But in the same three decades as Ulster's "Troubles," the hitherto moderate Muslim populations of south Asia were radicalized by a politicized form of Islam; previously formally un-Islamic societies such as Nigeria became semi-Islamist; and large Muslim populations settled in parts of Europe that had little or no experience of mass immigration.

On the Continent and elsewhere in the West, native populations are aging and fading and being supplanted remorselessly by a young Muslim demographic. Time for the obligatory "of courses": of course, not all Muslims are terrorists — though enough are hot for jihad to provide an impressive support network of mosques from Vienna to Stockholm to Toronto to Seattle. Of course, not all Muslims support terrorists — though enough of them share their basic objectives (the wish to live under Islamic law in Europe and North America) to function wittingly or otherwise as the "good cop" end of an Islamic good cop/bad cop routine. But, at the very minimum, this fast-moving demographic transformation provides a huge comfort zone for the jihad to move around in. And in a more profound way it rationalizes what would otherwise be the nuttiness of the terrorists' demands. An IRA man blows up a pub in defiance of democratic reality — because he knows that at the ballot box the Ulster Loyalists win the elections and the Irish Republicans lose. When a European jihadist blows something up, that's not in defiance of democratic reality but merely a portent of democratic reality to come. He's jumping the gun, but in every respect things are moving his way.

You may vaguely remember seeing some flaming cars on the evening news toward the end of 2005. Something going on in France, apparently. Something to do with — what's the word? — "youths." When I pointed out the media's strange reluctance to use the M-word vis-à-vis the rioting "youths," I received a ton of emails arguing there's no Islamist component, they're not the madrasa crowd, they may be Muslim but they're secular and Westernized and into drugs and rap and meaningless sex with no emotional commitment, and rioting and looting and torching and trashing, just like any normal healthy Western teenagers. These guys have economic concerns, it's the lack of jobs, it's conditions peculiar to France, etc. As one correspondent wrote, "You right-wing shit-for-brains think everything's about jihad."

Actually, I don't think everything's about jihad. But I do think, as I said, that a good 90 per cent of everything's about demography. Take that media characterization of those French rioters: "youths." What's the salient point about youths? They're youthful. Very few octogenarians want to go torching Renaults every night. It's not easy lobbing a Molotov cocktail into a police station and then hobbling back with your walker across the street before the searing heat of the explosion melts your hip replacement. Civil disobedience is a young man's game.

In June 2006, a 54-year-old Flemish train conductor called Guido Demoor got on the Number 23 bus in Antwerp to go to work. Six — what's that word again? — "youths" boarded the bus and commenced intimidating the other riders. There were some 40 passengers aboard. But the "youths" were youthful and the other passengers less so. Nonetheless, Mr. Demoor asked the lads to cut it out and so they turned on him, thumping and kicking him. Of those 40 other passengers, none intervened to help the man under attack. Instead, at the next stop, 30 of the 40 scrammed, leaving Mr. Demoor to be beaten to death. Three "youths" were arrested, and proved to be — quelle surprise! — of Moroccan origin. The ringleader escaped and, despite police assurances of complete confidentiality, of those 40 passengers only four came forward to speak to investigators. "You see what happens if you intervene," a fellow rail worker told the Belgian newspaper De Morgen. "If Guido had not opened his mouth he would still be alive."

No, he wouldn't. He would be as dead as those 40 passengers are, as the Belgian state is, keeping his head down, trying not to make eye contact, cowering behind his newspaper in the corner seat and hoping just to be left alone. What future in "their" country do Mr. Demoor's two children have? My mother and grandparents came from Sint-Niklaas, a town I remember well from many childhood visits. When we stayed with great-aunts and other relatives, the upstairs floors of the row houses had no bathrooms, just chamber pots. My sister and I were left to mooch around cobbled streets with our little cousin for hours on end, wandering aimlessly past smoke-wreathed bars and cafes, occasionally buying frites with mayonnaise. With hindsight it seemed as parochially Flemish as could be imagined. Not anymore. The week before Mr. Demoor was murdered in plain sight, bus drivers in Sint-Niklaas walked off the job to protest the thuggery of the — here it comes again — "youths." In little more than a generation, a town has been transformed.

Of the ethnic Belgian population, some 17 per cent are under 18 years old. Of the country's Turkish and Moroccan population, 35 per cent are under 18 years old. The "youths" get ever more numerous, the non-youths get older. To avoid the ruthless arithmetic posited by Benjamin Franklin, it is necessary for those "youths" to feel more Belgian. Is that likely? Colonel Gadhafi doesn't think so:

There are signs that Allah will grant Islam victory in Europe — without swords, without guns, without conquests. The fifty million Muslims of Europe will turn it into a Muslim continent within a few decades.

On Sept. 11, 2001, the American mainland was attacked for the first time since the War of 1812. The perpetrators were foreign — Saudis and Egyptians. Since 9/11, Europe has seen the London Tube bombings, the French riots, Dutch murders of nationalist politicians. The perpetrators are their own citizens — British subjects, citoyens de la République française. In Linz, Austria, Muslims are demanding that all female teachers, believers or infidels, wear head scarves in class. The Muslim Council of Britain wants Holocaust Day abolished because it focuses "only" on the Nazis' (alleged) Holocaust of the Jews and not the Israelis' ongoing Holocaust of the Palestinians.

How does the state react? In Seville, King Ferdinand III is no longer patron saint of the annual fiesta because his splendid record in fighting for Spanish independence from the Moors was felt to be insensitive to Muslims. In London, a judge agreed to the removal of Jews and Hindus from a trial jury because the Muslim defendant's counsel argued he couldn't get a fair verdict from them. The Church of England is considering removing St. George as the country's patron saint on the grounds that, according to various Anglican clergy, he's too "militaristic" and "offensive to Muslims." They wish to replace him with St. Alban, and replace St. George's cross on the revamped Union Flag, which would instead show St. Alban's cross as a thin yellow streak.

