The carnage wrought in Paris on Friday served as a grim reminder for the West that no place is truly safe from terror.
None of the 120+ victims expected to become targets while they walked to a soccer match, enjoyed a drink at a cafe or watched a rock band play at their favorite venue. None of them thought they would die in a war that doesn’t discriminate between combatants and civilians on a night meant for care-free entertainment.
It’s hard to think of a literal war being waged against the places people associate with safety and comfort. But that’s the nature of the “new normal” Europe and North America have to live with. For the enemy that struck Paris is not just a villain that can be defeated through an invasion of a foreign locale. This is an enemy that lives in cities throughout the West and is growing stronger every day.
And it’s an enemy that our governments continue to invite in and nurture.
Shortly after the attacks, French President Francois Hollande promised a “ruthless” and “pitiless” retaliation for the blood bath unleashed on his country’s soil. But who exactly is this retaliation going to be directed at? Hollande did say that the violence was the work of ISIS, but if ISIS is living among your population, how will more bombs over Raqqa make you any safer if you fail to tackle the problem in the homeland? (RELATED: French President Promises: ‘We Will Be Ruthless’)
Jihadis are not just in Syria. They can be in your neighborhood, your favorite bar or even your school.
The uncomfortable truth is that Europe will have to endure more of the kind of senseless slaughter the world saw on Friday if nothing is done to control Muslim mass migration and eradicate homegrown extremism.
While it is abundantly clear the attacks were the work of Islamic extremists and ISIS has claimed responsibility for the atrocities, there’s an apparent attempt at foot in social media and normal media outlets to portray the terror along the lines of a natural disaster. The likely culprits are downplayed in favor of promoting the meaningless Eiffel Tower peace sign and calls for more universal understanding.
As fired MSNBC personality Krystal Ball so eloquently put it, “Most powerful response to radical hate is radical love. Open your hearts wider and love harder.”
In other words, welcome more terrorists into your country because you’re more loving than they are. That’s a clearly an invitation for civilization suicide — but it feels a whole lot better than trying to solve the problem.
More than a few liberal commentators expressed shock that the area struck the hardest by Friday’s terror was home to “the city’s young, progressive core,” according to Fusion. These are folks who would never in a million years consider voting for Marine le Pen and the National Front. They’re the “hipster socialists” who wanted to make France welcome refugees and consider criticism of Islamic migration as inherently racist.
Now they’re the very victims of Islamic terror, and there will be more just like them if Europe continues to pursue bad policies and ignores homegrown trouble.
The latest example of bad policy is how the European Union handled the thousands of illegal migrants who swarmed into Europe over the summer. Instead of trying to stop the flow and sending back those who had no legitimate claim to asylum, countries all over Western Europe have enthusiastically welcomed any migrant who claims he (and they’re mostly “hes”) is a refugee. (RELATED: Bleeding Hearts Will Only Make Europe’s Migrant Crisis Worse)
At least one of the Paris terrorists was a recent refugee, and the majority of the assailants could be as well. (RELATED: Paris Attacker Was A Syrian ‘Refugee’)
It looks like the fears that militants lurked among the migrant exodus have been proven true.
The West is now faced with a choice. It can close its borders to illegal migrants, deport/arrest promoters of violent jihad and restrict immigrant quotas from countries that are known to breed extremism. Or it can learn to accept the new normal and hope hashtags someday vanquish terrorism.
The peace and love crowd assume that what all these terrorists really want is good ol’ liberal democracy. They just need a hug first and some hip messaging to get on board. In reality, most of these jihadis have been well exposed to liberal values, and have chosen jihad instead. They believe bombings, shootings and beheadings are all done for good, and that what the West represents is pure evil.
A Peace for Paris post is not going to change that.
Those who want to unleash Armageddon upon Syria but want to do little about the jihadis at home are also mistaken. This invade the world/invite the world mentality gives your enemies the opportunity to strike at your cities while you bomb theirs. Besides, the interventions into Iraq and Libya only fueled the fires of radical Islam, with the world becoming a much more dangerous place as a result.
We need to start waging a much smarter War on Terror. It has to place the immediate threats at home first, not the ones far away.
If anything, the bloodshed on Friday the 13th might have finally awoken Europe from its refugee daydream.