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Far Left French MP Hit With Complaint Over Tweet Suggesting Global Jewish Conspiracy
Protesters from the “Nous Vivrons” collective, which combats antisemitism, outside a meeting of the far left French LFI party carrying signs declaring that “Hamas thanks you.” Photo: Reuters/Nicolas Rongier
A far left member of the French parliament was on Wednesday the subject of a legal complaint submitted by a Jewish organization concerning a posting on social media that invoked a popular Japanese manga meme appropriated by antisemites.
David Guiraud — a parliamentarian from the far left La France Insoumise (“France Rising”) Party — posted a video on X/Twitter from the Japanese manga cartoon “One Piece” in which a character known as Doflamingo complains of being silenced in denouncing the crimes of the “Heavenly Dragons,” an ultra wealthy and secretive global elite that serves as a “world government.” The theme has been eagerly picked up by antisemitic agitators who regard it as a symbol of the world Jewish conspiracy imagined in antisemitic screeds such as the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” a fabrication of the Russian secret police first published in the early 20th century.
Some observers have argued that “One Piece” has deliberately promoted a toxic anti-Jewish stereotype through the “Heavenly Dragons,” pointing out that conspiratorial notions about Jewish power are visible in Japanese culture and politics, despite the absence of a sizable Jewish community in that country. “There is an ambiguity that is inherent in ‘One Piece’,” Rudy Reichstadt of the watchdog group Conspiracy Watch told the news outlet Le Point. “We can make the assumption that the author of this manga drew, with full knowledge of the facts, an anti-Jewish fantasy from which Japanese culture is unfortunately not immune.”
In response, the Jewish Observatory of France (OJF), an organization that combats antisemitism and Holocaust denial, filed a legal complaint against Guiraud that slated his post as an “apology of terrorism and provocation to discrimination, hatred or violence.”
Guiraud later deleted his tweet but offered an explanation that appeared to justify its original posting.
“The Heavenly Dragons are not a religion or a ‘race’ and if you think so, you have misread ‘One Piece,’” he wrote. “They are a military alliance of powerful people who crush others. They are not hated for what they are, but for what they do to others. But I don’t want to attack anyone, so I prefer to delete [my post].”
Guiraud’s outbursts were already viewed with concern by French Jews following his speech at a conference in Tunisia in November following the Oct. 7 Hamas pogrom in southern Israel.
In his remarks, Guiraud charged that Israel had already committed the atrocities which the Hamas terrorists were accused of executing. “Every accusation from Israel is a confession,” he claimed. “The baby [burned] in the oven, that was done by Israel, the mom who was disemboweled, that was done by Israel, during the massacre at Sabra and Shatila.” Two of the Palestinian refugee camps in Beirut, Sabra and Shatila, were the location of a gruesome massacre in 1982 that was carried out by Christian Phalange militiamen but widely blamed on Israeli forces.
Guiraud also attracted controversy when he refused to participate in last November’s national march in Paris against antisemitism, which drew nearly 200,000 people, slamming the event as an attempt to “normalize unconditional support for ethnic cleansing in Gaza.”
The post Far Left French MP Hit With Complaint Over Tweet Suggesting Global Jewish Conspiracy first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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‘With or Without Russia’s Help’: Iran Pledges to Block South Caucasus Route Opened Up By Peace Deal
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., July 8, 2025. Photo: Kevin Lamarque via Reuters Connect.
i24 News – Iran will block the establishment of a US-backed transit corridor in the South Caucasus region with or without Moscow’s help, a senior adviser to Iran’s supreme leader was quoted as saying on Saturday by the Iran International website, one day after the historic peace agreement between Azerbaijan and Armenia.
“Mr. Trump thinks the Caucasus is a piece of real estate he can lease for 99 years,” Ali Akbar Velayati said of the so-called Zangezur corridor, the establishment of which is stipulated in the peace deal unveiled on Friday by US President Donald Trump. The White House said the transit route would facilitate greater exports of energy and other resources.
“This passage will not become a gateway for Trump’s mercenaries — it will become their graveyard,” the Khamenei advisor added.
Baku and Yerevan have been at loggerheads since the late 1980s when Nagorno-Karabakh, a mountainous Azerbaijani region mostly populated by ethnic Armenians, broke away from Azerbaijan with support from Armenia. Azerbaijan took back full control of the region in 2023, prompting or forcing almost all of the territory’s 100,000 ethnic Armenians to flee to Armenia.
Yet that painful history was put to the side on Friday at the White House, as Trump oversaw a signing ceremony, flanked by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.
The peace deal with Azerbaijan—a pro-Western ally of Israel—is expected to pull Armenia out of the Russian and Iranian sphere of influence and could transform the South Caucasus, an energy-producing region neighboring Russia, Europe, Turkey and Iran.
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UK Police Arrest 150 at Protest for Banned Palestine Action Group
People holding signs sit during a rally organised by Defend Our Juries, challenging the British government’s proscription of “Palestine Action” under anti-terrorism laws, in Parliament Square, in London, Britain, August 9, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Jaimi Joy
London’s Metropolitan Police said on Saturday it had arrested 150 people at a protest against Britain’s decision to ban the group Palestine Action, adding it was making further arrests.
Officers made arrests after crowds, waving placards expressing support for the group, gathered in Parliament Square, the force said on X.
Protesters, some wearing black and white Palestinian scarves, chanted “shame on you” and “hands off Gaza,” and held signs such as “I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action,” video taken by Reuters at the scene showed.
In July, British lawmakers banned Palestine Action under anti-terrorism legislation after some of its members broke into a Royal Air Force base and damaged planes in protest against Britain’s support for Israel.
The ban makes it a crime to be a member of the group, carrying a maximum sentence of 14 years in prison.
The co-founder of Palestine Action, Huda Ammori, last week won a bid to bring a legal challenge against the ban.
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‘No Leniency’: Iran Announces Arrest of 20 ‘Zionist Agents’
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi addresses a special session of the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, June 20, 2025. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse
i24 News – Iranian authorities have in recent months arrested 20 people charged with being “Israeli Mossad operatives,” the judiciary said, adding that the Islamic regime will mete out the harshest punishments.
“The judiciary will show no leniency toward spies and agents of the Zionist regime, and with firm rulings, will make an example of them all,” spokesperson Asghar Jahangiri told Iranian media. However, it is understood that an unspecified number of detainees were released, apparently after the charges against them could not be substantiated.
The Islamic Republic was left reeling by a devastating 12-day war with Israel earlier in the summer that left a significant proportion of its military arsenal in ruins and dealt a serious setback to its uranium enrichment program. The fallout included an uptick in executions of Iranians convicted of spying for Israel, with at least eight death sentences carried out in recent months. Hit with international sanctions, the country is in dire economic straights, with frequent energy outages and skyrocketing unemployment.
In recent weeks Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi affirmed that Tehran cannot give up on its nuclear enrichment program even as it was severely damaged during the war.
“It is stopped because, yes, damages are serious and severe. But obviously we cannot give up of enrichment because it is an achievement of our own scientists. And now, more than that, it is a question of national pride,” the official told Fox News.