Brussels is the heart of European democracy. Despite its rather staid reputation, the Belgian capital attracts many tourists every year. Most of them certainly gather in the center, around the Royal Palace and in the European Quarter, stroll on the Grotemarkt, sit with a beer in chic cafés or marvel at the shop windows of renowned chocolatiers in the legendary Galeries Royales Saint-Hubert. Beyond that, there is another Brussels, and with it a name that stands like no other for ISIS terror in Europe: Salah Abdeslam, the only surviving terrorist from the Paris attacks in November 2015.
Leaving the ostentatious, bustling streets lined with luxury goods to the west, after not too long a walk you come across water - the Canal de Bruxelles. Basically, however, it is not a canal, it is a brutal aisle, the symbolic deep rift between two parts of a city that could hardly be more opposite. I dare say that not many tourists stray here, not on purpose anyway. That’s hardly surprising, given that Molenbeek has been in the headlines as an “Islamist stronghold” since the Islamist terrorist attacks in Paris on November 13, 2015 (more than 130 dead) and Brussels on March 22, 2016 (32 dead). Don’t think so? Just Google it.
The Copy
Anyone crossing over one of the bridges to Molenbeek will suddenly find themselves in a completely different world. Different, but not foreign. At least not for those who have already been to North Africa. Brussels - interpreted Maghrebian, or Maghreb - painted Belgian, just as you like. In any case, underneath this façade is a society that is largely Islamic and conservative. Including all the implications that this entails. To put it mildly. To put it casually, it’s “Neukölln on coke.” The Chaussée de Gand is, so to speak, Brussels’ Sonnenallee - only more Islamic, more North African, than the Sonnenallee will ever be. Gentrification has been gnawing away at Neukölln for years; in Molenbeek, you’ve probably never heard the term.
Moroccans and Algerians dominate Molenbeek, without a doubt. The longer one walks through the streets, the more impressive becomes the power and persistence with which a parallel society par excellence has established itself here, not far from the tourist streams and the European Quarter. One gradually gets the feeling of being in a Moroccan or Algerian city, in Tangier, Marrakesh, Algiers, Oran or Casablanca. In parts, an immaculate copy. In contrast to Neukölln, the streets are much denser, the atmosphere more crowded, the crowd of people on the streets more homogeneous. Contacts with the other side of the canal seem to be reduced to a minimum, aside from the business level. It seems quite conceivable to spend a day in Molenbeek without seeing a single white Central European. Here you will not only find the typical North African bread specialties such as Batbout, Baghrir and Msemen in the numerous bakeries. In Molenbeek, there is an almost incomprehensible number of women’s fashion stores, all of which offer “Islam-compliant” clothing. Fashion and clothing are always an important indicator of the nature of societies, of their values and norms. For Molenbeek, that means specifically long robes, headscarves, Maghrebian style of course. For the really hardcore, there is a street market at the town hall - not far from the Saint-Jean-Baptiste church, whose striking tower ironically reminds one all too much of a minaret - that could hardly be more Arabic. It is also ironic that the house where the Abdeslam family lived at the time of the attacks is exactly opposite this town hall (Place Communale 30). Molenbeek is small, people know each other. That’s why it’s hardly surprising that Salah, the only survivor of the 2015 Paris terrorist attack, was finally arrested here, just a few hundred meters from his original home.
Apart from that, the countless Arab street cafés are particularly interesting. In North Africa, these are also places for the unemployed. In Molenbeek, according to the oriental model, these are places that are exclusively, and I emphasize exclusively, frequented by men. Here, people talk about politics and family, drink mint tea sweetened to the point of inedibility (with real mint!) or the classic coffee, and, of course, there is always a soccer game going on (which few people pay attention to). You will hardly find better coffee in Brussels. For this exclusive men’s spectacle, it is unusual for a tourist to join in. However, it would be a real affront if this tourist is accompanied by an (unveiled) woman. Nevertheless, there is a women’s restroom.
The Island
Have you ever heard of the “Hammam”? In Berlin, too, there are these public baths - sometimes known as “Oriental baths”. In keeping with the cultural customs of the Islamic world, from which these baths were once imported to Western Europe, access for the respective sex is only possible at certain times. Of course, such establishments can also be found in Molenbeek, you don’t even really have to look for them for long. And of course, it is advertised in Arabic script. In general, despite the ubiquitous Arabic script in the streetscape, you don’t hear much Arabic in Molenbeek. Hammams is symbolic of everything you probably won’t find anywhere else in Brussels outside of Molenbeek.
Over generations, the residents have created their own world, attuned to their needs, oriented to their respective values and norms. Molenbeek can be called a prime example of the genesis of a parallel society, in which the inhabitants of the same obviously have no interest in the majority society (in this case, one could say, on the other side of the canal), in integration into it. On the contrary, they do not even want to appear to be. This dynamic of demarcation, meanwhile, is based on reciprocity. A state of affairs with which both sides seem to have resigned themselves, to have come to terms. How did it come about? Molenbeek is a microcosm, an island that raises many questions related to extremism - but not exclusively. How are children raised here? Would the inhabitants of Molenbeek define themselves as “Belgians”? Does any transmission of Belgian/Western values take place at all in this society? What role did socialization in Molenbeek play in the radicalization of terrorists like Salah Abdeslam, Abdelhamid Abaaoud and the El Bakraoui brothers?
