France has, after all, been open to the world. It has welcomed millions of other, non-Muslim migrants — refugees from the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s, Portuguese workers in the 1950s, Italian miners throughout the 20th century, and more recently, Latin Americans, Chinese, Vietnamese, Christians from black Africa and the Caribbean, Hindus, Buddhists, even Americans — without any of those migrants causing the problems that arise with Muslim immigrants, not just in France, but all over Europe.
Having had the good fortune to spend much of my working life reporting from around the world, and Africa in particular, I adore melting pots of different cultures, languages and races.
And I have almost always been treated with kindness and respect in Muslim countries.
In Muslim countries, there is no doubt who rules; the resentment Muslims feel in Infidel lands is absent. When sure of their position, as “the best of peoples,” they have no need to prove their superior status to a visiting journalist. And why not show a little “kindness” and feigned “respect” if the result is good coverage? These are, after all, people well-versed in the art of taqiyya.
Yet, frankly, the time I spent in Paris has convinced me of the difficulty of achieving genuine integration between these defiant, troubled inner-city Muslim communities and mainstream French society.
Indeed, the only person to shake my hand during my visit was the rabbi. Everyone else offered me their wrist, not wanting to touch hands with an infidel — someone unclean.
As a metaphor for what is happening in the French capital, it couldn’t be more sad — or more troubling.
Indeed. How can one expect or plan for “national reconciliation” with people who won’t even shake your hand because, as an Infidel, you are regarded as unclean? People who think it amusing to pretend to shoot down French helicopters, people who are happy to violate French laws, to openly deal in drugs and stolen goods, to threaten the forces of order, who enter Saint-Denis only in groups of four? And these people, beneficiaries of so much that the French state provides, add to this largesse the sums they make by trafficking in drugs, or by robbing French people on the street, or burglarizing their homes, at the same time complain that it is they who are being harassed for no apparent reason. It is not Muslims, but Unbelievers, who are afraid to walk the streets, and not just in Saint-Denis.
In this now-deleted Report From Hell, realism briefly broke through, and left Andrew Malone, a veteran journalist, thoroughly alarmed about what he experienced in Saint-Denis and what he fears is still to come. What’s to come is even more, and even bigger, Muslim ghettos in France, though these “ghettos” are not forced on Muslims, but rather created by them, as their violent behavior drives out Christians and Jews from whatever area Muslims settle in, in numbers sufficient to make that area their own. It is in those areas that they create an economy based on government benefits and crime, including the drug trade, and — carried out in “French” areas of Paris — street robberies and house burglaries. And it is in Seine-Saint-Denis that jihadis have planned attacks, and after carrying them out, hidden from the police, as did those who were responsible for the mass murders at the Bataclan nightclub.
This report from Saint-Denis is a cautionary tale. The French need to make up for their own earlier optimistic misunderstandings of Islam, that some still cling to, with their dreams of “national reconciliation,” and to understand that a silent invasion has taken place in their country, as in much of the rest of Europe. There is still time, using laws now on the books and laws not yet on the books, to reduce the threat in France to manageable proportions. But first you have to recognize, rather than deny, that threat.
Andrew Malone’s forthright observations on the Muslim “ghetto” of Seine Saint-Denis are a good place to start. But it is not at all a good sign that the Daily Mail deleted his report under pressure, with promises to restore it that never came to fruition. That incident in itself is an indication that the crisis in France, as well as in Britain and Europe as a whole, may be too far advanced now to address adequately.
Robert Carrillo says
Says it all.. IF YOU ARE PAYING ATTENTION that is..
Hugh Fitzgerald says
Yes, they just have to pay attention — but our giddy globe makes that ever more difficult. People have a thousand ways to distract themselves, to avert their eyes, to not face the unpleasant reality of Islam, and to recognize that much worse is to come. They have their phones always at the ready to distract them with hundreds of apps, opposable thumb-texting, Instagramming, Facebook-friending, tweeting. There are games to play, Youtube songs to listen to, videos to watch. Why think about Islam? Things will work out in the end, won’t they? They always do.
Xeri_G says
But my professors, co-workers, politicians, police, talk show hosts and left-wing cable news talking-heads are telling me that “paying attention” is racist, ignorant, and immoral.
Xero_G says
But my professors, colleagues, politicians, friends, late-night talk-show hosts, and cable news pundits keep telling me that “paying attention” is RACIST!
