Ban Islamists, not Muslims

Donald Trump, the leading Republican presidential candidate, called on Dec. 7 for "a total and ‎complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can ‎figure out what is going on." Replace one word in this formulation and it goes from outrageous ‎to brilliant.‎

Reacting to massacres by Muslims in Paris and San Bernardino, Trump pointed to a Muslim ‎hatred "beyond comprehension" for the West. Therefore, he concluded, "Until we are able to ‎determine and understand this problem and the dangerous threat it poses, our country cannot be ‎the victims of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in jihad."‎

The negative responses, domestic and international, Muslim and non-Muslim, came in fast and ‎furious -- and rightly so, as Trump's crude blast is unconstitutional, unacceptable, unworkable, ‎and unstrategic.‎

Unconstitutional: Every Western basic law is secular, disallowing a religious test for immigration, ‎rendering Trump's statement less an exercise in practical policymaking than a gadfly provocation.‎

Unacceptable: Beyond legalities, secularism represents a Western core value, up there with ‎freedom of speech, a value hardly anyone accepts gutting for reasons of momentary expediency.‎

Unworkable: Islam is not a permanent identity like skin color. Nothing prevents Muslims from ‎renouncing Islam or converting to another religion. Unless Trump extends his "total and complete ‎shutdown" to former Muslims -- which is even more unconstitutional -- he just encourages the ‎already-existing phenomenon of Muslim conversions of convenience (as symbolized by achurch ‎in Berlin).‎

Unstrategic: Trump's presidential campaign once again is counterproductive; he simultaneously ‎makes conservatives look like idiots and brings adoring attention to those who oppose his views, ‎in this case radical Muslim groups like the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which has enjoyed an unprecedentedcornucopia of media coverageto spread its ‎deceitful message.‎

That said, Trump has raised a critical and urgent issue that all Westerners must face, as ‎symbolized by the recent tsunami of illegal immigration to Europe and the huge strains it has ‎created. Simply put, Muslims present a disproportionately large source of problems, as becomes ‎clear when they are compared with Hindu immigrants, who are roughly the same in number but ‎generally fit quietly into the West.‎

Violence is the headline topic relating to Muslims, whether large-scale plots (Paris) orsudden ‎jihad syndromelone wolves (San Bernardino), but violence is hardly the whole problem. Muslim ‎hostility toward non-Muslims takes many other forms, such as teaching Islamic supremacism in ‎mosques, spewing anti-Semitism in the streets, and threatening anyone who dares publicly to ‎criticize Islam. Issues concerning women include female genital mutilation, honor killings, ‎polygyny, and forced marriages. Islamic mores lead to strong antipathies against guide dogs, ‎mixed swimming pool usage, and homosexuals.‎

Polls show widespread -- and legitimate -- concern about these issues as well as growing ‎impatience with governmental dismissal of those concerns. When GermanChancellor Angela Merkelwelcomes an unlimited number of illegal immigrants or U.S.President Barack Obamaridicules concerns about ‎Syrian immigrants, populist voices, like Trump's, inevitably find followers.‎

Indeed, he is just the latest anti-immigrant figure to find a message that increasingly resonates. A recent poll indicates that Geert Wilders' Party for Freedom in the Netherlands would win 39 out of 150 seats in parliament, ‎up from his current 15 and almost twice that of any other party. This upward trend will ‎continue until one of these ostracized insurgent parties gains over 50% of the vote and ‎enters office. In this sense, Trump stands at the cutting edge.‎

How to deal with Muslim immigration in a responsible and uncontroversial manner? I offer two ‎suggestions. First, replace the "Muslims entering the United States" in Trump's formulation with ‎‎"Islamists entering the United States." Islamists are those Muslims who seek to apply Islamic law, ‎oppress women and non-Muslims and establish a worldwide caliphate. They make up about 10-‎‎15% of the Muslim population; they, not Muslims in general, are the barbarians who ‎‎"believe only in jihad."‎

Second, engage in serious research into all would-be visitors and immigrants, not the pro forma ‎review that prevails these days. Doing so requires money and time, as well ascreative inquiriesto ‎smoke out ideological proclivities, but each person entering the country must be checked to make ‎sure no Islamists are allowed in, ever, at all, even for brief visits, thereby increasing our common ‎security.‎

Daniel Pipes (DanielPipes.org, @DanielPipes) is president of the Middle East Forum.