Situation Report: Macron Vows Crackdown on “Islamic Separatism”

In a two hour long speech on Friday, French President Emmanuel Macron proposed a new bill to combat what he described as “Islamic separatism,” arguing that the failure of Muslim immigrants to assimilate to French values was a French failure.

The proposed legislation formalized several previous statements Macron has made regarding assimilation of Muslim immigrants and included stricter examination of homeschooling and religious school curriculum for schools soliciting government funds, and seeks an end to the importation of foreign imams to lead mosques and schools.

The announcement was swiftly condemned by members of the Turkey’s ruling Islamist Justice and Development Party. According to a former president of a major French mosque, nearly half of France’s imams are Turkish, despite the relatively low Turkish population in France compared to neighboring European countries.

The speech came a week after a Pakistani man stabbed two people outside the offices of satirical paper Charlie Hebdo, the site of a brutal terror attack in 2015 that killed 12. Trials for the accomplices of the attackers are currently ongoing in France.

The move by Macron had been repeatedly signaled for months.

As Robert Spencer, author of Mass Migration in Europe: A Model for the U.S.? recently told a Center for Security Policy audience, that agreements between Arab states and the European Union regarding migration had prohibited policies of assimilation, and led to the growth of terror threats, high crime, and the expansion of so called “no-go zones” which have threatened stability.

French security officials say the country’s terror watchlist includes over 8,000 potential threats.

It remains to be seen whether Macron will be able to follow through on his rhetoric, which is certainly encouraging but may prove challenging to implement.

Special Address by Emmanuel Macron, President of France by World Economic Forum is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0