After the violent attacks – shocking details, European leaders are already changing the tone

Shocked by such barbarous violence, European leaders are changing the tone. But aren’t the militant statements just a phrase? Can we also expect a change in policy?

The first tenacious fight against Islamic radicalism was declared by French President Emmanuel Macron, for which he immediately received angry reactions and protests from Islamic states. And Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan not only saw insults against the French, but also accused him of Islamophobia.

However, according to Christof Schwennicke, editor of Cicero magazine, the Turkish president is only exposing himself, because then “part of Erdogan’s Islam is what happened in the streets and churches of France. A different logic will not explain such a reaction.”

Silent: for fear of being challenged by Islamophobia

Macron has not been criticized by representatives of the political left, who tend to explain the radicalization of Muslims in European countries mainly by inadequate policies of social integration and insufficient European ones.

Furthermore, according to the ideology of left-wing identity, Europeans do not even have the right to expect that Islam in Europe will adapt to the Western way of life.

Mr Macron is making the mistake of declaring a fight against Islamism or making a “new” Islam that suits his interests in France, “criticized Stefan Buchen, a journalist for the German public broadcaster, Quantara Dialogue. of with Islam.

Similar statements stem from fears of being accused of racism, said Judith Sevinç Basad, a publicist for German liberal Islam.

“Germany is so afraid of isolating Muslims that journalists are seizing on despotic propaganda that curses Macrono’s resistance to terrorism as an ‘anti-Islamic program’, ‘hostility towards Turks and Islam’, as ‘cultural racism’ and even as a ‘new crusade’ “.

This latest accusation, by the way, is used as an argument by Islamic fundamentalists to justify their brutal attacks in France, ”recalled the young author, who has already had the opportunity to make bold comments in the German press.

E. Macron was drastically humiliated in Berlin

German Muslim organizations or senior clergy were in no rush to loudly condemn the Islamist attacks in France, and no one called for solidarity with the French shocked by the attacks or to pray for the victims. On the contrary, there have also been people in the country who have demonstratively supported the protests of the Muslim world against Macron.

On October 29, after the murder of three believers in a church in Nice, the slogans of Allahu akbar! percentage of the population of Arab descent, which should now be higher).

At Berlin’s Hermannplatz, Neukölln, tonight, several dozen demonstrated against Emmanuel Macron and the exhibition of Mohamed cartoons, among other things with calls from “Allahu Akbar”. Recorded by an individual, according to a local police officer pic.twitter.com/eXRCW4ttfJ

– Felix Huesmann (@felixhuesmann) October 29, 2020

And on October 31. At night, in Berlin itself, what should be called an Islamist provocation happened: the “Avenue of the Sun” is called Callejón del Sol, and then Alexander Square was driven by a man in a blonde wig and an E. Macron mask. The “sheikh” who led him behind the rope symbolically struck his “prisoner” on a belt and called him a “parasite” and a “dog.”

Syrian Youtuber Fayez Kanfash now has his own video of the #MacronAction in #Neukoelln released. In it he burns the mask of the French president, insults him like a “dog”. The credits say: “Everything except the Prophet!” Https://t.co/SMooU79qQg

– Julius Betschka (@JuliusBetschka) November 2, 2020

According to the Berlin daily Tagesspiegel, which published the video and described the procession, the provocation was organized by Fayez Kanfash, a youtuber of Syrian origin dressed as a sheikh.

They come to us not because of our values

Similar taunts are no longer shocking. No more worries about reports of Islamist attacks.

Most recent, October 4. The Islamist attack in the city center of Dresden did not even make the front pages of the press, although, as it was later discovered, the details associated with it were simply outrageous.

Twenty-year-old Syrian, who arrived in Germany in October 2015 and 2019. convicted of preparing an act of terrorism (making a bomb), treated psychologically in a prison, participating in a de-radicalization program aimed at facilitating his integration into the society, having been on the run for only five days, attacking two German tourists with a knife: one stabbed and the other seriously wounded, which the men caught as a gay couple.

