There have been an increasing number of distressing stories about migrants drowning in the Mediterranean while attempting to reach the coastline of southern Europe. Liberal critics have pounced on these headlines and insisted that the tragedy is being caused by European countries pursuing an intentional policy of scaling back their search-and-rescue operations. But the real reason more people are drowning is that more people are attempting to make the hazardous journey and European countries are taking no real measures to deter them from doing so.

Most of those attempting to enter Europe illegally are coming from across Africa, others from the Middle East. Setting sail from lawless Libya they are attempting to reach mainland Europe where they rightly anticipate that they will be able to take advantage of the European Union’s internal open-border arrangements to travel freely across the continent. Once in Europe they can seek out a country that has a liberal enough asylum and immigration policy to house them and provide them with welfare assistance until they can find work. Sweden and Germany are two particularly popular destinations in this regard.

With economic prospects in much of Europe still forlorn, and given the social tensions that failed policies of multiculturalism have inflicted on many of Europe’s cities, there is already considerable opposition to further immigration. Naturally, the left has scolded the public for this allegedly uncharitable attitude, while presenting everyone attempting to enter Europe illegally as victims and legitimate refugees. Indeed, there is a refusal on the part of rights groups to recognize that very many of these people are simply motivated by a perfectly understandable sense of economic self-interest. In which case there is no real reason why those currently breaking the law and forcing their way through have any more right to come to Europe than anyone else in the world who might be attracted to that prospect.

The people of Europe are, however, entitled to ask some basic questions about who exactly it is that is coming. Out of the many horrific stories of people drowning in their efforts to cross the Mediterranean, one stood out as particularly appalling, and far more alarming than the others. Last week twelve Christian migrants were drowned—not when their boat sank, but rather when their Muslim fellow passengers threw them overboard for not praying to Allah.

This story is important, not simply because of how it challenges the way in which Europe’s liberals want the migrants to be viewed, but also because of the serious questions that it raises about the kind of people these are. After all, if this is what the Muslims on board that boat were prepared to do to their fellow Christian migrants, then what are we to assume these people’s attitude toward the nominally Christian societies they are coming to will be?

Europe already has a serious problem with those sections of the Muslim immigrant community that have failed to integrate. Are Europeans really expected to welcome in yet more people with an intolerant hostility for the host culture? Yes, some of these people do come from very troubled and volatile parts of the world, but it helps no one if they simply bring their conflict with them. Those lobbying on behalf of the migrants seem to expect European citizens to embrace a suicidal compassion and ask no questions about the ramifications this mass migration might have for their own communities.

Inevitably, anyone who expresses a sense of disquiet about the growing wave of illegal migration is framed by the left as being in favor of leaving the migrants to drown. But whether the rights groups accept it or not, European governments had their reasons for reconsidering the way in which search-and-rescue operations were being conducted. For one thing, the traffickers had realized that they could simply abandon people just off shore and the Italian coastguards would come and collect them. In some instances traffickers were even sending off boats with fuel tanks half empty, only to then radio the coastguards to come to the rescue. Gradually European authorities were being drawn into doing half the trafficking for them. And all the while the incentive to risk everything and to try and reach Europe was being increased.

Since abandoning the migrants to their fate is not acceptable to anyone, the only other option is for European governments to actually deport those who break the law in attempting to reach Europe illegally. This will actually save lives because right now people are willing to risk the treacherous waters for the chance of a new life in Europe. Far fewer would undertake the journey if they knew that all that awaited them was a few weeks in a detention center and a prompt return to the shores from which they came. But failing that, Europe may as well abandon all pretense of immigration limits and border controls, for it will in effect have adopted open borders. But then perhaps that is what the liberal rights groups really want.