Thousands of people gathered in Paris on Saturday afternoon for a rally in support of the Palestinian people, despite being prohibited by authorities. The crowd chanted slogans such as “Gaza, Gaza, Paris is with you!” at the Place du Châtelet. However, they were prevented from moving by a large police presence, resulting in them being confined to the area for the entire afternoon. Some protesters repeatedly sang, “Let us leave.”
At the end of the peaceful rally, police allowed people to leave only one at a time and issued numerous fines of 135 euros for participating in a prohibited demonstration. The prefect of police in Paris, Laurent Nuñez, proudly claimed on BFMTV that hundreds of fines were issued and the participants were blocked. By 7:30 PM, the police prefecture announced that 15 arrests and 1,077 fines had been issued. Nuñez explained that the security forces had surrounded the protesters to prevent them from dispersing and estimated the number of participants to be between 3,000 and 4,000.
The Association France Palestine Solidarity (AFPS) did not release a statement on the event due to the ban. Among the demonstrators were elected officials. At the end of the day, Sabrina Sebaihi, an ecologist deputy from Hauts-de-Seine, protested against the police’s “kettle” tactic, stating that they were being confined in the rain without movement. She expressed her frustration, saying, “With the intensification of the bombings in Gaza, many people thought, ‘It’s not possible for France to forbid a demonstration in a context like this,’ but that’s the case. We are suffocating democracy, and moreover, we don’t really understand the criteria for issuing fines, which seem to be random and arbitrary.”
Administrative justice had validated the prefecture’s ban at midday, citing the seriousness of the risks to public order and the heightened tensions related to events in the Gaza Strip, along with a rise in anti-Semitic acts in France. A protester from La France Insoumise (LFI), Raymond, lamented the ban, saying, “In the United States, there are thousands of protesters calling for a ceasefire, as in other countries, but in France, it’s forbidden in Paris.” This statement came after an unprecedented night of bombings by the Israeli army in Gaza, marking the 22nd day of the deadliest war in Israel’s history, sparked by Hamas’ attack. According to Israeli authorities, the Hamas attack had killed over 1,400 people in Israel, while the Hamas Health Ministry reported that more than 7,703 Palestinians, including over 3,500 children, had been killed since the continuous bombings began.
“We are in France, we should have the right to express ourselves because what affects us the most is that children are dying,” commented Sarah, a 23-year-old participant. Some protesters chanted, “They are assassinating humanity, children of Gaza, children of Palestine.” Others accused Israel of being an assassin and dubbed Emmanuel Macron a accomplice. The police prefect noted that slogans that seemed to promote terrorism had been pronounced and stated that he would take the matter to the judiciary.
