Europe
Archived Posts from this Category
Greece under fire from European Parliament
Atens News | September 7, 2007
Property speculation and lack of land registry are to blame for thedevastating fires, say MEPs
MEMBERS of the European Parliament have blamed a decade-long delay in setting up a land registry in Greece for the outbreak of fires over the years, including the recent spate of wildfires in southern Greece - the worst in history.
Mosque ignites German hostility
London Daily Telegraph | June 25, 2007
LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH - COLOGNE, Germany — The construction of one of Europe’s biggest mosques near a globally famous Christian landmark has sparked a furious dispute in Germany.
Immigration and integration are extremely sensitive issues in Germany, which is home to a Turkish community of several million.
4 comments Tuesday 26 Jun 2007 | Jacobse | Europe, Islam |
The New Europeans
Wall Street Opinion Journal | May 5, 2007
Can an election change France?
The changing of the guard in Europe’s biggest countries is a chance for the Continent to renew itself. That’s the good news. Here’s the other kind: This fresh crop of leaders doesn’t look well-placed to pull it off.
comments off Sunday 06 May 2007 | Jacobse | Europe, Politics |
The Mid-Life Crisis of the EU
Townhall.com Patrick J. Buchanan March 30, 2007
The 50th birthday of the European Union, born in Rome in March 1957 as the European Economic Community or Common Market — of Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, Holland and Luxembourg — was a pallid affair.
French Supreme Court Rejects Gay Marriage
AHN Julie Farby March 14, 2007
Paris, France (AHN) - In a landmark ruling, France’s highest court ruled the first marriage by a homosexual couple in the country was unlawful, thereby annulling the June, 5 2004 union between the two men.
comments off Friday 16 Mar 2007 | Jacobse | Europe, Gay marriage |
Europe is not the sum of its parts
Asia Times Online Spengler March 13, 2007
Apropos of the debate over a European constitution, it should be remembered that Europe did not arise as an agglomeration of nations. On the contrary, Europe existed before any of its constituent nations, and the unified Europe of Church and Empire created the nations along with their languages and cultures. As individual nations, Europe’s constituent countries will die on the vine.
comments off Wednesday 14 Mar 2007 | Jacobse | Europe, History |
Entrepreneurial Culture
Wall Street Opinion Journal Edmund S. Phelps February 12, 2007
Why European economies lag behind the U.S.
The nations of Continental Western Europe, in the reforms they make to try to raise their economic performance, may prove to be a testing ground for the view that culture matters for a society’s economic results.
4 comments Monday 12 Feb 2007 | Jacobse | Europe |
Losing the Enlightenment
Wall Street Opinion Journal Victor Davis Hanson November 29, 2006
A civilization that has lost confidence in itself cannot confront the Islamists.
Our current crisis is not yet a catastrophe, but a real loss of confidence of the spirit. The hard-won effort of the Western Enlightenment of some 2,500 years that, along with Judeo-Christian benevolence, is the foundation of our material progress, common decency, and scientific excellence, is at risk in this new millennium.
comments off Wednesday 29 Nov 2006 | Jacobse | Europe, Islam, Politics |
Sharia law is spreading as authority wanes
London Telegraph Joshua Rozenberg November 29
Islamic sharia law is gaining an increasing foothold in parts of Britain, a report claims.
Sharia, derived from several sources including the Koran, is applied to varying degrees in predominantly Muslim countries but it has no binding status in Britain.
comments off Wednesday 29 Nov 2006 | Jacobse | Europe, Islam, Politics |
Don’t Look at Us!
Wall Street Best of the Web James Taranto October 17, 2006
“British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett last week issued the latest European demand to close down the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba,” The Washington Post reports. “The existence of the prison is ‘unacceptable’ and fuels Islamic radicalism around the world, she said, echoing a recent chorus of complaints from Europe about U.S. counterterrorism policy.”
comments off Tuesday 17 Oct 2006 | Jacobse | Europe, Iraq, Politics |
Europe Raising Its Voice Over Radical Islam
Los Angeles Times Jeffrey Fleishman October 16, 2006
Some say the continent is betraying its ideals by trying to appease fundamentalists.
BERLIN — In Europe’s cafes, the newspapers are as wrinkled as always, the conversations still veer toward the abstract, but tempers these days are riled.
Artists and influential leftists are warning that the rise of radical Islam is threatening the tradition of European liberalism. Theater directors, cartoonists and writers say the continent is betraying its identity by practicing self-censorship aimed at appeasing a fundamentalist Islam they believe is determined to impose its will on free speech and creativity.
Islamist School Inspector
Ed. We hear all the time that we all believe in the same God (including the Muslim God). Has anyone asked the Muslims if they believe that is true?
