2023-10-17 06:41:16
Do fears of an importation into France of the conflict between Israel and Hamas justify hindering the fundamental freedom to demonstrate? The highest administrative court in France must rule on this question on Tuesday, in the midst of controversy over the general ban on pro-Palestinian gatherings.
Published on: 10/17/2023 – 08:41 Modified on: 10/17/2023 – 10:20
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The freedom to demonstrate in France before the Council of State. The highest administrative court must rule on Tuesday October 17 on the general ban on pro-Palestinian gatherings decided by Gérald Darmanin. The Minister of the Interior announced this ban on Thursday, estimating that these demonstrations “are likely to generate disturbances to public order”.
With this “strict instruction”, according to Gérald Darmanin, France stands out from other Western countries: thousands of people have marched legally in recent days in Spain, England, the Netherlands or the United States “against colonialism Israeli” and in “support of the Palestinian people”.
“France makes its own choices,” noted the head of Italian diplomacy Antonio Tajani, “but banning demonstrations in a democratic country when they are not violent demonstrations does not seem to me to be fair.”
The French government fears excesses in a country which has the largest Jewish community in Europe – some 500,000 people – as well as numerous Muslims – nearly 9% of the population of Muslim faith or tradition on its metropolitan territory, i.e. some six million people.
Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin holds a press conference in Paris, October 16, 2023. © Yoan Valat, Pool, AFP
Gérald Darmanin announced Monday that 102 people had been arrested for anti-Semitic acts or those promoting terrorism since the unprecedented attacks by Hamas against Israel on October 7.
More than 1,400 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in Israel since the attack and Hamas has captured 199 hostages, according to Israel. Israeli retaliations have killed at least 2,750 people in Gaza, the majority Palestinian civilians, including hundreds of children, according to local authorities.
“Impression that Palestinian expression does not have the right to be heard” in France
A pro-Palestinian association thus urgently referred the Minister’s directive to the Council of State, which it considers contrary to French law, as stated by Vincent Brengarth, one of its lawyers. “This gives the impression that Palestinian expression does not have the right to be heard” in France, “it is democratically problematic,” he notes.
Pro-Palestinian demonstration banned on October 12, 2023 Place de la République in Paris © Dimitar DILKOFF / AFP
An administrative court had validated the ban on a Parisian demonstration last Thursday, in the face of “proven risks of the export of this violence” on national soil and the “resumption of anti-Semitic acts”. This did not prevent thousands of demonstrators from gathering.
At the end of the decision, however, the court specified, as a warning: “This detailed ban cannot, moreover, be analyzed as a ban in principle on any demonstration having the same object.”
In the “extremely sensitive context”, Nicolas Hervieu, professor of public law at Sciences Po, cannot imagine the Council of State inflicting a “frontal snub on the minister” but he should get away with a “pirouette” by “making people say to the minister what he did not write”, while ensuring “respect for the rules of freedom to demonstrate, which require control on a case-by-case basis”.
Pro-Palestinian demonstrators face police during a banned gathering in Toulouse on October 12, 2023 © Charly TRIBALLEAU / AFP
Because for Roseline Letteron, professor of public law at the Sorbonne, this “general” ban is “surprising”.
“What is a pro-Palestinian demonstration?” she asks. “Support for the terrorist action of Hamas? For the victims of the conflict”? “Compassion for children under bombs, is that pro-Palestinian?” she asks, before recalling the rule: “You cannot prohibit the exercise of the freedom to demonstrate”, which arises from the freedom of expression, “only if there is a threat to public order”.
“Any banning measure must be strictly justified, and proportionate, taking into account the circumstances of each demonstration,” insists Nicolas Hervieu. “We cannot prohibit it in a general and absolute manner.”
Head of the “Freedoms” program at Amnesty International France, Fanny Gallois denounces an “impediment to freedom of expression” by those who “currently wish to peacefully express their support for the Palestinian people”.
“Calls for hatred and discriminatory remarks are obviously not protected by this freedom of expression,” she underlines, “but presuming that demonstrators would necessarily make such speeches is part of a dangerous mix-up.”
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