Charles De Gaulle on Muslims in France

According to Harold Macmillan's diary, Winston Churchill told his cabinet in January 1955 that

Keep England White 

would be a good slogan in the forthcoming general election. I often wondered what Charles De Gaulle's views on immigration were, knowing that he began his memoirs with the words I find very stirring

All my life I have had a certain idea of France.

I have just come across the answer, which is here.

It is very good that there are yellow French, black French, brown French. They show that France is open to all races and has a universal vocation. But [it is good] on condition that they remain a small minority. Otherwise, France would no longer be France. We are still primarily a European people of the white race, Greek and Latin culture, and the Christian religion.


Don't tell me stories! Muslims, have you gone to see them? Have you watched them with their turbans and jellabiyas? You can see that they are not French! Those who advocate integration have the brain of a hummingbird. Try to mix oil and vinegar. Shake the bottle. After a second, they will separate again. Arabs are Arabs, the French are French. Do you think the French body politic can absorb ten million Muslims, who tomorrow will be twenty million, after tomorrow forty? If we integrated, if all the Arabs and Berbers of Algeria were considered French, would you prevent them to settle in France, where the standard of living is so much higher? My village would no longer be called Colombey-The-Two-Churches but Colombey-The-Two-Mosques.

No official figures are kept in France but Pew Research estimated that in 2010 there were 4.7 million Muslims in France (7.5% of the total population) which is fewer than the ten million that De Gaulle thought could not be absorbed.