Manifesto called for passages of Koran to be removed amid rising anti-Semitism

Open letter said verses calling for 'murder and punishment of Jews, Christians and disbelievers' should be deleted on the grounds that they are 'obsolete'

It has sparked anger among Muslim leaders who say it subjects French Islam 'to an unbelievable and unfair trial'

A French manifesto calling for passages of the Koran to be deleted on the grounds of rising anti-Semitism has sparked outrage among Muslims amid claims their religion was being unfairly 'put on trial'.

An open letter published in the French media blamed 'Islamist radicalisation' for a 'quiet ethnic purging' in the Paris region, with abuse forcing Jewish families to move out.

ADVERTISEMENT

The manifesto, whose signatories included ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy and former PM Manuel Valls, called for verses of the Koran calling for the 'murder and punishment of Jews, Christians and disbelievers' to be removed on the grounds that they are 'obsolete'.

But Muslim leaders say the nearly 300 signatories were blaming a whole religion for the actions of an extremist minority.

A French manifesto calling for passages of the Koran to be removed on the grounds of rising anti-Semitism has sparked outrage among Muslims amid claims their religion was being unfairly 'put on trial' (file picture)

The manifesto, whose signatories included ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy (pictured) and former PM Manuel Valls, calls for verses of the Koran calling for the 'murder and punishment of Jews, Christians and disbelievers' to be removed on the grounds that they are 'obsolete'

Days after the manifesto was released, 30 imams signed a counter-letter in French newspaper Le Monde while the Observatory for Islamophobia called its contents 'hateful racism'.

After a series of high-profile attacks on Jews, Muslim leaders contacted by AFP acknowledged that anti-Semitism was a problem in France.

Click here to resize this module

But Dalil Boubakeur, rector of the Grand Mosque of Paris, said the manifesto 'subjected French Muslims and French Islam to an unbelievable and unfair trial'.

'It creates a clear risk of pitching religious communities against one another,' he said in a statement.

Ahmet Ogras, head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith umbrella group, said: 'The only thing we can agree on is that we must all unite against anti-Semitism.'

Jewish pensioner Mireille Knoll (pictured) was stabbed 11 times in Paris before her body was set on fire, in a crime treated as anti-Semitic

Tareq Oubrou, imam of the Grand Mosque of the southern city of the Bordeaux, pointed out that Islam was not the only religion whose ancient holy texts contain anachronistic passages.

'Any number of holy texts are violent, even the Gospel,' Oubrou said, adding that the signatories, who also included celebrities like actor Gerard Depardieu, had misinterpreted the Koran.

He called the characterisation of the Koran 'nearly blasphemous', according to The Atlantic.

The writer Pascal Bruckner, among those who signed the letter, told France Inter radio it had not been intended 'to stigmatise but to spur on the goodwill of reformist Muslims'.

The letter, published in the Parisien newspaper on April 22, said that since 2006, '11 Jews have been assassinated - and some tortured - by radical Islamists because they were Jewish'.

The latest attack rocked France in March when two perpetrators stabbed 85-year-old Jewish woman Mireille Knoll 11 times before setting her body on fire, in a crime treated as anti-Semitic.

Officially, the number of anti-Semitic crimes fell in France in 2017 for a third year running, according to the interior ministry, down seven percent.

But Jews are the target of about a third of France's recorded hate crimes despite making up only about 0.7 per cent of the population.

ADVERTISEMENT

The half-a-million-plus Jewish community is the largest in Europe but has been hit by a wave of emigration to Israel in the past two decades, partly due to anti-Semitism in immigrant neighbourhoods.