London Daily Mail FrontPageMagazine.com October 5, 2006
A hardline Muslim teacher who caused a furore by denouncing pupils for celebrating Christmas has been made a Government schools inspector.
Israr Khan’s Ofsted appointment was described by a former colleague as ‘absolutely astonishing’.
10 comments Thursday 05 Oct 2006 | Jacobse | Europe, Islam |
Violent Islam, cowardly Europe: from the cartoons to Regensburg
An Asian Jesuit warns the west.
Asian News Samir Khalil Samir September 30, 2006
A cultural attack by Islam against the West is under way, to which Europe is responding with fear and backtracking. In Regensburg, the pope showed the way ahead: no to the violence of Islam; renew European culture.
comments off Thursday 05 Oct 2006 | Jacobse | Europe, Islam |
Ireland, where abortion is illegal, has the highest fertility rate in Europe
Life League Newsletter October 3, 3006
Thanks to the legalization of abortion, most nations in Europe are experiencing severe underpopulation problems. Had abortion not been legal, the nations likely wouldn’t have had the same issues. A new report from the OECD shows that all European nations recorded birth rates of more than 1.3 children per woman in 1990. But, by 2002, 15 counties had rates below 1.3 children per woman, and six countries had rates between 1.3 and 1.4 children per woman. A rate of 2.1 is needed to maintain a population. Ireland, one of the few European nations where abortion is illegal, has the highest fertility rate of any European nation. Portugal, which also prohibits abortion, is in the top half. Malta, another pro-life nation, is in the middle of the list of counties.
comments off Thursday 05 Oct 2006 | Jacobse | Europe, Sanctity of life |
Muslims are waging civil war against us, claims police union
London Telegraph David Rennie, Europe Correspondent
Radical Muslims in France’s housing estates are waging an undeclared “intifada” against the police, with violent clashes injuring an average of 14 officers each day.
Interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy was warned of an ‘intifada’
comments off Thursday 05 Oct 2006 | Jacobse | Europe, Islamic violence, Terrorism |
Essay critical of Islam leaves teacher on run
Ed. So who is running France? The French or the Muslims?
Washington Times Tom Heneghan October 1, 2006
PARIS — A French teacher hiding from Islamist death threats says he has been abandoned by the Education Ministry and has to arrange for his own safe houses when police bodyguards move him every two days.
In Europe, a search for what defines the EU’s moral identity
Christian Science Monitor Christa Case and Michael J. Jordan September 6, 2006
Newer EU members struggle to promote a more traditional morality.
BERLIN; AND BRATISLAVA, SLOVAKIA – Europe, it seems, is having a bit of an identity crisis. As leaders from Budapest to Barcelona vie to guide the continent’s forward course, the needle on Europe’s moral compass is bouncing frenetically between two increasingly polarized camps.
comments off Thursday 07 Sep 2006 | Jacobse | Culture war, Europe, Politics |
Londonistan
Townhall.com Melanie Phillips August 11, 2006
The following is an excerpt from Londonistan, a new book by Melanie Phillips.
Britain is in denial. Having allowed the country to turn into a global hub of the Islamic jihad without apparently giving it a second thought, the British establishment is still failing even now — despite the wake-up calls of both 9/11 and the London bomb attacks of 2005 — to acknowledge what it is actually facing and take the appropriate action. Instead, it is deep into a policy of appeasement of the phenomenon that threatens it, throwing sops to both radical Islamism and the Muslim community in a panic-stricken attempt to curry favour and buy off the chances of any further attacks. This disastrous policy ignores the first law of terrorism which is that it preys on weakness. The only way to defeat it is through strength — the strength of a response based on absolute consistency and moral integrity, which arises in turn from the strength of belief in the values that are being defended. By choosing instead the path of least resistance, Britain is advertising its fundamental weakness and is thus not only greatly enhancing the danger to itself but is also enfeebling the alliance in the defence of the West.
In France, Islam and secularism spread as Christianity lapses
Chicago Tribune Tom Hundley June 19, 2006
PARIS - Al Fath Mosque is in a scruffy immigrant neighborhood not far from the neon-lit kitsch of Pigalle. On Friday afternoons the mosque is jammed, and the overflow of worshippers - all men - spills into the streets.
comments off Wednesday 28 Jun 2006 | Jacobse | Europe, Islam, Religion (general) |
Latvian Parliament Withstands EU Pressure on Homosexuality
Samantha Singson June 23, 2006
(NEW YORK — C-FAM) The Latvian Parliament has decided to exxclude a ban on sexual orientation discrimination from its Anti-Discrimination Bill, despite a directive from the European Union. Although implementation of the legislation was a condition for Latvia’s accession to the Union in 2004, Latvian lawmakers have rejected it.
comments off Saturday 24 Jun 2006 | Jacobse | Europe, Gay marriage |
