France reacts to 'shockwave of riots'(Paris/France burns Live Thread Night #12)

Times of London ^ | 11/07/05 | Simon Freeman, Charles Bremner

[Dane]

French police made 395 arrests last night as riots intensified for the 11th consecutive night, with violence and fire engulfing towns from the North to the Mediterranean.

In the impoverished suburbs and satellite towns around Paris, where the unrest began on October 27, churches, schools and warehouses were set alight. At least 1,408 vehicles were destroyed, many more than on previous nights, and the random attacks have spread into the heart of the city.

In Grigny, south of the capital, a gang of around 200 youths are reported to have lured police into a housing estate before opening fire with hunting rifles. At least 30 officers were injured, two seriously with lead pellets in the legs and neck.

Riots broke out in beacons of disaffection across the country from Lille, on the border with Belgium, to Montpellier on the Mediterranean coast. In Toulouse, police used tear gas to disperse a mob. Cars were set alight on the streets of Nantes, Orleans, Rennes and Rouen, and youths in St Etienne forced passengers off a bus before burning it. Churches were set ablaze in northern Lens and southern Sete.

SNIP

In Strasbourg, youths stole a car and rammed it into a housing project, setting the vehicle and the building on fire. "We’ll stop when Sarkozy steps down," the defiant 17-year-old driver told an Associated Press reporter.

Police are calling for a night-time curfew in affected areas and some senior officers have demanded that troops are brought on to the streets.

Michel Gaudin, France's most senior police officer, said today: "We are witnessing a sort of shock wave that is spreading across the country."

[hershey]

Sarkozy told the truth. God forbid anyone do that!

[proud_yank]

Fair enough and maybe I went overboard. However I do not, nor have I ever viewed the French as an ally. They will be the first people to stab you in the back, they are a country quick to aid your enemies, and they opened the door to this problem by appeasing it. Needless to say, the thought of any Americans dying to save them again does not make me very happy.

[hershey]

God, the two of them...Chirac and Dominique de Villepin. They make me sick. France hasn't got a clue.

[SauronOfMordor]

And they are telling the truth, both of them. That's why they're doing it. Mohammed really can't get a job in France. His parents so named him, and thereby doomed him to unemployment. He is French, but EXCLUDED.

If somebody started a company in one of the "estates" areas, and hired the mohammeds, and fired the ones that didn't work out, what labor inspector would dare to show up in a no-go area to make an issue of it?

France seems to have a labor system designed to keep the native French at fairly close to full employment, by the means of having the immigrant community absorb all the ups and downs of the business cycle

[proud_yank]

A liberal on a message board scolded me earlier since we do not appreciate the French sacrifice during the Rev. War.

I recall reading that the French did not play a very significant role during the rev. war besides training, and it took a long time for french troops to arrive. Is this true, what specific role did they play? Shortly after the rev. war, we were at odds with the French.

[pgkdan]

In France, the hotheads stop the bus, make the driver get off, then they light it on fire.

And handicapped female passengers. They lit her up too, remember?

[pgkdan]

What it is not is a civil war, or a Muslim jihad. This is a French protest, unrolling in the pattern of violent French protests of the past.

Does the Iranian President make a habit of encouraging violence from striking French farmers?

[SauronOfMordor]

I thought France was known for remarkable equality and respect for people of African descent. Isn't that why so many talented African-Americans became expatriates to live in Paris last century?

I think France can willingly absorb people of whatever color who WISH to become FRENCH. By that I mean learn the French language, absorb the French culture, and become Frenchmen

The problem with Muslims is that they want to get a French check and live in France, while remaining culturally Islamic. They are thusly rejected by the French. As they would be by Americans under the same principles

[SauronOfMordor]

But that has not happened yet. And the reason that the police do not simply massacre the rioters in the streets is so that it won't.

I think the non-Muslim French are becoming increasingly frightened of this.

I think that the longer it goes on, the more willing they will be to accept any measures the government chooses to take to put an end to it.

And, unfortunately, it may take steps that would make Rwanda look like a Chucky Cheese birthday party

[LikeLight]

Hunting rifles do not shoot "pellets". Sounds like shot guns.

Exactly.

[tobyhill]

Religion of peace. LOL
These Muslims are just now showing their true colors and Europe being the big wimps they are will give in to their "demands".

[mainepatsfan]

DeGrasse's fleet showed up at Yorktown.

[SauronOfMordor]

if just half the 15% turned on their comrades and took one out, they would lose 15% of their forces outright, half of that to casualties and half to desertion+joining enemy theoretically speaking. an army that loses 20% is no longer combat effective,

In most armies, troops in garrison in their native countries do not have their guns issued. All that's needed is to confine the Muslim troops to barracks, and only issue guns and ammo to non-Muslim troops. Sort the Muslim troops out at leisure

[Dark Skies]

I just heard John Gibson interview Lawrence Eagleburger on Fox and, when Gibson asked Eagleburger if the rioting in France might be a Ramadan offensive, Eagleburger said that thought had never occurred to him. Eagleburger went on to say if that is true, we (the west) have a big problem.

I am astonished that a former Sec. of State would be so in the dark as to potential Islamic trouble in Europe.

If he doesn't get it, I have to wonder if others in the current administration don't get it either. Perhaps some in the administration really do believe Islam is "peaceful and benevolent."

Scary thought!

[SauronOfMordor]

France has a history of strikes and marches, people in the streets, so after a while, they get accustomed to it and think it'll blow over the same way it always has.

It's different when the rioting is done by somebody who is ethnicly and culturally French. The other French can have some degree of confidence that the rioters know the rules and boundaries

It's something very different when the rioting is being done by the "other", and the French can have no confidence that the rioting will stay within "civilized" boundaries

[ez]

I hope the French DO give in to their demands so we can have a societal experiment revealing the way NOT to handle large, hostile immigrant populations.

I'm happy to have this battle on French turf.

[calebcar]

The French played a very important but very liimitted role in the revolution. Their Navy's arrival in yorktown, the war's final battle, deprived the British of hope and triggered their surrender. It is possible the British Navy
might have rescued them otherwise. The French did no heavy lifting and their help was mostly ambivalent or absent before the battle, but we do owe them a debt.

[Rushmore Rocks]

I saw the same interview and had the same thoughts you did.

I really believe FReepers are the best educated (in many areas) Americans. We have all the bases covered here on FR and are totally flummoxed when others, who should know, are not aware of the things we are.

[SauronOfMordor]

I just heard John Gibson interview Lawrence Eagleburger on Fox and, when Gibson asked Eagleburger if the rioting in France might be a Ramadan offensive, Eagleburger said that thought had never occurred to him. Eagleburger went on to say if that is true, we (the west) have a big problem.

If a former Sec State is no ignorant, we are indeed in trouble

Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever ye find them, and take them captive, and besiege them, and prepare for them each ambush...
        Surah IX:5

And slay them wherever ye find them ... Such is the reward of disbelievers.
        Surah II:191

[Dark Skies]

...when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters

And Ramadan is the MOST sacred month. I think it ends on November 13th. I wonder if all hell will break loose then.