In this article, we study the Faraday effect in a binary composite consisting of a dielectric matrix with metallic inclusions. We first use the replica trick together with a variational method in order to compute the effective permittivity tensor (in the quasi-static limit) of this composite in a static magnetic field. In order to find the scaling exponents near the percolation threshold pc, we use a high contrast or low frequency expansion combined with scaling. The results of the two methods are in agreement and predict that near pc (and below, that is, in the dielectric region), the Faraday effect is greatly enhanced.