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New Poll Registers Strong Support for Hamas Among French Muslims
“From Gaza to Paris, Resistance!” A sign on display at a pro-Hamas demonstration in France. Photo: Reuters/Fiora Garenzi
Almost half of French Muslims consider the Oct. 7 Hamas pogrom in southern Israel to have been “an act of resistance against colonization” while nearly one in five expressed sympathy for the atrocities, according to a new survey published on Monday by Ifop, France’s leading pollster.
The survey contrasted French Muslim attitudes towards the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians with the population of France at large, uncovering significant differences regarding the perception of Hamas, French government policy in the region, and media coverage of the war in Gaza triggered by the Oct. 7 atrocities.
Asked whether they were sympathetic to Hamas, 19 percent of Muslim respondents answered affirmatively, compared with just three percent of the population overall. A majority of Muslims — 56 percent — said they were neither supportive of or opposed to Hamas, while a further 25 percent said they were opposed. Among the general population, 54 percent declared their antipathy towards Hamas, while a further 43 percent stated their neutrality on the question.
When asked to characterize the Hamas atrocities, 45 percent of Muslim respondents classed them as “resistance against colonization.” A further 26 percent described the Oct.7 atrocities as “war crimes” with another 29 percent describing them as “terrorist acts,” indicating a more or less even split among Muslims surveyed. Among the French population more broadly, a full 90 percent interpreted the Oct. 7 atrocities as “war crimes” and “terrorist acts.”
A further 62 percent of Muslim respondents said that Israel’s military response in Gaza amounted to “ethnic cleansing,” compared with 38 percent of respondents in the general population. Both segments, however, were in agreement with the contention that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict reverberates in France’s domestic politics, as expressed by 76 percent of Muslims and 82 percent of the overall population.
Asked about the French government’s position, a clear majority of Muslims — 58 percent — believed that President Emmanuel Macron’s administration was sympathetic to Israel, compared with 20 percent in the population at large. Similar discrepancies were revealed in the question about media coverage, with 67 percent of Muslims saying that the French media is more sympathetic towards Israel, compared with 38 percent of the general population.
The demographic breakdown of Hamas sympathizers among French Muslims revealed that 50 percent of those under 25 supported the terrorist group, rising to 53 percent among those aged over 50. An average of 41 percent of Muslims aged between 25 and 49 answered similarly.
About six million Muslims live in France. A total of 1,022 people participated in the Ifop survey, which was conducted at the end of November.
Antisemitism has exploded in France since Oct. 7, with more than 1,500 outrages recorded. Nearly 200,000 people attended a demonstration in Paris on Nov. 11 to oppose antisemitism.
The post New Poll Registers Strong Support for Hamas Among French Muslims first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iran Says Eight Arrested for Suspected Links to Israel’s Mossad Spy Agency
The Mossad recruitment ad. Photo: Screenshot.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Saturday they had arrested eight people suspected of trying to transmit the coordinates of sensitive sites and details about senior military figures to Israel’s Mossad, Iranian state media reported.
They are accused of having provided the information to the Mossad spy agency during Israel’s air war on Iran in June, when it attacked Iranian nuclear facilities and killed top military commanders as well as civilians in the worst blow to the Islamic Republic since the 1980s war with Iraq.
Iran retaliated with barrages of missiles on Israeli military sites, infrastructure and cities. The United States entered the war on June 22 with strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.
A Guards statement alleged that the suspects had received specialized training from Mossad via online platforms. It said they were apprehended in northeastern Iran before carrying out their plans, and that materials for making launchers, bombs, explosives and booby traps had been seized.
State media reported earlier this month that Iranian police had arrested as many as 21,000 “suspects” during the 12-day war with Israel, though they did not say what these people had been suspected of doing.
Security forces conducted a campaign of widespread arrests and also stepped up their street presence during the brief war that ended in a US-brokered ceasefire.
Iran has executed at least eight people in recent months, including nuclear scientist Rouzbeh Vadi, hanged on August 9 for passing information to Israel about another scientist killed in Israeli airstrikes.
Human rights groups say Iran uses espionage charges and fast-tracked executions as tools for broader political repression.
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Body of Idan Shtivi, Murdered on Oct. 7, Retrieved from Gaza in Special IDF Operation
Idan Shtivi. Photo: Courtesy of the family
i24 News – The body of Idan Shtivi, a 28-year-old murdered by Palestinian jihadists at the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023, was recovered in a joint operation by the IDF and Shin Bet in central Gaza, it was cleared for publication on Saturday.
Shtivi’s remains were returned to Israel alongside the body of Ilan Weiss, another hostage killed during the October 7 massacre.
“Idan Shtivi was abducted from the Tel Gama area and brutally murdered by Hamas terrorists after acting to rescue and evacuate others from the Nova music festival on October 7th, 2023. He was 28 years old at the time of his death,” read an IDF press release.
“Following an identification process conducted at the National Center for Forensic Medicine, along with the Israel Police and the Military Rabbinate, the Hostages and Missing Persons Headquarters notified his family.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Shviti “was a gifted student of sustainability and governance, and a courageous individual” who acted heroically on October 7, helping others flee.
“He was killed in the process and his body was abducted to Gaza by Hamas. My wife and I send our heartfelt condolences to the Shtivi family. So far, 207 hostages have been returned, 148 of them alive. We will continue to act tirelessly and decisively to bring back all our hostages—living and deceased.”
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Woman Stabbed at Ottawa Grocery Store in Latest Antisemitic Attack
A social media post by the alleged attacker, Joseph Rooke of Cornwall, Ontario. Photo: Screenshot via i24
i24 News – The stabbing of a Jewish woman at an Ottawa grocery by a man with a long history of antisemitic posts on social media, the latest antisemitic hate crime in Canada, sparked outrage and prompted condemnation from officials including the prime minister.
Both the victim and the attacker are in their 70s. The woman is reportedly in serious condition.
The suspect was identified as Joseph Rooke, who has authored a series of lengthy rambling screeds on social media, ranting against Israel and Jews.
“Judaism is the world’s oldest cult,” he writes in one post, going on to say “over time jews have become insidious in governments, businesses, media conglomerates, and educational institutions in order to do what they do better than anyone else. Jews are the world’s masters of propaganda, gaslighting, demonization, demagoguery, and outright lying. Using their collective wealth they have become masters of reprisal.”
“I am under no obligation whatsoever, legal, moral, or otherwise, to like jews and I do not. If that means I meet the jewish definition of an anti-semite, so be it.”
Canada has seen a steep spike in antisemitic attacks over the past two years, including a recent incident in Montreal where a Hasidic Jew was beaten in front on his children.
After Prime Minister Mark Carney condemned the incident, many, including former Israel’s ambassador the US Michael Oren, pointed out that Carney’s rhetoric and policies contribute to the increasing insecurity of Canada’s Jewish community through uncritical embrace of outrageous and easily disprovable allegations that Israel and its supporters were guilty of the worst crimes against humanity.