Fenton:
I'm curious if you have ever lived in Europe or Britain? I have and Muslims are fine friends and great neighbours. Having lived a rather sheltered life in Canada until I was 12 years of age, I first came into personal contact with virulent bigotry and hate-driven violence while I lived in Bristol, England for about 18 months. But the hate was directed at East Asian Muslims who were called "Pakis" and who were threatened and attacked for being from abroad, even though they were native Britons. I myself was beaten up on two occasions while trying to defend my targeted school mates from attack. The attackers in both cases were uniformly white Britons, Irish, Scots and one was a Russian. The kids they were targeting were fine folk from good families with strong moral character based on their Islamic faith.
I have also walked through French cities like Paris, Tours, Grenoble and Marsaille and have seen the Muslim neighbourhoods which Americans like to characterise as No-Go zones. I never had a problem with the folks in these neighbourhoods. They were polite and welcoming. I did have problems with pure-laine French who were routinely rude and haughty to me and my parents as we travelled through France and some of the Low Countries.
Europe's precolonial history was pretty blood-soaked, long before Muslims were welcomed into European societies and when European nations had more culturally homogeneous populations. The Hundred Years War, the Wars of Religion, the Great Northern War, the Seven Years War, the Wars of Successions, the French Revolution and the Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars, etc. Muslims fought and died defending France and Britain in two world wars and since then have been peaceful and important contributors to the wealth and cultures of most European countries in which they reside. Europe is on the whole better off for their presence and citizenship. Xenophobic demonisation and prejudice notwithstanding.
Cheers.
Evilroddy.