Paris: anti-Semitic chants in the metro, an open investigation

Several people were recorded in the Paris metro singing an anti-Semitic song. Laurent Nuñez, the Paris police chief, announced that the Paris prosecutor’s office has been contacted.

“Shocking, unacceptable, unworthy comments”. It is with his words that the Paris police chief, Laurent Nunez, qualified the video showing people singing anti-Semitic chants in the Paris metro. In images, which appeared on social networks on Wednesday, a young person films the scene on her mobile phone. In a Paris metro train, several people chant these words: “Only the Jews and only your mother, long live Palestine (…) Only the Jews and the grandmothers, we are Nazis and proud.” In the train, there was no reaction to stop them.

According to information from BFMTV, the scene took place in line 3 of the metro. The author of the video was questioned by the news channel to discuss the context of her anti-Semitic songs. She indicates in particular that the group “targeted a lot of communities”. “They started singing songs in groups against the police, against the LGBT community and also against France and finally against the Jewish people,” she explains. According to her, the events lasted “a good ten minutes”. A passenger then intervened, to no avail.

The Paris public prosecutor’s office was contacted by the Paris police headquarters for “anti-Semitic and hateful chants, cries and comments uttered on public transport and circulating on social networks”. The prosecution immediately opened an investigation to identify and prosecute the authors of comments repressed by law, and “likely to take on different qualifications depending on their content”.

A video which comes as the number of anti-Semitic acts recorded in France reaches records. 857 anti-Semitic acts have been committed in France since the Hamas terrorist attack against Israel on October 7, said Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin on Tuesday, October 31, during a press conference.