A Palestinian demonstrator shouts slogans during a protest against the publications of a cartoon of Prophet Mohammad in France and French President Emmanuel Macron's comments, outside the French cultural centre in Gaza City, October 26 2020. Picture: REUTERS/MOHAMMED SALEM
Erdogan on Monday joined a chorus of voices calling for a boycott. In Kuwait city, a supermarket had stripped its shelves of L'Oreal cosmetics and skincare products after the co-operative union to which it belongs decided to stop stocking French goods. French trade minister Franck Riester said it was too early to put a figure on the impact of the boycott campaign but so far it was limited and mainly affected French agricultural exports.The row has its roots in a knife attack outside a French school on October 16 in which an 18-year-old man of Chechen origin beheaded Samuel Paty, a teacher who had shown pupils cartoons of Mohammad in a civics lesson on freedom of speech.
Qatar’s government issued a statement on Monday condemning what it described as populist rhetoric inciting the abuse of religions. “What is the problem of this person called Macron with Muslims and Islam? Macron needs treatment on a mental level,” Erdogan said in a speech on Saturday. “Our history is one of a battle against tyranny and fanatacisms. We will continue,” Macron tweeted in French, English and Arabic.