a great extent. As a result, according to Leiken, Europe has yet "to develop an integration policy that works". This, he adds, will "not happen over night." Perhaps "European Islam", a school of thought adopted by prominent intellectual Tarek Ramadan, grandson of Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan El-Banna, may provide guidelines towards integration. According to Ramadan, one can be both a loyal Muslim and a full European citizen. "Loyalty to one's faith ... requires firm and honest loyalty to one's country; [Islamic law] requires honest citizenship," Ramadan states in his book To be a European Muslim. Such a blend can happen, he noted, if Muslims neither lose their identity through assimilation nor reject European values and thus separate themselves from the societies in which they live. Cesari believes that integration is a two-way process that involves commitment on both sides. "Muslims have a duty to reveal the genuine tolerant face of Islam, to show its diversity and reveal to the world that an intellectual as Mohamed Abdou is the best example for a modern thinker." On the other hand, "now is the time to merge Islam into European culture; to insert its culture in Europe's educational curricula." Ramadan holds similar beliefs: "It is important for us as Muslims to be unambiguous that we respect the law and the secular [European] framework," he said. But "Europeans also must start considering Islam as a European religion."
