The issue of the niqab in Europe, especially in Belgium where a law banning it has been passed and in France which is headed towards similar legislation, obscures a highly sensitive matter regarding the extent to which European Muslims are able to take upon themselves the display of their religious belief, whether in terms of their relationship to others or in terms of patterns of social behavior. Much can be said about the motives behind heading towards a ban of the niqab by law, and about attempts to politicize it by authorities, political parties and segments of society in Europe. Many of these motives fall under provoking a “major crisis” over an issue not liable to be subjected to a law. Even the French Constitutional Council has warned François Fillon's government of the unconstitutional nature of taking such a direction when he put forth the idea of banning the niqab, under instructions from President Nicolas Sarkozy. Many French experts on sociology and religions have spoken of the ineffectiveness of such a law, and in fact of the harm it might cause to the image of citizens who adhere to the Muslim faith. Moreover, the case of the Algerian man married to a niqab-clad French woman while at the same time having marital relations with other women who live in the same neighborhood in a suburb of the city of Nantes has been exploited, in a manner that shows how easy it is to mix between a specific case falling within the framework of press “tabloids” and between an image of European Muslims that is being imposed on public opinion – this despite the fact that the polygamous Algerian's defense attorneys have recognized that the man has done only what any other Frenchman might do, i.e. kept multiple “mistresses” and not “wives”, thus not falling under the law prohibiting polygamy. This matter had had an echo with the stars of satellite television and carnivals of incitement, through announcing absolute rejection of the fatwas of European Islamic councils and European imams stressing on making the practice of religion easier and not more difficult, especially in terms of seeking to harmonize worship with European Muslim society. Thus for example, if there is a text allowing polygamy, a practice which is steadily receding all over the Muslim world, returning to it to justify the case of the polygamous Algerian falls within the framework of complicating worship on the one hand, and on the other exposing European Muslims to take on only the image of being polygamous, and thus of going against the law and being in opposition to the society in which they live. And if a solution to the issue of the niqab has not been found among Muslim clerics in the Muslim world, with there being numerous points of view and fatwas over it, from it being a core doctrine to a social custom, how can satellite preachers impose a single point of view on European Muslims? European politicians have politicized the image of Islam for political interests by focusing on the niqab and on polygamy. Similarly, satellite preachers have politicized this image also in order to promote political interests. Indeed, to the same extent to which such politicians seek to exploit feelings of fear from “radical Islam” in Europe, fundamentalist preachers seek to widen the chasm between European Muslims and the countries in which they live. And it is in such a climate that feelings of enmity towards the other arise, reaching the point of isolating Muslim citizens, and of spawning extremist and terrorist cells. Over the past few days, responses have been heard from Arab preachers to the fatwas of European formal bodies that stress on making the lives of European Muslims easier, rejecting such fatwas by describing them as of dubious source and not corresponding to the radical ideas of fundamentalists. Those European Muslim fundamentalist preachers have called for rejecting such fatwas and subscribing to these radical positions, which means making the lives of Muslims in Europe more difficult.
