French Government Moves to Shut Down Salafist Website Promoting Extremism

Created in 2012, the site "La voie droite" is in the sights of the Minister of the Interior. "It’s a form of publishing house on the Internet" with "Salafist content that clearly calls for hatred, that calls for jihad," Gérald Darmanin said on the M6 channel’s Zone interdite program, after a documentary on the "danger of radical Islam." "Under the law strengthening respect for the principles of the Republic," he announced that he had initiated the adversarial procedure prior to the closure of the site. "We have managed to take measures that mean that in a few hours, in a few days, we will be able to have this site closed and penalize the people who continue to keep it alive," the minister added.

"La voie droite" makes available to Internet users conferences, audio courses, sermons and religious opinions (fatwas). Among the preachers, the former imam of Pantin, Ibrahim Abou Talha, removed after the assassination of teacher Samuel Paty in October 2020. The authorities had closed for six months the mosque of this Parisian suburb town, blaming him for having relayed on his Facebook page a video from the student’s father who had accused the history-geography teacher of "discrimination" against his Muslim students for having shown them caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad during a lesson.