I work on a non-profit site, which has LOTS of plugin. Last night, I switched the host from PHP 5.6 to PHP 7.0. I had to revert to 5.6 because when trying to access the site, either admin or public, I -immediately- get

ParseError thrown
syntax error, unexpected ‘<‘, expecting end of file

OK: I understand that 5.6 is more forgiving. I’m a bit upset that there was no “… in file XYZ.php” in that less-than-helpful notice.

But I hoping that that there’s a clue in the immediacy of the message. It’s instant. No login window; no WP logo. Just the message. I’d think that means there are only a few places to look, and I’m hoping someone here can make a suggestion.

Here’s the htaccess:

# BEGIN WordPress
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]
</IfModule>

# END WordPress

# Wordfence WAF
<Files ".user.ini">
<IfModule mod_authz_core.c>
	Require all denied
</IfModule>
<IfModule !mod_authz_core.c>
	Order deny,allow
	Deny from all
</IfModule>
</Files>

# END Wordfence WAF

and here is the WAF file:

<?php
// Before removing this file, please verify the PHP ini setting <code>auto_prepend_file</code> does not point to this.

if (file_exists('/home/cpaorg/photography.org/wp-content/plugins/wordfence/waf/bootstrap.php')) {
	define("WFWAF_LOG_PATH", '/home/cpaorg/photography.org/wp-content/wflogs/');
	include_once '/home/cpaorg/photography.org/wp-content/plugins/wordfence/waf/bootstrap.php';
}
?>

I’d like to move up to PHP 7, and I anyone can help with this, I’d greatly appreciate it.

thank you.