Boualem Sansal affair: Nedjib Sidi Moussa, the political scientist victim of a full-blown attack after his appearance on France 5

Welcome to a world where all nuance is forbidden. On France 5, political scientist Nedjib Sidi Moussa, specialist in Algerian issues, was invited this November 24 to comment on the arrest, in Algiers, of the writer Boualem Sansal. Stating straight away that “nothing justifies this arrest”the researcher took the liberty of recalling that the author was not either “a man of the Enlightenment, who defends great causes”contrary to what some claim.

Some of Boualem Sansal’s outputs close to Islamophobic identity discourse have been criticized. As when in 2018, he accused the French government of participating “to the plan of conquest of the planet by the submission of its inhabitants to Islam”. For having recalled what is factual, Nedjib Sidi Moussa and alongside him the historian Benjamin Stora, also on set, are at the center of an out of proportion media storm.

For having simply explained, contextualized, they are accused of justifying Sansal’s arrest. « Abjection », “indelible shame”, “obscenity” : the right and the Republican Spring have brought out their dictionary of synonyms from the worst days to attack researchers. The weekly Marianne writes that “Boualem Sansal was executed by small media prosecutors “, when the designer of Point Xavier Gorce evokes, regarding Nedjib Sidi Moussa, a “potential cutthroat”.

Several historians, including Mathilde Larrère and Alain Ruscio, have signed a column in support of their academic colleague in Mediapart. They denounce a rhetoric which aims to “equate all men of Algerian origin who show a little nuance in their remarks to a potential Islamist terrorist”.