There was a big uproar in France during the past few weeks caused by the horrifying murder of Ilan Halimi, a 23 year old Jewish shop clerk, by a gang of hoodlums who called themselves, very aptly, “The Barbarians”.
Halimi was abducted by the gang on January 21st. On Monday 13th he was found naked, gagged [...]

David Irving, as no doubt we all know, is beginning his new career as a jailbird, in the great grey walls of the Josefstadt prison next to the even greater and greyer Landesgericht between Vienna’s city hall and its university. Now, there are plenty of facile things to say about this: freedom of expression is [...]

Just ran across this article at Radio Free Europe. Short version: Russia has decided that independence for Kosovo is probably inevitable, and has decided to milk it for maximum benefit to Russia. Putin’s saying, fine, independence for Kosovo — but then apply “universal principles”, and give independence to the Russian-supported breakaway republics of [...]

I’m not alone in thinking that our last debate about multiculturalism was marred by the fact that nobody seemed to agree on what the word actually meant. The following bit from a Christian Science Monitor opinion piece caught be eye:
Supposedly [European authorities] were enlightened “multiculturalists” who respected differences; for many, the real reason was a [...]

Greece and Albania are having a small diplomatic tiff. If reading about that sort of thing interests you, read on.
So: two weeks ago, Greek President Karolos Papoulias’ was scheduled to meet with Albanian President Alfred Moisiu, in the southern Albanian town of Sarande. I’m pretty sure this was the first meeting of Greek [...]

Thanks to Juan Cole I do not have to spend a great amount of time writing and explaining some key elements needed to understand multiculturalism, or the absence of it, in France. I’l give you a few quotes to digest and discuss.
The young people from North African societies such as Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia are [...]

I’m going to barf if one more person writes that “multiculturalism” has somehow contributed to the riots in France. How exactly you square “multiculturalism” with France’s ban on the headscarf – and the fact that French is, officially, about as un-multicultural as you can get – is beyond me.
If you ask me, I’d hazard [...]

There’s a letter in today’s (UK-based) Daily Telegraph by that famous KGB-defector and media-darling, Oleg Gordiesvsky:
Sir - France always had a cult of revolution. The French public fully supported extremist political parties, Communists and Trotskyists, which had political violence as an integral part of their programmes.
Now they are reaping the fruits of it.
Oleg Gordievsky, [...]

Daniel Pipes, a Middle East scholar prone to lambasting Edward Said, says that the French media is ignoring the obvious: that radical Islamism is behind the riots in France.
I don’t read French so I can’t check all his links. The theory fits in nicely with many people’s worldview (including, I suppose, Pipes’s), but is [...]

Apparently the rioters in France are about to form a union and will soon be limited to wreaking mayhem 32 hours per week.