A recent broadcast of Zone Interdite, a program devoted to Islamism across France, has sparked fury after it showed a classroom at a private school in Marseille in which girls are seated separately from boys and must wear the hijab.
The report, broadcasted on French television channel M6, revealed that the school has been open for nine years and currently has 143 registered students with no less than a dozen teachers.
The images — taken with a hidden camera — show a check by the Academic Inspectorate, during which the inspectors discover that girls as young as six are being veiled and separated from the boys during a preparatory (CP) class.
Questioned by the inspectors, a teacher explains that children must learn to live without contact with the opposite sex from an early age, revealing to the inspectors that it is a necessary act to respect religious codes. This separation continues even into the playground where little girls and boys are not allowed to come into contact and their recreational areas are separated by a wall.
Critics have claimed the undercover footage is proof of the continuous Islamic radicalization of Marseille. Gilbert Collard, a French MEP and honorary president and spokesperson for Reconquête, tweeted: “Veiled girls, separated boys, they learn to live without going to see the opposite gender: look, this is communitarianism from an early age, it happens in France and it’s unbearable!”
