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Rabat – An AFP dispatched claiming French far-right leader, Marine Le Pen, is a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad, has made the headlines in France and worldwide.
The dispatch circulated widely but was quickly retracted, as the AFP claimed it was a draft that had been “published by mistake.”
Still, Jean-Louis Beaucarnot, the French genealogy expert cited in the dispatch, continued to uphold the veracity of his claim in interviews with French media outlets..
“I confirm everything I say in the dispatch,” he told the French daily Le Parisien. He explained that Le Pen is a descendent of the Prophet through her mother’s ancestry.
While her mother is from a family from Aveyron, in south-west France, Beaucarnot said that a woman in this family, Anne de Roquefeuil, is a descendant of King Louis VI, whose ancestors were kings of England and Spain. The genealogist went on to explain that one of these Spanish ancestors married a woman from the Omayyad caliphate during the Muslim rule of Spain.
“Among the ancestors of this woman, there are many Syrian caliphs who are descendants of the Prophet Muhammad,” he stated in interview with the magazine Marianne.
Despite the seriousness of Beaucarnot’s claim, French social media users found it quite funny, pointing to the irony that the presidential candidate, known for her anti-Muslim political platforms, might be a descendant of the prophet of Islam.
A picture posted on Twitters shows Le Pen wearing a headscarf while her name changed to “Fatimarine”.
