In search of an intifada
Around the time of the last French riots, I had a friendly exchange with Fred Siegel, City Journal contributor and biographer of Rudy Giuliani, regarding the "intifada" which some American conservatives claimed had broken out in France's housing estates. Fred e-mailed again this week, asking if the latest violence had made me reconsider:
I want to suggest that the back and forth we had last year on whether there was an intifada brewing in the banlieues seems to be resolving in a yes direction. If so it presents a clear challenge to Sarkozy's reign.
Well, I still haven't come across any firm evidence. As far as I can see (I'm an interested bystander, not an expert) the new bout of theorising is limited to the usual suspects. Front Page, for instance, is banging the drum in its inimitable style:
The Muslim immigrant "youths" in the banlieues have taken to the streets to expand a Western front in the global jihad...The present violence we are seeing in France and elsewhere is undeniably the Muslim Brotherhood’s "Civilization-Jihadist Process" at work.
Michelle Malkin files her report under the category of "jihadists", influenced, perhaps by Pajamas Media's exciteable correspondent, Nidra Poller and her talk of a "punk jihad". Instapundit takes first prize for inanity with a post on the "Paris intifada" which ends with the line: "The French haven't taken this seriously enough. Perhaps they should ask this guy for advice." Follow the link to "this guy" and you find a dispatch from Michael Totten in, er, Fallujah. No wonder I stopped reading Glenn Reynolds a long, long time ago.
Martin Peretz, meanwhile, thinks the youths in the banlieue ought to just get on their "bicyclettes": "They are rioting against France and the French who had the temerity to expect that immigrants come to a country to live the lives of those who receive them." Ah, all so simple, isn't it? He also links approvingly to a New York blogger at Jewcy.com who begins a sentence with the immortal words, "I’m not saying the rioters are jihadists, but..." A classic.
None of this is to say there's not a threat from Islamism. But for the time being, I'll continue to put my trust in wicked MSM organs such as The Economist. There's also an interesting, multi-faceted discussion in the comments at Charles Bremner's Times blog. A lot to trawl through there, including delinquency, unemployment, police tactics, bad urban planning and a culture of low expectations.
UPDATE: As he's mentioned in the comments below, Reuters journalist Tom Heneghan examines the issue in a lengthy post at the FaithWorld blog. A must-read.
[Pic: A man passes the broken window of a shop in Villiers-le-Bel, outside Paris. Credit: Thomas CoexAFP/Getty Images.]