“You love life, we love death”—a phrase the French scholar Olivier Roy attributes to radical Islamists. Its relevance is starkly visible in the ongoing threats to Germany’s Christmas markets.
The toll of the two biggest attacks on such markets—Berlin in 2016 and Magdeburg last year—is devastating: 19 people killed and over 200 severely injured. The ongoing threat was underscored last week when authorities announced the arrest of five men—three Moroccans, an Egyptian, and a Syrian—in Bavaria for planning an Islamist-motivated vehicle-ramming attack on a Christmas market in the Dingolfing-Landau area. On the same day, the public learned that a 21-year-old from Central Asia was also arrested for planning a similar attack. These arrests follow many others throughout recent years.
Christmas markets have become targets of a certain ‘holy war’ against normal German people. Even as authorities have tried to downplay the significance and breadth of the threats, their character is clear: they are directed at ordinary people, the enjoyment of life, and anything reminiscent of an old Christian tradition.
The elite’s parallel assault
But there is an underlying irony in all of this. It’s not just these terrorists who have sought to undermine this tradition—it has also been targeted, albeit in a far less aggressive and life-threatening way, by modern-day elitism. The traditional Christmas market has long been viewed as a ‘dodgy thing’ by multiculturalists, environmentalists, and all those who felt their tastes were superior to those of normal people.
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