French intelligence services have reportedly identified the far-left as having been at the forefront of the violence that occurred during the riots across the country on Saturday, including Antifa and other similar radical groups.
An assessment produced by the French intel community has found that there are around 5,000 people within “radical violent groups on the fringes of the democratic and republican sphere” who are behind most of the violence seen in the recent riots. The report identified three “ideologically distinct groups”: Antifa, the most numerous; insurrectionary “anarcho-autonomists”; and anarchists, which are identified as being the oldest group.
While the report sought to differentiate between the various entities, claiming that “the ultra-left” and “the radical far left” are “not the same thing,” they still admitted that the disparate groups converged on Saturday into the mob, 20 minutes reported. Given the considerable overlap between the leftist factions, such a convergence is perhaps unsurprising.
However, the intelligence services said an “unprecedented” alliance formed between the left and groups “primarily composed of young men, young people who came in large numbers from the neighbourhoods out of opportunism, a few ‘yellow vests,’ and more politically engaged young people.”
The “neighbourhoods” mentioned appear to be a euphemism for the large-scale ethnic minority and migrant enclaves which exist in the suburbs around major cities in France. The report identified people from these areas as being the principal agents behind the looting and general mayhem, while the leftist groups were more interested in attacking law enforcement and symbols of the state.
The report said far-left political parties, such as the French Communist Party or La France Insoumise (France in Rebellion/LFI), the radical presidential party of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, did not appear to have been directly involved in any violence.
Nevertheless, the “unprecedented” alliance between the far-left and largely Islamic minority groups backs up claims from figures such as Nice Mayor Éric Ciotti, who said that terror investigations should be opened into the “Islamo-Leftist” riots, which he said were the combination of Antifa forces and ‘narco-Islamist’ migrant criminal clan groups. Mr Ciotti has called on the government to ban groups like Antifa as terrorist organisations.
Others, including a previous report from the Paris Police, have suggested that Mélenchon’s LFI has been active in manipulating and directing the youth revolt movement which has sprung up over the past month.
In participating in protests, as top LFI politicians have done over the past month, including Mélenchon and Saint-Denis Mayor Bally Bagayoko, the party gives the appearance of legitimacy and thereby provides cover for radical violent leftists and multicultural youth hoodlums to reach and enact chaos in city centres.
Commenting on the LFI’s role in the unrest, National Rally president Jordan Bardella told BFMTV: “Mr Mélenchon bears a very heavy responsibility for the insurrectional climate that prevails in our country. One wonders whether his goal is to become President of the Republic, or to spark civil war in France!”
The government has similarly blamed the Mélenchonists, with Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez telling LFI lawmakers on Tuesday: “I bear my share of responsibility as Minister of the Interior… but you also bear yours in the support you give to the far-left.”
Manuel Bompard, who served as Mélenchon’s presidential campaign director in the previous two elections and serves as the party’s nominal head, claimed that the Macron government were “manipulating” the intelligence community to shift blame to the far-left for the riots, which he asserted were merely the organic outpouring of emotion from the nation’s youth. Nuñez denied that the government influenced the intelligence community’s findings.
Police Prefect Patrice Faure said on Tuesday that 200 investigators have been tasked with identifying and arresting rioters, saying: “Social media, CCTV footage, forensic evidence collection—they are exploring every lead at their disposal.” Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau stated that 557 people have been detained and that nearly 300 have been brought before a judge.
Separately on Tuesday, counter-terror police arrested a new main suspect over the alleged arson attack which destroyed the tower of the historic Limoges City Hall on Saturday. According to local reports, the suspect, identified as 34-year-old Hodei Docampo Ciarra, is said to have been an active member of radical left environmentalist groups and had an “S-file”, meaning that he was on the government’s national security watch list before the attack.
Sensationally, liberal presidential candidate and current Mayor of Cannes, David Lisnard, claimed this week that there are communist “terrorist training camps” in the areas surrounding Limoges, where militant leftists are “training in urban guerrilla warfare” while acquiring “heavy equipment and weapons for attacks against the police”. He went on to claim that Mélenchon has made multiple “pilgrimages” to the region.
Apparently undeterred, Mr Mélenchon doubled down on Tuesday, calling on his supporters to join the demonstrations planned for Saturday, saying: “Our duty is clearly laid out. We must help them, protect them. Rebellious ones, male and female, you are all requisitioned… Our duty is to help the youth. We must open the path to political mobilization.”
