Outcry in France as Principal Steps Down Over Head Scarf Incident

A Paris college principal’s resolution to step down after he acquired on-line dying threats over an incident involving a Muslim scholar’s head scarf has prompted nationwide outrage this week in France.

Digicam crews have descended on the varsity and the federal government mentioned it deliberate to sue the coed, accusing her of creating false accusations — the most recent flashpoint in a debate over French secularism and the treatment of the country’s Muslim minority.

Officers say the incident occurred on Feb. 28 on the Lycée Maurice-Ravel when the varsity’s principal requested three college students to take away their head scarves on college grounds. Two of the scholars complied, however a 3rd refused, inflicting an “altercation,” in keeping with the Paris prosecutor’s workplace.

Since 2004, center and highschool college students in France have been barred from carrying “ostentatious” symbols which have a transparent spiritual that means, like a Catholic cross, a Jewish skullcap or a Muslim head scarf.

The total particulars of the altercation are unclear. However the incident rapidly drew nationwide consideration in France, the place the perceived encroachment of Islam within the public college system is a particularly delicate matter.

The nation stays deeply scarred by the killing of two schoolteachers by Islamist extremists lately.

The coed advised investigators that the principal had pushed her and hit her arm, however the Paris prosecutor’s workplace mentioned {that a} criticism she had filed accusing the principal of assault had been dropped over an absence of proof. The principal filed a separate go well with accusing the coed of intimidating a public official, the prosecutor’s workplace mentioned.

The federal government and politicians throughout the spectrum have defended the principal and disputed the accusations of violence made towards him.

French officers haven’t publicly recognized the principal or the coed. The regional training authority for Paris mentioned that the coed dropped out of the varsity shortly after the incident.

The controversy started to attract better nationwide consideration final week after the principal determined to step down. In a message to high school workers that was shared with the French media, he mentioned he had determined to go away over considerations about his private security and the varsity’s personal safety.

Prime Minister Gabriel Attal mentioned that the threats towards the principal had been “unacceptable” and introduced on Wednesday that the federal government would file a authorized criticism towards the coed, accusing her of making an attempt to “intimidate” the principal by making wrongful accusations of violence towards him, resulting in a wave of on-line dying threats.

“Laïcité is consistently being put to the check,” Mr. Attal told a national television station on Wednesday in regards to the case, referring to France’s model of secularism, which ensures freedom of conscience but in addition the strict neutrality of the state and of some public areas.

The Paris prosecutor’s workplace mentioned it had opened an investigation into the dying threats and “cyber-harassment” confronted by the principal. Three individuals have already been arrested, and considered one of them will face trial subsequent month, the prosecutor’s workplace mentioned.

Mr. Attal, who met with the principal on Wednesday, mentioned that the principal was scheduled to retire in June however had determined to step down earlier due to the threats. The prime minister added that the state could be unwavering in its help for “all of those that are on the entrance traces of those assaults on laïcité.”

In his former place as training minister, Mr. Attal had spearheaded a ban in schools of the abaya, a loosefitting, full-length gown worn by some Muslim ladies.

Nicole Belloubet, Mr. Attal’s successor on the ministry, visited the varsity in early March to specific help for the principal, and he or she assured lawmakers this week that he had been given full authorized and ethical help. Law enforcement officials had been additionally deployed in entrance of the varsity as a precautionary measure after the incident occurred, she mentioned.

In a video published by the Collective for Countering Islamophobia in Europe — a Belgium-based activist group that was created after an analogous one was disbanded by the federal government in France — the coed mentioned that the altercation occurred as she was leaving college.

Talking together with her face blurred to hide her id, the coed mentioned that she was beginning to cowl her head with a hat as she ready to placed on her head scarf when the principal shouted at her to take away it.

Earlier than she might comply, she mentioned, the principal “pushed me violently” and “hit me exhausting on the arm,” then he tried to tug her to his workplace till one other scholar intervened, she mentioned.

The Collective for Countering Islamophobia in Europe condemned the dying threats towards the principal however accused the French authorities of “fueling a local weather of battle inside colleges, pitting lecturers, pupils and households towards one another.”

“We need to reiterate our dedication to the struggle towards all types of harassment and discrimination, particularly towards Muslim college students, who’re underneath undue stress within the present local weather,” the group mentioned in a statement.

For a lot of in France, the case echoed the chain response that led to the killing of Samuel Paty in 2020. The historical past instructor was beheaded in a northwestern suburb of Paris by an Islamist assailant after he confirmed caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad to his college students in an try and illustrate free speech.

Mr. Paty was murdered lower than two weeks after a schoolgirl lied about attending his class and made false accusations towards him — setting off a spiral of on-line rumors that finally put the killer on his path.

The killing final yr of Dominique Bernard, a French literature instructor who was stabbed to dying at a highschool in northern France by a radicalized former scholar, put the nation additional on edge.

In an interview withFrench television on Thursday, Mickaëlle Paty, Mr. Paty’s sister, praised the federal government’s swift response to the incident at Lycée Maurice-Ravel. However Ms. Paty, who needs the federal government to be held liable for failing to guard her brother, mentioned there was nonetheless a “lack of expertise” of the threats confronted by lecturers.

A French Senate report revealed this month discovered there was a worrying rise of insults, threats and bodily violence towards lecturers over the previous few years, and it urged the federal government to extend safety and colleges and to make it simpler for employees to flag worrying incidents to the Schooling Ministry.

A lone digicam crew was nonetheless lingering in entrance of the varsity on Thursday, however the environment was calm. A number of college students mentioned that they’d not witnessed the incident themselves, however had been stunned by the nationwide consideration it had acquired and the rumors it had spawned.

“The foundations are the foundations, all of us signed them in the beginning of the yr: it says the top scarf is banned inside the varsity,” mentioned Yacine Kone, 16. However, she added, the principal “shouldn’t put his hand on a scholar, even when it’s simply to the touch her.”

Ralph Modisa, 15, mentioned the principal had a superb popularity with college students. “Individuals are getting a bit too fired up over nothing,” he added.

Ségolène Le Stradic contributed reporting.