A Town in Europe

A group of people gathered in the town square to protest. They were Muslims, carrying signs in English saying, “Islam will prevail,” and “Stop atrocities against Muslims.” There were counter-demonstrators carrying signs, also in English, that said, “Muslims go home.”

The two groups clashed, according to witnesses, and the cobblestone streets of this medieval town were soon spattered with blood; some people were injured. Each group said that the other group started it. Men from both groups said, “We’re tired of them flirting with our women.” Women said, “We’re tired of them showing disrespect towards women.”

The Muslim women wore black niqabs or chadors, but most them said that their style of dress reflected their religious beliefs, not a political position. There were also European women in punk regalia, but few said that their clothes reflected their politics, and many said that they were just watching the demonstration.

A woman with spiked green hair and several piercings in each lobe said, “The problem is that they don’t want to be assimilated.”

A woman in a chador said, “This is my country, too.”

There were extremists in both camps. Men with jackboots and shaved heads shouted "Heil Hitler," waving Nazi flags and showing swastika tattoos on bare skin, even though the protest took place in November. There were men in white skull caps and white pyjamas with full beards; their clothing did little to protect them from the autumn chill.

The police said that they were caught in the middle but prevented both groups from clashing. The police ended up turning a water cannon on a group of demonstrators. Police blamed the Muslims for the violence, but both groups claimed that the police did little to prevent the violence and aided and abetted the other side.

A man who was born in this town but had lived abroad for many years said, “There was a time when the foreigners dressed like us, but they couldn’t speak the language. Now we all speak the same language, but they don’t dress like us. They have never had the same religion.”

He traced the violence to the 1960s, when the immigrants first came to work the wine presses in the vineyards and pick up garbage from the curb. "We didn't want them," he said, "but we needed them."

The people of this town have never liked the immigrants, yet they seem surprised when they hear that the immigrants don’t like them either. “They should be grateful that we let them stay,” an older man grumbled.

The immigrants have the right of citizenship, but one immigrant, an older man, said, “It isn’t enough. We want the same rights as anybody else born in this country. We want acceptance. We aren't foreigners anymore; we're here to stay.”

A young man, obviously working class, said, “They want the whole store. If you give them an inch, they’ll take a mile.” Then he spat, “We should just send them back where they came from.”

An aristocratic-looking woman who is a member of a wine growing family said, “We need to come together. Our whole existence is threatened because they plan to build a highway in this region. If they build it, runoff from the highway will get into the river, and it will affect the taste of the wine.”

Environmentalists agree with the grower. However, they are reluctant to link up with immigrants for fear of alienating the townspeople, even though most of the immigrants work in the vineyards. “The devil is always in the details,” sighed a member of an environmentalist group.

A businessman who designs software said, “We can’t live just off other people drinking our wine. We need new growth, and the highway will lead new people here.”

Another businessman, who is Muslim, agreed. “The only thing that has ever united the world,” he said, “is commerce.”

However, there is much that still divides the people of this town, and commerce has yet to united them. There has been a rumour of another demonstration.