AS

Submitted by Octavio (Italy), Mar 20, 2007 at 03:22

Dear AS,

I have been violently opposed to immigration for a long time. People who know me personally can confirm that. But even readers of danielpipes.org can remember that. Immigration from Islamic countries has always been a problem for me, and I was very out-spoken against it.

Now, I have realized that Muslim immigrants are already here. Some Muslims were born in Europe, therefore we cannot call them "immigrants" anymore.

So, my opposition to immigration is still in place, and so is my opposition to Turkey in the EU. Immigrants take too much of our welfare systems and Turkey is not ready for EU membership. I have not changed those views.

What has changed is that I now realize that Europe is no longer a Christian-only entity. Therefore, we need to include non-Christians (Muslims, Jews, Sikhs, Hindhus and Buddhists) into the new Europe.

I didn't say that I want to open the borders. All I am saying is that European identity must be updated. It is in our best interest to integrate Muslims into European society.

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