Storm Track Disinformation: We Were Wrong. It’s the French Cops Fault

Listen up IBA and especially FOX News. You are all wrong! There are no Muslim riots in France.

“The riots, as anyone who lives in France will attest, are nothing to do with jihad - and are nothing to do with religion. They are the result of a combination of an oppressive police force, a lack of hope and an appallingly easy recourse to violence.

So says today’s article at Paris Link.

We have received several e-mails from the US claiming that the riots taking place in the suburbs of France's major cities are part of an Islamic jihad. We want to take this opportunity to put the record straight. They are not. They are nothing to do with religion, and not all of the rioters are Muslim... Fox News would do well to learn. This may seem like a radical statement to the Fox News-watching public who have seen headlines like "France in Flames", but the vast majority of its immigrants are proud to be French. In fact, the vast majority of Muslims in France are very happy to live in a secular society, and the current rioting is not an Islamic jihad. All of this may make me sound like a liberal loony, but it is the truth. One e-mail I received this morning called for France and Europe to have more "cojones" in tackling the Islamic menace. The fact is that France has more experience and more "cojones" when it comes to tackling radical Islam, than any other country in Europe.

Here’s the real problem according to Paris Link.

First of all, though, it pays to understand these suburbs. France's first wave of immigration from its former colonies resulted in the housing estates that we see today. The de Gaulle government created the miserable tower blocks to the north and south of Paris, and around other major French cities that we see today. Their expectation was that the immigrants would do their job and leave. At no point did de Gaulle or his government consider that the immigrants would wish to stay in France. This in itself caused problems. The immigrants came with their families. The children of these immigrants, born on French territory, were French. They grew up between cultures - that of their family, to which the original immigrants clung on to, and that of the République, which is enforced by the state. France's political élite has never been able to truly tackle the growing problem of the suburbs. Refuting positive discrimination as a non-republican measure, they fall back on the idea that the République makes everyone equal. However, if your name is Mohammed and you are applying for a job - good luck, you're on your own. The noble aims of the République leave room for the ignoble roots of racism to take hold. The result today is that the children of the immigrants, and even their children - are NOT immigrants. They are citizens of the Republic, on a par with Dominique de Villepin and his ilk. At least, that's what the Republic says. They have French nationality, and they have no problem with secularism.

So whose fault is it?

They do have a problem with the police. France is repeatedly hauled in front of the European Commission of Human Rights for its police brutality. This is not fiction, and it is not myth - there is a minority of police officers in France who are overtly racist, and who regularly attack youths of immigrant origin. They only ask coloured youths for identity papers - never whites. Further to this, the removal by Nicolas Sarkozy of the police de proximité meant that the local police force that operated in the suburbs around France's major cities was replaced by a less welcoming CRS force, told not to repair links with these communities, but to punish them.

And of course….

Lack of jobs, lack of hope, police brutality and a desolate landscape add up to one thing: trouble. It is simplistic and wrong to say that these youths are muslims - in many cases they are not in fact Muslims, and religion does not enter into the equation. The riots are part of an on-going confrontation with police officers in which they see themselves as the oppressed opposition. They are the result of a combination of an oppressive police force, a lack of hope and an appalingly easy recourse to violence. They should be condemned and ended as soon as possible, but it is wrong and it is dangerous to say that it is anything to do with radical Islam.

So all is peachy keen with Muslims in France. They’re not any different from any other Frenchman. We were wrong. Should we admit our mistake?