Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin asked prefects that
“all places of Muslim worship”
in France be protected
“statically by the police”
during Ramadan, which is due to begin on Sunday or Monday.
In a note sent Wednesday and consulted by AFP, Gérald Darmanin calls for
“a reinforced presence of security forces at the arrival and departure times of the faithful during gatherings and services”
, with an emphasis on
“the most important places and buildings more sensitive and emblematic (...) in coordination with the forces of Operation Sentinel
.
“High level of terrorist threat”
He also called for paying particular attention to the celebrations of the night of destiny, around April 5, and the Eid el-Fitr festival, which marks the end of Ramadan, on April 9 or 10.
The Minister of the Interior recalled
“the high level of the
terrorist threat
which continues to weigh on our country, as well as the persistence of tensions at the international level in particular in the context of the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict
(which) require the maintenance of “extreme vigilance, particularly with regard to demonstrations and places of a religious nature”
.
After five months of war and a few days before Ramadan, Egyptian, American and Qatari mediators have been trying since Tuesday in Cairo to reach a truce in the Gaza Strip between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas.