Culture Clash in Denmark
The close-knit Danes find their liberal ideals tested by a growing, alienated Muslim population
The government's moves, at the least, have sought to give Danes a breather from rapid immigration. After years of policy neglect, Hvilshoj says, "the number [was] too high. ... we needed to get control of immigration." The government is stepping up efforts to reduce immigrant unemployment and emphasizing success stories, sending "role models" into Muslim communities.
The governing coalition has a persuasive reason not to soften its stand on immigration: It needs the tacit backing of the right-wing Danish People's Party to stay in power. With 13 percent of the seats in parliament, it appears to wield more influence than any other such party in Europe. Critics accuse it of outright xenophobia, a charge it rejects. But Danes know where the group stands in the culture wars. Its party chairwoman has called Islamic leaders here the "Trojan horse in Denmark," and another lawmaker's website referred to Muslims as "cancer tumors." The party aims to keep Denmark the way it is. "We don't want to change our ways. They [immigrants] have to adapt their ways," says Soren Espersen, a prominent People's Party lawmaker. Espersen likens political Islamists to communists and Nazis and says they aim to limit Denmark's democracy. "There are people now who want to tell us what we can laugh at," he says. "I don't want to respect Islam. Why should I respect the prophet Muhammad?"
There is political combat within Denmark's Muslim communities as well. Ahmed Abu Laban, an imam who leads Copenhagen's Muslim Faith Society, tells U.S. News that he helped organize the foreign missions publicizing the Muhammad cartoons in order to counter "an anti-Islamic campaign." Says Laban, "We have been demonized for six, seven, eight years–then the cartoons." Laban adds, "The Danes don't like religion, and they don't like Islam. ... I see nothing bad in this country except the spirit itself." Many Danes now loathe Laban as a virtual traitor for having promoted the controversy overseas.
Bodyguards. Laban dismisses a recent political initiative by moderates to form the group Democratic Muslims, calling it a "fake approach." The leader of the new group, a secular Muslim lawmaker named Naser Khader, needs 24-hour-a-day bodyguards. His effort is popular with Danes, but hard-line Muslims like Laban call Khader a "shield" for the Danes and vilify him. The group makes it "very difficult to say, 'You Muslims,'" says Khader. "We are democratic without any reservations. ... We are Danes first and Muslims second." Naser says that the Islamists consider secular Muslims like himself as their principal enemy. "They are seen as more dangerous than Christians and Jews," he says. Still, only 14 percent of Danish Muslims back his group, according to a recent poll.
Meanwhile, Danes are edgy about growing Muslim radicalism–a development that is not quantified but is almost universally suspected. The primary threat to Denmark may be external: Its sturdy support for the Bush administration, including troop commitments to Iraq and Afghanistan, along with the cartoon case has raised its profile in the Muslim world–in a most unwelcome way. A poll of Egyptians rated Denmark as the second-most-hostile country after Israel. Officials have tallied some 200 threats against Denmark, including one from al Qaeda during the cartoon crisis.
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