French colonialists declared family endowments immoral for circumventing Quranic inheritance

Evidence

Consistent with this project, family habous and Quranic inheritance were declared—on behalf of Muslims—mutually exclusive; and since the raison d’être of the former was the skirting of dictates of the latter, family endowments were deemed both immoral and illegal. — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 239

Categorization

• QUESTION: The irony is striking: colonial France, a secular republic, prosecuting Muslims for failing to follow Quranic inheritance law exactly. Worth checking whether this was a rhetorical or legal argument.
• CANDY: Fun irony: French colonizers invoked Quranic orthodoxy to declare Muslim family practices illegal.