"Germany Divided over Hijab" by Andreas Tzortzis

Controversy surrounds a recent court decision in favor of a school teacher wearing a headscarf.

In the debate that has ensued, politicians and Muslim leaders have begun to ask some serious questions about the place their religion and identity holds in a Europe rooted in Christianity and Judaism, but with a growing Muslim population.

"You have a new generation of Muslims ... reasonably educated, fluent in cultures of languages they live in ... demanding a sort of legitimization; they want it without having to become assimilated," says Shireen Hunter, the head of the Center for Strategic Studies Islam Program, and editor of "Islam, Europe's Second Religion."

In France, the ban on head scarves in everything from schools to ID cards has provoked an outcry in recent years by that country's increasingly strong Muslim population.

Germany's relationship to its 3.2 million Muslims is decidedly more fragile.

The legal conflicts are symptoms of the German government and Turkish community neglecting to address the issue of integration, say historians.

They built up parallel societies that made the Turkish grocer, corner Doener stand, and mosque part of the everyday urban landscape in Germany.

"Are we so weak that a square foot of cloth can make us feel threatened?"

Germany has no official religion, and the state is constitutionally bound to maintain a position of neutrality in religious matters.

"This is not an Islamic country, it's a Christian country, and we should not be forced to accommodate Islam."

Other Germans perceive the scarf as a threat not so much to a Judeo-Christian heritage, but to Western secularism and women's rights.

"There are very few women who wear the head scarf voluntarily, and their number is so small they are not worth talking about," says Seyran Ates, a women's right activist and lawyer in Berlin.

Since running away from her parents' traditional Turkish household in Berlin at 18, Ms. Ates has spent her life fighting for the rights of women yearning to break free of the traditional and religious mold their parents foresee for them.

In the two weeks since the decision came down, she has been a favorite of TV news producers looking for the choice sound bite.

The 40-year-old, who wrote a book about leaving her strict home, says she is astounded at the legitimacy with which some German politicians give the head scarf.

"We need to never forget that what we're talking about here is fundamentalism," she says.

Rather than decide what place a piece of cloth that represents religious freedom to some, fundamentalism to others, has in a state-run school, Germany's constitutional court referred the question to the state parliaments and the public domain--where many believe it belongs.

Pockets of devout Muslims, facing limited job prospects because of their religious dress, could withdraw into parallel societies harboring the type of terror nests that produced the Sept. 11 attackers.

"There's not a fundamentalist under every head scarf, and thinking that would be fatal," says Spielhaus.

Öztürk makes a similar argument, adding that her head scarf could even begin dismantling prejudices before they arise in her young students.