Europe's postwar miracle was
founded on these cheap, plentiful and oft-replenished Gastarbiter -
"guest workers". Objective studies have consistently shown that
immigrants contribute more to their host economies - as consumers,
investors and workers - than they ever claw back in social services and
public goods. This is especially true in Europe, where an ageing
population of early retirees has been relying on the uninterrupted flow
of pension contributions by younger laborers, many of them immigrants.
Business has been paying attention to this emerging market. British
financial intermediaries - such as the West Bromwich Building Society -
have recently introduced "Islamic" (interest-free) mortgages. According
to market research firm, Datamonitor, gross advances in the UK alone
could reach $7 billion in 2006 - up from $60 million today. The Bank of
England is in the throes of preparing regulations to accommodate the
pent-up demand.
Yet, their very integration, however hesitant and gradual, renders the
Muslims in Europe vulnerable to the kind of treatment the old continent
meted out to its Jews before the holocaust. Growing Muslim presence in
stagnating job markets within recessionary economies inevitably
generated a backlash, often cloaked in terms of Samuel Huntington's
1993 essay in Foreign Affairs, "Clash of Civilizations".
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