Hollande worried about support in France for terror

French President François Hollande expressed “deep concern” about the support in his country for Islamic terrorism.

By JOSEPH STRICH
FRENCH PRESIDENT François Hollande 370 (photo credit: REUTERS)
FRENCH PRESIDENT François Hollande 370
(photo credit: REUTERS)
French President François Hollande on Tuesday expressed “deep concern” about the support in his country for Islamic terrorism.
“Of course, one should really be concerned about what is said within families. This acceptance of terrorism is very worrying,” the French president said, at a press conference in Paris attended by 400 correspondents – something he hopes to hold every six months.
Hollande responded to a question in a way that echoed the words of Interior Minister Manuel Valls, who accused the right wing on Tuesday of being responsible for the wave of terrorism in France. “The return of terror it’s you, your fault,” Hollande said, referring to the rightwing opposition in parliament.
Hollande was talking about the latest development in the Merah affair, which involves Souad Merah, the 34-year-old Salafist sister of Mohamed Merah, the Muslim Franco- Algerian man who killed seven people last March, including four Jews, in the southwest city of Toulouse.
In a conversation filmed by M6, a French broadcaster, Souad said she was “proud” of her brother for murdering the Toulouse Jews, and of how “he fought till the end,” until police killed him The video of Souad was filmed with a hidden camera while she was speaking to another brother, Abdelghani Merah, AFP reported.
“The Jews are all about massacring the Muslims. I detest them,” she said. “I think well of [Osama] bin Laden.
“I said that to the cops: I am proud of my brother – proud, proud, proud,” Souad Merah said.
In a book that went on sale in bookstores on Wednesday, Abdelghani Merah wrote that both Souad and Mohamed “hated the infidels and particularly the Jews, without distinction.
“My young brother was certainly a Salafist, but before he turned into one he grew up in this detestable atmosphere that accommodates anti-Semitism,” he wrote, according to a report in French newsweekly Le Point.
The Merahs grew up with a “cultural anti-Semitism” and “despised Jews,” Abdelghani wrote.
The interior minister said Souad’s words constituted an “apology for terrorism and anti- Semitism, and a provocation to religious and racial hatred.”
Meanwhile, the popularity of Hollande, the socialist president elected six months ago, is plummeting, with almost 60 percent of the French dissatisfied with him.
Additionally, according to a poll by the IFOP institute published last weekend by the weekly Le Journal du Dimanche, 75% of French citizens think “there are too many Muslims in France.”