Serafín Fanjul: “Islamic communities are very much opposed to integration”

Serafín Fanjul is a Spanish Arabist and Islam-critic. In addition to being a media commentator, he is a professor of Arabic Literature at the Autonomous University of Madrid.

In the following video, Prof. Fanjul takes part in a TV panel discussion about Islamic terrorism, “integration”, and the non-existence of “moderate” Muslims. This is not a new video, and I don’t know when it was recorded, so I’m not sure which specific jihad attacks in France are being referred to in the discussion.

Many thanks to Pampasnasturtium for the translation, and to Vlad Tepes for the subtitling:

Video transcript:

00:02   Joining the table in order to provide analysis, we have Serafín Fanjul,
00:05   the Arab studies scholar. Mr. Fanjul, good evening.
00:09   Good evening. —Thanks for being with us on a night like this to try to help us understand.
00:12   …all of you will pose a question anyway.
00:15   For my part, one more (question). A moment ago, at the start of the evening,
00:18   talking to one of the Spanish Public TV special correspondents, Víctor Guerrero,
00:21   he mentioned some data that makes us think, and about which I want to ask you.
00:24   Four out of five of the terrorists arrested during recent hours
00:27   were born in France. —Dead, dead you mean.
00:30   Dead, dead, indeed.
00:33   I was going to say arrested, arrested after being dead. —They’re very dead.
00:36   Very dead, absolutely arrested.
00:40   Four of them, four out of the five
00:44   were born in France. What do you conclude from this fact?
00:48   You’ll see. Just earlier, I heard the dialogue you had
00:52   on this (I don’t know what to call it) soirée, I don’t know if it’s offensive.
00:57   “Conversation”, “conversation”.
01:01   OK, and the matter came out.
01:04   And it was asked, “What have we done wrong for this to happen?”
01:07   This is a question that is repeated so many times on the media
01:11   that I truly find it excessive.
01:15   We can ask ourselves, “And what have we done right?”
01:18   And we can also ask, “What have the others done wrong?” or, “What are they not doing?”
01:22   It’s also true that we can add, “What have we done wrong?”
01:25   Or what’s not (being) done. As far as I know, in France
01:28   much money is being used for integration,
01:32   precisely for Islamic communities.
01:35   But in France there are many immigrants and they have been there for a long time,
01:40   and from many backgrounds. Italians, Spaniards, Portuguese,
01:43   Slavs, South Americans…
01:46   None of those communities react this way.
01:50   What’s up? Well, I don’t want to
01:53   play haruspex or only be an interpreter,
01:57   but one of the explanations,
02:00   I say, one of the explanations
02:03   is that Islamic communities are very much opposed to integration.
02:06   And they practice a tightly closed endogamy,
02:09   most of all via the marriages, of women,
02:12   that place them automatically outside of the majority of society.
02:16   Is this a fault? Well, I don’t know;
02:19   in any case, it is a type of behavior
02:22   that generates, in due time, a reaction from society.
02:25   To this, can economic alienation also be added,
02:28   the lack of a cultural standard, etc.?
02:31   Yes, it’s true, all of those are factors that matter.
02:34   Now, all terrorists, most of all those of middle- and higher-class background,
02:38   are all of them alienated, coming from the outskirts of Paris? Well, no;
02:41   Bin Laden wasn’t, those of the New York attacks, neither were they.
02:46   Some of the masterminds (of these attacks), it seems like some of those weren’t, either.
02:50   Those of London, that same savage who died
02:54   some days ago, who would behead prisoners,
02:57   it seems this one had quite solid foundations in his education.
03:01   Afterwards, he quit, but he was of Kuwaiti background,
03:04   and he was received in England with all the social welfare,
03:10   he and his family. He was able to study
03:13   at a good college, and nevertheless he preferred to dedicate himself to something else.
03:16   It’s also true, and this must be said,
03:19   that when a person feels individual estrangement,
03:22   it’s very possible that he then will go to his roots, to his origins,
03:25   to those of his parents, to those of his community, because he looks for
03:29   a certainty, a security in life, to stick to.
03:33   And if what surrounds him in a Paris banlieue
