Muslim Nurses Dismissed from French Hospitals over Headscarves, Sparking Outcry
A number of Muslim women working in French hospitals have been arbitrarily dismissed due to wearing hijab, which their superiors considered a religious symbol. This decision has been met with rejection and disapproval from French politicians and organizations, such as the French Council of Muslim Faith.
Commenting on these anti-Islam actions, Mathilde Panot, president of the “France Unbowed” parliamentary group in the French National Assembly (the first chamber of parliament), attacked the silence of President Emmanuel Macron regarding these developments concerning the Muslim community.
Mathilde Panot said in a video attached to a tweet on her “X” platform account (formerly Twitter): “A new scandal at the level of Parisian hospitals. In Macron’s France, we have witnessed three assassinations that fall within the framework of anti-Islamism during this year, which is nearing its end, affecting Djamel Ben Djaballah, Hiseam Merawi, and Abu Bakr Cissé.”
The leader of Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s party added: “We also knew an interior minister named Bruno Retailleau, and despite being a minister of religions, he used to shout and say: Down with the veil in front of thousands of people. We also know that there were two opinion polls requested by Ikram Doufay, which described all Muslims as terrorists, and a Fouquier investigation, and draft laws proposing to ban the veil for minors, as well as attempts to prevent children from fasting during Ramadan and verifying that in school cafeterias…”
The parliamentarian continues, enumerating scandals targeting the Muslim community in France: “…In addition, there is a new scandal at the level of some French hospitals, which was revealed last November, where a nurse named Magdouline, who had been working in a Parisian hospital for seven years, was dismissed for wearing a head covering, even though many of her colleagues wear this covering and it does not indicate any religious symbol at all. She was dismissed for a flimsy reason related to the principle of secularism…”
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The MP for France Unbowed confirms that this dismissal was not limited to Parisian hospitals, but extended to hospitals in Marseille, Lyon, and Rennes, for trivial reasons. This is happening at a time when French hospitals are suffering from a shortage of 15,000 nurses, noting that these decisions contradict the principle of secularism, which is supposed to imply freedom of religion and not target Muslims in France, which must stop immediately, according to Mathilde Panot, who spoke about a third of Muslims in France being subjected to an act falling within the framework of anti-Islamism during the current year.
In the same context, the French Council of Muslim Culture (CFCM) stated that it had learned of a large number of Muslim women who had been harassed in their work in French hospitals due to wearing a head covering, which the authorities of those institutions arbitrarily considered a religious symbol. The Council considered this to be “disproportionate and unjustified errors” and said that these “decisions will have serious consequences.”
In a statement published on its “X” platform account, the Council criticized the ambiguity of some French laws related to this issue, which opens the door to professional errors, which “leads to inconsistent, unfair, preposterous, and incomprehensible decisions,” given that this attire is common among workers in all hospitals worldwide.
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The Council indicated in its statement that what is happening is an “unacceptable deviation from the principle of secularism,” especially since there are nurses who wear the same covering and have not been subjected to harassment or dismissal, which places the decisions taken by some French hospitals in this regard within the actions classified as anti-Islam.
Accordingly, the Council called for a “transparent administrative inquiry and a diverse set of accurate data, including the number of people affected by these decisions,” in addition to the nature of the elements requested each time to justify the serious measures against those affected by these decisions.
Source: echoroukonline.com
