European Muslims: caught between two worlds

British Muslims stage an anti-war rally in Manchester, England. AFP Yonhap

Most identify with their heritage rather than their nationality

Delwar Hussein, 27, is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of London, and is currently writing a novel about the Bangladeshi diaspora. His Bangladeshi father was born to an upper-class family in East Pakistan before immigrating to England in the 1950s, where he worked at an automobile assembly plant. Though originally he had intended to return to Bangladesh upon earning money in England, he changed his mind due to changes in immigration laws, choosing to settle in England instead. Thus, his son Delwar was born in England as a British citizen.

Hussein regards himself as an atheist, who accepts Islam only as a cultural tradition. But with his long beard and dark brown skin, strangers mistake him as a follower of Islam as a religion. He explained that, to him, his identity as a citizen of London is most important. Though his Muslim heritage is but a small part of his being in his mind, strangers tend to see him exclusively as a Muslim youth, and thus as being a danger to society, he said.

According to a paper made public by the U.S.-based Pew Research Group in June, European Muslims feel a greater sense of affiliation to their religion or cultural heritage than to the nation in which they live. Such thoughts are especially prevalent in England, where some 81 percent of respondents described their Muslim identity as outweighing their English one. A mere 7 percent described their British identity as being more important. Indeed, Hussain was surprised on his trip to Bangladesh some years ago that a mere one in 30 of the locals wore Hijabs, which contrasts starkly with England where, he estimated, the same ratio was as high as one in three.

Even in France, which registered the highest levels in Europe of national identification among its Muslim population at 42 percent, those claiming their Muslim identity to be stronger were counted at 46 percent. In reality, the adoption of Muslim symbols such as donning the Hijab and not shaving facial hair is on the rise. The two female students I met in front of Universite Paris 7, Hanne (17) and Rahma (19), mentioned the ban on the Hijab in public primary educational institutions, but emphasized that they wore the Hijab elsewhere as a matter of their personal choice. A female student wearing traditional black attire in London named Nadira also claimed she had chosen such clothing herself, as it made her feel safer from sexual harassment.

According to Jocelyne Cesari, researcher at the French National Center for Scientific Research, the strengthening of Muslim identity stems from discrimination perpetrated by mainstream society. As the majority of Muslims in Europe are migrants from former colonies or descendants of those migrants, they suffer from overall inferior social conditions. As a result, they feel as if they have been rejected by society. According to Hussain, though England claims itself to be a tolerant society, this is found merely in the strong sense of looking out for the less priveledged, which is a far cry from establishing actual equality. According to a French specialist on religion Jean-yve Camus, the second and third-generation offspring of Muslim immigrants are more sensitive regarding their rights, and the Islamic religion in turn serves as a source to heal their wounded pride.

"There is not only a religious but also an ethnic side to Islam," said Camus. "Islamic political groups like Hamas and the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood rebel against corruption and emphasize returning to an Islamic golden age of equality, purity, and religiosity." It is exactly on this point that Camus argues that the Muslim youths of Europe, having shared the common experience of discrimination, find appeal in Islam. Some French youths even look to such nationalist organizations as the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt or the Islamic Salvation Front of Algeria for guidance in their pursuit of "true Islam." Among the youths inspired by these teachings are those who have turned to Islam as a pillar for their lives amidst environs filled with joblessness, drug use, and moral degradation, and there are others who accept Islam as an alternative to the materialism of capitalism.

Islamic nationalism spread its roots after the 1979 Iranian revolution and the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan. According to the explanation of London resident Assad Rehman, an advocate for the poor, in the 1960s, socialist groups took the lead in the struggle against the dictatorial regimes governing in North Africa and the Middle East. However, after they failed, people searched for new alternatives in the form of Islam, which at first joined hands with left-wing groups in the 1970s. Afterwards, the sense of Muslim brotherhood spread with events in Bosnia, Chechnya, and Iraq, which gave way to the reasoning that Muslims should help other Muslims who are suffering. Rehman described this development as the Muslim adaptation of the Marxist call for the workers of the world to unite.

The reason for Muslim wrath in the wake of the wars in Afghanistan, Lebanon, and Iraq, in turn, stems from this sense of brotherhood. Hussain posits that British Muslims witnessing the combat in Iraq felt that the U.S. and other Western nations were attacking an Islamic nation, and that the current government’s decrease in welfare spending is also serving to draw British Muslims together in anger.

Many Muslims feel a particular irritation when the word "Islam" is used as if it were a synonym for extremism. Camus pointed out that though extremists make up a mere 2,000 to 3,000 people in a population of 5 million French Muslims, their every move is broadcast by the news media, thus making it appear as if a struggle between Islam and the West is growing fiercer.

"I think it is wrong for true Islamicists to make the West into a target for terror for political or strategic purposes," said Rehman. "Muslims live here as members of society, and the wars are taking place elsewhere, in Iraq and Afghanistan. To truly pursue Muslim fraternity, they must go to those places," he said. His words reflect the majority opinion of Muslims in Europe.