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London Murder May Move History

May 27, 2013 by White House Chronicle Leave a Comment

The murder of a British soldier in Woolwich, the working-class district of London, may be one of those murders that move history. The repercussions will echo down through the years affecting British politics, immigration, attitudes to Europe, possibly the survival of the United Kingdom as now constituted and the social progress of Asian and African minorities there. Immigrants now comprise 11.9 percent of the population.

These things, which were in flux, may now transit to turmoil. And Prime Minister David Cameron's differences with his own Conservative Party could lead to his ouster, unless he can use the murder as a kind of call to order in his rebellious ranks.

There are two big but related issues that have already roiled British politics and now may be forced to a head. The first is immigration. Always a thorny issue for Conservatives, it has been front and center since a big victory in local elections this month by the upstart United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) led by Nigel Farage.

Farage's platform is anti-immigration, not only from Africa, Asia and the Caribbean but also from the European Union. He calls for Britain to the leave the European Union and essentially seal Britain's borders against all comers.

UKIP's local government success led to backbench Conservatives — more than 100 of them — to seek an immediate referendum on Britain’s leaving Europe. They were joined in public support by Tory grandees, who had heretofore supported the prime minister.

One way or another, things will be harder for immigrants no matter when their families arrived in Britain. These divide essentially into longtime immigrant groups from Africa, Asia and the Caribbean, and eastern Europeans, allowed in as a result of European Union labor law.

There is also a sharp division between Muslim immigrants and those who practice other religions. Muslim immigration has grown to the point of domination in some areas – like Bradford, in the north of England, and Birmingham in the Midlands. Muslim immigrants — now 4.8 percent of the population, and Islam the second-largest religion after Christianity in the United Kingdom — have established states within their adopted state with Islamic education, very visible mosques, and a palpable sense of their homelands being where they came from ancestrally rather than where they live now.

The Internet and cell phones have made this duality easier to practice. Sadly, the Muslim community in the United Kingdom has prospered far less than the Hindu community, where millionaires and some billionaires abound.

British resentment of the Muslims extends to the treatment of women, halal slaughter of animals, instances of honor killings and many foiled terrorist plots since the subway bombing of 2005.

In Qatar, I ran into a young English Muslim woman wearing a veil and dressed in traditional Arabic clothing. Hearing her speak, I said: “Hi, you’re English.” She rounded on me, replying angrily that although she was born and raised in England that did not make her English.

Understandably, this active refusal to assimilate breeds resentment among the Anglos. The trouble is everyone of color is assumed to be Muslim in the eyes of the Anglos, and the working class in particular.

Hence the rise of right-wing extremists, like the skinheads and the fascistic British National Party, and the more seductive UKIP. The Labor and Liberal parties are sidelined for now, without the visceral appeal that the Tories feel they may ceded to the UKIP.

Meanwhile, there is another shadow on the horizon: Scottish nationalists may push their own referendum on whether to leave the United Kingdom. Their leader, Alex Salmond, sees trouble in the south as opportunity in the north.
 
 
If things go really badly, Cameron could be seen in history as the prime minister who lost both Europe and Scotland – or rallied the country and saved the day. The murder in Woolwich, ghastly in its barbarity, will have consequences beyond that place. — For the Hearst-New York Times Syndicate

Filed Under: King's Commentaries Tagged With: Alex Salmond, British National Party, Conservative Party, David Cameron, immigration, Muslim, Nigel Farage, UKIP, United Kingdom, United Kingdom Independence Party, Woolwich

The Danger Posed by ‘The Enemy Within’

January 7, 2010 by White House Chronicle Leave a Comment

In a time of terrorism, the enemy within is the most pernicious.

He is the terrorist who can strike at any time. He is the good neighbor who harbors hate. He is he loner who craves to be part of something larger than his own life promises.

Most disturbingly, he is probably a third or fourth generation immigrant.

He is the lethal misfit.

He is also the unique product of the modern world: The immigrant who doesn’t assimilate into the society in which he lives, but connects with the world of his ancestors through technology. He may be a Nigerian youth living in London, Madrid, or Houston, but in his mind he lives in Nigeria because technology makes it possible to do so.

Britain is filled with pockets of immigrants who choose not to assimilate, enjoy the privileges of British society, and deny their nationality.

A few years ago I met a young woman in Doha, Qatar, who covered her head with a scarf and spoke with an English accent.

“Oh, you’re English,” I said, thinking we might talk about the old country.

Stiffly, she said, “I was born there, but I am an Arab.”

Before taking a job with Al Jazeera’s Web site in Doha, she had never been out of England. But psychologically, she had grown up in the Middle East and was indifferent to the culture and the people who had taken in her family and educated her with tax money. She closed her ears in school and opened them in her local mosque. She is typical of immigrant children from Houston to Rome and from Toronto to Sydney, alienated by their own intent, angry and vulnerable.

When America’s immigrants were pouring in through Ellis Island, N.Y., they were coming to a new life; and however hard, it was going to be an American life. Sentimentally, they might sing rebel Irish songs in Boston, dance the polka in St. Paul, Minn., and mix the marinara sauce in Hoboken, N.J., but the tickets that brought them here were one-way tickets. The only contact with the world they had left was by slow, sea-borne letters.

Now, with technology, all immigrants’ tickets to America are essentially roundtrip tickets. Immigrants no longer have to consider assimilation as a worthy or a necessary goal.

There are reasons of national unity to work against the Balkanization of America. However, the clear and present danger is from those likely to fall prey to the malicious excesses of politics or religion.

It is frightening that a wealthy young man from Nigeria, Umar Farouk Abdulmuttalab, tried to blow up an inbound airliner on Christmas Day. But the home-grown rebel–like the five, middle-class young men who are now being held in Pakistan–is more concerning.

Gradually, screening of passengers will improve and the intelligence community will handle information better. In the meantime what are we, and other nations like Britain, to do about our citizens who hate the lands that have given them so much? Spy on our neighbors? Inform on our friends?

If we do those things, the enemy within will have won; and if we don’t, the enemy within may win with an act of terrorism. –For the Hearst-New York Times Syndicate

Filed Under: King's Commentaries Tagged With: al-Qaeda, immigration, Nigeria, terrorism, Umar Farouk Abdulmuttalab

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