Amidst Rising Anti-Muslim Policies: The Presence of Muslims Might be the Greatest Gift to European Societies

News:

After a successful campaign by Hizb ut Tahrir in Denmark during the month of August, aimed at Muslim students in the Danish high schools to stand firmly by their Islamic identity, after having been the subject of much political stigmatization for practicing basic Islamic acts such as the prayer, fasting Ramadan, and wearing the Islamic headscarf, politicians across the parliamentary spectrum reacted with open anti-Muslim sentiments. The Minister of Integration, Morten Bødskov, stated unequivocally that “dark Islamic values have no place in Denmark” and “preaching these values is dangerous”!

Parallel to the political fallout and massive debate in the media, nationalists and far-right activists staged a public rally in Copenhagen where some participants openly called for a ban on Islam and performed nazi salutes in front of bystanders.

Comment:

Events in the past month in Denmark are but part of a larger trend across Europe of rising anti-Muslim policies and sentiments expressed by segment of the populations, radicalized by the very same policies and hostile anti-Islamic propaganda they have been fed for decades. In the German state of Saxony-Anhalt, the far-right “Alternative for Germany” (AfD) won a landslide victory securing 43.8% of the vote. Recently in Austria, Chancellor Christian Stocker and Integration Minister Claudia Bauer have been pushing for a constitutional ban on “political Islam”. Meanwhile, the French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen has reiterated her proposal to impose economic fines on women wearing the Islamic headscarf in French public spaces.

These examples hardly require further explanation or analysis to realize that they are an expression of a deep intellectual crisis in Europe – an ideological decay. The Western secular system has shown clearly that it is deeply plagued by hypocrisy and contradictions at its very core, when all claimed principles of freedom and tolerance crumble to dust at the first real ideological clash with steadfast Muslims. While having had all opportunities to convince the Muslim communities in Europe of their culture and values, European governments across the continent now find themselves helpless and desperate when confronted by the fact that even after living in the West for several generations, Muslims stand firmly and proudly by their Islamic identity and values. Unable to provide arguments to match the solid intellectual basis of Islam, and unable to convince the Muslims that neither a culture ridden with crises on all levels nor “values” that condone genocide and settler-colonialism are in any way attractive, when Muslims carry in their hearts and minds the merciful message of Muhammad (saw) for all mankind. Thus, they turn to the age-old European disciplines of thought control, forced assimilation, bans, stigmatization, racism and fearmongering.

The far-right monster rearing its hateful head across the West is of their own making, and it is the European governments that bear the responsibility for the hatred and conflict they have meticulously sown. Meanwhile, the Muslims living in the West, especially the youth, increasingly flock to Islam and carry it as a message of mercy and a viable alternative to the genocidal, misanthropic ideology visible through crumbling façade of Western civilization.

Provided that they stand firmly by their Islamic identity and values, and carry Islam as a global message with awareness, strength, and wisdom, the presence of Muslim population groups in Europe will be the greatest gift to European societies and populations, whose governments lead them with deceit and hatred from one crisis to another.