"Clichy-sur-Jungle" was the title of an article in France's Liberation newspaper referring to the hooliganism, then in its second week, in the Parisian suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois, one of the many troubled blue-collar townships that ring the French capital.
Clichy-sous-Bois, and other similar towns only a 10-minute drive from Paris, are part of what Parisians call "les banlieux chaudes", or "the hot suburbs" - a French genteelism for towns facing severe social-economic problems.
Officials in France, meanwhile, are starting to suspect that organized Islamist groups might have a hand in the nightly rioting by Muslim youths in those suburbs, which are heavily populated by Muslim and North African immigrants, or their descendants who now hold French citizenship.
By the weekend the violence spread from Paris to Marseille in the south, Rouen in the north and Dijon in the center of the country. French interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy implied that there might be more behind these gratuitous acts of violence than meets the eye.
"We were struck to see in departments - notably Seine-Saint-Denis - a large organization" behind the rioting that has swept the gritty suburbs around the French capital, Sarkozy told reporters on November 4. "And all of this doesn't appear to us to be completely spontaneous," he added.
Sarkozy's remarks are similar to those expressed by law enforcement officials who believe that criminal gangs and possibly Islamist movements could be fueling the nightly clashes between youths and police.
The origin of this round of violence - there have been previous eruptions though never as prolonged or widespread - started in Clichy-sous-Bois when two Muslim youths were electrocuted after seeking refuge in an electrical sub-station. Reports say that they were being chased by police officers. The exact details are still unclear, but what is clear is that it did not take long for hundreds of other youths to take to the streets in protest, smashing storefronts, ransacking schools and setting cars on fire.
Since then rioting has become a nightly occurrence. For the night of November 4 alone, police reported arson attacks on 600 vehicles, with a total of more than 1,200 private cars destroyed since the outbreak began. Anti-riot police were called in but were forced to retreat under a hail of rocks, Molotov cocktails, and an extreme rarity in France - several gunshots.
With his no-nonsense attitude on crime, Sarkozy, who as interior minister is responsible for enforcing law and order, promised to rid the suburbs of the "rabble" accountable for the state of lawlessness prevailing in much of the banlieux chaudes. Indeed, some of these towns have become so dangerous that even the police tend to stay away, leaving gangs of youths to terrorize citizens who live in constant fear in a ghetto-like environment.
The minister's remarks angered the townships' youths who are demanding from Sarkozy either an apology or his resignation. They claim that the "ministers' lack of respect" is to blame for the flare-up; now if that is not the world upside-down.
Of course, French politics come into play, too, as some politicians in Sarkozy's own party joined in criticizing him. In fact, President Jacques Chirac would be quite pleased to see Sarkozy, a leading candidate for the 2007 presidential race, crash and burn, leaving the road to the Elysee Palace wide open for his candidate, Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin.
There is, however, far more at stake in this debacle than Sarkozy's or de Villepin's political future. It is the very future of France and its democratic institutions that are in play. If the problem is not quickly addressed it will strengthen the extreme rightwing National Front of Jean-Marie Le Pen, who came frightfully close to winning the last presidential elections. Le Pen's campaign played up the immigration and lack of security factors, promising aggressive action if elected.
France is host to Europe's largest Muslim community. About 4 million or 5 million Muslims live in France. The discrepancy in numbers is partially due to illegal immigration. Tens of thousands of North Africans - mostly from France's former colonies and domains of Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria - cross yearly into France. And no one knows exactly how many.
Western European countries began to "import" guest workers to fill jobs that Europeans would not consider soon after the end of World War II. France in 1965 welcomed some 800,000 Algerians, 400,000 Moroccans and 200,000 Tunisians. Belgium made deals with the Moroccan government to import entire villages, according to Claude Moniquet of the European Strategic Intelligence and Security Center, a Brussels-based firm specializing in counter-terrorism.
"They brought tens of thousands of workers and parked them in the most dilapidated, rundown parts of town, without thinking ahead," said Moniquet.
The problems arose with the second and third generations. Some began to turn toward Islam, the religion of their parents. "They began to mystify their country of origin," said Antoine Sfeir, editor in chief of Les Cahiers d'Orient, a publication that covers the Arab world. "They also began to mystify Islam, their parents' religion, often one of which they knew very little."
"Then you have to factor in unemployment and life in the 'ghetto,'" says Khadija Mohsen-Finan, who specializes in Arab world studies for the French Institute for International Relations in Paris, IFRI.
Often faced with discrimination and lack of education, an increasing number of the young fell into petty crime, pushing drugs, pick-pocketing, etc., and soon found themselves in prison. Although Muslims make up about 10 percent of France's population, they represent close to 60 percent of the country's incarcerated population.
"There, in prison, the imams were waiting for them," said Sfeir. More precisely, it was radical imams who turned to recruit followers in the jails of France. This trend was being repeated across Europe.
It was mostly in jail that many of these petty criminals turned radical. "Radicalism will be expressed in actions," warned Sfeir.
"Why do they identify with Islam?" asks Mohsen-Finan. "Lack of integration," she replies.
Paradoxically, while Europe has traditionally been the front-runner in campaigning for human rights, and the pioneer in social construction - they are light years ahead of the United States in terms of social guardrails such as social security, unemployment benefits and almost-free higher education - they have lagged behind in integrating their immigrant communities. This eruption of violence is the result of years of poor planning by a succession of governments on both the left and the right.
"European tolerance to intolerance is coming back to bite them," commented Zeyno Baran, director of International Security and Energy Program, and a scholar who follows Islamic trends at the Nixon Center, a Washington think tank.
Claude Salhani is international editor at United Press International
Viewpoint: Paris-sur-Jungle
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