“They are likely to be restricted more to their home. They will see access to services, goods and perhaps even the assistance that they might want to reach out to taken away from them,” he added.

According">According to Dalhuisen, “There's obviously a risk of a double punishment - they are punished in the home and then they go out in the street and they are punished again."

Discrimination

Ibrahim Hooper says that the security argument is not valid - that there are plenty of circumstances where Muslim women are identified in private by removing their veils and then replacing them in public.

“Female officers can see the face. There's all kinds of ways to deal with that situation,” Hooper said.

“Muslim women in face veils regularly get on airlines, and you don't have tougher security than airline security,” the AIR">CAIR spokesman said. “That's just one of those arguments that is thrown out there, and it really has nothing to do with the real issue and the real issue is the targeting of Islam in Europe."

Public Opinion

If the ban becomes law, violators face a $190 fine. Men who force women to wear the full veils face an $18,000 fine and a year in jail. The French law goes to the Senate in September where it is also expected to pass.

A

new poll

by the Pew Research Center shows that more than 82 percent of the French public approves of the ban. Majorities in Germany (71 percent), Britain (62 percent) and Spain (59 percent) said they would support banning the full-face veils in their own countries. By contrast, in the same poll, a majority of Americans said they would not approve a similar law.