Many outraged reactions followed this statement. Geopolitics researcher Pascal Boniface drew strong criticism on Sunday, October 20, when he used this expression when commenting on a video about the socialist mayor of Saint-Ouen, Karim Bouamrane, described as “Muslim (editor’s note) in appearance” because he decided not to speak about the conflict in the Middle East in a broadcast.
In the program “Quelle époque” on France 2, Karim Bouamrane deplored the importation into France of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict “for electoral purposes”, repeating the criticism directed at LFI, in particular during the campaign for the European elections on June 9.
“Honestly, I wonder about this man I don’t know personally. Is he an example of meritocracy? Bravo! Or exploited as an apparently Muslim who doesn’t criticize Netanyahu and therefore benefits from a lot of media hype,” Pascal wrote. Boniface in X.
“The fight against essentialization continues!”
Karim Bouamrane, a rising figure in the PS and member of the wing of the party that opposes the alliance with France Insoumise (LFI), was outraged at being described as an “apparently” Muslim.
“After 30 years of commitment to the left, elected to the Republic since 1995, this is how a researcher qualifies me and definitively disqualifies himself. The fight against essentialization continues! Long live the Republic! Long live France!” he wrote about the mayor. of Saint-Ouen, of Moroccan origin and whose name had circulated in Matignon after the legislative elections of July 7.
“I just wonder about his career, his media success and I wonder if it is related to a ‘modesty’ about the wars in the Middle East. I think his aggressive response clarifies things,” Pascal Boniface responded.
Outraged reactions
Many leaders, most of them socialists or Macronists, reacted to this publication by Pascal Boniface.
“No one should be assigned to a supposed religious or cultural identity. No one should prejudge what a Muslim, a Jew, a Christian or an atheist may think. Even less judge that a position could give them a ‘Muslim appearance,'” he said. The first secretary of the PS, Olivier Faure, protested against X.
The Macronist Minister of European Affairs, Benjamín Haddad, considered that “the assignment of identity is the opposite of our republican pact.”
Pascal Boniface is the founder and director of the Institute for International and Strategic Research (IRIS), one of the main French think tanks on geopolitics. A former member of the Socialist Party, he left it after a controversy related to the publication of one of his notes in 2001 dedicated to the party’s positions on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
The latter also questioned another elected socialist from Paris, Lamia el Aaraje, on Sunday. “Would I have done it if my name had been Colette Durand?” she asked.
Source: BFM TV
