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Money And Migration: How Radical Islam Gained A Foothold On Western Campuses
Homeland Security recently arrested a Tufts University student, Rumeysa Ozturk, for engaging in “activities in support of Hamas, a foreign terrorist organization that relishes the killing of Americans.”
While the Trump administration’s arrest of Ozturk is a move in the right direction, she is just one of countless students across the country who share a radical ideology.
Days after the first anniversary of the October 7 massacre which left 1,200 civilians dead, including 40 Americans, the New York Times released a chilling headline: “Pro-Palestinian Group at Columbia Now Backs ‘Armed Resistance’ by Hamas.”
The article claims a pro-Hamas student group at Columbia University marked the anniversary by distributing a newspaper titled “One Year Since Al-Aqsa Flood, Revolution Until Victory.” The headline was placed over an image of Hamas fighters breaching Israel’s security fence. Additionally, the student group published an essay describing the attack as a “moral, military, and political victory” and citing Ismail Haniyeh, the former political leader of Hamas hiding in Qatar who would later be assassinated.
In 2024, encampments held by these same student groups multiplied on campuses across the country, from New York University to Harvard, Yale, UCLA, and many others.
How have American institutions come to the place where the mass slaughter of Westerners is celebrated on campus?
A cursory glance at recent history reveals two driving factors: Mass Islamic migration to the West and mass funding from Islamic countries.
First, some clarification and some definitions. Radical Islam, or Islamism, is not the same as Islam. Rather, it is a radical offshoot that seeks, through political and often violent means, to establish a global caliphate where all citizens, Muslim or not, would be governed by a radical interpretation of Sharia law. While not all Muslims are Islamists, many who migrate are.
The Crusades
To truly understand the mindset of Islamists today, it is important to look back at the history of the Islamic empire. Since its rapid and bloody expansion in the 7th Century, the empire has clashed with the Western world a great many times in its pursuit for global dominance. The most famous example being the Crusades (1095-1300AD).
As Daily Wire commentator Michael Knowles described on a recent Piers Morgan panel, “The Crusades started because the Eastern Emperor requested help from the Western Pope. The Seljuk Turks were slaughtering Christians in the Holy Land, which had been Christian territory before the Muslim invasion in the 7th century.”
While the Holy Land may have remained in Muslim control at the conclusion of the Crusades, a greater victory was secured by the West that continues to define our world to this day: Islamic expansion was stopped from conquering all of Europe.
Fast forward nearly 1,300 years, and Islamists have yet to give up on the ambitions of their ancestors. Take Lebanon, for example. Once dominated by Maronite Christians, the mass migration and high birthrates of Muslim Arabs in Lebanese society over the 20th century eventually changed that. Today, Maronite Christians are a minority, and the nation is predominantly controlled by Hezbollah, a Shia Muslim terrorist organization.
They have now taken a new, alternative strategy when it comes to Europe and the West: mass migration.
Mass Migration
Over the past few decades, mass migration has overwhelmed many many European countries.
In 2014, England’s Daily Mail published a chilling headline; “The changing face of Britain: A child in Birmingham is now more likely to be a Muslim than Christian”. According to the 2011 census, the second largest city in England with a rich Christian history, had 97,099 Muslim Children growing up there, compared to 93,828 Christian children.
Radical progressive and generous immigration policies, including England’s, are to blame for this trend. During a recent Q&A session, Parliament Member and leader of Reform UK Nigel Farage did not hold back when addressing the state of immigration in the UK:
From after the war up until the millennium, net immigration ran at 30,000 to 40,000 a year. And yes, it worked. In fact, we had the most successful immigration policies of any country in the whole of Europe—no question. Now, it is totally out of control. Just think about this: two and a half million people have come in the last two years … The numbers are now literally unimaginable and are diminishing the quality of life for everyone in this country.
Farage is correct. These policies have significantly worsened life for everyone living in England. A 2018 YouGov poll found that a third of England’s population believed there were areas in the UK they could not enter if they were not Muslim. Now, reports of predominantly Muslim grooming gangs allegedly terrorizing young girls across the country for over a decade have made headlines, while the government turned a blind eye. Meanwhile, Islamic terror attacks remain a grim reality, with the last major incident occurring as recently as 2023.
England is not the only European country dealing with an immigration influx. A recent Pew Research study shows the top two European destinations for migrating Muslims are Germany and France. In both Germany and France, some estimates hold that by 2050 nearly one fifth of their respective populations will be Muslim if record high immigration patterns persist.
North America is also grappling with mass Muslim migration. According to a 2011 study by Pew Research:
The number of Muslims in Canada is expected to nearly triple in the next 20 years, from about 940,000 in 2010 to nearly 2.7 million in 2030. Muslims are expected to make up 6.6% of Canada’s total population in 2030, up from 2.8%.
When an Islamist migrant was asked by a Rebel Media reporter if he would like to see Sharia law implemented in Canada, he replied:
At some point it will! You know because we are having families, we are making babies. You’re not. Your population is going down the slum, right? And by 2060 according to Pew Research institute, your research, by 2060, Muslims will be the biggest religious group.
Mass Funding
A key player in subverting their minds is funding. While some universities receive funding from the U.S. government, large dollar amounts are funneled in from foreign governments like Qatar, a major funder of Hamas.
According to a 2022 study noted by the National Association of Scholars, from 2001-2022 Qatar donated $4.7 billion into universities across the United States. As a direct result of Qatar’s funding, according to research from the Lawfare Project, students across America are “learning about the Middle East in a biased way that emphasizes only the positive aspects of Islam while omitting a balanced discussion of other religions or belief systems, most notably Judaism.”
Imam Hasan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim brotherhood, an influential Islamist organization from Egypt, once shared his commitment to the next generation, “The youth are our hope and the backbone of our movement; train them in the principles of Islam, and they will carry the banner of reform into the future.”
If universities remain under the influence of foreign entities like Qatar, the next generation of college educated Westerners will not only fail to stop the spread of radical Islamists, they will inadvertently support their efforts.
Whether it be through mass migration, funding, or ideological subversion, Islamism is a force the West cannot afford to ignore. World leaders would do well to follow the actions of the Trump administration who have been cracking down on the threat since day one. The West deserves to stay Western, and only through political action can current pushes for a global caliphate be subdued.
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Jacob Falach is an associate producer at The Daily Wire. You can find him on Instagram at: @jacobfalach.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
