FRANCE is preparing to kick out 231 foreigners on an extremism watchlist following the beheading of a teacher outside his school.

Police raided a series of addresses today after Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin ordered the suspected radicals to be expelled.

Samuel Paty, 47, was decapitated by a teenage refugee from Chechnya after showing cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in a lesson on free speech.

Emmanuel Macron's government is keen to show it is tough on Islamic extremism after Friday's horror in a Paris suburb sparked nationwide outrage.

A sweeping crackdown includes the order to deport 231 foreign nationals on the File of Alerts for the Prevention of Terrorist Attacks (FSPRT), which tracks radicals.

Of those, 180 are already in prison and 51 would be arrested soon, officials said.

Mr Darmanin went to Morocco last week to ask the government to accept nine of its radicalized nationals, and plans to to discuss similar deals with Algeria and Tunisia.

Meanwhile this morning the Interior Minister said police had launched 80 investigations linked to online hate.

Mr Darmanin said he was also looking into whether certain Muslim groups should be dissolved following accusations of promoting violence.

"Police operations have taken place and more will take place, concerning tens of individuals," he told Europe 1 radio.

It was not clear if any of the probes targeted the 231 suspects on the FSPRT list.

ONLINE 'FATWA'

Yesterday thousands of people marched in Paris and other cities in support of free speech with placards saying #JeSuisProf in tribute to the murdered teacher.

Teenage killer Abdoullakh Anzorov, 18, is believed to have travelled 50 miles from his home in Normandy after seeing an online campaign targeting Mr Paty.

He asked pupils to point out the teacher, then butchered him with a kitchen knife and shared images of his body online before being shot by police.

Parents had complained about the Charlie Hebdo cartoons Mr Paty showed in class and tried to have him sacked from his school in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine.

Brahim Chnina, who said his 13-year-old daughter is a pupil, posted a video on social media claiming the teacher had shown an image of the Prophet naked.

He urged other angry parents to contact him, and also called for the teacher's dismissal at a meeting with the headteacher.

Mr Chnina was accompanied to that meeting by preacher Abdelhakim Sefraoui, who is on the intelligence agency watchlist of suspected Islamists.

The dad and preacher were among 11 people arrested over the murder over the weekend.

The Interior Minister said Mr Chnina and Mr Sefraoui had "launched a fatwa" against the teacher.

Sefraoui is not among the 231 on the deportation list as he has French citizenship through marriage, reports The Times.

At least four members of Anzorov's family were also arrested. They were granted ten-year residency after claiming asylum in March.

The killer's uncle told French television: "He was a child. He was only 18.

"If he were still alive, I would have asked him: 'Why did you do that? What was going on your head?' He must have been influenced by someone."

Macron held a defence council on Sunday to discuss the response to what he condemned as "an Islamist terror attack".

Security will be beefed up at schools when classes resume on November 2 after a two-weeks holiday, the president's office said.

He is also said to considering outlawing some organisations that campaign against Islamophobia, which are claimed to use it as a cover to spread extremist views.

A national tribute will be paid to honour Mr Paty on Wednesday.

French imams have denounced the killing as "barbaric".

Hassen Chalghoumi, president of the Conference of Imams in France, said:"Samuel is a martyr of freedom.

"Barbarism has no place in schools nor elsewhere in France."

He added he had received death threats from radical Islamists after speaking out against the murder.

Friday's attack is the fifth in France this year alone.

Just last month, seven people were detained after a meat cleaver attack outside Charlie Hebdo's former offices in Paris.

Twelve people were massacred at the site in 2015 after the magazine published satirical cartoons of Muhammad.

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