Faced with the controversy that was swelling in France, the Council of Europe finally decided to backtrack. A campaign celebrating diversity and “freedom in the hijab” was withdrawn by the organization on Tuesday.
Launched on October 28 by the Council’s Program for Inclusion and the Fight against Discrimination and co-financed by the European Union, this campaign featured portraits of several young women, veiled in only one half of the image. A message in English stated in particular: “beauty is in diversity as freedom is in hijab” (“beauty is in diversity as freedom is in the hijab”).
Zemmour, Le Pen and Dupont-Aignan shoot red balls
Going unnoticed at first, it ended up triggering a lively controversy. “Islam is the enemy of freedom. This campaign is the enemy of truth ”, tweeted polemicist Eric Zemmour, denouncing an“ advertising jihad ”. “This European communication in favor of the Islamist veil is scandalous and indecent while millions of women fight courageously against this enslavement”, launched for her part Marine Le Pen. “This is not a propaganda campaign of the Muslim Brotherhood but of the Council of Europe”, for his part quipped the deputy Nicolas Dupont-Aignan.
On the right, Valérie Pécresse also expressed her “amazement”, believing that the veil was “not a symbol of freedom but of submission”. The mayor of Nice Eric Ciotti denounced him a “promotion of the Islamic veil” and a “negation of our Judeo-Christian roots, of our civilization, of the spirit of the Enlightenment”. As for the leader of LR senators, Bruno Retailleau, he estimated that the Council of Europe “now openly promotes submission to Islamist mores”.
“Disapproval” in the government
The campaign also caused a reaction on the left, the former Minister of Women’s Rights, Socialist Senator Laurence Rossignol, estimating that “to say that freedom is in the hijab” amounted to “to promote it”. The former Prime Minister, Manuel Valls, considered it “shocking, bewildering and dangerous”. Within the government, the Secretary of State in charge of Youth Sarah El Haïry indicated on LCI that France had “expressed its extremely strong disapproval, hence the withdrawal of this campaign”.
“These tweets have been withdrawn and we are going to think about a better presentation of this project”, confirmed the Council of Europe. They “were part of a joint project” by the Council and the European Union “against discrimination, the objective of which was to raise awareness of the need to respect diversity and inclusion and to combat all types of hate speech. “. The tweets “reflected the statements made individually by participants in one of the workshops of the project and do not represent the position of the Council of Europe or its Secretary General” Marija Pejčinović Burić, further assured the organization.