In the heart of the Chevreuse valley in the Yvelines department, the commune of Magny-les-Hameaux is troubled by a murky incident. On December 8, a young father fled his home with his wife and children because, as he says, he had simply “asked questions” about the construction of a mosque in a residential area. Against the backdrop of the opaque communication of the left-wing mayor and accusations of “racism” and “Islamophobia”, the violent reactions on social networks even included death threats. “Our flyer only asked questions because the topic was not transparent. The mayor did this behind the backs of all the residents,” says Pierre-Louis Brière, who has still not returned to the municipality three weeks after his departure and in view of the poisoned climate.
It all began in November, when the city council acquired a plot of land from the agglomeration of Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines that was intended for use by the Association of Muslims of Magny-les-Hameaux (A2MH). The aim is to build a place in the community of 10,000 people where “Arabic can be learnt and the Muslim religion can be practised”, as the association writes on its website. The Muslim community currently has to resort to the nearby mosques in Trappes or La Verrière. During the month of Ramadan, tents are set up on a piece of land borrowed from the community.
The opposition was never consulted about the project. Now the construction of a place of worship in this residential neighbourhood is not to the satisfaction of all the inhabitants of Magnycois. The site, located at 24 Rue André-Hodebourg, is adjacent to a school, the “Cap Ados” youth orientation centre and a playground. “It’s very complicated to drive all the way to the school,” confided a mother who is a member of the “Magny tranquille” (Quiet Magny) association. This association, the first, launched a petition in mid-November, citing urban planning problems. “This plot of land, which is now a public green space, is located in a quiet pavilion neighbourhood whose street is a dead end, already largely occupied by the parking of residents’ vehicles and by through traffic – mainly children – on bikes, scooters or on foot,” reads the appeal for signatures.
An outcry on the social networks. Almost 200 comments pour in under the committee’s post, most of them outraged. “You can shit (sic), we will oust you”, “We North Africans and blacks are the ones who have the power”, “I would have read anything with this degenerate committee”, etc. Profiles with sometimes worrying content, such as a profile with a photo of two men holding the heads of decapitated mannequins with the caption “Daesh on holiday”. The particularly vehement post by a resident of Magny, who labelled the members of the citizens’ collective as “racists” and “Islamophobic paranoids” and spoke of a “friendship of cheerful Nazis” with “sympathetic Aryan features”, was republished … by the mayor’s first deputy.
In the WhatsApp group where the committee members meet, Pierre-Louis receives new requests for further posts every day. It is difficult for the administrator to keep control of the hundreds of participants with unknown identities.
Too late. Supporters of the mosque who had sneaked into the members’ group took screenshots of the messages. Pierre-Louis Brière, founder of the committee, sees his name spread along with the terms “racist”, “Islamophobe” and his number. The critics accuse in particular a “false information” on the flyer, on which a sentence from the A2MH website is quoted: “Today we are 200 families, tomorrow we will be 100,000 thanks to your help”. When Pierre-Louis visits the website again, he finds that the sentence has been changed. To prove his credibility, he publishes the screenshots. Le Figaro