03:37   is not enough, and it’s very plausible that it is not,
03:40   then he may easily fall into one of these networks of recruitment
03:43   of people who initially are not terrorists,
03:46   that are only, if you’ll excuse the expression,
03:50   “pissed off”, as there are from other backgrounds, I insist, but
03:55   there were in South America, for decades and decades,
03:58   terrible guerrillas, there are still some left, in Colombia:
04:02   they never went to attack the New York metro,
04:07   never did they try to bring down the World Trade Center,
04:10   none of these guerrillas, and yet they were very anti-American,
04:13   in Argentina, in Uruguay, in Chile.
04:16   In Peru, in Colombia of course.
04:19   Never did they go to attack there. Then, what’s going on?
04:22   That rejection has taken one bigger step up.
04:25   It’s no longer just a personal problem, but rather…
04:28   deep down, though it may be ugly to have to recognize it,
04:31   it’s a clash of civilizations. There’s a clash of one background
04:36   that refuses to accept the situation that surrounds it.
04:39   And if the clash occurs, to me from the start, the whole thing seems very unfortunate,
04:43   and of course, what’s the solution? Well, to try to integrate them, evidently.
04:47   Now, do they allow themselves to be [integrated]?
04:50   That’s a question that has to be asked, which must be dealt with
04:53   in a rational manner, as objectively as possible.
04:56   It’s not just a matter of blaming them for what they’re doing, although
05:00   obviously, the number one person responsible for a terrorist attack is the terrorist himself,
05:05   and, it goes without saying, whoever commands him.
05:08   But it’s also true that we can acknowledge about them
05:11   some general, social conditionings, etc.,
05:14   that can be, that must be, studied, and one must try to alleviate them,
05:17   but believing that everything is going to be solved solely by giving more money to mosques
05:21   (and it is already given to them, in France),
05:24   and to the organizations in charge of teaching who-knows-what (and that is already given),
05:27   believing that it’s going to be solved that way, well, it is not going to be.
05:30   In our case, I know that the (Spanish) Ministry of Justice is
05:34   financing the building of mosques, has been for a long time,
05:37   through intermediary entities.
05:40   I cannot say I find it OK, but neither do I see it as being bad.
05:44   If it is for everyone, for sure.
05:47   Houses (flats) are being given,
05:50   children are being schooled,
05:53   what else can we do? If, when the baby girl turns eleven, she’s given the hijab
05:58   by her parents, what can we do?
06:01   If, when she’s going to be married, they bring her a much older relative from Morocco
06:05   and marry her to him. And she’s strictly forbidden from making the acquaintance, not even as friends,
06:10   of neighbor children or schoolchildren.
06:14   It’s a quite tough matter,
06:17   getting into those family areas, and, of course,
06:21   that has consequences afterwards.
06:24   There’s no doubt that every endogamous group ends up by generating, all around it,
06:27   a feeling of marginalization.
06:30   This is unavoidable, in all cultures and at all times in history;
06:35   it’s always been like that, which doesn’t mean
06:38   that we must persecute them, expel them, or anything of the sort;
06:41   I’m not saying that. I simply believe we must encourage integration.
06:44   But encourage it for good.
06:48   Anyway, I know that, in general, in these times of conversations,
06:51   it’s looked upon favorably that
06:55   we discuss history, which is very far away, no? They’re distant things. But let me remind you —
06:58   I love talking about history! —It’s that if we don’t talk about history, (unintelligible)…
07:01   Well, let’s see, let’s see;
07:04   I know the problems in Paris happened two days ago, and
07:08   I know that if I speak about the Moriscos at the beginning of the 16th century, you’ll tell me
07:11   “you’re straying too far away (in time)”. Well, maybe not,
07:14   because it turns out that with the Moriscos of the start of the sixteenth century
07:17   there was a true problem trying to integrate them,
07:21   although it was tried. And it was tried very seriously, precisely through
07:24   mixed marriages… —…of the one and true religion that has to be imposed,
07:28   you’ll agree with me that… all in all… no? —Well, I…
