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PDF FormatSuspicion, it must be noted, is not reserved for Muslim immigrants alone. Italian, Polish, or Indian immigrants living in Germany are also “others,” and their attitudes and values, as well as their identification with their country of origin, are not necessarily considered positive attributes by native Germans. For this reason, German law requires immigrants to give up their original nationality if they wish to become citizens. Despite these fears, however, the Italian, Polish, or Indian “other”—and similarly the Iranian, Turkish, or Syrian “other,” insofar as the dominant aspect of his identity is national-territorial—has a well-defined and easily recognized identity. This identity is separate from but similar, ideologically as well as ethically and legally, to the structure of German national identity; it is easily delineated and therefore easy to deal with.
But the “other” who associates himself with the Islamic nation is different. He does not have a foreign passport, and therefore it is impossible to demand that he give up his original citizenship. His identity is fluid, ever-changing, and multi-faceted. He belongs simultaneously to two nations, one real and one imagined. Like the Jewish minority, the Muslim “other” is an object upon which a myriad of negative images and emotions can be projected. In this sense at least, anti-Semitism and hostility towards Muslim immigrants share a common basis.
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However, there are crucial differences between the Jewish and Muslim concepts of the imagined nation. A discussion of these differences requires us to tread carefully, but there is no avoiding it.
One of the most basic tenets of modern anti-Semitism is the fear that the “pure” national identity will be “hijacked” by the Jew. This fear is quite groundless, however. Judaism, by its very nature, is an introverted identity without a proselytizing tradition; even dedicated converts must undergo a difficult process to become part of the community. The primary desire of the “old Jew” was that the non-Jew would leave him in peace and allow him to live his life in as autonomous a manner as possible; whereas the desire of the “new Jew” was that his Jewish identity would not be an obstacle to his own social integration. The conversion to Judaism of Christian Europe has never been a Jewish objective. The illusory and fluid identity of the Jew is what enabled the anti-Semite to ascribe intentions to him that he did not have; to imagine the Jew as a corrupting agent whose aim was to deprive Christian Europe or the ethnic nation state of its “true” nature.
On this point the Muslim outlook is radically different from the Jewish one. The imagined nation of Islam nurtures universal aspirations; it seeks to encompass all mankind, and no special effort is required to become a part of it. In fact, according to Islam, all people are born Muslims but are led astray by growing up in an imperfect—i.e., non-Muslim—environment. The non-Muslim who joins the ranks of the Islamic nation does not “adopt” the religion of Muhammad, but “returns” to it. Therefore, the Muslim considers it a religious and moral imperative to help draw those estranged from Islam toward the truth.
This axiom assumed a special significance as a result of Muslim immigration to Europe. For thirty years, Islamic scholars have been forced to contend with the voluntary presence of Muslims in Christian-secular societies. On the one hand, this is an intolerable state of affairs from the point of view of religious law, since it leaves the fate of the Muslim immigrant in Europe and his ability to keep his faith in the hands of infidels. On the other hand, it is simply a fait accompli; whatever the rulings of religious scholars, millions of immigrant Muslim workers are not going to forsake the countries in which they enjoy a certain measure of economic security and prosperity and in which they have established their homes.
One of the most popular strategies adopted by Muslim religious authorities in response to this challenge has been to represent the immigrants as the ambassadors of the Islamic nation; as pioneers entrusted with a holy mission. This approach is eminently logical: If all men are destined to recognize the truth of Muhammad’s prophecy and become part of the Islamic nation, and if fate has decreed that millions of Muslims should emigrate to Europe, then it must be assumed that Allah has sent these immigrants to Europe in order to offer Westerners an alternative to their decadent and degenerate lives. Accordingly, Muslim immigrants should not be considered traitors who have forsaken their nation; quite the opposite—they are blessed messengers charged with the momentous task of fulfilling the divine mission of the nation.
These theories represent the consensus which current Muslim-Arab thinking has reached regarding emigration. They appear regularly in Muslim-Arab theological and legal texts that examine the Muslim presence in Europe. Yusuf al-Qaradawi, for example, an Egyptian specialist in religious law based in Qatar and considered to be the most influential of the present generation of Sunni scholars, replied to a question about the duties of a Muslim living in the West thusly: “They must remember that the call of others to Islam is not confined to scholars or sheiks, but to every faithful Muslim.”16 Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah, the leading Arab Shi’a scholar, makes a similar declaration: “We expect you [the Muslim immigrants] to be over there the callers for Islam, so that new positions will open for us and so that you open new prospects for Islam.”17 He continues by recommending that immigrants learn how a person from their host culture thinks and the strengths and weaknesses of that way of thinking so as to be better able to influence him.18 Egyptian born Muhammad al-Ghazali, one of the most outstanding contemporary Muslim scholars, conceives of the possibility that hundreds of thousands of immigrants “will not only keep their faith but will become pioneers in spreading it, if the Muslim nation wants this and will work toward achieving it.”19 Hamdi Hassan, who lectures on communications at al-Azhar University in Cairo, perceives the Muslim presence on European soil as proof that the spread of the Islamic faith has graduated from the defensive stage of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to a new phase of dissemination.20 And Muhammad al-Hanni, chairman of the Dar al-Ri’aya al-Islamiyya organization in London, believes Muslim immigrants represent the potential for establishing an “alternative civilization” in the West, the decline of which we are now witnessing. When Western civilization crumbles, he argues, the Muslims will be the natural heirs to its technological legacy but will invest it with their superior principles.21
Western observers and commentators are sometimes tempted to characterize this Muslim-Arab attitude as a response to recent policies of Europe and the United States (and certainly Israel). It is not. The perception of the immigrant as a pioneer in the service of the Islamic nation was already formed twenty-five years ago, when the first generation of immigrant workers on the continent was beginning to establish itself. Moreover, those who disseminate this idea are not only extreme or fringe characters; quite the opposite. Al-Qaradawi, al-Ghazali, and Fadlallah, for example, are considered progressives on all social and scientific matters. Al-Qaradawi is a prominent proponent of the concept known as wasatiya—freely translated as “the middle way”—which is a concept of Islam that balances materialism and spirituality, progress and tradition, the individual and society. Muslim immigrants in the West pay heed to his fatwas specifically because he is perceived as someone who does not ignore the demands of real life.
The desire or duty to bring Christians into the bosom of Islam is not the only point that divides Judaism and the Islamic nation. There is also the question of territory; that is, the territory toward which the political and religious yearnings of the nation are directed.
For the Jews, this territory was always the land of Israel and only the land of Israel. Only there could Jewish autonomy be realized; only there could the Jewish Temple be established; and only there was it possible for a Jew to keep every one of the 613 commandments. It is true that Jewish institutions were established in Europe that enjoyed a certain degree of autonomy. The Sanhedrin, convened at the order of Napoleon Bonaparte in October 1806, was an example of such an institution. But its purpose was not to establish Jewish self-determination on foreign soil—on the contrary, it was intended to establish a bridge between the requirements of halacha and the civic duties of the Jews as citizens of France; that is, to facilitate the creation of a French-Jewish identity. The Sanhedrin’s leaders proclaimed their subservience to French law and exalted the emperor. They made no claim, however abstract, on France, and retained the idea that the land of Israel was the only place in which Jewish autonomy could exist.
