”This tribute should banish her from political life. This form of complacency, recurrent in her party, has no place in our Republic”, reacted the International League against Racism and Anti-Semitism (Licra).

The Union of Jewish students in France (UEJF) has lodged a complaint for ‘’apology of terrorism’’ against a far-left  member of the French parliament Sophia Chikirou for paying tribute to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in a post on Instagram.

The post showed a four-page text being shared in memory of Haniyeh, who was recently killed in Tehran in an operation attributed to Israel. The text was originally published by the so-calle ‘’Urgence Palestine’’ organization.

Chikirou is a member of ”La France Insoumise” (France Unbowed) whose leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon has adopted antisemitic and anti-Israel positions.

Her post triggered a wave of indignation, particularly within the Socialist Party (PS). Olivier Faure, first secretary of the PS, sharply criticized these “provocations”, which he said were detrimental to the collective work of the left. Other Socialist voices were raised, including that of Carole Delga, President of the Occitanie region, who described the gesture as “abject” and an “apology for terrorism”.

”This tribute should banish her from political life. This form of complacency, recurrent in her party, has no place in our Republic”, reacted the International League against Racism and Anti-Semitism (Licra).

The incident rekindled tensions within the New Popular Front (NFP), a recently-formed left-wing electoral alliance. This coalition, which includes LFI, the PS, the Ecologists and the Communist Party, had  condemned “the terrorist massacres of Hamas” in its joint program. This scandal comes in an already tense political context. Despite the NFP’s victory in the last legislative elections, France remains without a new government, President Macron having postponed any appointment until mid-August, after the Olympic Games.