François Fillon is the anti-Islamist candidate – and an Islamist target

The news on Tuesday that French security services have prevented another attack by Islamic extremists should come as no surprise given the proximity of the election. Nor should the fact that according to police sources the intended target was François Fillon. When police raided the apartments in Marseille of the two suspects, they reportedly discovered a submachine gun, two handguns, three kilograms of TATP explosives, which was used in the 2015 suicide attacks in Paris, and a newspaper photograph of Fillon.

The Islamists loathe the conservative candidate, more than they do Marine Le Pen, despite the fact that she leads the National Front, a long-time foe of conservative Islam. When she launched her presidential campaign at the beginning of February, Le Pen told delegates in her address that Islamic fundamentalism was the ‘enemy of France’, and she promised that ‘the places of Islamic preaching will be closed and the propagators of hate will be condemned and expelled.’

Fillon, who has made much of his Catholicism during his campaigning, has vowed to do something similar if elected, but unlike Pen, he recognises that the rise of what he calls Islamic totalitarianism is a menace that needs to be confronted globally and not just in France.