Inside Story - Can Islam Be Integrated With French Secularism?

Islam in France - BBC Documentary

A fascinating look at the problems surrounding Muslims and Islamic extremism in France, as well as the rise of the National Front.

French Imam Mohamed Khattabi Discusses "Man-Made" French National Anthem: The Quran Is Our Anthem, Our Identity, Our Constitution

Marine Le Pen’s Anti-Islam Message Gains Influence in France

THE NEW YORK TIMES: PARIS — Well before the attacks that killed 129 people in Paris on Friday, Marine Le Pen, the president of the far-right National Front party, was parlaying fear of Islam, migrants and open borders into political support. Now, with France angry and in mourning, she is seizing the opportunity to expand her appeal and show her clout, underscoring how far-right messages are resonating across Europe.

“France and the French are no longer safe,” Ms. Le Pen said in a speech the day after the attacks, demanding a crackdown on Islamists in the country.

Analysts said Ms. Le Pen’s already favorable prospects in regional elections in three weeks have most likely been given a lift, strengthening her position as a possible presidential candidate in 2017. She has also succeeded in pulling the political center of gravity in France to the right, forcing the main center-right party to adopt a stronger anti-immigration stance and taking positions in the wake of Friday’s attacks that were subsequently adopted by President François Hollande, a Socialist. » | Adam Nossiter | Tuesday, November 17, 2015

After Paris Attacks, a Darker Mood Toward Islam Emerges in France

THE NEW YORK TIMES: PARIS — November is not January. That thought has been filtering through the statements of most French politicians and the news media, and most people seem to understand.

Unlike the response in January after attacks at the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo and elsewhere left 17 dead, there were no grand public appeals for solidarity with Muslims after the Friday attacks that left 129 dead in Paris. There were no marches, few pleas not to confuse practitioners of Islam with those who preach jihad.

Instead, there was a palpable fear, even anger, as President François Hollande asked Parliament to extend a state of emergency and called for changing the Constitution to deal with terrorism. It was largely unspoken but nevertheless clear: Secular France had always had a complicated relationship with its Muslim community, but now it was tipping toward outright distrust, even hostility.

The shift could be all the more tempting because the government is struggling to find its footing politically as it is threatened on its far right by the anti-immigrant National Front party.

Already, tough talk from officials in the government shows them shifting rightward, calling for new scrutiny of mosques, extending the state of emergency and possibly placing restrictions on the 10,000 or more people loosely indexed as possible threats to the state. France needs to “expel all these radicalized imams,” Prime Minister Manuel Valls declared Saturday. » | Adam Nossiter and Liz Alderman | Monday, November 16, 2015

Resentment Grows between Christians and Muslims in France

The deadly attack on Charlie Hebdo puts a spotlight on the growing tensions between France's Muslim and immigrant communities and a large portion of French society, which is traditionally Catholic. The NewsHour’s Megan Thompson recently visited Marseille, one of the country’s most diverse cities, to report on the root of the conflict and the rise of anti-Muslim sentiment in France.

Fury over Gender Ban in Bordeaux Muslim Grocery Store

Veiled women in Bordeaux

THE TELEGRAPH: Muslim grocery store in Bordeaux withdraws sign announcing gender-specific days for customers following local and national outcry

The south-eastern French wine capital of Bordeaux is up in arms over a Muslim-owned grocer’s decision to impose male and female-only days for customers.

A small sign outside the De L'Orient à L'Occidental (From East to West) store stipulated that women were only welcome on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesday and Fridays. Men, on the other hand, were kindly asked to take their custom elsewhere on weekends.

The gender split was put in place by the store's owners, recent converts to Islam, to make sure women and men do not meet.

Jean-Baptiste Michelon, the store's co-owner, said: “It’s really for practising Muslims. A man doesn’t want to find himself alone with a woman. A woman who comes to buy books here doesn’t want to find herself alone with a man, especially out of respect if she is married."

“I don’t think her husband would accept such things,” he told BFM TV, adding that the rule did not apply to non-Muslims. Read on and comment » | Henry Samuel, Paris | Monday, June 22, 2015

La France est en guerre

Les phénomènes ont des causes. Ce qui frappe la France aujourd’hui porte un nom et est le résultat de causes identifiables.

EURACTIV: National Front MEP under investigation for Islam comments: Relieved of his duties as leader of the National Front delegation in the European Parliament after calling for the "de-Islamification of France", sources told AFP that Aymeric Chauprade is now the subject of a legal inquiry. EurActiv France and AFP report. » | EurActiv France avec l'AFP | vendredi 05 juin 2015

Sarkozy Panned for Holding ‘Question of Islam’ Meet

In first action, former French president’s new center-right party debate place of Islam in France, to dismay of religious groups

THE TIMES OF ISRAEL: Nicolas Sarkozy’s right-wing opposition party held an internal meeting Thursday on the “question of Islam” in France, drawing criticism from Muslim groups and some members of the party for “stigmatizing” the religion.

The former French president’s party, recently rebranded “The Republicans,” debated “the place of religion” in secular France and more specifically “Islam in France.”

France is home to Europe’s largest Muslim community and also the continent’s biggest Jewish community but is officially secular.

One month after the January attacks in Paris that killed 17, Sarkozy said: “The question is not to know what the Republic can do for Islam, but what Islam can do to become the Islam of France.” » | AFP | Thursday, June 04, 2015

French Mayor Suspended after Calling for Islam to Be Banned

THE INDEPENDENT: Robert Chardon tweeted the extreme view as part of a discussion with former president Nicolas Sarkozy

A French mayor has been suspended from his party after calling for the country to ban Islam.

