France's leading Islamic body has called for imams to be licensed before being allowed to preach, a move that has prompted criticism from voices within the country's Muslim community.
An AFP news agency report on Tuesday said Anouar Kbibech, the president of the French Council for the Muslim Religion (CFCM), had called for imams to be tested on their knowledge of Islam and French values before being allowed to preach.
Kbibech said the move would ensure religious leaders promoted a tolerant version of Islam during a meeting with the Bernard Cazeneuve, French interior minister, in Paris.
The proposal comes shortly after attacks by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group on the French capital, which left 130 people dead.
All those identified as having taken part in the attack so far have either been French or Belgian nationals, a fact that increased scrutiny of Muslim communities in both countries.
Al Jazeera spoke to two prominent Muslim activists in France about whether the idea could deter French Muslims from joining ISIL and other armed groups intent on attacking the country.
Yasser Louati, spokesperson for the Collective Against Islamophobia in France, told Al Jazeera he did not see how the move would tackle the appeal ISIL has to some French Muslim youth.
"I don't see any added value in this announcement, the people who did it [Paris attacks] were not religious and were not radicalised in mosques.
"We already have a curricula in place where imams get what's called an 'ijaza' (permit) so there is nothing new to add. Who will license this? It is not for the government to interfere in the religious affairs of Muslims," Louati said.
The CFCM, though not a state body, serves as the main respresentitive of the Muslim community to the government.
Felix Marquardt, a Parisian Muslim and co-founder of the Al Kawakibi Foundation, which works towards Islamic reformation, said the move was a "normal reaction" to the attacks but questioned its effectiveness.
"To think this is product of some kind of slow radicalisation in a mosque is wrong, it's simply not the case," Marquardt said, adding that did not mean the Muslim community could distance itself from the attackers.
"They are completely hostile to the idea on any kind of reform in Islam and we have a community that is lacking in courage to confront the problem ... . There is a problem and it comes from our incapacity as Muslims to see that there is a problem," he said.
Nevertheless, Marquardt said a number of factors contributed towards the appeal of groups like ISIL to French youth.
"If you're French Muslim, there's a big chance you're going to end up without a job, either selling drugs or up to no good, and you're going to be told all day that you're not French," he said.
"Then one day, you're going to go on the internet and meet Sheikh Google, and that's going to show you the way to ISIL propoganda and they're going to tell you that you're not with the French, you're with us. ...You're going to end up blowing yourself up without ever opening the Quran."
For Louati, continued lack of opportunity coupled with severe security measures threatens to stigmatise Muslim communities further.
"The police have carried out 1,200 raids after the attacks and most of these have led to nothing...Muslims are paying the price for a failed foreign police, failed domestic police and intelligence failures. We keep repeating the same mistakes," he said.
France has the largest Muslim population in Western Europe, made up mostly of Arabs and Berbers from its former colonies in North Africa and their descendants.
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