France bans pro-Palestinian protests after Hamas attack

France on Thursday said it was banning all pro-Palestinian demonstrations after the bloody attack on Israel by Hamas, on the grounds such protests threaten public order.

Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said in a note to regional prefects that the demonstrations “are likely to generate disturbances to public order”, adding that organisers should face arrest as well as any troublemakers.

In defiance of his order, several hundred people had gathered in the central Place de la Republique in Paris shouting pro-Palestinian and anti-Israeli slogans, AFP correspondents said.

Darmanin had told French media earlier that over 100 “anti-Semitic acts” had been recorded in France since the attack by Hamas on Israel on Saturday, with 24 people arrested.

In his order to prefects, Darmanin also reiterated his request that foreigners guilty of any anti-Semitic offence or of advocating terrorism should have their residence permit “systematically withdrawn” and expelled “without delay” from France.