France Expelled 40 Radical Muslim Preachers Over Three-Year Crackdown

07.02.2015 | Surge Wire |

France has deported 40 foreign imams over the past three years, the government announced just days after a deadly terror attack at an American-owned factory near Lyon.

Ten of the clerics were expelled after the Charlie Hebdo attack in January, Christian news site Aleteia reports. Gunmen stormed the offices of the French humor magazine in retaliation for the magazine printing Mohammed cartoons.

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve vowed to deport any foreign clerics preaching hatred. Authorities are investigating some mosques, and if found to be inciting terrorism, they will be closed, according to Cazeneuve. (RELATED: Charlie Hebdo’s Editor Doesn’t Want To Be Your Free Speech Hero)

“We cannot lose this war because it’s fundamentally a war of civilization,” French Prime Minister Manuel Valls told French television. “It’s our society, our civilization that we are defending.”

Yassin Salhi, 35, admitted to decapitating his boss at the factory. After pinning the severed head to a fence with two Islamic State flags, Salhi took a selfie with it and sent the picture to a contact, Agence France Presse reported.

It is unclear if Salhi was radicalized in a French mosque. He had been known to French officials since 2006 for ties with radical Islamists inside the country. (RELATED: ISIS Attackers Decapitate, Attempt Massive Explosion At US Factory In France)

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