07:31   In that regard, Christendom, luckily, has found the way to evolve, (unintelligible). —Of course,
07:35   of course, (unintelligible). —…the expression “clash of civilizations”. I believe that here we are
07:39   labeling this part, this Salafist fundamentalism
07:42   that has existed historically, that the first cruelty they exercise, they do so upon themselves.
07:46   That is to say, within their territory there are atrocious victims
07:49   among their heritage, among people, among their possessions, and so…
07:53   and we talk, and we label them a terrorist group, because they are,
07:56   because they are, and that’s not the essence of Arab civilization.
07:59   Therefore, talking about “clash of civilizations”, I can’t find that appropriate, I don’t know
08:03   what your opinion is. —Let’s see… listen, I know that Huntington’s book
08:08   had, among other negative features,
08:11   the creation of this mandatory confrontation
08:15   within debates. But Huntington quotes data.
08:20   And among the data he brings forward,
08:23   out of every five conflicts that occurred during the past twenty or thirty years
08:27   in the world, out of them, among ethnicities or religions,
08:31   in four of them Muslims were involved. Four out of five, that’s not a forgery; that means that
08:37   are they trying to impose couscous, or are they intending to steal paella from us?
08:41   No, it’s simply an idea about life and about the world,
08:44   that I, in a simplistic and reductionist manner,
08:48   in the way we’re speaking, I say “clash of civilizations”.
08:51   Obviously, human civilization,
08:54   I acknowledge, is one. There’s only one human civilization.
08:58   And what there is, is variations of all of them.
09:01   Within human civilization, different embodiments (of it)
09:04   that have reached different results, but sometimes those results clash.
09:07   And in the concrete case of endogamy, it is utterly clear:
09:11   because there it is not only two words, “clash” and “civilizations”,
09:14   no, no, it is that there, what’s implied is,
09:18   for example, the freedom of women to decide. For example. And there,
09:21   there, you’ll acknowledge to me that… —Absolutely, absolutely.
09:25   …there’s a clash. When what’s imposed is a different thing… —It’s an attack on human rights.
09:29   Against human rights. But, of course, we can go farther,
09:32   Another one of the things that are said a lot is that, well, that we don’t understand them, etc.,
09:38   and that moderate Muslims don’t accept that. Let’s see,
09:43   if a Muslim is asked: “do you accept apostasy?”
09:47   (to a moderate Muslim)… Let’s see if he’s a moderate or if he isn’t, because
09:52   he’s going to say “no”, and from his point of view, he’s right.
09:56   “Will you accept mixed marriages?” No. “Will you accept religious proselytizing,
10:03   from other religions, in certain places, for example
10:06   in Arabia?” He’s going to say no. It means that…
10:09   And you know what he’ll answer: It’s that “if I accepted all of that, I wouldn’t be a Muslim”.
10:12   And I tell him, he’s right.
10:15   If he accepted all those things, he wouldn’t be a Muslim.
10:19   There is where the conflict moderate Muslim / extremist Muslim comes from.
10:22   You know what happens? Muslims, true, normal ones,
10:26   which, besides, are the majority,
10:29   laugh at all these differences and differentiations that we make
10:33   in Europe, in the US, between moderates and extremists.
10:37   They laugh! Because they know it’s a creation from here, not theirs.
10:41   They distinguish: Muslims or non-Muslims. If you don’t accept these things,
10:44   well, besides attacking, the shahada, and thence accepting the Koran,
10:47   and a whole series of things, besides
10:51   all those things, if you stray outside the orthodoxy in those key points
10:54   that I mentioned, proselytizing, apostasy, endogamy,
10:58   if you move outside (them), you’re not being a Muslim.
11:01   Then it is incompatible, the presence of Muslims in our civilization,
11:04   the way you are… —I don’t… I haven’t said that, but… draw your own conclusions.
11:10   We must leave it here; it’s four minutes to midnight, four to eleven in the Canary Islands…
11:14   Mr. Fanjul, Serafín Fanjul, Arab studies scholar, thanks for coming to
11:17   a conversation like this, to tell us
11:21   So much that you know.
11:24   I know a little more. —And what he’s silent about.
11:27   What I’m silent about — because I have no other option.
 

