It was not until 2000 that Germany allowed Turks to take up citizenship, although they had been residents for decades. In France, even those born in the country must pass an acculturation test at eighteen to determine suitability for citizenship based on knowledge of the French language and French culture. “If the Muslims say they pray regularly, the officials take that as prima facie evidence that the applicants are not French enough and reject them,” Professor Klausen told me in a 2005 interview. Whereas the cornerstone of the French model is that everyone living legally in France is French, regardless of religion or ethnicity, the children of immigrants, especially Muslims from North Africa, are not considered French precisely because of their religion and ethnicity.

France, Germany and Denmark, which have the lowest percentage of their Muslim populations on their electoral rolls, also have the fewest elected Muslim officials. By contrast, in Britain and the Netherlands, where half the Muslim population is eligible to vote, Muslims enjoy high political representation: Britain (four MPs and seven Lords) and the Netherlands (seven MPs, five of whom are women, plus two cabinet ministers, one a woman). Sweden, despite its small Muslim population, has five Muslim MPs, because refugees are allowed to obtain citizenship after five years of residency. The equation is clear: no citizenship equals no voting power, equals no political clout, equals marginalization.

European public discourse on Muslims, besides being indisputably negative, is often misleading and dishonest. Politicians and media outlets routinely suggest that Muslims may be too religious to integrate. But a 2005 poll by the US State Department showed that barely 1 percent of French Muslims want to remain isolated, while an overwhelming majority want to belong; two-thirds speak French at home; and six in ten do not mind intermarriage.7 Jytte Klausen found the 300 Muslim leaders she interviewed to be “overwhelmingly secular in outlook and supportive of core liberal values” but facing enormous hurdles to integration. Similar conclusions were drawn by the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies, after surveying Muslims in London, Paris and Berlin.8

Conversely, Muslims in North America, enjoying full citizenship and the benefits of meritocracy, are well-integrated, economically and socially — “middle class and mostly mainstream,” in the words of a study done by Pew Research Center.9 American Muslim median family income is higher than the national average, and four out of five Muslim Americans are registered voters.10 Corporations and major advertisers are wooing Muslims, who spend an estimated $170 billion a year on consumer products.11

The Pope and Islam

Muslim baiting in Europe, once the preserve of right-wing parties and leaders, such as Jean-Marie Le Pen in France and the late Pim Fortuyn in the Netherlands, has entered the mainstream. German chancellor Angela Merkel, former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, former French president Valery Giscard d’Estaing and others have been openly anti-Muslim, especially in the context of the possible entry of Muslim Turkey into the European Union.