“The crime statistics provided by the police over many years show that not everyone comes to us for our values. That a disproportionate number of men who allegedly” seek protection “in our country commit serious violence and sexual crimes but are not expelled. Terrorist attacks such as those in Ansbach, Würzburg and Brighthaid Square in Berlin have killed or seriously injured many people, “said a group of perpetrators, including leading Islamic scholars and terrorists, in a public statement” Stop Political Islam! ” Die Welt at the end of October. , lawyers, publicists, politicians (among the signatories – and people of Muslim faith).

“Let’s stop political Islam!”

The authors of the appeal lack a clear position from politicians, as well as from other responsible individuals and institutions on the issue of increasing public insecurity. Following the attacks by right-wing extremists, they were outraged and openly protested, demanding action, recalling the names of the dead.

And after the Islamist attacks, “the recurrent silence from politics, the media, churches and civil society organizations is surprising.” “Could anyone say at least one German name for a victim of Islamist terror?” The authors rhetorically ask.

“When in 2020 George Floyd was killed by the police during an arrest in the United States in May, he not only sparked massive protests against racism in Germany, but also called for similar investigations to be carried out in Germany. And where? Are the demonstrations after the murder of Samuel Paty, after the attack in Nice or after the massacre of a Catholic cleric in a French church? Those who take to the streets to protest against racism remain silent in the face of Islamist violence, as it seems reprehensible name the perpetrators and their motives ”, the speech reads.

“He who is silent cannot change anything, it only remains to see the development, which is already becoming a test for our society. Political Islam represents a serious threat to our country. It is an obstacle to integration with unpredictable consequences. Conscious of their responsibilities, sustainable policies must be proactive, including with regard to religious extremism. It is time to look openly at the problems of the immigration society and not allow intimidation into baseless accusations of alleged hostility to Islam, “Islamophobia” or “anti-Muslim racism,” the statement said.

It is a “struggle between civilization and barbarism”

Unfortunately, this address, published in the daily Die Welt, sounded like a voice in the desert. And it was only the attack in Vienna and subsequent resolute statements by Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and French President Macron that ultimately forced a change of tone and a German leader.

“Islamist terror is our common enemy. The fight against murderers and their instigators is our common fight,” said German Chancellor Angela Merkel in unusually militant intonations.

It was an attack of “hatred of our fundamental values, hatred of our way of life, hatred of our democracy,” the young Austrian leader Kurzas said emotionally after a bloody attack in which an Islamist shot 4 and wounded 22 people.

At the same time, the Austrian leader emphasized that one should not fall into the trap of the division of society in the hands of Islamists and cast a shadow of suspicion on all Europeans of Muslim faith.

“But those who have rebelled against our society, who reject our way of life and are willing to fight against it, we must fight against them.” There can be no tolerance for the intolerant. “It is a struggle between civilization and barbarism,” he said.

The European Union must finally act

“We are stronger than hatred and terror,” wrote the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, on a Twitter account after the attack in Vienna.

However, you will not defend yourself against political Islam with such charms and declarations of solidarity.

“The EU must take up the issue of political Islam much more firmly in the future. I hope that this misunderstanding of tolerance ends and that all European countries finally realize how dangerous the ideology of political Islam is for our freedom and freedom. European way of life, “Kurz said in an interview with Die Welt.

And the Islamic scholar and religious educator Mouhanad Khorchide noted in the same newspaper that “the ideology of political Islam, even when it does not call for violence, still sees the West as the enemy of Muslims.”

Therefore, “the European Union must fight as resolutely as possible not only against Islamist terrorism, but especially against its political base: political Islam,” Kurz said.

He said he had already contacted French President Macron and other EU heads of government to better coordinate their position on the issue in the Community.

“The EU, but also our country, must increase the level of security,” Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio wrote on Tuesday on his Facebook account, asking “face to face” on illegal immigration and the safety of citizens.

And current German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer (CSU) has promised to discuss European security at the meeting of EU interior ministers next Friday. He is convinced: “We can only stop terrorists and their supporters by working together.”