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Muslims in Europe seem to be under a microscope in Europe today. This has nothing to do with their faith, it's just that some Europeans who are non-Muslims are panicky about the situation in their neighboring countries. The number of European Muslims is on a steady rise, and some few millions practice it in the continent today.
European Muslims are not facing a difficult time adapting to the society, steadily convincing native Europeans to accept them and their culture. The rise of Muslims in Europe is mainly because of the immigrants belonging to countries like Turkey, North Africa, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Europeans are beginning to accept religious diversity.
The rise in terrorism in the world has put Muslims in Europe on a very delicate platform. Some of them do not speak the language of the country they have gone to live in. This raises suspicions among some of the country’s citizens, but this is not very important, as extremists will always be there in any country of the world, and fortunately their ideas are generally rejected by normal people.
If Turkey joins the European Union, the number of Muslims estimated to live in the continent arrives to an astonishing figure of 83 million and more. We would be talking about a whole lot of Muslims then, and this is great, since the general tendency nowadays is to unite all countries and connect people, regardless of religion or race or the community they live in.
Equality among Muslim men and women is the first agenda being explored by Muslims in Europe. If Muslims want to adapt to European culture, they will have to change relations between both the sexes, between parents and children, attitudes towards other religions and also their attitude towards European culture.
European Muslims are facing a dilemma about how they may practice their lifestyles. A few of them have adopted completely the European culture. Some others have completely left behind their ancestral and traditional culture to adopt a new Muslim culture in Europe. This of course depends on the character of each individual.
Fundamentalism doesn't have a place in Europe, and so it is with Islamic fundamentalism, so it is quite easy for Muslims to integrate. Unfortunately we all know that a few Muslims in Europe have embraced “Jihad”, or the holy war against the Western world. Several young Muslim men from Europe have been arrested for allegedly planning terrorist attacks after 9/11.
While the Koran states that killing innocent people is not right, these young Muslim men practicing “Jihad”, say that it is the voice of their God telling them to fight for Islam. Europeans must also begin to accept slowly the religion of the Muslims, and stop treating it like an alien factor in their continent. But let's face it, generally the European Muslims are well integrated and live a happy life among the others, and that is the most important fact.
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