Eurabian Intifada enters its 11th night

Aljazeera-- "Rioters attacked us with baseball bats," said Philippe Jofres, a deputy fire chief, told France-2 television. "We were attacked with pickaxes. It was war."

It was not that long ago that France mightily opposed the ways of our Cowboy President, especially his taking the "war on terrorism" to the enemy. French officials argued that Saddam Hussein could be contained.

Now that entire country seems at the mercy of a few underprivileged rock-throwing "youths" whom they cannot so contain. It will be interesting to see how the French go about trying to appease the unappeasable (not my phrase - I read it somewhere and can't remember where).

Tonight the intifada moved from arson to gunfire, and Chirac made his first public pronoucements.

On this the eleventh night of rioting, Chirac vowed to restore order and promised that France would promote "respect for all, justice and equal opportunities."

WHOOPS - The Scotsman reporter was able to withhold the dreaded M-word as long as she was writing about France, but later in the article, it slipped out, thus:

Neighbouring Germany also has a large immigrant population, including more than three million Muslims - most of Turkish origin.

Wolfgang Bosbach, the deputy leader of the conservative Christian Democrats in the German parliament, told a Sunday newspaper: "There are differences between the situation in France and here, but we should not be under the illusion that similar events could not happen in Germany."

In Italy, Romano Prodi, the opposition leader, called on the government to take urgent action, telling reporters: "We have the worst suburbs in Europe. I don't think things are so different from Paris. It's only a question of time."