“They apparently launched a fatwa against the teacher,” minister Gerald Darmanin told Europe 1 radio of the two men, who are among 11 people being held over the attack by a young Chechen man.
Samuel Paty was murdered on his way home from the school where he taught in a suburb northwest of Paris on Friday afternoon.
A photo of the teacher and a message confessing to his murder was found on the mobile phone of his killer, 18-year-old Chechen Abdullakh Anzorov, who was shot dead by police.
Witnesses said the suspect was spotted at the school on Friday asking pupils where he could find Paty.
French police raid homes of ‘dozens’ of Islamist militants
French police on Monday raided the homes of “dozens” of Islamist militants three days after the beheading of a teacher who showed his pupils cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, the interior minister said.
Gerald Darmanin said over 80 investigations had been launched for online hate speech following the killing of the teacher, who had been the target of vitriolic attacks on the internet.
France rallies after beheading of teacher
Tens of thousands of people rallied in Paris and cities across France on Sunday in solidarity with a teacher beheaded for showing pupils cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.
Demonstrators on the Place de la Republique held aloft posters declaring: “No to totalitarianism of thought” and “I am a teacher” in memory of murdered colleague Samuel Paty.
“You do not scare us. We are not afraid. You will not divide us. We are France!” tweeted Prime Minister Jean Castex, who joined the Paris demonstration.
Castex was accompanied by Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer, Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo and junior interior minister Marlene Schiappa who said she was there “in support of teachers, of secularism, of freedom of expression”. Politicians from the other major parties also attended.
The Charlie Hebdo attack in 2015 unleashed a wave of Islamist violence and forced France into a national discussion about Islam’s place in a secular society.
After the massacre at the magazine, some 1.5 million people gathered on the same Place de la Republique in support of freedom of expression.
Local authorities said around 12,000 people rallied in Lyon in eastern France.
