Last fall, I commented on an ill-conceived proposal in the Netherlands to ban the wearing of burqas in public:

The way to address the fact that there are some Jihadists in the Muslim world who need to be defeated is not to strip all Muslims of their right to wear religious attire. Doing so does nothing to further the integration of Muslims, it only serves as a signal that they are not welcome.

Western cultures will go down a dangerous path if we start outlawing legitimate, non-violent and uncoerced expressions of faith.

I feel the same way about this proposal in Switzerland:

A group of right-wing politicians is gathering signatures to try to force a national vote on banning the construction of minarets in Switzerland.

The planned building of minarets, the towers attached to mosques from which the Islamic call for prayer is issued, in small Swiss towns has sparked local protests.

A group of politicians from the Swiss National Party and Federal Democratic Union are seeking to prevent the construction of minarets in national law, saying they are a symbol of power and threaten law and order in Switzerland.

The campaign has to gather 100,000 signatures by November 2008 to force a national vote on the initiative which, if it gains a majority vote, would then be written into law.

“We have no doubt that we’ll reach the goal,” Ulrich Schlueer, a Swiss National Party parliamentarian for Zurich who is heading the initiative, said.

Muslims living in the West can be our long-term allies against the Jihadists, but only if they are integrated into society as equal members. To treat them as second-class citizens by placing restrictions on the construction on their houses of worship when no such restrictions apply to any other religion is not only short-sighted, it goes against the founding ideals of Western civilization.

It is legitimate to combat those who would seek to destroy us, but it is unfair to treat all Muslims as though they fall into that category.