[Order Michael Finch’s new book, A Time to Stand: HERE. Prof. Jason Hill calls it “an aesthetic and political tour de force.”]

As I have been shouting from the rooftops (figuratively speaking) for a quarter of a century, there exist in Western Europe entire cities, and large sections of other cities, that are already effectively under Islamic control. Muslim leaders who at first, before their fellow believers had achieved dominance, played the victim and spoke of religious freedom and minority rights, now wield their power ruthlessly, imposing sharia law with increasing imperiousness and treating the non-Muslims among them the same way that infidels have always been treated in Islamic societies. In Bradford and Malmö, in the Stockholm neighborhood of Rinkeby and the Brussels neighborhood of Molenbeek, the future of Western Europe has already arrived, and it’s not a pretty sight.

I once hoped – long ago – that America would somehow escape such a catastrophic fate. I was wrong. Back in April I wrote about EPIC City, a project of the Islamic Center – i.e., mosque – in East Plano, Texas, which had bought over 400 acres of rural land on which it planned to build a Muslim-only municipality. The project had gotten pretty far along (with over 500 lots sold) without getting a lot of attention in east Texas, but, Texans being Texans, people did start standing up. The Justice Department launched an investigation – only to close it soon afterwards. Then, earlier this month, Governor Greg Abbott signed a law, triggered by the EPIC City project, that forbids sharia-run property developments; but within just a few hours, the Texas Workforce Commission seemed to cave to the East Plano Muslims, dismissing a complaint that had been lodged against them under the Texas Fair Housing Act. In short, it’s not necessarily looking good.

Or take the case of Hamtramck, Michigan, a separate municipality that is surrounded by Detroit, just as Beverly Hills is surrounded by Los Angeles. But Hamtramck is no Beverly Hills. In 2015, it became the first city in the U.S. to elect a majority-Muslim City Council Local liberals cheered. But they weren’t cheering two years ago, when the City Council – now 100% Muslim – voted to ban rainbow flags from being flown on municipal property.

To be sure, Muslim residents who packed City Hall for the occasion did cheer. Lustily. As the Guardian reported at the time, one local posted a triumphant message on social media reading “Fagless City.” Responding to angry gay residents, Councilmember Mohammed Hassan shouted: “I’m working for the people, what the majority of the people like.” Former mayor Karen Majewski wasn’t pleased. “There’s a sense of betrayal,” she said. “We supported you when you were threatened, and now our rights are threatened, and you’re the one doing the threatening.” Yep, that’s how it works. Every time.

A few months earlier, the City Council had voted to permit residents to carry out animal sacrifices in their homes. And a few months later, a candidate for Hamtramck’s City Council and a member of the city’s Plan Commission posted the following on Facebook: “Was the holocaust God’s advance punishment of the ‘Chosen People’ for the savagery they’re committing today…? A heinous act proving that they’re as savage and cruel as the Nazis themselves, or even worse.”

Not far from Hamtramck is another Detroit suburb – Dearborn, Michigan, population 100,000. It’s the birthplace of Henry Ford, the longtime world headquarters of the Ford Motor Company, and for many decades it was a proud, prosperous center of automobile manufacturing that was home to a great many people of Polish and Ukrainian extraction. Nowadays, however, Hamtramck has nothing on Dearborn: as of the 2020 census, just over half of its population was of North African or Middle Eastern ancestry; in no city in the U.S. is the percentage of Muslim residents higher. Its current mayor, Abdullah Hammoud, a Democrat, was born in Dearborn and holds an MBA as well as a Master of Public Health in epidemiology and genetics. Like the physicians who have carried out jihadist terror attacks in Britain, Hammoud is a fine example of the fact that you can be a well-educated, America-raised Muslim, rather than some superstitious illiterate from a village in Pakistan, and still be a menace to individual liberty and national security.

Earlier this month, a resident of Dearborn, a Christian minister named Ted Barham, showed up at a meeting of the City Council to protest the renaming of two intersections in honor of a local journalist, Osama Siblani, publisher of the Arab American News. Barham was polite and self-effacing, expressing respect for Siblani’s efforts to draw attention to the plight of Palestinians. But he also pointed out that Siblani was a supporter of terrorism, citing articles in which Siblan had written “about how the blood of the martyrs irrigates the land of Palestine” and opined that “everyone should fight within his means,” some “with stones, others…with guns, others…with planes, drones, and rockets.” Barham commented: “I feel like having that sign up there is almost like naming a street Hezbollah Street or Hamas Street.”

Mayor Hammoud wasn’t having it: In a reply that according to the Detroit Free Press “shocked many in attendance,” Hammoud told Barham: “The best suggestion I have for you is to not drive on Warren Avenue or to close your eyes while you’re doing it. His name is up there and I spoke at a ceremony celebrating it because he’s done a lot for this community.” Hammoud wasn’t done. He went on to call Barham  a “bigot,” a “racist,” and an “Islamophobe,” and told him: “Although you live here, I want you to know as mayor, you are not welcome here. And the day you move out of the city will be the day that I launch a parade celebrating the fact that you moved out of this city.”

Interviewed after the exchange, Barham said that he believed Hammoud had in many ways been a “terrific” mayor, and that he hadn’t expected their interaction to get “so heated.” Well, better get used to it. Again, this is how it works. Always.

Meanwhile Hammoud, who is running for re-election, has issued a new campaign video. It’s subtitled in Arabic.