At least 20 of the 120 Salafi mosques in the country have been shut down in France since December 2015.
But in the wake of a third radical Islamist terror attack, last month Prime Minister Manuel Valls called for a ban on foreign funding on Islamic mosques altogether. Nor would Valls say how long that ban would last.
A few days later, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve met with Muslim leaders about the ban, and explained it was time to put an end to incitement once and for all.
Speaking with reporters after the meeting, Cazeneuve was quoted by The Washington Post as saying, “There is no place in France for those who call for and incite hatred in prayer halls or in mosques.”
French Muslims are deeply concerned that government officials will tag their community as being friendly to terrorists. Marwan Muhammad, the director of the Collective Against Islamophobia in France, told The Post, “It gives the idea that mosques have something to do with terrorism.”
All told, at present there are more than two thousand mosques in France.
