Book Depicts Vienna's Muslim Preschools as Breeding Ground for Future Extremists
With the rising Muslim population in Austria brought about by the migrant crisis in Europe, a book that raised the possibility that Muslim kindergarten schools may be producing future radicals has caused concern and debate among residents in the capital city of Vienna.
In his book, Prof. Ednan Aslan of Vienna University wrote that around 10,000 children aged 2 to 6 are enrolled in 150 Muslim preschools where they are taught the Quran. He noted that at least 25 percent of the schools are sponsored by groups that advocate the more conservative strains of Islam.
"Parents are sending their kids to establishments that ensure they are in a Muslim setting and learn a few suras (chapters from the Koran)," the respected researcher of Islamic education told Agence France Presse. "But they are unaware that they are shutting them off from a multicultural society."
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Aslan's findings drew mixed reactions. The local government has commissioned its own study that will be published later this year. But the team conducting the research is having difficulty finding out how many Muslim kindergarten schools there are in Vienna, indicating that authorities are not keeping tabs on them.
The magazine Biber sent an undercover Muslim reporter to 14 Islamic preschools posing as a mother looking for where to send her child didn't find evidence that would support Aslan's findings. But the probe found that four of the schools were "cutting off or isolating children" from mainstream society.
Groups representing Austria's 700,000-strong Muslim population questioned the methodology of Alan's study.
"This study feeds populism and forces Muslims to justify themselves constantly," said Murat Gurol of Muslim Civil Society Network.
The 45-year-old IT worker said he sent his own son to a Muslim preschool for him to learn "the values of solidarity, humanity and responsibility," which, for him, is no different from other parents who send their children to Christian schools.
