The despicable beheading of a school teacher in France by an extremist Muslim on Oct. 16—and an attack at a church in Nice later in October—point to a troubling cultural dynamic in Europe. Some Muslims are bringing one-dimensional, old-world thinking to the pluralistic environments in the West, resulting in intolerance and extremist violence.
Some Muslim leaders around the globe claim this violence is a reaction to Islamophobia. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has sought to deflect attention from the crimes by saying France and European societies were suffering from an “Islamophobia disease.” More recently, former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad tweeted that “Muslims have a right to be angry and to kill millions of French people for the massacres of the past,” alluding to French colonialism.
