Western Europe Fights Islamization

AN ARTICLE by Ryan Mauro, which listed European efforts to stop the encroachment of Sharia, and listed them all in one article, one after another, was like an inspiring tour de force. Check it out:

France took the first step in trying to stop the spread of Islam by banning any religious symbols from being worn in public schools, which included the headscarves worn by many Muslim women. This caused outrage in the Muslim world, and President Obama criticized it during his address in Cairo. Then in November, the Swiss voted in favor of banning the construction of minarets on mosques. This has sparked major movements on the continent to take further measures that would have been unthinkable a decade ago.

One by one, the countries of Europe are placing restrictions on wearing the burqas and niqabs in government buildings or even in public. In April, Belgium became the first of them to pass an all-encompassing ban, and the French Council of Ministers followed by passing a similar ban that the National Assembly has just approved. It is expected to pass the Senate in September and then be signed by President Sarkozy.

Now, the Senate in Spain has passed a motion calling on the government to completely ban the wearing of the veil in public, and several municipalities in Spain have also placed restrictions on the burqa, although the parliament of Catalonia has switched its initial vote in favor of a ban. The Senate’s motion went further than what the ruling Socialist government wanted, which only sought to stop the veils from being worn in public buildings. There are growing movements with varying success in Germany, Switzerland, Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands and Italy for placing restrictions on the face veils. A battle over Sharia courts should be expected in the coming years, which Norway is taking the lead on. The Foreign Minister, who is the head of a panel on integration, has just expressed his opposition to them, saying “desegregation is our society’s biggest social challenge.”

Political parties that express a hard line on assimilation and Islam are gaining in the polls. A new Poll poll found that bans on the face veils are supported by a strong majority of Western Europeans. Eighty-two percent of the French, 71 percent of the Germans, 62 percent of the British and 59 percent of the Spanish are in favor of such a law.

The Freedom Party of Geert Wilders came in third in last month’s general elections in the Netherlands, expanding their number of seats from nine to 24. Wilders rightfully said that his party was “the biggest winner today.”

Read the whole article (which is fully referenced): Europe's Backlash Against Islamization.

Swiss Say No to a Concession For Islam

A Muslim man wanted his two sons to be exempt from mixed swimming classes (boys and girls in the same class), so he took it to court. The Swiss court ruled that it is more important to encourage equality between the sexes and to integrate into the society than it is to gratify religious considerations.

That's just beautiful, isn't it?

Muslims will not stop pressing for concessions. It is the free world that will have to say no. And in Switzerland, the court did just that. As Hege Storhaug, the co-founder of Human Rights Service in Norway, said: "All the time [Muslims] have special rules...We get a split-up society and Islam gets more presence in the public sphere...In the most extreme consequence it leads to the Islamization of society."

"All the time it's Muslims who come with special requirements," she says. "We never hear a peep from Catholics, Jews, Hindus etc."

Read the whole story: Mixed Swimming Worries Swiss Muslims.

European Citizen Warrior Heroes

From an article in USA Today:

• Supporters of the Swiss referendum collected enough signatures two weeks ago to call for a constitutional ban on minarets, the towers used to call worshipers to prayer.

• Italy's Interior Minister Roberto Maroni announced this month that he wants to close a Milan mosque because crowds attending Friday prayers spill onto the street and irritate neighbors. In April, the city of Bologna scrapped plans for a new mosque, saying Muslim leaders failed to meet certain requirements, including making public its source of funding.

• In Austria, the southern province of Carinthia passed a law in February that effectively bans the construction of mosques by requiring them to fit within the overall look and harmony of villages and towns.

• Far-right leaders from 15 European cities met in Antwerp, Belgium, in January and called for a ban on new mosques and a halt to "the Islamization" of European cities. The group said mosques act as catalysts for taking over neighborhoods and imposing Islamic ways of life on Europeans.

"We already have more than 6,000 mosques in Europe, which are not only a place to worship but also a symbol of radicalization, some financed by extreme groups in Saudi Arabia or Iran," Filip Dewinter, leader of a Flemish separatist party in Belgium, told Radio Netherlands Worldwide at the conference.