Europe's identity crisis
A growing Muslim minority is challenging Europe's view of itself
There is, experts agree, even more to come. With a verdict expected next month in the retrial of Mounir el-Motassadeq (which could result in an acquittal of the only person ever convicted in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks), as well as the appointment of an EU terrorism czar, the adoption of a European arrest warrant, and rapidly increasing government surveillance of Muslim communities in Europe, the suspicions and social collisions, say some, will intensify.
At the offices of the Islamic Federation in Berlin's Kreuzberg neighborhood, a leafy, canal-lined residential area for the city's more-established Muslim families, Islamic Federation Chairman Burhan Kesici reports that he, too, has heard about the trouble with the Muslim children at Rixdorfer Elementary. His students have been calling non-Muslim classmates pork-eaters and the like. This, he acknowledges, is not good. "But there is no more trust left in the German system," says Kesici. "And times have changed. There are more and more Muslim people living here, and [German authorities] have to realize this and change their structures, so the problems don't become worse." Principal Berning, he says, has been in no hurry to work with him. Berning responds that she won't work with radicals, and she often puts down the telephone and walks away from it while Kesici is talking. They are at a stalemate, but 15 more schools in Berlin alone are scheduled to initiate Islamic education classes this year.
And as the sun sets at Speakers' Corner, the group of Christian hecklers heads to a nearby KFC to debrief. "We spend all of our time listening to the moderate Muslims, but no one is talking to the radicals," says Jay Smith, who leads the Christian workshops. "It is an ideal way to find out what they're saying." He fears this could all end if the proposed hate laws pass. Muhammed Dawud, pausing for a moment to let a passerby borrow the prayer rug draped over his shoulder, agrees. "Why would you want to have a law that would regulate what people say?" he wonders. "We don't support these laws." Neither does Merali, of the Islamic Human Rights Commission, nor a man calling himself Red, a recent immigrant from Morocco who loves coming down to Speakers' Corner. "I think Speakers' Corner is the best thing that I have ever seen in this world for entertainment," he says. "You can talk about religion, and no one can stop you from doing it. And here, you also learn how to discuss things."
And so, in the heart of prime European debating territory, Christians and Muslims have found one point upon which they can agree.
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