A woman and a girl dressed in an abaya in France/Reuters
A school principal in France resigned after receiving death threats following an argument he had with a Muslim girl about removing her headscarf, as required by law. His resignation caused a great uproar in the country, where the Islamist threat to educational institutions has already led to the murder of two teachers in recent years.
French Prime Minister Gabriel Ettel said the country would sue the girl for lying and claiming the manager assaulted her during the argument, which led to threats against him on social media.
"I finally made the decision to resign from my position due to fear for my safety and that of this establishment," wrote the principal, whose name has not been disclosed to the public to protect him, in an email he sent last Friday to his colleagues at the "Maurice Ravel" high school in the 20th arrondissement of Paris. "I'm leaving after seven years, rich and intense, that I spent by your side, and after 45 years in public education," added the director, who thanked his colleagues for the support they showed towards him in the last three weeks.
High school in Paris, France/Reuters
The incident occurred on February 28, when the principal told three female students that they must obey the law and remove their head coverings. Two of them obeyed his order, but the third did not and a conflict developed between the parties. In the days that have passed since then, the principal has been subjected to threats on his life on social media, and these have been forwarded by the school to the Ministry of Interior's hotline.
The authorities arrested two suspects for making threats. Their identities were not revealed, but the Ministry of Education said they had no connection to the school. Following the fear of violence from extremist elements, the police began to patrol around the educational institution and the Minister of Education, Nicole Belov, visited it.
The police found no evidence that the manager attacked the girl, and the Prime Minister promised that she would be prosecuted for false allegations.
"The state will always stand by these public figures, those who are at the forefront of the fight against these vulnerabilities in secularism, in the attempts of Islamism to enter our educational institutions," said Atal, who led the ban on the wearing of the abaya - traditional Muslim clothing - in educational institutions when he served as Minister of Education last year.
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Condemnations from the right and the left
The affair was condemned by politicians from the right and the left, a few months before the European Parliament elections in which the issue of immigration will be central.
"This government is not capable of protecting our schools," Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right "National Union" party, wrote in X. Her niece, Marion Marshall, a member of a rival far-right party, said: "This is a defeat for the country, and the Islamist death continues to spread."
"This is where you end up when your policy is 'not to stir up a storm'. This is where all these small capitulations lead," said Bruno Rataio, from the center-right "Republicans" party.
"This is unacceptable. When a manager resigns because of threats to his life, it is a collective failure," said Boris Valo from the Socialist Party.
Le Pen: "This government is not able to protect our schools"
Meanwhile, several schools in Paris closed their doors yesterday after receiving bomb threats from Islamist elements, allegedly - French authorities do not rule out that these are part of a Russian disinformation campaign. Last week, about 30 other schools in the Paris region received similar threats, accompanied by a video of a beheading, a reminder of the murder of teacher Samuel Petty in a suburb of Paris in 2020.
Prime Minister Atal warned earlier this month that the Kremlin had begun a "massive operation to destabilize" France to erode its support for Ukraine.
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