From whenever I hear about Muslims in Europe, it makes me feel that America's anti-Islam sentiments pale in comparison to anti-Muslim sentiments in Europe. I read every now and then about protests trying to deport Muslims or rallies against Islam. I tend to be indifferent because I don't live there and America's media likes to distort things. But faston, what is the general public's opinion in Europe about Muslims?
Hard to tell. People really aren't open about it.
Here in Sweden you cant even criticize the huge immigration waves we have to take care of right now (immigration comes almost exclusively from Afghanistan, Somalia and Syria) without being called a racist. Criticizing Muslims is even worse.
Here is an example, immigration per million citizens.
This is a nation of 8-9 million people, a welfare state.
We have an unemployment problem, the employees are the ones which have to foot the bill in order to keep the welfare state up and running. How does the people feel? Well, in 2010 the only political party which criticizes the immigration policy of this country were elected into the parliament with 5.7% of the votes.
In 2014 we had a new election, they more than doubled their support reaching almost 13% of the votes.
No other political parties (there are 7 others) works with them, the left nor right.
The problem? Mainly that they don't want to talk about this as they see it "non-issue".
Yet the "ghettos" (not the correct term, but a place where many immigrants are located, where there is crime and no jobs) have increased dramatically over the years. It has become so bad the police have been ordered to keep out of the areas so they don't "provoke" the people living there. We have had quite a few riots in these areas over the years. Fire fighters, ambulances and of course the police have been attacked when entering some of these locations.
Right now a new problem has floated to the surface. There are no more places in which to house these immigrants. Private companies lease buildings to the "Swedish Migration Board" at inflated prices, and they have to accept because they dont have a choice, there are no homes left for these people.
Of course these "private entrepreneurs" makes a small fortune this way.
This is neither fair to us or the immigrants which come here. They are housed in ghettos where there is crime, and little hope of leaving.
So yeah, I think the tolerance of our very generous immigration policy of wearing thinner and thinner. The anti-immigration party is growing larger and larger (latest polls place them at 17-18%).
This does not signal hate towards Muslims though, because they are not the ones who dictated the terms, that is the fault of the established political parties.
Terrorist attacks such as these aren't helping their cause though. We had one in Stockholm (a suicide bomber) but he only managed to blow himself up (he was checking his bomb and accidentally triggered it) on a busy street in Stockholm during Christmas a few years ago.
There have been many failed plots which the police have managed to stop.
There is an artist in Sweden, Lars Vilks which drew a picture of Mohammed. This had the effect of two Muslims trying to burn his house to the ground, and a failed assassination plot against him. He has constant police protection these days.
It is known that over 200 Muslims swedes have traveled to Syria to fight for ISIS.