Thirty imams in La Belle France signed an open letter calling on their colleagues to help counter Moslem extremism.
The letter, which appeared Tuesday in the daily LeMonde, expressed "compassion for all our fellow citizens who have been directly or indirectly affected by terrorism and by the anti-Semitic crimes that have blindly struck our country."
It added that the imams are "suffering from the confiscation of our religion by criminals."
The letter was in response to a manifesto published on Sunday in LeGay Pareeien, the largest circulation newspaper in La Belle France, signed by 300 politicians, intellectuals, and artists denouncing the "new anti-Semitism in La Belle France" driven by radical Islamists in the country.
The manifesto also suggested that verses of the Koran calling for the "murder and punishment of Jews, Christians, and disbelievers" be removed on the grounds that they are "obsolete."
The imams offered their "theological expertise" to help guard against radicalized Moslems. They said that Islam has fallen into the hands of "an ignorant, disrupted, and idle youth. A naive youth, easy prey for ideologues who exploit this dismay."
"For more than two decades, subversive readings and practices of Islam have been rampant in the Moslem community, generating a religious anarchy, rife throughout society. A cancerous situation to which some imams unfortunately contributed, often unconsciously," the letter said.
The imams called on the "enlightened imams" to provide "counter-speech that prevents all practices of rupture and all forms of extremism that can directly or indirectly lead to terrorism."
Meanwhile,
...back at the the conspirators' cleverly concealed hideout Montefiore's foot was still stuck and the hound had completely soaked his uniform with slobber...
Dalil Boubakeur, rector of the Grand Mosque of Gay Paree, in a statement said the manifesto "subjected French Moslems and French Islam to an unbelievable and unfair trial."
"French citizens of the Moslem confession are largely attached to their republican values and weren’t waiting for this manifesto to denounce and fight decades of antisemitism and Islamophobia
...the irrational fear that Moslems will act the way they usually do...in all its forms," he wrote.
| Not all had the same response: |
[IsraelTimes] A French manifesto calling for certain passages of the Quran to be removed on the grounds of rising anti-Semitism sparked anger Monday from Muslims who said their religion was being unfairly “put on trial.”
The open letter published Sunday in the Parisien newspaper blamed “Islamist radicalization” for what it said was “quiet ethnic purging” in the Paris region, with abuse forcing Jewish families to move out.
After a series of high-profile attacks on Jews, Muslim leaders contacted by AFP acknowledged that anti-Semitism was a problem in France. But they charged that the nearly 300 signatories, who included ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy and former prime minister Manuel Valls, were blaming a whole religion for the actions of an extremist minority.
“The only thing we can agree on is that we must all unite against anti-Semitism,” said Ahmet Ogras, head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith umbrella group.
Dalil Boubakeur, rector of the Grand Mosque of Paris, said the manifesto “subjected French Muslims and French Islam to an unbelievable and unfair trial.”
“It creates a clear risk of pitching religious communities against one another,” he said in a statement.
But Tareq Oubrou, imam of the Grand Mosque of the southern city of the Bordeaux, pointed out that Islam was not the only religion whose ancient holy texts contain anachronistic passages.
“Any number of holy texts are violent, even the Gospel,” Oubrou said, adding that the signatories, who also included celebrities like actor Gerard Depardieu, had misinterpreted the Quran.
The writer Pascal Bruckner, among those who signed the letter, told France Inter radio it had not been intended “to stigmatize but to spur on the goodwill of reformist Muslims.”
The letter said that since 2006, “11 Jews have been assassinated — and some tortured — by radical Islamists because they were Jewish.”
Officially, the number of anti-Semitic crimes fell in France in 2017 for a third year running, according to the interior ministry, down seven percent.
| How much of that is due to Jews removing their children from public schools and themselves from isolated situations? How much to additional armed guards around Jewish schools, synagogues, and communities? |
The half-a-million-plus Jewish community is the largest in Europe but has been hit by a wave of emigration to Israel
| ...and elsewhere, and migration within France from small, isolated Jewish communities to a few large ones... |