The indignation,” “but also the embarrassment, of French Moslems, who fear the backlash of public opinion” “” “” “
The Islamic communities in France are following with great apprehension the events of recent weeks. To understand why, we interviewed Fouad Imarraine , director of a Centre of Islamic worship and culture at Saint-Denis, on the northern outskirts of Paris. How are you experiencing the tragic events of recent weeks? “There was a widespread reaction of indignation to the terrorist attacks of 11 September. As a result of them and what happened in their aftermath, many Moslems fear becoming once again victims of a backlash of public opinion. But they are also indignant about the American air strikes on Afghanistan. No political solution is yet in sight. So Moslems feel a sense of unease, a sense of embarrassment. They fear that what happened in Iraq is going to be repeated in Afghanistan: namely, that in spite of the bombardments, power continues to remain firmly in the same hands, and that it is the civilians who suffer. Concurrently, in all this time, no solution has yet been found to the Palestinian question. And at the present time, there is even a recrudescence of violence”. From your point of view is it right to speak of a “holy war”? “We ourselves pose a fundamental question: can an attack like that perpetrated on 11 September be accepted in the name of the Koran? Is it justified or not? In this regard a debate has opened within the Moslem community, which has led to an almost unanimous condemnation of such terrorist acts. Only a tiny fraction of us sees the world divided into two: the Islamic half and the other half that rejects the message of Islam. This is a vision of war. Those who think in this way believe it is necessary to react: they do not support the terrorist attacks, because nothing can justify the murder of innocent civilians, but they believe that acts of this kind may at least pose questions about the actual situation of many realities in the Islamic world”. How can the existence of terrorist cells in the Islamic world be explained? “The Moslem world is still so divided because it has not completed its reforms. And it has failed to complete these reforms because there exist political regimes that prevent this from happening. Such terrorist cells appear in societies governed by regimes in which freedom of expression does not exist. These countries are, in general, too subordinated to the agenda of the industrialized countries and privilege the economic interests dictated by the world market, instead of the democratization of society. Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan are examples of this”. M.G. Fact File The figures for the Islamic presence in France are as follows: – those of Maghrebi origin: 2,900,000 – those of Algerian origin: 1,550,000 – those of Moroccan origin: 1,000,000 – those of Tunisian origin: 350,000 Arabs from the Middle East: 100,000 Turks: 315,000 Sub-Saharan Africa: 250,000 Converts: 40,000 Asylum-seekers and clandestine immigrants: 350,000 Asians: 100,000 Others: 100,000 Total: 4,155,000 Statistics supplied by the Upper Council for integration (report of the Prime Minister); cf. La Documentation Catholique, Paris, 2001. From the point of view of places of Islamic worship, France currently has eight mosques, that may each accommodate congregations of over a thousand faithful. They are located in Roubaix-Tourcoing, Lille, Mantes-la-Jolie, Paris, Rheims, Lyons and Marseilles. In addition there are some 120 permanent prayer rooms that can contain from 200 to 1000 faithful, and over a thousand other small sites allocated to prayer. Various other mosque-construction projects are currently in progress. (data updated to 1998, from “Musulmans de France” by Gilles Couvreur)
