Western Europe has a lot of immigrants who have come from Muslim countries in search of a better life. When I lived in Germany in the late 80s, there were large ethnic communities of Turks moving there, much as Mexicans come here to the U.S. looking for a better way of life. These folks often retain a lot of their customs and dress from their home countries, as well as their religion.

There's no strict separation of church and state in Western Europe, like we have here (which is one reason why we're over here and they're still over there for the past 230 some-odd years). The major churches, Catholic and Protestant, receive tax funds from the government, and in return, a lot of the social services provided by human services agencies in U.S. are provided by the churches in Europe. Islam is "different," and they're somehow behind all those crazy jihadists running around back in the Islamic countries as well as exporting their violence to Europe. Switzerland (& Germany) is a place where your neighbors get all out of sorts about you running your lawn mower too early ona Saturday morning, much less the howling Arabic call to prayer at o'dark-thirty every day of the week. Your average western European just flat doesn't cotton to that kind of carrying on.

Think of all the uproar and outrage that our current politicians are raising about ILLEGAL ALIENS!! here in Arkansas, as well as the other states. The Swiss ban on minarets stems from the same sort of xenophobia, only the European countries often don't have the same constitutional protections as the U.S., and they have the community solidarity to get those sorts of laws introduced and enacted.

I loved living in Europe for the six years that I was there... but one thing it really impressed on me is how precious are the constitutional privileges that we have here.

This is definitely not a PC description of the issues, but it is my observations from living in those sorts of communities for an extended time...

Tom