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Mr. Chaoui, who had served as an imam at Quebec City’s Université Laval while studying engineering there, remained mostly under the radar until La Presse reported last week on his plans to open the Ashabeb Centre. He was prolific on Facebook and YouTube, offering his fundamentalist interpretations of everything from World Cup soccer matches (too much flesh on display) to women driving (not forbidden by the Koran and preferable to being crammed together with strangers on public transit).

He preaches that women require a guardian and that men must wear beards. In a Facebook posting last February, he wrote that democracy and Islamic law “are on two parallel lines that will never intersect.” Among his complaints about democracy was the fact that a nonbeliever or a homosexual can be elected to office.

When he announced the upcoming opening of the Ashabeb Centre and sought donations to cover renovations and rent, he described it as a place where “young people can come together to pray to Allah and study science.”

But Quebec politicians have suggested there would be something more sinister going on. Kathleen Weil, the Minister of Immigration, said Mr. Chaoui should be stopped because his writings are “dangerous” and “a deformation of our values.” After Mr. Coderre and borough mayor Réal Ménard announced that Mr. Chaoui would be denied a permit to occupy his centre, Mr. Ménard said he was motivated by security concerns. “We have information that leads us to understand that the imam is part of a network that is bigger than him,” he told Radio-Canada, declining to elaborate.