Wednesday, November 25, 2015

After Paris, The Deluge?

Just what is the state of opinion among France's Moslems? Is the slaughter in Paris a leading indicator of shifting opinion?

Six of the Paris attackers did not come in from overseas:

The fact that most of the Paris attackers identified so far were European-born radicals has once again shined the spotlight on the growing problem in the West of homegrown extremism.

Authorities have identified four Frenchmen and two Belgians as suspects in the shootings and suicide bombings that killed 129 people on Friday.

A seventh had fingerprints that match someone coming into Greece as a migrant, if memory serves me, so it isn't a clean sweep for homegrown terrorists.

But it does highlight a potential crisis I saw a decade ago when French Moslems torched cars because of lack of jobs:

This year's rioting is based on lack of opportunity and is not jihad coming to Europe this year.

But this begs the question of what happens next time? First of all, I obviously assume there will be a next time. I assume this because I don't think the French are capable of opening their economy, government, or society enough to bring these suburban aliens into French life. So hopes raised by increased government attention to their plight will be dashed in a few years by pitiful results that leave France's Moslems in pretty much the exact same spot as September 2005. A few dozen more Social Cohesion mime academies won't count as progress.

My fear is that the jihadis in France will increasingly lead the alien and alienated Moslems of France. Remember our own Revolution. When colonists first confronted British soldiers with arms in April 1775 at Lexington and Concord, and then lay siege to the British in Boston, we did not seek political separation. Our forebears only wanted their rights as Englishmen recognized. It was not until July 1776, more than a year later, that we made independence from the British our official goal.

This is not jihad and it never has been, says Strategypage. But this says nothing of the future. Will it become jihad? A cry for rights can become a cry for separation in remarkably short time. Will we look back at the events at Clichy-sous-Bois as the first clash leading to a declaration of independence by France's Moslems?

You remember those riots, right?

I don't think we are at the point where there is a cry for separation.

But we are at the point where those who have separated themselves from France are willing to kill people rather than just torch cars.

Does it continue to get worse? Does ISIL try to actively provoke separation?

Has Moslem opinion in France started to lean toward choosing hijabs over jobs?

Or can France make an effort to assimilate their Moslem residents more effectively to reduce the urge to kill.

Of course, defeating the ISIL base of the potential outside support will have a good effect on convincing French Moslems that taking up the jihad inside France is no path to Paradise.