French Nationalist Marine Le Pen Rises From the Ashes of Riots

France’s weekend riots — 1,000 policemen injured, 1,500 shops looted, and 2,400 protesters arrested — are expected to give a major boost to the law and order, anti-immigration candidacy of Marine Le Pen in France’s presidential election six months from now. Over the last week of protests, Mme. Le Pen’s chances of becoming France’s next president jumped eight points, to 48 percent, according to the U.S.-based prediction market, Polymarket. Before the protests turned violent, she led opinion polls with 38 percent of vote intentions, compared to 18 percent for her greatest rival, hard left politician Jean-Luc Mélenchon.Playing into Mme. Le Pen’s hands, Arab and Black young men figure disproportionately in Internet videos of store lootings and street beatings. About 10 percent of France’s population is Muslim and three percent is Black.“We are paying the price for decades of uncontrolled immigration,” Mme. Le Pen, a leader of the National Rally party, said Sunday. Reflecting France’s social and political polarization, M. Mélenchon’s party, France Unbowed won an estimated 69 percent of Muslim votes cast in the 2022 presidential election. On Saturday, M. Mélenchon marched at the head of a protest of 100,000 people in Paris, demanding more government funding for schools and reduced gasoline prices.In a tale of two protests, half a million high school students and trade union members marched in protests across France. However, in a process similar to the looting that accompanied some Black Lives Matter protests in the US in 2020, anarchists and criminals realized police were outnumbered and took that as a green light to smash and grab.Among stores looted in Paris were: Louis Vuitton, Swarovski and Hugo Boss. ‘Protesters’ broke into private homes in Paris and Marseille.“We witnessed scenes of methodical looting that have nothing to do with social demands, nothing to do with the thousands of demonstrators who marched peacefully throughout the afternoon,” deputy mayor of Paris Lamia El Aaraje, told FranceInfo yesterday. “It’s absolutely tragic.”From the Americas, conservative politicians are quick to join the law and order, anti-immigration critique.“France is burning!” President Trump posted yesterday on Truth Social. “The immigration of people from an entirely different world, people with hatred in their hearts, has shattered that once great country. Close your Borders and take control, before it is too late!” His Vice President, J.D. Vance, posted on X: “Western liberals imported the third world into France and other countries in the name of diversity and compassion. They ignored fundamental questions of assimilation and compatibility. They were told it would lead to this and they didn’t listen.”El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele, a worldwide law and order icon, said: “I’ve heard it said that France is finished, that it’s too late to save her. But France remains just as beautiful, enviable even. Her greatness hasn’t vanished; it only awaits rebirth. We overcame, in a single year, a problem a hundred times more severe, without having the resources at France’s disposal. France could manage it in a week.”The impact of France’s fires and looting may even impact Brazil, boosting the presidential candidacy of Flavio Bolsonaro, a son of a former Army officer. Yesterday, a massive pro-Bolsonaro rally took place in São Paulo, Brazil’s largest city. Polls indicate that Mr. Bolsonaro will beat socialist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in next Sunday’s presidential election. This would complete a conservative sweep in elections across Latin America.In France, the protests may lose steam as high school students start today their traditional midterm, two-week Toussaint holiday. But they will leave behind a nation smarting over attacks on sacred figures of La République.At Paris’s Place de La République, protesters graffitied and vandalized the statue of Marianne, the national symbol of liberty, equality and fraternity since the French Revolution of 1789. In Marseille, protesters broke into City Hall and knocked over a bust of Marianne.In France, city halls are respected symbols of the secular Republic. Now, undoubtedly everyone in France has watched the video of the bell tower of the 19th century Limoges City Hall collapsing in a blaze of fire, victim to a protest arson attack.“How can French people do this to France?” President Macron asked the nation in a televised speech last night.While many rioters were undoubtedly native French, many others appear to be unassimilated second and third generation immigrants from North Africa. Few protesters waved France’s ‘tricolore’ flag. Instead, they waved flags of Algeria, Morocco and Palestine.Anti-semitism, a phenomenon that often accompanies Muslim immigration also was evident. In Paris, the Service de Protection de la Communauté Juive reported that a synagogue was looted in the 19th Arrondissement. In Marseilles, Jewish-owned stores reportedly were looted. Muslim-owned stores were untouched.By contrast, Mme. Le Pen addressed the nation while seated in front of the blue, white and red flag of France. Presenting the looting and rioting as a direct assault on the nation, she warned her swelling nationalist flock: “You saw the most sacred symbols of our republic desecrated.”

French Nationalist Marine Le Pen Rises From the Ashes of Riots

French Nationalist Marine Le Pen Rises From the Ashes of Riots

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