Burqa Ban in France: A Sign of Things to Come?

France’s National Assembly – the lower house of Parliament – voted on Tuesday 336-1 in favor of a ban on burqas worn in public. The vote will now proceed to the Senate, where it is expected to pass easily in September. President Nicolas Sarkozy, who is a major supporter of the bill, said in June of last year that burqas and similar dress are “not welcome” in his country, and that women must not be “prisoners behind a screen, cut off from all social life, deprived of all identity.”

The vote comes in the midst of a heated debate in France and across Europe regarding social identity and the competition between secularism and religion. In 2009, France launched a nationwide initiative to define “what it means to be French,” according to the AP. The country has a long history of secular pride, and critics of the burqa contend that public dress that connotes a specific religious affiliation is an attack on French values.

Muslim advocates both within France and abroad have expressed strong disapproval of the movement to ban burqas and other face-covering veils. While such veils are not required by the Qur’an or by traditional Islamic jurisprudence, French Muslim advocacy groups fear that the ban will serve to stigmatize the Islamic community further. France has the largest Muslim population in Europe, and while fewer than half of one percent of Muslim women in France are believed to wear veils that are made illegal by this law, prosecuting Muslims (or any religious group) in secular courts for their religious dress is treading a slippery slope, according to many watchdog groups.

The bill does not make any specific reference to Islam or to burqas, but some French lawmakers worry that passing the bill will serve to revive tensions between native French and the masses immigrating to France from Muslim-majority countries. There have also been fears that terrorist groups will begin targeting France because of the decision on the burqas. Algerian-based terrorist organization al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb issued a statement warning that it will “seek vengeance against France” in response to Sarkozy’s support for the bill.

France is not the only country which is considering such a ban; both Belgium and Spain have expressed interest in similar votes within their parliaments. The issue at the root of the headscarf controversy seems to stem from an influx of Muslim immigrants into the heart of Europe. Some experts contend that by the year 2100, a full one in four Europeans will be Muslim. The enormous growth rate of Islam in Europe has created cultural and religious tensions which are being manifest by riots and civil unrest in places such as Paris, London, and Dresden, Germany.

Peter Osborne, a leading scholar on Islam-European relations from the University of Exeter in Great Britain, says that the media and certain politicians in Europe have given rise to an “atmosphere where hate crimes, ranging from casual abuse to arson to even murder, are bound to occur and are even in a sense encouraged by mainstream media.” Given the overwhelming public support for the anti-headscarf law just passed in France, it seems likely that this atmosphere of public indifference toward Islamic values will continue, and possibly be made worse by the influx of more Muslim immigrants in the coming years.

The Muslim community in France and across Europe will undoubtedly face many hardships as attempts at reconciliation and cross-cultural acceptance continue in the next few decades. The law passed Tuesday in France’s National Assembly, while not entirely inflammatory or outrageous, is not a good sign of what is to come as far as Euro-Islamic relations are concerned. Combined with the ban on mosque-building recently passed in Switzerland, this law and others which are likely to be passed in Belgium and Spain, there seems to be growing anti-Muslim sentiment in Europe. (Although, to be fair, this sentiment might better be characterized as anti-Muslim symbolism or perhaps pro-secularism movements). However you characterize it, the movements resisting Muslim “encroachment” on traditional Christian, western European values are not likely to cease anytime soon.

SWITZERLAND NOT SO NEUTRAL WHEN IT COMES TO RELIGION: SWISS MINARET BAN

Earlier this week Switzerland, the world’s foremost neutral country, sidestepped impartiality by approving a constitutional ban on the construction of minarets. The referendum put forth by the powerful Swiss People’s Party (SVP), a traditionally conservative right wing party, was approved by a 57% majority. The SVP sponsored the ban claiming the construction of minarets represents the “creeping Islamization of Switzerland.” The ban was advertised through suggestively racist posters that juxtaposed a fully veiled woman in the foreground of what appear to be missile shaped minarets. Such xenophobic posters are nothing new from the SVP’s earlier campaigns to institute harsher immigration laws in the country.

The head of the SVP, Ulrich Schluer, argues that minarets are a symbol of the political aims of Islam. In an interview with Russia Today, Schluer contends that the “minaret is seen as a symbol for political attitudes, for political demands. For instance, to introduce step by step elements of the Shariah right, also in Switzerland.” He defends the ban by referring to various Imams and leaders of mosques, in Switzerland, that have openly stated their goal is for implementation of Shariah law. Rather than symbolize the spirituality of Islam, the minaret, historically used to initiate a call to prayer, is now perceived as a political icon. As a result, the future construction of minarets can be construed as a politically motivated objective to introduce other laws into Switzerland, specifically Shariah law.

There are an estimated 200 mosques in Switzerland. According to the Swiss government, most Muslims are former refugees from the Yugoslav wars waged during the 1990s and comprise approximately 6% or 400,000 of Switzerland’s 7.5 million citizens. The implications of such a ban are not only heartfelt by Swiss Muslims, but for Muslims all across Europe.

Fellow Europeans fear an extremist reaction within their own countries. Concerns have been raised over whether or not Sunday’s vote in Switzerland may provoke more anti-Muslim sentiment in Europe. Will the ban in Switzerland promote passage of similar policies in neighboring countries? The European Union is already hard pressed in trying to preserve each countries distinct cultural allure amidst a large influx in foreigners. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan condemned the act, remarking on the widespread Islamaphobia afflicting Europe since France’s widely publicized dispute over the burqa, a full length covering worn by Muslim women. Supporters of the ban mentioned that Prime Minister Erdogan has in the past equated mosques to Islam's military barracks, referring to minarets as Islam’s bayonets.

Worldwide criticism over the ban has emerged from Pakistan and Indonesia, to the Vatican. Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey openly rebuked approval of the ban claiming it restricts religious freedom, while other financial officials in Zurich fear losing wealthy Arab and Muslim investors. The UN, along with other international rights organizations, has denounced the Swiss populist vote citing the government’s violation of international conventions on religious freedoms and individual human rights.

President Obama, notorious for having an open dialogue with the Muslim world, demonstrated by his land mark speech in Cairo not long ago, has yet to give any official response on the U.S. position towards Sunday’s vote in Switzerland.