Not So Quiet Night in France

We didn't see thousands of cars torched last night on the first anniversary of the initial riots sparked by the death of two teens who were electrocuted at a power substation after being chased by police. But it wasn't entirely quiet either.

More cars were torched, but not in the numbers that have become the new normal. Two buses were torched, and police were pelted by rocks yet again.

The country's interior ministry says things were "relatively calm" last night, although two buses were torched in a Paris suburb. Six police officers were slightly hurt and 25 people were arrested.

Riot police were out in force in the banlieus where the rioting was worst last year.

For all that, the French are trying to project an air of calm, but they're only fooling themselves and anyone who isn't really paying attention.

Government efforts to deal with the situation have focused more on supposed economic cures to the problem, but disregard the cultural and law enforcement aspects. Police have essentially let certain areas of the banlieus go unpoliced. Muslim immigrants have become ever more strident and opposed to assimilation and the French themselves treat immigrants poorly. Work rules are only a small part of the problem, yet that's the part that Chirac's goverment has focused to little effect.

No pasaran also notes the growing tendency of the thugs attacking buses to use guerilla militia tactics - and wonders whether this is the work of not so sleeper cells.

In a potentially related note, an Amsterdam Holland bus was attacked with a chemical bomb. The media has been largely silent on this dangerous development.

At around 10:00 p.m. Friday evening in the Duivendrecht district, a group of youths threw a plastic bottle with chemicals into a stationary bus carrying 20 passengers. The bottle exploded and a panic broke out. Two passengers suffered burns on their legs, local broadcaster RTV Noord-Holland reported based on police information.

RTV Noord-Holland said it is unknown what liquid the bottle contained. Unconfirmed sources however say it was a liquid for unstopping drains. If this substance is mixed with aluminium and shaken up in a bottle, it explodes a few seconds later. As well as burns, the explosion can cause blindness and knock people unconscious.

The two passengers, women aged 36 and 27, had their burns treated in hospital. The police confirmed that the driver was also hospitalised, for breathing problems. A spokesman said the assumption is not terrorism but "mischievous behaviour." The perpetrators disappeared without trace.

The reason I note that this is a potentially related incident is that it bears watching to see whether the thugs in France adopt the tactic of those in Amsterdam or whether the violence spreads in Amsterdam.

UPDATE:
The New York Sun has an editorial on the permanent intifada that has taken hold in France. The way out isn't going to be easy as it will require changes to the French economy, but also makes demands of the Muslim immigrants who are agitating through this violence.

Technorati: riot, paris riots, paris, france, banlieu, muslim immigrant.