Shafaqna English– When a veiled woman in France has an 80% lower chance of landing a job interview, when Muslim schools face disproportionate scrutiny, and when a man can be murdered in his mosque, nowhere is truly safe for Muslims in France.
Late last month, the news broke: Aboubakar Cisse, a young Black Muslim man of Malian descent, had been killed inside a Mosque in southern France. Initially described in the media as a personal dispute, that narrative quickly fell apart as a local prosecutor announced the case was being investigated as “an act with Islamophobic connotations”.
Cisse wasn’t just killed; he was targeted in a sacred space. After cleaning the Mosque for Friday Prayers, surveillance footage showed him teaching another man how to pray. As Cisse prostrated himself in prayer, the other man pretended to follow along before pulling out a knife, stabbing him 57 times and shouting vile Islamophobic slurs.
The emotional wreckage this has caused is immense. Since the footage surfaced, each detail has deepened the Muslim community’s collective grief and ignited a seething anger.
Source: Middle East Eye