Islam in France

PARIS -- The graves of several Muslim soldiers in a cemetery in southeastern France were desecrated over the weekend, officials said Monday. The Frenc...

Do we have an irreconcilable gap, then, between Islam and free speech? I am sure many, among both Muslims and Westerners, would readily say "yes" to this question, but I am not one of them.

These two Muslim communities are important these days for a variety of reasons. And indeed, one finds the two surveys reflecting those interests very sharply in the questions that were asked.

Sustainable cultural change can come only though free will and not compulsion. I am not for the burqa, but we have to defend the woman's right to wear what she chooses.

France has now officially outlawed the Islamic niqab or burqa in public. Where's the liberté in that?

The burqa ban is really less about preserving women's freedom and more about the underlying discomfort that many in France have over the growth of Islam and the increasing assertion of Muslim identity in the public sphere.