Post Paris attacks: The long shadow of a dark night

In the last few weeks, Parisians have alternated between remembering and trying to forget the terrible tragedy that has struck their city. Many have found solace at the impromptu memorials that have sprung up, by placing flowers, candles and notes or by simply observing a minute of silence in honour of the victims.

Laurent Clerc, a novelist, who lives in the 11th district close to the scene of the attacks, went to place flowers with his wife and three daughters. Spontaneously, it was five-year-old Josephine, his youngest daughter, “the most helpless and the most innocent in the face of such barbarity”, who laid the flowers. Laurent said he felt “dejected and defeated” after the attacks that were a cruel “reminder that everything could end so quickly”. He said he had no answer to Josephine’s question about “why the baddies were killing people”. He said he himself did not understand why.

Deprived by the Emergency of the cathartic benefits of a solidarity march that had united thousands of Parisians after the Charlie Hebdo attacks, visitors have been congregating at the Place de la République, deriving strength from numbers. Spontaneous concerts erupted, bringing temporary joy. A blindfolded Muslim man asked strangers for hugs in an attempt to restore trust and bonhomie.

Placing flowers and candles in honour of the victims. (Source: Reuters)

For others, however, the panacea for regaining peace of mind lies in showing that, come what may, life goes on uninterrupted. They have made it a point of honour to eat out, to frequent restaurants, bars and cafés in a thumbing-one’s-nose gesture at the Islamic State who claimed responsibility for the attacks on “the capital of prostitution and obscenity”. To live “normally” in spite of the terror threat is the leitmotif of these Parisians.

To live normally is also the ardent wish of an overwhelming majority of France’s roughly six million Muslims. Terror attacks, like the ones Paris has just experienced, strike a chilling dread in their hearts because, in addition, to the fear that all citizens have to deal with, they have to brace themselves against indiscriminate targeting. Not only can they be the object of suspicion on flights, trains, in stores etc., they can also be the targets of Islamophobic attacks, verbal and physical aggression. A rise in anti-Muslim incidents has been reported in France, the UK and the US in the weeks following the Paris attacks, with women in traditional Islamic attire being most frequently at the receiving end.
The situation has been compounded by the extraordinary powers enjoyed by the police during an Emergency. Administrative powers override judicial powers. Investigating officers have the power to search homes day or night and place the occupants under house arrest, based not on proof, but on serious suspicion.

As of December 1, more than 2,000 searches have been carried out and 312 persons are under house arrest, including 24 environmental activists on the pretext that they may indulge in violent protests during COP21. The searches have certainly turned up weapons and other incriminating evidence, allowing the police to close in on the terrorist network. But the media also contain reports about how these Emergency powers are being abused, how battering rams are being used to break doors though keys are being proffered, how little children are awoken in the dead of the night and sit petrified with their hands on their heads while their homes are ransacked.

Sefen Guez Guez, a lawyer specialising in civil liberties, recently declared on radio that 90 per cent of the premises searched across France revealed nothing. A large number of ordinary Muslims have been singled out for these searches on the most tenuous grounds. So much so that the organisation “The Collective Against Islamophobia in France” (CCIF) has published a guide to searches and house arrests on its website, thereby informing people of their legal rights. If additional methods of radicalising Muslims were needed, this would certainly be one. The French State, in what is assuredly a most praiseworthy attempt to counter the terror threat and ensure the safety of its citizens, is, by its indiscriminate, hasty and heavy-handed application of Emergency procedures, alienating more and more law-abiding Muslims. Already at the time of the attacks, a small section of Muslims were disillusioned enough to buy into the conspiracy theory doing the rounds on the internet that the government had orchestrated the attacks in a bid to justify tighter security measures as well as a crackdown on Islamists and immigrants.

As in all crisis situations, there are those who have not hesitated to use the attacks as ammunition to fire their own political salvos. Feeding on the public’s growing sense of insecurity, Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Front has seized the occasion to reiterate its hardline position on security, immigration and the refugee crisis. It looks set to wrest two regions for the first time in the imminent regional elections.

François Hollande has also gained from this gory chapter in French history. In the public’s perception he has changed from being inept and indecisive to a determined, in-control President who has the ear of the world’s most important leaders. His popularity rating in opinion polls has soared by 22 points in just over two weeks to reach 50 per cent, his highest ever.

It is, of course, the French people who have to bear the consequences of the Paris attacks and their aftermath. France’s knee-jerk reaction of bombing the ISIS with its inevitable loss of civilian lives will provide additional fodder to jihadist recruiters and further alienate Muslims. The ISIS’s threat against France and all those who oppose the group, “the smell of death will never leave their nostrils”, remains undiminished for the time being.

Yet, rather than these dire words of warning, I prefer to remember Hemingway’s words: “Paris is a moveable feast”. Paris is a beautiful celebration of life itself.

Radha Kapoor-Sharma is a Paris-based writer.