Relics
At least six of the attackers in the Brussels ISIS cell that carried out the Paris attacks in November 2015 and in Brussels in March 2016 had links to Molenbeek. The main terrorists involved, Abaaoud, the Abdeslam brothers, the El Bakraoui brothers, Najim Laachraoui and Mohamed Abrini all knew each other personally, most for many years. The early biographies of the assassins, most notably the masterminds Salah Abdeslam and Abaaoud, read like those of so many young men from Molenbeek. Parents immigrated from Morocco in the 60s and 70s, grew up in Molenbeek, got involved in petty crime, drugs, knew the police, little perspective. Abaaoud and Salah Abdeslam had been friends since childhood. It can be said that both led a rather “un-Islamic” life until becoming members of IS. Salah as well as his brother Ibrahim are said to have smoked until a few months before the Paris attacks and were also not averse to alcohol consumption.
A stroll through Molenbeek is a journey into the not-too-distant past. Not only Abdeslam’s former residence is located there. The bar “Les Beguines,” which the Abdeslam brothers ran together until shortly before the Paris attacks, is also located in Molenbeek. The bar was closed by the authorities in September 2015 due to drug use. Mosques in Molenbeek are at best backyard affairs, converted garages, for example. Magnificent buildings à la the Sehitlik mosque in Berlin are nowhere to be found. One can only imagine how Khalid Zerkani (“Emir of Molenbeek”), one of the most successful IS recruiters in Western Europe until his arrest in 2015, indoctrinated young people with radical sermons. His “network” included Abdelhamid Abaaoud (who left for Syria and masterminded the 2015 Paris attacks) and Najim Laachraoui (bomber in Brussels in March 2016). Characteristic of the network was the close ties and personal relationship (including kinship) of the individual actors
At the same time, the question arises whether it was and is not precisely this hard break, this obvious discrepancy between Molenbeek and “Western European Brussels” that ISIS recruiters were able to juxtapose and stage so fabulously in their sermons? It is the discrepancy between poverty and decadence, between gold-washed splendorous buildings on the one hand and (by politics) neglected problem neighborhoods on the other. At the time of the Paris attacks, youth unemployment in Molenbeek was said to be around 50%; it was the second poorest municipality in all of Belgium. Prospects, especially in terms of finding work, were limited. Not much has changed since then, on the contrary. The siege of the international press, which lasted for weeks, has left the residents in a state of consternation. The myth of the “terrorist hotspot” was born, and stigmatization and distrust of Molenbeek residents increased. As a result, migrant society became even more isolated, relying even more than before on cohesion among themselves. Lack of equal opportunities, discrimination as well as the immanent instability of one’s own identity are omnipresent companions of so many residents of Molenbeek.
Demystification
Do we have to evaluate the presented aspects of a tendentious parallel society like in Molenbeek as negative? From the point of view of an intact urban community and society, undoubtedly. From the point of view of preventing radicalization and fighting terrorism, not necessarily. A parallel society in itself does not guarantee the emergence of terrorism. Ultraconservative Muslims do not necessarily take the path of jihad. Is it not an overly Eurocentric perspective to stigmatize or even condemn our values of liberalism and social coexistence, which lead us to perceive an introverted, extremely cohesive society as threatening?
According to statistics, 413 people have left for Syria and Iraq to join the so- called Islamic State. In terms of population, this is equivalent to the highest rate in all of Western Europe, with most coming from the Brussels-Antwerp- Vilvoorde region. Crucial to this was the existence of three overlapping radicalization and recruitment networks, the best known being the so-called Zerkani network in Brussels, which can be linked to at least 72 departures. Just as crucial as the mere existence of these networks, however, were external developments on the ground in Syria and the associated increased motivation - and dynamics - to leave the country, specifically the success of ISIS on the battlefields of the Middle East from 2013 onward. Moreover, the link between criminality and subsequent recruitment for jihad is striking. Zerkani in particular relied on a target group of young petty criminals without prospects who acted as a kind of street gang. Very few of those recruited were truly “Islamic.” Rather, the ISIS ideology provided them with a new sense of purpose for their previous actions.
Those who come from Molenbeek may be more susceptible to crises of meaning and questions about their own identity, their sense of belonging, due to their socialization in an Islamic society and the local socioeconomic situation. However, this alone does not make a person an Islamist extremist. Because these basic conditions can also be found in so many other large urban centers in Europe. In Molenbeek, it was much more the interplay of various factors that was decisive: socialization, perspectives, the existence of recruiters and networks, state failure in integration, inclusion and participation. At the same time, it reveals the importance of external events as well as the long-standing personal contacts of the actors in a terrorist cell.
The flaw in the assessment of the situation in Molenbeek lies in perception. The obvious tendencies towards a parallel society, the Islamic components of this neighborhood are overinterpreted, precisely because they are visible against other factors. Bearded men in long robes flanked by (fully) veiled women produce powerful, symbolic images. However, hidden factors such as socioeconomic perspectives and what goes on in back rooms were much more decisive in the case of the two terrorist cells and their members, especially in view of the fact that they had probably the most “un-Islamic” life models imaginable until their radicalization and the attacks.
At the same time, the passivity and neglect of state authorities in Molenbeek played an important role, as the ISIS recruiters were basically confronted with too few alternatives during their “heyday.” Even today, it is striking how little police presence there is in Molenbeek. On foot in the streets, there are no policemen to be seen at all. They are also rarely seen in patrol cars. A picture with symbolic character. Citizen-oriented police work, which would be so important in neighborhoods like Molenbeek, is obviously missing. Molenbeek is a memorial because even today - more than five years after the devastating attacks in Brussels and Paris - it offers important clues and insights into the importance of the environment and socialization of Islamist extremists and their mechanisms of action.