France's state schools reopen on Thursday with the challenge of imposing a ban on headscarves while a death threat hangs over two French journalists held hostage by militants in Iraq.
A national wave of solidarity for journalists Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot has made it unthinkable for any French Muslim to voice approval for the hostage-takers' demand that Paris revoke the controversial law.
Even the staunchest critics of the law, which the National Assembly passed last March despite protests from across the Muslim world, say they hope for an uneventful start to term.
"We expect it will be quiet," said Thomas Milcent, a revert to Islam known as "Doctor Abdallah", who runs a hotline to advise Muslim girls who want to keep their headscarves.
Education Minister Francois Fillon said he hoped schools would reopen "in a spirit of fraternity".
"Tomorrow, all children - black or white, Muslim, Catholic, Jewish or agnostic - will sit at the same school desks and show that the state schools are one of the great strengths of our country," he said after the weekly cabinet meeting in Paris.
A smooth reopening of school looked far less likely nine months ago when the debate was dividing France and Muslim activists organised protest marches by girls in headscarves denouncing the ban as anti-Islamic.
The ban also covers Jewish skullcaps and large Christian crosses, but officials have made clear their main aim was to outlaw the headscarf as a means to combat growing Islamist influence among a minority of France's 5 million Muslims.
Although the official French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM) initially opposed the ban, its moderate leader Dalil Boubakeur said Muslims would respect it once it became law.
The Union of French Islamic Organisations (UOIF), activist rivals to Boubakeur's Grand Mosque of Paris network, encouraged schoolgirls to challenge it by wearing bandannas.
Confusion has mounted over when the kidnappers' deadline expires. France has rejected the demands of the militant group, called the Islamic Army, to rescind the ban.
Muslim leaders have nervously rushed to make clear the militants' demand had nothing to do with their campaign.
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