'Sensitive urban areas'

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Last November, 15-year-old Mouhsin and 16-year-old Lakamy were killed in Villiers-le-Bel, an immigrant suburb of Paris. The boys, joyriding on a stolen motorbike, collided at high speed with a police vehicle which happened to be passing in a neighborhood where the police normally do not venture.

Though Moushin and Lakamy were French-born and of French nationality, their families had them buried in Morocco and Senegal — the countries of their ethnic origin. The self-imposed segregation extends even beyond death. Muslims, who claim that France does not have enough separate Islamic cemeteries, do not want to be buried near Christians or Jews.

The death of the two boys led to three nights of heavy rioting in which gangs of criminals — invariably described in the media as "French youths" — burned down dozens of public buildings and tried to kill two police officers in retaliation.

For the first time the French police were confronted with rioters using firearms. On Nov. 28 Nicolas Sarkozy, the French President, declared that "opening fire at officials is completely unacceptable." He promised that "those who shoot at officials will face court for attempted murder." Two months later Mr. Sarkozy's words can be evaluated. All in all, seven delinquents have received a jail sentence for participating in the riots. No one had to stand trial for attempted murder. The longest sentence is a 12-month term. Two of the youths were convicted following the testimony of a deputy police officer. Because the court disclosed the identity of the witness, the latter had to face the consequences. When he arrived at his home he was beaten up by a group of young immigrants.

In May, the French voters elected Mr. Sarkozy as president because he had promised to restore the authority of the Republic over France's 751 no-go areas, the so-called zones urbaines sensibles (ZUS, sensitive urban areas), where 5 million people — 8 percent of the population — live. During his first months in office he has been too busy with other activities, such as selling nuclear plants to Libya and getting divorced. While the French media publish nude pictures of the future (third) Mrs. Sarkozy, the situation in the ZUS has remained as "sensitive" as before.

People get mugged, even murdered, in the ZUS, but the media prefer not to write about it. When large-scale rioting erupts and officers and firemen are attacked, the behavior of the thugs is condoned with references to their "poverty" and to the "racism" of the indigenous French. The French media never devote their attention to the bleak situation of intimidation and lawlessness in which 8 percent of the population, including many poor indigenous French, are forced to live. Muslim racism toward the "infidels" is never mentioned.

Xavier Raufer, a former French intelligence officer who heads the department on organized crime and terrorism at the Institute of Criminology of the University of Paris II, thinks that organized crime has a lot to do with the indifference of the French establishment.

The ZUS are centers of drug trafficking. According to a recent report of the French government's Interdepartmental Commission to Combat Drug Traffic and Addiction (MILDT) 550,000 people in France consume cannabis on a daily basis and 1.2 million on a regular basis. The annual cannabis consumption amounts to 208 tons for a market value of 832 million euros ($1.2 billion in U.S. dollars). MILDT estimates that there are between 6,000 and 13,000 small "entrepreneurs" and between 700 and 1,400 wholesalers who make a living out of dealing cannabis. The wholesalers earn up to 550,000 euros ($820,000) per year. Since they operate from within the ZUS the drug dealers are beyond the reach of the French authorities.

The ZUS exist not only because Muslims wish to live in their own areas according to their own culture and their own Shariah laws, but also because organized crime wants to operate without the judicial and fiscal interference of the French state. In France, Shariah law and mafia rule have become almost identical.

Mr. Raufer says that corruption is the key to understanding both the silence of the French media and the unwillingness of the French politicians to reconquer the lost territories of the republic. He suggests that Parisian journalists, intellectuals and politicians may have been bought with drug money: "Enormous interests are at stake. Once such [a] vast amount of money circulates underground everything can be bought, including the culture of condonement."

Recently the Islamist ideologue Tariq Ramadan was appointed professor at Leiden University, the eldest and most prestigious university in the Netherlands. His chair is being financed by the Sultan of Oman. In Europe as elsewhere, large sums of Saudi and Gulf money are being used to buy universities and media outlets. The purpose is not to promote a moderate form of Islam and to stimulate Muslim immigrants to assimilate into their Western host countries, but to do exactly the opposite. It is possible that money resulting from criminal activities within Europe's own borders is being used for the same goals. In that case no one need be surprised at the vast propaganda of multiculturalism emanating from our schools, our press and our politicians.

Multiculturalism is a disaster. Because it is a disaster and has opened the door to organized crime, the latter's money has bought everything and the praise of multiculturalism is being sung louder than ever.

Paul Belien is editor of the Brussels Journal and an adjunct fellow of the Hudson Institute.