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Reflections on the Revolution in France
By Daniel PipesThe rioting by Muslim youth that began Oct. 27 in France to calls of âAllahu Akbarâ may be a turning point in European history. What started in Clichy-sous-Bois, on the outskirts of Paris, by its eleventh night had spread to 300 French cities and towns, as well as to Belgium and Germany. The violence, which has already been called some evocative names â intifada, jihad, guerilla war, insurrection, rebellion, and civil war â prompts several reflections: End of an era: The time of cultural innocence and political naïveté, when the French could blunder without seeing or feeling the consequences, is closing. ... Not a first: The French insurrection are by no means the first instance of a semi-organized Muslim insurgency in Europe ... Media denial: The French press delicately refers to the âurban violenceâ and presents the rioters as victims of the system. Mainstream media deny that it has to do with Islam and ignore the permeating Islamist ideology, with its vicious anti-French attitudes and its raw ambition to dominate the country and replace its civilization with Islamâs. Another method of jihad: Indigenous Muslims of northwestern Europe have in the past year deployed three distinct forms of jihad: the crude variety deployed in the United Kingdom, killing random passengers moving around London; the targeted variety in the Netherlands, where individual political and cultural leaders are singled out, threatened, and in some cases attacked; and now the more diffuse violence in France, less specifically murderous but also politically less dismissible. Which of these or other methods will prove most efficacious is yet unclear, but the British variant is clearly counterproductive, so the Dutch and French strategies will probably recur. Sarkozy vs. Villepin: ... Anti-state: The riots started eight days after Sarkozy declared a new policy of âwar without mercyâ on urban violence and two days after he called violent youth âscum.â Many rioters see themselves in a power struggle with the state and so focus their attacks on its symbols. ... The French can respond in three ways. They can feel guilty and appease the rioters with prerogatives and the âmassive investment planâ some are demanding. Or they can heave a sigh of relief when it ends and, as they did after earlier crises, return to business as usual. Or they can understand this as the opening salvo in a would-be revolution and take the difficult steps to undo the negligence and indulgence of past decades. I expect a blend of the first two reactions and that, despite Sarkozyâs surge in the polls, Villepinâs appeasing approach will prevail. France must await something larger and more awful to awake it from its somnolence. The long-term prognosis, however, is inescapable: âthe sweet dream of universal cultural compatibility has been replaced,â as Theodore Dalrymple puts it, âby the nightmare of permanent conflict.â Posted by: ed 2005-11-08 |
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