The text of this slim manifesto was finalised exactly five days before Charb, aka Stéphane Charbonnier, editor in chief of Charlie Hebdo, was gunned down along with 11 colleagues by a terrorist group in the Paris offices of the satirical magazine. What was meant to be an assertion of the magazine's editorial philosophy thus became a poignant defence of a position that led to death.

The free speech argument was split down the middle after the terror attack, with accusations of Islamophobia being levelled at the Charlie Hebdo, and associated implications of "asking for it". In this little book Charb explains the difference, from his point of view, between being anti-Islam and anti-Muslim.

His argument is that the antipathy towards Muslims in France and elsewhere in Europe is a form of racism rather than of religious hatred. And that, therefore, it is the people who follow Islam, rather than Islam itself, who are victims of bigotry. Against this backdrop, he asks:

"If the legal system is able to distinguish between Muslims and terrorists who claim to follow Islam, why are the majority of anti-Islamophobes unable to do likewise?" 

Published in French in 2015. English translation published in 2016.