Ireland is a hotbed of Islamic extremism. Shocking, right? Of course it is. However, that's the view of Imam Ali Al-Saleh, who is the head of Ireland's biggest Mosque, the Islamic Cultural Centre in Dublin {photo}.

Speaking to the Sunday Tribune newspaper Al-Saleh said many of the extremists came to Ireland as asylum seekers and now their children are becoming adults, taking over university societies, brainwashing other students. These "indigenous" extremists are being bolstered by students from the Middle East.

This may explain why American Jamie Paulin-Ramirez came to Ireland after she told Colleen LaRose (aka Jihad Jane) in an e-mail that she would like to join her in Europe at a place that would be both a jihadist "training camp" and home. As Al-Saleh puts it, Ireland is an extremist "safe haven" and an al Qaeda "base."

Yet, unlike France, Britain, Holland and other European countries, Ireland does not have a large Muslim population. Ireland has no colonial legacy among the Islamic nations - there is no Irish equivalent to Algeria, Pakistan, Indonesia or any ex-colony among the Muslim nations.

There are only 30, 000 or so Muslims in Ireland (approx .75% of the population) and no areas where they live in large numbers. There is no Irish equivalent to Marseilles, Bradford or Detroit. Muslims are, as Al-Saleh says, "an integrated part of Irish society."

There are no Muslim neighborhoods teeming with loads of innocent Muslims just trying to fit in and get by, amongst whom extremists can hide, using the innocent mass of Muslims as a shield. So where are Ireland's Islamic extremists hiding? In plain sight, it seems.

This is why I think Jamie Paulin-Ramirez's marriage is so important to the story. True or not, I can easily see a situation where a public official might bend the rules to suit a Muslim, immigrant couple because we 'mustn't judge' and 'we must accommodate them' are two overriding themes when it comes to Ireland's treatment of immigrants.

Irish people are actually very reticent when it comes to criticizing people, despite the "fighting Irish" stereotype. Most Irish people wouldn't complain in a restaurant even if there was a worm in their soup.

This reticence combined with a relentless, dogmatic campaign promoting multiculturalism has the effect of muting criticism and thwarting questioning. Most Irish people would be very reluctant to say anything even if they heard a 6 year old boy recently arrived from America saying "all Christians will burn in hellfire," as Paulin-Ramirez's son said to his grandmother, Christine Holcomb-Mott {photo}.

Paulin-Ramirez's brother Mike described her son's school in Ireland as "a radical Muslim school." He made that assessment from 4,000 miles away.

I would bet there are plenty of people in Waterford who feel the same way about the school attended by little Christian, now Walid, but who would be very wary of saying anything publicly. This is the culture, the atmosphere, the society in which the radical Muslims are thriving.

Al-Saleh cannot be the only one. The Christian majority have to join him in condemning this sort of thing. Otherwise we risk becoming al Qaeda's European headquarters, a place where silence abets Islamic terrorism.