As part of an 80-point plan to fight terrorism, France is setting up about a dozen "reinsertion and citizenship centers" around the country to reeducate young Muslims whom the government believes have been radicalized.
"Radicalization and terrorism are linked," said French Prime Minister Manuel Valls of the project. "We are faced with a stubborn phenomenon that has widely spread through society and which threatens it because it could expand massively." As many as 11,000 "potentially radicalized" residents of France, including about 2,000 French nationals, may be housed in the centers for 10-month stints, during which they will be closely monitored and subject to "deprogramming" by psychologists and teachers.
Critics of the plan, which will round up people who have not been convicted of any crime, warn that it sounds Orwellian at best and could well backfire by providing an easy way for would-be ISIS fighters to connect. The centers could unintentionally function as "jihadist academies," warned political scientist Asiem el Difraoui, noting that it would take just "one leader in there to take over the group" and use the 10-month confinement for radicalization.
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