21 thoughts on “Serafín Fanjul: “Islamic communities are very much opposed to integration”

  1. “Islamic communities are very much opposed to integration”, says the professor.
    The Western listener cannot help receiving this in a Western democratic mindset, as if some diligent persuasion work would bring these Islamic communities round to a more accommodating and integrating disposition.

    Not so.

    It is Islam itself – the rule book – that is “very much opposed to integration”. It quite simply does not allow it. Islam imposes its own “them and us” apartheid, the doctrine of Loyalty and Enmity. Muslims are “the best of peoples”, kuffar are “filth…..the vilest of beasts…the enemy”.
    In addition, Islam MANDATES violence towards all other ideologies. Theresa May prevented Robert Spencer from visiting the UK for saying that. As Spencer explains, it is rather like saying sky is blue, or grass is green.

    European governments are negligent in failing to inform themselves.

    • The governments — I’m just cynical enough to say — have all along been more than adequately “informed” as to the down side, the traumatizing-to-the-native-inhabitants’ side, that their own policies are inflicting upon ethnic Europeans.

      The bureaucrats, government leaders, and policy makers will reap a magnificent windfall, buoyed up as they are by their multifarious paymasters — of whatever stripe; but these all are unanimous in their contempt for you and for me: the paymasters and their puppets hate us.
      They wish us dead.

      Never forget that the biggest payoffs — profits — are reaped after the collapse of “peoples,” when the rebuilding of infrastructures, cast in the utopian likeness, enter hyper-speed, when the only persons to tax and control are truly slaves. Such are the plans of those who wish us harm.

      But — these impotent tyrants do not rule as they think they do.

  2. “Clash of civilisations”?
    Clash, yes. Civilisations, plural? No.

    Slavery, stonings, daughter-murder, amputations, genital mutilation, child marriage, forced marriage, wife-beating, no equality before the law, no freedom of conscience, no freedom of speech, no music, no sculpture, no portraiture, no dogs. Those are not civilisation.

    • A civilization is the structural reflection of a culture. In other words, the civilization includes the roads, temples, housing, administrative buildings, cities and commercial relations centered around a culture.

      You don’t have to like the culture, but civilization is a common process around very different cultures. Our culture is no more suited for Muslim countries than Islam is suited for our countries.

      Here’s the reason you don’t want to play with semantics and deny Islam the respect of civilization designation: you don’t want to underestimate Islam and the threat it imposes. If you refuse to accord Islamic countries the category of civilization, then the threat imposed by Islam and Muslims is a random danger rather than a well-organized, well-supported incursion on our countries and their cultural identities.

  3. Yes, it is “a clash of civilizations”. Each of us, unfortunately, has to decide where to stand; omission is also taking a postion for the bad side. Wherever we live, we should, IMHO, say and do what we can for mutual respect, tolerance (which is not the same as accepting other people’s ideas as true, but just as opinions for which they should not be punished as long as they remain just opinions and not acts of violence…) and against moral and religious relativism (no, it is not correct to say “all religions lead us to God – there are some that surely do not!). Islam is evil, Leftism is evil.
    If we must live in other countries than that in which we were born, or choose to do so, either should we try to integrate, or at least respect its laws … That is obvious, but should be made clear to everybody who migrates. As a South American myself (I’m Brazilian) I must say that integration is possible for most people, should they try it…; it appears that it is difficult for muslims, probably because they don’t try. If they think their ways are so much better , they should stay home…

  4. certainly there contradictions,

    “multiculturalism” vs integration,
    “diversity” vs unity of law,
    “collectivism” vs individual rights,
    “freedom of religion” vs secular education, and
    “positive discrimination” vs high-IQ meritocracy.

    To say that they are irreconcilable is to state the obvious.
    And to the generetion “snowflake”, it is to be explained with utmost clarity, that there can’t be place in the West for cultures based upon archaic myths, ignorance and violent coercion, – be it Islam or whatever.

  5. “In our case, I know that the (Spanish) Ministry of Justice is financing the building of mosques, has been for a long time, through intermediary entities. I cannot say I find it OK, but neither do I see it as being bad.”

    Isn’t that the problem right there? So-called leaders can’t see the insanity of building mosques, at OUR expenses, for the very people who are expressly stating that they mean to either subject us or kill us.

    • Absolutely.

      We should be incensed governments are using our tax money to liquidate us, our children, and our future in slow-motion.

    • “Isn’t that the problem right there? So-called leaders can’t see the insanity of building mosques,…”

      I don’t think it matters who builds the mosques. The Saudis are more than happy to finance mosques in any and all countries.

      The problem is the presence of mosques in great numbers, whoever built them.

  6. The photo shown is that of Saleh Abdeslam, who was involved in the November 2015 Paris attacks.

    And, yes. What the good man points out means we must deport them.