11B40 says
Greetings:
I grew up in the Bronx of the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s whence came the euphemism “white flight”. It found significant resonance in the media and the academy as an explanation (or part thereof) for the Dresden-lite treatment that that bit of geography was being subjected to at those times.
Whatever its demographic accuracy, it was in actually a clever semantic convolution that put an onus on the people who valued their quality of life more than being introduced to multiculturally diverse experiences like being mugged or having their property burgled.
A couple of decades on, I came across another bit of semantic trickery, to wit, “ethnic cleansing”. Not being of much of a philosophical bent, it took a while before I realized that the two phrases provided a “compare and contrast” opportunity.
Now certainly, there is a relevant similarity between the “white” and the “ethnic”. While the latter might well encompass more than the former, I don’t think that there is any serious argument that “white” is an “ethnic”.
So that brings us to the “flight” versus “cleansing” assessment. Now the former would seem to me (due to the Progressive education I have been subjected to over the last several decades) to be blaming the “victims”. The neighborhood I grew up in had residents, my own extended family among them, who had lived therein for decades. I failed to discern even a hint of nomadism among them for years and years. It was only when the muggings and burglaries arrived and the ruling and policing parts of the government failed to do their jobs that relocation became not an “if” but a “when”.
Thus, I am convinced that what I had been sold as “white flight” was much more like an “ethnic cleansing”. Personal and property protection were certainly part of the decision-making process, all be it, not at levels that would interest CAIR or Samantha Power. Or, alternatively, could it have been their inability to get over the “white” hump.
don vito says
Here is a post that not only verifies that islam is violent, but ” though these “ghettos” are not forced on Muslims, but rather created by them, as their violent behavior drives out Christians and Jews from whatever area Muslims settle in, in numbers sufficient to make that area their own.” moslems (sic) are violent, well well may the truth prevail.
Jezz says
I am sorry. This article by Hugh Fitzgerald has left me doubting whatever he has written before, which is quite tragic. I have been to the the state de France to watch football (soccer) on several occassions and have never felt threatened or been intimidated. There are problems there, I don’t doubt but what is being described there is not what I recognised. Have you gone there Hugh.
Rufolino says
A visit to the Stade de France is not the same as an exploration of France ! You put me in mind of a blinkered horse.
Ginny says
Haha. You obviously don’t live in Europe and don’t have to fight the daily battle your tax money finances!
gravenimage says
Is Jezz ignoring the Muslim No Go Zones of France, and the skyrocketing Jihad terror attacks there? It seems so–and that he is demanding we ignore them, as well.
gravenimage says
A Report From Hell: Seine Saint-Denis (Part Five)
…………………
Yes–Muslims come not to integrate, but to impose the horrors of Islam on their victims.
james collins says
misery loves company!
Joseph Foley says
Laws already on the books need to be enforced and new ones derived so that Muslims either fulfill them or they find that they cannot live in such a country and they go back to their own hell holes. Also, perhaps pay them to go and if they have paid into pension systems, make sure they get what they have contributed back in their hell hole so that they will not want to return. They just cannot live anywhere else without creating chaos.
gravenimage says
We just need to enforce our own civilized laws.
Politicianophobia says
The foremost duty of Islam in the world is to depose Jahiliyyah from the leadership of man, and take the leadership into its own hands and enforce the particular way of life which is its permanent feature. IT IS THAT SIMPLE.
Evangeline says
It is too true, modern man just distracts himself from what he does not want to see. We are amusing ourselves to death, rather than face the hard facts. France is so far down the road it is hard to see a way out, but we’re all heading there, thanks to globalists and their dopey minions. Lack of proper education, blaming Europe and Christianity for all the ills of the world, has primed our young to not only hate themselves and where they came from, but to want to see Islam (poor underdog) be victorious, even if it means they have to die for it. That is psychic illness, diabolical deception, and we see our young are leaning Left, willing to suffer for the cause of globalism. Of course they have no idea what that means, but, they’re willing to vote for more migration.
Abandoning God, Christendom has brought in the means of it’s own destruction. God, in His infinite wisdom and with all justice, is thus far leaving us to our own choices. The void created when He was removed is being filled by Islam. What will wake people up, who knows, if jihad and children being raped does not do it, what will. Unfortunately most people must have a first-hand experience before they are believers.