Copenhagen, Denmark – Rihab Kassem, a retired nurse and grandmother of Syrian and Palestinian origin, arrived in Denmark more than eight years ago.
She had been living in Yarmouk, an unofficial camp in Damascus for the Palestinian refugee community in Syria.
Her initial plan was to visit Waled, her son who had been living in Denmark since 1996 and has long been a citizen of the Scandinavian country.
But after she arrived, as the war intensified in Syria, violence gripped her refugee camp.
She applied for asylum and in January 2014, Danish authorities gave her a residence permit, valid for five years. That was then extended for another two years. Later, she was granted temporary protection status.
As anti-Muslim sentiment grows in the West, European evangelical consultant urges a better response than burqa bans.
Jayson Casper| Image: loeskieboom / iStock / Getty Images
A minaret tower of a mosque in front of the Austrian alps in Telfs, Tirol, Austria.
Within three decades, Muslims may comprise 14 percent of Europe.
The face of the historically Christian continent, tallied at 5 percent Muslim in 2016, may dramatically change by 2050 if high migration patterns hold.
And as Muslim families have a birth rate one child higher than the rest of the continent, the Pew Research Center projects nearly 1 in 5 people will be Muslim in the United Kingdom (17%), France (18%), and Germany (20%). Sweden is projected to become 30 percent Muslim.
7 municipal plans for integration of Roma and Egyptian minorities published in Albania coe.int - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from coe.int Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
For most of emerging Europe, LGBTIQ rights and social inclusion remain contentious issues with no clear path forward. Poland and Hungary especially have seen a sharp rise in anti-LGBTIQ rhetoric and policies that have worried many activists and analysts.
In November of 2020, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced a new LGBTIQ Equality Strategy, the first of its kind, which aims to bolster LGBTIQ rights across the European Union by fighting discrimination, ensuring safety, protecting the rights of “rainbow” families, and promoting LGBTIQ rights around the world.
The strategy has been in the works for nearly a decade, says Ana Munoz Padros, communication officer at ILGA-Europe, an advocacy group promoting the interests of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and intersex people at the European level.
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Introduction
In 2019, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres launched the U.N. Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech in response to violent attacks against houses of worship around the world including synagogues, churches, and mosques. The Strategy observed:
Around the world, we are seeing a disturbing groundswell of xenophobia, racism and intolerance including rising anti-Semitism, anti-Muslim hatred and persecution of Christians. Social media and other forms of communication are being exploited as platforms for bigotry.… Hate is moving into the mainstream in liberal democracies and authoritarian systems alike. And with each broken norm, the pillars of our common humanity are weakened. Hate speech is a menace to democratic values, social stability and peace. As a matter of principle, the United Nations must confront hate speech at every turn. Silence can signal indifference to bigotry and intolerance, even as a situation escalates and the vulne