  7. The professor fails to realize the Latin American guerrilla groups never received the level of financial and logistical support the 9/11 crew did.

    • they also don’t have global suremacist goal, nor 1400 practice of its implementation through extreme violence.

  8. I don’t think Islam is the root adversary in the West. It seems our fundamental problem–amongst many on the left–is in the faux altruistic toleration of Islam and the secret desire to use it to overturn our culture. Even without Islam, this treasonous faction is simply going to search for another vanguard–to keep their own noses clean–to use as a tool for its revolution.

    If the left thinks Islam is going to get out of the way after its team has been so used, they have ‘another think coming’….but a lot of good this does us.

    • William-

      The Hungarians got it right in 1956 with their, “Traitors first,” policy.

      Agree that the Left are useful idiots for Islam that have deluded themselves into believing they will be able to progressivize the Ummah into degeneracy.

      • >>progressivize the Ummah into degeneracy

        actually this is good idea for which Progressives deserve a credit.

        however, to acomplish that, two simple condition are to be met:
        1. Muslims in the West renounce violence and switch to peaceful competition.
        2. Condition (1) isn’t disturbed by Islamic oil money, taqiyya, and Muslim immigration.

        situation in the West is far from meeting both points, obviously.

  9. Definitely a clash of civilisation.

    Take the N. Africans (who are Berbers i.e. quite distinct from Arab lineage which makes up much less than 10 % admix eg. https://www.quora.com/Do-Moroccans-consider-themselves-Arabs ) and until @ 600 AD were well part of the European Mediterranean mixture/society/circuit etc.

    If you read up the “Islamic conquest” at

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berbers#Origins

    or other sites, it becomes quite clear that it is a cultural/religious/political expansion that continues, not just (or even, in some cases) race.

    http://www.theolivepress.es/spain-news/2017/11/19/spanish-police-shoot-unarmed-moroccan-man-in-terror-scare-after-he-shouted-allahu-akbar/

  10. The key to integrating the muslim populations into Western societies is breaking down their control they have over their women. By forcing sexual equality, you give the average muslim some idea of religious freedom, and the women the ability to make up their own decisions. That is one reason why forceful policies to disallow ghettization are a must.

    • There is not going to be any so-called integration of “muslim populations into Western societies.”

      My reading of the Muslim culture re its treatment of women goes back 500 years, to the writings of Martin Luther on this very subject.

      Nothing has changed in 500 years.

      Your prescription for advancing comity between Islam and the West, while “hopeful” in its approach, bears slim insight as to what’s at the heart of Islam: A complete repudiation of, a fierce hatred of, all that is not of Islam.
      Concretely: Control over women is a central tenet of Islam. Hard stop.

      BTW: there can be no ghettoization of Muslim communities if the West were to MAN UP and send the Mohammedans back to where Islam rules — which is where these people belong.

      • realistically to “send the Mohammedans back” isn’t possible.
        the only foreseeable future in the West is “containment” (apartheid) – either instead or after low-level civil war, depending on luck.
        Israel lives like that for many generations.
        next country approaching this model, is France.

  11. Gobbledegook. I’m not impressed with this Spanish professor. He doesn’t have a firm grip on the subject. I much prefer that Italian who was far more outspoken and to the point in a video from Vlad Tepes a few weeks ago.

    Here, this is from a poster on Quadrant, an Aussie publication:

    ‘Words, words, words, I’m so sick of words!’ It’s all been said before and then some.

    Allah’s objective is the subjugation of the world to himself. Unless you understand that you don’t understand the problem: and I don’t think the article mentioned Allah.

    Look, when you have a book that teaches and encourages the following you are not dealing with sweetness and light. You are dealing with treason.

    • Antagonism between, separation of, and alienation by, a specific group and the rest of mankind.
    • Deception and dissimulation in dealings with people who are not of that group.
    • Physical harm and/or subjugation for those who are not of that group.
    • Coercive management as a tool to exact performance from members of that group.
    • No recognition by that group of the separation of church and State.

    The niceties of staying calm, and continuing to work on intelligence, increasing surveillance of mosques and Muslim schools, providing encouragement and support for moderate local Islamic leadership, and firmly defending the Australian tradition just don’t cut it. They simply play into Allah’s hands.

Comments are closed.