In a few years, as millions of Muslim teenagers are entering their voting booths, some European countries will not be living formally under sharia, but — as much as parts of Nigeria, they will have reached an accommodation with their radicalized Islamic compatriots, who like many intolerant types are expert at exploiting the "tolerance" of pluralist societies. In other Continental countries, things are likely to play out in more traditional fashion, though without a significantly different ending. Wherever one's sympathies lie on Islam's multiple battle fronts the fact is the jihad has held out a long time against very tough enemies. If you're not shy about taking on the Israelis and Russians, why wouldn't you fancy your chances against the Belgians and Spaniards?

"We're the ones who will change you," the Norwegian imam Mullah Krekar told the Oslo newspaper Dagbladet in 2006. "Just look at the development within Europe, where the number of Muslims is expanding like mosquitoes. Every Western woman in the EU is producing an average of 1.4 children. Every Muslim woman in the same countries is producing 3.5 children." As he summed it up: "Our way of thinking will prove more powerful than yours."

In criticism of these and other passages, the CIC Report comments:

Adopting a fear mongering tone, this article focuses on the influx of Muslim immigrants into Europe and North America. It explicitly and implicitly states that this influx poses a threat to the fabric of Western society, to democracy, and to human rights due to the religious identity and beliefs of Muslims in general. Another significant theme contained in the article is that there is allegedly an ongoing war between Muslims and Non-Muslims, that Muslims are part of a global conspiracy to take over Western societies, and that Muslims in the West need to be viewed through this lens as the enemy. Finally, other all-encompassing and negative generalizations are made about the Muslim population in the West [which the Report goes on to enumerate] . . . .

1. EVERY ACCOMMODATION IS "REASONABLE"

The traditional populations of European countries are declining as birthrates fall and they must now focus on attracting new immigrants to preserve their economies and infrastructures. Germany is even creating a new ministry of Immigration and Integration in response to this growing 21st-century challenge. Governments are now beginning to reformulate existing policies and plans to encompass the need for direct involvement. Integration is becoming tied to direct federal actions, including responsibility for providing training, addressing discrimination, and meeting the cultural and spiritual needs of new immigrants. This is a virtual sea-change in attitude from the recent past, when immigrants were routinely and falsely accused of not wanting to integrate.

2. MICHAEL ADAMS: AN UNLIKELY UTOPIAN GIVES MEANING TO POLLS

Today, Muslims - numbering nearly 800,000 according to the latest numbers — are "the new other" in our society and the fastest-growing religious and cultural group. As a result, Canadians are seeing more examples than ever of "reasonable accommodation": hijabs on soccer fields, niqabs at the polling booth; or the modest restyling of professional uniforms for everything from the local Tim Horton's server to VIA Rail conductors. . . .

Whatever it is at the core of our collective national psyche, we have made this country the destination of choice for more immigrants - 250,000 annually - than any other on the planet. Today, one in five Canadians is foreign-born and two in five are first- or second- generation offspring of immigrant parents. Only Australia has a higher proportion of foreign-born in its population.

Apart from sheer numbers, perhaps the biggest challenge facing 21st-century Canada is that for the past 15 years, more than half of our new immigrants come from non-Christian nations. We are becoming not only a multi-ethnic nation, but a multi-faith one as well; and among the major non-Christian religions, Islam is one that does not make a formal distinction between the secular and spiritual life as large segments of Christendom once did. A staggering 90% of Canadian Muslims are foreign-born and have forever changed the professional and technological landscape of our nation - most would say for the better.

3. FEAR OF ISLAMIC SCHOOLS BASED ON FALSE STEREOTYPES

Here are some pertinent facts. Islamic schools are operating in just about every province of this country. They are publicly funded in British Columbia, Manitoba, Alberta and Quebec. Yes, Alberta, despite being Prime Minister Stephen Harper's power base, and Quebec, despite sharing Quebec Premier Jean Charest's "safety concerns" for hijab-wearing girls on the soccer field, both fund Islamic schools. . . .

An overwhelming majority of women representing the mainstream Muslim community support faith-based schools. In fact, Muslim mothers usually insist on Islamically educating their children, even though the added expense often imposes genuine strains on parents' limited budgets.

4. RIDLEY CHALLENGES CRITICS WHO CAN’T SEE PAST HIJAB

Once a hard-nosed, hard-drinking Fleet Street reporter, Yvonne Ridley today is a proud, pious and unapologetic Muslim. Islam is "the biggest and best family in the world," she says, but also a family that is deeply misunderstood.

The 48-year-old London-based journalist and political activist brought her campaign against the West and its war on terror to Canada last month, visiting Toronto, Waterloo and Montreal to speak at fundraising dinners for the Canadian Islamic Congress. . . .

Ridley has been called an Islamist dupe and an apologist for terrorism. Remarks attributed to her include a reference to Jewish critics as "those nauseating little Zionists who accuse me of being an anti-Semite" and a characterization of London cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri, who is serving a seven-year prison sentence for soliciting murder and inciting racial hatred, as "quite sweet, really."

Asked prior to her Toronto talk to comment, she denies nothing. Those reported remarks "are regurgitated by people who have an agenda against me," she said. Yes, she called al-Masri sweet, but "that was part of a one- hour, 20-minute talk in which he was featured for about 30 seconds." She was quoted "totally out of context," she says. . . .

Would she characterize a Muslim who calls for violence as un-Islamic or radical? "Historically," Ridley points out, "violence has worked." The Irish Republican Army, for example, "bombed their way to the negotiating table."