In the face of a 90% increase in immigration to Italy this year, with Sicily the doorway in from Northern Africa, the beginnings of open warfare between the Mafia and immigrants, especially immigrant gangs have been seen.  Although no longer a dominant force, the Mafia is contesting control of neighborhoods with a heavy immigrant presence, anxious to continue and expand its tradition extortion of merchants operation of other rackets like gambling and prostitution.

Jake Wallis Simons reports in the UK Daily Mail:

Mayor Leoluca Orlando told MailOnline: 'Palermo is no longer an Italian town. It is no longer European. You can walk in the city and feel like you’re in Istanbul or Beirut.' (snip)

The deadly Mafia-migrant war began after African criminal gangs apparently entered the country alongside law-abiding migrants, and started to operate ‘on the Mafia’s doorstep’.

Mobsters claimed that police were targeting their activities while leaving African gangs alone. 

Then, two weeks ago, an innocent Gambian migrant was shot through the head in a 'hit' by a gangster dubbed 'an animal'. Astonishingly, he survived, but the attack was a brutal example of the violence gripping the island and raises fears it will spin out of control. (snip)

The shooting took place just after 6pm in broad daylight, near the Balleró street market in the centre of the city, where street vendors sell pigs’ heads and gut fish while Mafiosos collect protection money.

Victim Yusapha Susso, 21, had been playing football at a nearby park. According to his attorney, Mr Susso was walking with two friends along Via Maqueda, the main thoroughfare, when an Italian man riding an electric bicycle drove into them from behind ‘intentionally and provocatively’.

An argument ensued. The Italian told them that he knew he was outnumbered, but ‘soon you will see’. He then allegedly contacted gangland friends and within minutes a group of up to 10 hoodlums arrived in cars, on motorcycles and by foot.(snip)

CCTV footage showed a fight breaking out. Susso managed to beat back his assailants and went to the aid of his friends. 

That was when local mobster Emanuele Rubino, 28, retrieved a handgun from a nearby building, chased Susso into a side street and shot him in the head, it is alleged.

The bullet passed through Susso’s skull and out the other side, grazing the brain but not damaging it. According to police, the gangster then ‘sauntered off’.

Long a plague on ordinary Sicilians, the Mafia has now generated sympathy for the invaders:

Mayor Orlando said: ‘This Mafia shooting was a tremendous mistake because it turned the city against them. The Mafia needs silence and darkness. It needs people to keep their mouths shut.

‘When it does such a brutal act, shooting a young guy, the mayor switches on the lights and the whole city comes after them.’ 

Palermo police commissioner Guido Longo added: ‘We are facing acts of unprecedented aggression and bullying [against migrants] with typically Mafioso attitudes. There is a will to impose their rule on the territory.’

Gangsterism is not the answer to the invasion, but so far, Italian and local authorities have not been able to stop the transformation of parts of Palermo into alien territory. Islam goes completely unmentioned in the article, and perhaps the migrants in Sicily are not attempting to enforce Sharia. Yet. But official acquiescence to what amounts to an invasion and transformation of the character of an ancient territory like Sicily (or for that matter many cities in Germany, France, Sweden, and elsewhere) will not go peacefully. There will be resistance by the most violent and lawless elements of society if their governments do not protect the way of life of the people.

Sicily, in particular, suffered centuries of invasion, rape, and plunder at the hands of jihadi pirates from North Africa, operating without mercy for the infidels. There has to be a memory of their ancestors’ fate at the hands of invaders form the south.

This won’t end well unless the authorities have clearer vision of what is required of them to maintain the lives of their constituents instead of acquiescing to the invasion. A tragedy is in the making, brought on by the default of the Italian and other European governments.

Hat tip: Alan Fraser