France: It's hate, not envy

Tony Blankley, who wrote the prescient "The West's Last Chance, Will We Win the Clash of Civilizations?" has a good short piece in the Washington Times today.

His point is that it is a grave error to assume that the widespread unrest in France is due solely to the lack of opportunity for disaffected Muslim youth and that it can be fixed, as proposed by the feckless de Villepin, by money thrown at affirmative action social programs. Rather, quoting Paul Belien, writing in Brussels:

"It is not anger that is driving the insurgents to take it out on the secularized welfare states of Old Europe. It is hatred. Hatred caused not by injustice suffered, but stemming from a sense of superiority. The 'youths' do not blame the French, they despise them."

As Mr. Belien reports, look what a typical radical Muslim leader, Dyab Abou Jahjah, the leader of the Brussels-based Arab European League, says: "We reject integration when it leads to assimilation. I don't believe in a host country. We are at home here and whatever we consider our culture to be also belongs to our chosen country. I'm in my country, not the country of the Westerners."

Or consider the statement of a German radical Islamist that I recounted in my book (based on a National Public Radio news-story broadcast): "Germany is an Islamic country. Islam is in the home, in schools. Germans will be outnumbered. We [Muslims] will say what we want. We'll live how we want. It's outrageous that Germans demand we speak their language. Our children will have our language, our laws, our culture."

It's important to realize that as much as the French have segregated their Muslim communities which have contributed to a lack of assimilation, many in these communities have no affinity for Western values and hence no desire to be assimilated creating what Blankley calls "Little Fallujahs." Therefore any economic aid needs to be combined clearly with concrete measures to neutralize and dismantle these growing cancers on the French (and European) landscape. It means a visible and long-lasting commitment to thoroughly policing these areas and a policy of finding and neutralizing the merchants of hate.

Blankley concludes that we should not sneer at French weakness but rather encourage them to answer strongly and vigorously. While we here at the Monk are no fans of the French the land and legacy of Rousseau and Tocqueville is worth defending against the racaille of bin Laden and Khomeini.

HT: Powerline