Western Resistance

The riots began as soon as the rumours of the youths' deaths spread through the community, and have been continuing on and off since. During a march in memory of the two dead youths, oon Saturday daytime, one youth grabbed a speaker's microphone and shouted "We want homes. We want jobs."

The problems of disaffected suburban youth have been creeping up on French society for some time. In Saint Denis on Thursday before the riots, a 56 year old father of three was taking a photograph when two youths, aged 19 and 23 assaulted him to steal his camera, according to Le Figaro. The man later died. Two young men are in custody. Less than a week before the Clichy riots, Nicolas Sarkozy, the Interior minister visited Argenteuil, where he declared he would rid council estates of their hooligans. A group of 200 youths gathered to insult him.

While young Muslim males in these suburbs feel disaffected and drawn to illicit activities for income, and drugs, the plight of suburban Muslim females is far worse. Muslim woman Samira Bellil wrote a book "Dans l'enfer des tournantes" describing how she had been gang-raped three times before she had the courage to speak out against an ever-present threat against young Muslim women from young Muslim men. She was patron of a charity called "Ni putes ni soumises" (Neither Prostiutes nor Submissives", which dealt with the way Muslim girls were subjected to threats of rape, even in school. She headed the charity until she died of stomach cancer, aged 31 in September 2004. This is from a Guardian obituary:

Samira did not report her rapes until two friends told her that K had raped them too. Reprisals are common - flats burned down, little sisters threatened - but Samira decided to prosecute. In the end, K was sentenced to eight years in prison.

As she wrote in her book, she was condemned to a lot more. Her parents threw her out in shame, and her quartier, or neighbourhood, rejected her. "People outside the estates don't know," she said. "And everyone on the estate knows, but they won't say anything." There were years of drug abuse, squats, foster homes, despair.

Another woman who tackles the issues of social disintegration in Parisian suburbs is Fadela Amara, who founded the "Ni putes nu soumises" charity, and wrote a book of the same name, which last year won the "political Book" award from the French National Assembly. Today, her charity has 6000 members in 60 local communities. Amara wants to clear the air regarding the culture of violence within the communities. An article in Print Sign and SIght describes the patterns often found in immigrant suburban families.

Fathers in immigrant families don't only lose their jobs when they're unemployed. They lose their authority in the family. This position is then occupied by their eldest sons who, although they may not be able to find legal employment, can provide for the family through their work in "parallel economies": car theft and drug dealing. With the authority they inherit, they are able to impose their conservative notions of religion and morality onto their social surroundings. Their spiritual nourishment comes from the Islamic fundamentalists, whose influence in the suburbs continues to rise.

The events in Clichy-Sous-Bois may be seen as alienated youth finding an outlet for their frustration against the authorities, but this is to ignore the underlying problem created in the culture of the Muslim communities in Paris and other urban areas.

The refusal to let go of traditional customs brought over from Algeria has created a lawless vacuum, in which criminal activities thrive, and Islamic militancy entices. France has a population of 5-6 million Muslims, about 6% of its population. In a country which prides itself on being a secular state, the narrow Islamic lifestyle is not geared to exist harmoniously within its framework. Sarkozy is making a stand against Islamic fanaticism and its involvement with terrorism, and also against the culture of violence, and the youths of Clichy-Sous-Bois are sending their response to his message. Today, he meets with the parents of the two youths whose deaths triggered the riots. He may be able to appease them, but he cannot appease entire generations of youths who do not follow the codes expected in other parts of France.

As Michel Thooris, a spokesperson for Action Police, a police union, who has called for army involvement in the street violence, says: "There's a civil war under way in Clichy-Sous-Bois. My colleagues are not equipped or trained for street fighting."