Why the Revival of Islam [it seems redundant to use the adjective fundamentalist] has not yet Peaked

Submitted by Ron Thompson (France), Apr 16, 2012 at 10:35

While I agree almost completely with the first Nine of Dr Pipes' answers, I do not agree with the Tenth, even if the theocracy in Iran should collapse in the near future. I disagree because of the still vigorously advancing threat of the Islamization of Europe. I see no sign that this threat is dependent on the success or failure of the Shiite regime in Iran. The multi-country threat in the biggest (and smaller) countries of Western Europe - all the countries that were foolish enough to open their doors wide to unrestricted Muslim immigration - has been largely composed of Sunni Muslims, and the Islamization project has been largely funded by Saudi Arabia, the center of Sunni/Wahabiist Islam, and Qatar, which I think is also Sunni Arab. If anything, the collapse of Shiite Iran might further invigorate the Sunni millions in Europe.

But here's the real paradox. The more "successfully" the core countries of the Middle East are Islamized, the more likely it is they will all implode from within, because Islamized governments will prove drastically incapable of meeting the basic needs of their peoples. In fact, there is every sign, as Dr Pipes has pointed out, in this and other columns, they will fail even more dramatically than the corrupt autocratic governments they are replacing. Among other calamities, they will dry up tourism (especially in Egypt, but perhaps soon in Turkey too), the lifeline of remittances from abroad will decline, foreign aid (especially again, in Egypt will decline or end), and a brain drain will likely occur throughout the region. in short, as used to be said about the Soviet Empire and should be said here too, the "contradictions" of attempting to lead hundreds of millions of people by means of a violent, hopelessly intolerant, closed-minded religion which hates the human rights of all its women will become more and more obvious.

The picture is very different in Europe. With whole peoples still only partially aware of the enemy within, and the leadership of most countries still hopelessly derelict in their duties of national and cultural self-defense, and the booty of one of the world's richest civilization there for the taking of the young crazily self-confident Muslims, it should be very clear, ominously clear, that Islam has not peaked in Europe even as it may be peaking in its homelands.

The more immediate question for Europe - where I am vacationing and studying for a month, in Paris - is whether it is April, 1914, or 1912, or even 1908, in terms of the coming crisis. It may not be absolutely clear that a violent catastrophe like that of 1914 is coming, but that a crisis of the magnitude of the summer of 1914 is coming, there does not seem to be much doubt. For the belief of many that Islam is somehow going to reform itself is a grand illusion. We may perhaps rely on Islam collapsing in on itself, to the vast distress of its peoples in the homelands of this terrible blight of a religion, but we are not going to be so lucky in Europe.

Ron Thompson

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