France Bars Four Islamists From Entry

The French have decided that they have more than enough trouble makers already.

France barred four Islamic preachers from entering the country on Thursday after banning prominent preacher Sheikh Youssef al-Qaradawi and another Egyptian cleric who wanted to attend a Muslim conference in Paris.

Foreign Minister Alain Juppe and Interior Minister Claude Gueant said in a joint statement the four preachers "call for hate and violence ... and, in the current context, present a strong risk of upsetting public order".

President Nicolas Sarkozy, who ordered a crackdown on radical Islamists after the Toulouse killings by an al Qaeda-inspired gunman last week, said on Monday that Qaradawi and Mahmoud al-Masri were not welcome in France.

The Union of French Islamic Organisations (UOIF), which invited the clerics to an April 6-9 conference, said it was surprised and hurt by the government's "manifest determination to prolong a polemic ... based on total ignorance".

I've got an idea. If they want to have a convention of radical Islamists, why not hold it in Egypt or Syria or some other paradise. And then keep them there.