The recent terrorist attack in England, London’s subway bombing at the Parsons Green Tube stop, continues to highlight the rising incidents of terrorism in Europe. An Iraqi, Ahmad Hassan, has been charged with the London bombing and three others remain in custody. Over the last three years, Europe has experienced a surge in terrorist attacks. This coincides with an unprecedented rise in refugee migration from Syria, Iraq and other war torn areas of the Middle East to Europe.
Also troubling is the recent report of 11,000 stolen blank Syrian passports in the hands of ISIS at a time when ISIS, due to defeats on the battlefield, is sending its fighters back to Europe. ISIS and other Jihadists will now be able to enter Europe and other countries with false Syrian identities. This facilitates the ISIS strategy of infiltrating the refugee stream with terrorists to carry out more attacks in Europe.
Two weeks ago, Jean Claude Juncker, Head of the European Commission, gave a speech to member nations about EU progress and outlined the priorities for the EU. He took a passive stance on migration and rising terrorism when throughout Europe over the last several years, millions of refugees – 1.3 million in 2015 alone- have been resettled in various European countries. This past year, there was a terrorist attack in Europe on average every seven days, however Junker barely mentioned terrorism. Furthermore, when outlining five priorities for the EU, the subject of refugee migration was last, two places behind climate change. Polls indicate that the majority of Europeans overwhelmingly oppose further migration, but there appears to be no official effort to slow it down.
In contrast to Junker’s speech, an article in the Gatestone Institute states: “The last three years saw an enormous surge in large-scale terrorist attacks in European cities: The ISIS attacks in Paris in November 2015, the Brussels attacks in March 2016, the Nice attack in July 2016, the Berlin Christmas Market attack in December 2016, and the Manchester attack in May 2017 — and those are just the most spectacular ones. The hundreds of people killed and thousands more maimed would probably not subscribe to Juncker’s definition of ‘progress'”.
Europe is at a serious crossroads on how they deal with refugees, migration and terrorism. While clearly, most migrants have no inclination towards terrorism, the majority of migrants coming to Europe are Muslims who do not embrace democracy or assimilation. The Muslim migrants isolate themselves and form their own communities. This foments radicalism often times influenced by Imams. To make matters worse, Sharia Law, with the acquiescence of European governments, becomes the recognized law for in some European communities that have high concentrations of Muslims. The objective from Muslims who practice Sharia Law is to transform the European societies they inhabit into a theocracy where Sharia Law is the only law of the land.
The landscape and identity of European societies are changing rapidly. The demographic shift in Europe is startling because of Muslim birthrates compared to European birthrates- Muslims are far out-pacing Europeans in birthrates- and this is being exasperated by mass migration. If European societies want to maintain their sovereignty and identity, they need to study the last few years in order to catch a glimpse of what the next decade will look like and decide if that is the Europe they want.