French President Emmanuel Macron faces backlash over ‘Islamophobia’ comments

French President Emmanuel Macron’s response to recent terrorist attacks in his country has sparked a huge backlash from Muslim leaders around the world and sparked boycotts and violent protests.

Last week, an 18-year-old Islamic extremist beheaded a high school teacher for his disrespectful portrayal of the Prophet Muhammad in his classroom.

This week, a Muslim terrorist killed three people in a church in Nice, trying to behead one of them. On Saturday, a Greek Orthodox priest was shot while closing his church in Lyon, although the motive remains unclear.

Macron blamed the attacks on “Islamist separatism” and “the creation of a [Muslim] counter-society “in France.

He said the growing Muslim presence was a danger to France because it had its own laws above all others.

Macron further said that some Muslim parents kept their children out of school, group sports and community activities as a “pretext to teach principles that do not conform to the laws of the republic.”

To stop this, the president announced his plans to pass a legislative proposal that would essentially ban homeschooling for children of all ages and prevent foreign-trained imams from heading French mosques.

The goal, the president said, was “to build an Islam in France that can be compatible with the Enlightenment.”

The comments were branded racist by world leaders, including the prime minister of Pakistan and the presidents of Turkey and Egypt.

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan said Macron blamed all Muslims and not just extremists, tweeting that Macron chose to “encourage Islamophobia by attacking Islam rather than terrorists.”

He also accused Macron of “deliberately [provoking] Muslims, including their own citizens. “

Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi was also outraged, saying that Macron’s actions had offended 1.5 billion Muslims around the world.

“We have the right not to have our feelings hurt and our values ​​not to be hurt,” he said.

Turkey’s reaction was more extreme. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called for a boycott of all French products and denounced Macron personally.

“What is the problem of this person called Macron with Muslims and Islam? Macron needs treatment at the mental level,” Erdogan said.

“What else can you say to a head of state who does not understand freedom of belief and who behaves in this way with millions of people who live in his country and who are members of a different faith?”

It wasn’t just the leaders of the Islamic nations who were upset; citizens began to take it out on French citizens.

Yesterday, the Associated Press estimated that 2,000 people tried to march towards the French embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan. They were turned away by the police who fired tear gas at them.

A Saudi Arabian man was arrested in Jeddah after attacking and wounding a guard with a “sharp tool” at the French consulate on Thursday, Saudi state television reported.

The French embassy said they were subjected to a “knife attack directed at a guard.” The guard was mostly unscathed and will survive the attack.

“The French embassy strongly condemns this attack on a diplomatic post that nothing could justify.”

In Raqqa, Syria, a former stronghold of the Islamic State, protesters were heard chanting “Death to France.” They also hailed terrorists as heroes and said that beheading was an appropriate punishment for “blasphemers.”