Cindy Storer: I think it’s too soon to evaluate the French and broader European response to the attacks. But I’d like to address what I hope will come of this. We’re hearing calls for increased intelligence cooperation and potentially “boots on the ground” in Iraq and Syria. Intelligence cooperation is always helpful, of course. But I doubt that any amount of increased government cooperation against terrorists will suffice to end the threat.
Terrorism ends when terrorists have no audience, and no new recruits. They become marginalized. That happens when the people whose needs they claim to represent are themselves no longer marginalized. It seems to me that having so many world leaders in Paris was an opportunity to make progress in building new relationships that bring people together. That may seem Pollyannaish, but I don’t see any other way out of this.
Barak Barfi: I think France faces two challenges — how to respond domestically to integrate Muslim minorities, in addition to decreasing Gaullist racism, and how to craft an international policy to confront radical Islam. Unfortunately for France, these policies are directly correlated. Every step Paris takes on the international stage by forcefully attacking al Qaeda and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria will lead to domestic blowback and further Muslim alienation.
Moreover, France has become a British clone in that it largely toes America’s Middle East line. In some cases, such as Iran, it’s even holier than the Pope. Since the presidency of Nicolas Sarkozy, France has abandoned its anti-U.S./Israeli posture of the post-Charles de Gaulle era. It is actively involved in the anti-ISIS air campaign in Iraq. It was willing to attack Syria for its use of chemical weapons. There’s very little more it can do to join the American camp.
If there is one area where France can better integrate, it’s on intelligence. The U.S. and France have an uneasy relationship. Washington has historically been frustrated by Paris’ corporate spying against American companies.
Sahar Aziz: To me, European government responses to the Paris attacks show that Western countries are unwilling to meaningfully address the root causes of terrorism arising out of the Middle East. Rather than examining why groups like ISIS and al Qaeda are able to recruit so many people from across the world, government officials appease public anger by calling for more aggressive anti-terrorism laws, which is basically code for selectively targeting Muslims within their countries.
Whether through stripping alleged terrorists of citizenship, censoring websites that are deemed to glorify terrorism, or sending informants to entrap Muslims into sting operations; these are merely reactive tactics that do not begin to address the much deeper underlying causes of the troubling spread of violent extremist views and practices within the Middle East.
Indeed, stripping citizens who are Muslim of civil liberties ultimately harms the entire nation’s citizenry because history shows it is just a matter of time before those same laws are applied against other groups the government deems suspicious.
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The poet Dante said he was “Florentine by birth, but not by character.” Right-wing extremists here believe the country has been stolen from them and emigrate to remote areas where their contact with society is minimized. You’re well familiar with the 1970 Egyptian group Takfir w’al-Hijra. Identity is what one chooses to be. Applying categories to the other doesn’t necessarily ensure they will choose that. You are identifying French Muslims as French, not them.
It isn’t that French Muslims don’t identify with the Republic’s values.These communities are so removed from their original traditional society that their attachment to religion is weak. Rather, French society has excommunicated them in some ways. They are totally alienated and broadening identity will not change this.
Shadi, your post intimates that you advocate changing French society from above through government action. But the greatest challenge is to change French societal views, and that simply cannot be accomplished. You are fighting an uphill battle that has few chances for success.
Sahar Aziz: Barak and Shadi, you raise important points. If it’s true that French society will never truly accept Muslim or Arab French citizens as equals beyond formal equality on the books, then France is on the wrong side of history. The world is globalizing and that includes migrations across countries and regions, usually for economic benefits both to migrating individuals and the receiving countries. Nations whose people pursue cultural isolationism, reinforced by official policies and practices, are inviting social unrest and the consequent social problems.
But regardless of whether non-Muslim French citizens accept their Muslim compatriots, they are here to stay and are likely to increase in number. So it’s wiser to accept that French identity will be affected their presence. Whether those effects are positive or negative depends largely on the French people’s willingness to practice their proclaimed belief in fraternity and liberty.
This applies to other European countries that are also experiencing migration influxes from people within Europe and other regions. While America has its flaws in terms of race relations (one need only look to the mass protests over the tragic police shootings of Michael Brown), the national identity is less rigid and more adaptable than many European countries.
I realize this is due, in part, to its vastly different history. But at a time when countries should be collaborating and learning what works and does not work, it’s time for the French to accept the new globalized world that we all live in and be more inclusive of other cultures and ethnicities of people who settle into France.
Otherwise, I fear we may start seeing a criminalization of French Muslim identity under the guise of counterterrorism.
