LFI deputy Eric Coquerel, president of the Assembly's Finance Committee, estimated Friday that pro-Palestinian activist Elias d'Imzalene, who was tried for calling for an “intifada” in Paris, was certainly “more respectable ” as the Minister of the Interior Bruno Retailleau.
Eric Coquerel was questioned on RMC about his presence at a demonstration in Saint-Denis Thursday evening against the holding of the France-Israel football match, to denounce a “genocide” in Gaza.
Pro-Palestinian activist Elias d'Imzalene was also at this demonstration.
On September 8, during a rally at Place de la Nation in Paris, he encouraged participants to “lead the intifada in Paris, in our suburbs, in our neighborhoods” so that “soon Jerusalem” would be “liberated.”
Comments which led to his being tried last month for public incitement to hatred. The court has not yet rendered its judgment.
“I did not see that I was next to this person,” assured Eric Coquerel on Friday, specifying that in his eyes, the slogan “Intifada in Paris” had “no meaning”.
The word intifada, which means uprising in Arabic, refers to the revolt of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza against Israel, which began in December 1987 and September 2000.
“In a demonstration, you are not necessarily next to people with whom you agree on this or that subject,” continued the deputy for Seine-Saint-Denis.
“I demonstrated, for example, in support of the Kurds in Paris. Not very far away, there was Mr. Retailleau who was there. Are they going to question me and say 'Mr. Coquerel, be careful, you have Mr. Retailleau…+? No, I will tell you that the cause is just”, he also argued.
“I think that this person,” Elias d’Imzalene, “is certainly more respectable given what Mr. Retailleau is coming out with today, which borrows a lot of his vocabulary from the far right,” he concluded.
Also present Thursday evening at the demonstration in Saint-Denis was LFI MP Ersilia Soudais, who had also exercised her visiting rights in September to go to Elias d'Imzalène, who was in police custody, in order to express “all our support”.
“By siding with a person who clearly claims to be an Islamist, this is distorting the legitimate struggle of the Palestinian people,” PCF spokesperson Léon Deffontaines denounced on CNews, denouncing a “serious error” committed according to him. by the two LFI elected officials.
