What is lacking from the literature are studies that empirically show just how the construction of otherness and Islam have changed in the past decades, and that cross the study of Islamophobia and migration. More specifically it seems important to test the claim that the construction of "Muslim immigrant" has replaced the "Italian worker." Through our research, we are filling this gap by analyzing Swiss newspapers in order to see how and to what extent Swiss newspapers of 2004 and 1970 differ in the use of the (presumed) affiliation to Islam to define foreign otherness (in comparison to other features). Was religion, more specifically Islam, an important criterion in defining otherness in journalistic entries thirty years earlier? Is it true that Muslims have become the predominant immigrant figure of the 21 st century? Does the Muslim presence in newspaper representations parallel their sociological existence in Switzerland? And finally, what are the themes used to frame media discourses on Muslims in comparison to other figures of foreigners? These questions will structure the present paper, broken down into six parts that address each question. Their answers shed light on the construction of the “foreign Muslim” in newspapers in Switzerland, along with testing claims and hypotheses never verified heretofore.