Anti-Islam sentiment in France following the Paris attacks on November 13 in which 129 people were killed and hundreds injured has led to a huge boost in the popularity of Marine Le Pen's Front National party.

Although Marine Le Pen leads the party and is enjoying enormous backing, attention has fallen on her niece, Marion Marechal Le Pen, granddaughter of the politician Jean-Marie Le Pen, who founded the party.

A poll conducted just after the Paris attacks puts Marion Marechal Le Pen well in the lead to win the presidency of the southern Provence-Alpes-Cote-d'Azur region (PACA) in December's regional elections.

Jean-Yves Camus, associate researcher at the French Institute for International and Strategic Affairs told France 24 her anti-immigrant and anti-Islam message resonates with the public in urban areas such as Nice "which is a big transit point for refugees entering France through Italy."

The Front National has long campaigned for the reintroduction of border controls, stripping known jihadists of dual nationality and for the closure of mosques where imams advocate radical forms of Islam.

"It is essential that France control its borders, definitely." Marine Le Pen @MLP_officiel https://t.co/y0cJfkxdQG — Daniel Scavino Jr. (@DanScavino) November 16, 2015​

Marine Set for Presidency Challenge

Meanwhile, her aunt, Marine Le Pen is set to take her seat in the depressed Nord-Pas-de-Calais region, setting her on course to challenge for the presidency of France in 2017. She has seen a huge rise in the popularity of her anti-Europe, anti-immigration Front National party, spurred on by the deep unpopularity of Hollande and the continuing migrant and refugee crisis in Europe.

© AFP 2020 / PHILIPPE HUGUEN French policemen patrol on November 5, 2015 in the "Jungle" migrants camp in Calais

Marine has carefully pulled her party slightly towards the center from its ultra-far right position under her father, Jean-Marie, when he led it. He courted controversy through the years and was accused and convicted several times at home and abroad of xenophobia and anti-Semitism and made several provocative statements interpreted by the legal system as constituting Holocaust denial.

Eventually, in May 2015, he was suspended from the party, but he brought two legal challenges against Front National, before finally being expelled in August 2015.