Robert Chardon, the UMP mayor of Venelles in southern France, tweeted: “The Muslim religion must be banned in France” and added that anyone practising the religion must be “immediately escorted to the border”.

He also claimed Islam will be banned in France by 2027. » | Ben Tuffy | Sunday, May 17, 2015

Related »

Mayor Wants to BAN Islam 'To Solve the Country's Problems'

Robert Chardon is the mayor of Venelles,
a town in southern France

DAILY EXPRESS: A MAYOR is pushing for a law to ban Islam – explaining that it is "the only solution for most of France's problems".

Robert Chardon, mayor of Venelles, a town in the south of France, tweeted: "We must ban the Muslim faith in France."

He called for the country to removal a secularism law dating back to 1905 – and instead "promote the practice of the Christian faith".

Chardon added: "We also need a Marshall Plan to send Muslims to countries where the religion is practiced." » | Tom Parfitt | Saturday, May 16, 2015

French Minister Agrees That Lack of Mosques Encourages Radicalisation

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Lack of "dignified" places of worship for France's Muslims fuels radicalisation, claims Thierry Mandon, French simplification minister, a day after Grand Mosque of Paris rector says number must be "doubled" by 2017

A French minister has poured fuel onto the debate about proposals to double the number of mosques in the country within two years, by conceding that France doesn't have enough mosques.

Thierry Mandon, the minister of simplification, said that the lack of "decent" places of worship for French Muslims was partly to blame for some believers turning to radical Islam.

His words came as France struggles to calm community tensions in the wake of the January Charlie Hebdo attacks.

"There aren't enough mosques in France," Mr Mandon told iTele, the TV news channel. "There are still too many towns where the Muslim religion is practised in conditions that are not decent." » | Henry Samuel, Paris | Tuesday, April 07, 2015

Demand for More Mosques in France Raises Tension

France is home to western Europe's largest Muslim population

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Muslim leaders' demand to double the number of mosques in France within two years causes anger

A call by Muslim leaders for the number of mosques in France to be doubled has aggravated community tensions barely three months after the Charlie Hebdo attacks.

"We have 2,200 mosques and we need double that within two years," the Rector of the Grand Mosque of Paris, Dalil Boubakeur, told applauding French Muslims at a conference.

Many Muslims believe local authorities in France block applications to open or build mosques and prayer-rooms, leading to overcrowding and protests over prayers held in the streets.

However, the conservative daily Le Figaro said the comments by Dr Boubakeur, generally considered a moderate, were "provocative". » | David Chazan, Paris | Monday, April 06, 2015

French Flocking to Buy Books on Islam Following Charlie Hebdo Attacks

RT: France is witnessing a surge in people buying books on Islam. Interest in the religion has seen three times as many volumes sold in the first quarter of 2015 than during the same period last year, according to the French National Union of Bookshops.

The public has been trying to make up their minds about Islam following the January terrorist attacks at the satirical Charlie Hebdo magazine and a Jewish supermarket, which left 17 people dead.

"The French are asking more and more questions, and they feel less satisfied than ever by the answers they're getting from the media," Fabrice Gerschel, director of Philosophie magazine, told AFP. » | Saturday, April 04, 2015

French Icon Brigitte Bardot On Trial Again For Blasphemy Against Islam

BREITBART: Former film star Brigitte Bardot, France’s iconic blonde bombshell and “sex kitten” who reigned supreme from 1952 – 1973, is currently on trial for the fifth time for insulting Muslims and “inciting racial hatred.” Bardot has been fined four times and has also received suspended jail sentences.

Now, the prosecutor, Anne de Fontette, wants a heftier fine and a tougher sentence: the equivalent of $24,000 and a two month (hopefully) suspended jail term.

What crimes has Bardot committed in the land without a First Amendment, in the land of Hate Speech laws that are being slickly exploited by non-persecuted Muslims?

Bardot has written: “I am fed up with being under the thumb of this population which is destroying us, destroying our country.”

Bardot, seventy[-]nine, is an avid animal rights activist and abhors the slaughter of animals for any purpose, including religious ones. But mainly, she laments “the Islamization of France.” » | Dr. Phyllis Chesler | Friday, February 20, 2015

The Crisis in French Multiculturalism

Marine Le Pen Discusses France and Islam with Al Jazeera

The leader of the National Front, a far-right party in France, talks about her position after the Charlie Hebdo attack

Paris Shootings: Marseille Muslims Condemn Violence

BBC AMERICA: More than two million people have taken to the streets of cities across France, in a show of unity after three days of terror attacks.

Seventeen people were killed during the violence, and police are still hunting one of the people believe to be responsible.

One million people of all faiths and origins marched in Paris, while hundreds of thousands of others staged demonstrations elsewhere.

Fergal Keane reports on one march in Marseille, the French city with the largest population of Muslims. (+ BBC video) » | Sunday, January 11, 2015

French Police Shoot Dead Knifeman Who Was Shouting Islamic Slogans

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Investigation under way after man attacks officers in police station in central France

French police on Saturday shot dead a man who attacked them with a knife in a police station while shouting "Allahu Akbar" ("God is great" in Arabic), a source said.

The man injured the face of an officer at the entrance to the police station in Joue-les-Tours near the city of Tours in central France and injured two other before he was shot, the interior ministry said.

Anti-terrorist investigators were probing the incident, a judicial source said.

The perpetrator was a French citizen born in Burundi in 1994 and known to police for common crimes, a source close to the case told AFP, adding that the attacker "shouted 'Allahu Akbar' from the moment he entered until his last breath." » | Agencies | Saturday, December 20, 2014

Talk to Al Jazeera: Marine Le Pen: The Threat of Radical Islam (December 2012)

The leader of the far-right National Front party explains why she sees Muslim immigration as a grave threat to France.