France introduces bill to tackle Islamist extremism

French Prime Minister Jean Castex on Wednesday presented the proposed legislation titled “Supporting Republican Principles” to the Cabinet. Castex said the bill does not target people of a particular region but “the nefarious ideology of radical Islamism.” France has faced multiple extremist attacks, including the October beheading of a school teacher who showed caricatures of Mohammad, the founder of Islam, to his students. The National Assembly will debate the bill in January.

What does the draft law stipulate? It requires mosques to register as places of worship and mandates school attendance from the age of three to curb fundamentalist home schools. The bill orders authorities not to issue residency papers to polygamous applicants and could fine or jail doctors who perform virginity tests on girls. It will also ask foreign mosque funders to declare donations of more than $12,000. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has called the bill an "open provocation.”

Dig deeper: From the WORLD archives, read Nick Eicher’s interview with John Stonestreet on the Christian response to the 2015 France attacks.